"You lost your cousin…so you took mine."(1)
Briseis's words floated uselessly in the still air of the tent with the whisper of tears and the heavy smell of blood. Achilles barely registered them. He had his head in his hands, digging his fingernails into his skull, somehow desperate for his own blood. Screaming snakes wrapped themselves around and wrestled in his soul and no matter how he searched, he could find no feeling of triumph anywhere within his being.
There was whisper of fabric and Briseis left the tent. Achilles didn't move. He tried to find the part of him that thought it would have been wonderful, the ultimate revenge, to kill Hector and drag his body in the sand behind his chariot. He tried to think of his darling Patroclus, think of his small body lying on it's bier, stripped of all the life it had and all the life it promised.
It made him weep, but not enough to make him feel satisfied about the death of the older Trojan prince. He knew this would haunt him forever. He hated it. He hated everything, hated this war, hated the girl, hated the gods. But most of all he hated himself, a deep black loathing that he knew, now, could never be erased. It was as much a part of him as if it had been scarred into his skin with a blunt blade.
He didn't move even when he heard the tent flap and the softness of sandaled feet in the sand. There was a silence, and it wasn't the silence of Briseis. Achilles raised his head.
The figure was tall and slim, wrapped in a cloak of shadows in the ill lit tent. His hood was up but Achilles recognised him instantly. Killing Hector had sent a barbed knife slicing straight into his gut. The presence of Paris ripped it back out with a bloody and determined twist.
Achilles had never, never even dreamt of such a helplessness as he felt now. He had dreamt of the Prince every night since their meeting, still longingly inhaled the scent of them on his furs and had had to tell his servants to stop bringing him oranges because they brought back too many feelings which he knew he could never recapture.
All he wanted now was to stand and bury himself in the boy's arms, find his cure, as he had last time, with the touch of his skin and the taste of his lips. But he knew now that that door had been slammed on him so tightly, the loneliness of it all suffocated him. He choked but didn't try to speak.
"There are no curses under the sun foul enough to do you the bitter justice you deserve to reap, Achilles, son of Thetis," Paris's words were swollen with venom and the came out choked and unsteady. There were tears glinting in the darkness inside his hood.
Achilles stood without realising. He felt himself reach out. He just wanted, more than anything, above breath, above life, to touch him.
Paris pulled back and the movement made wire contract around Achilles's heart. There were no words. The Greek refused to weep any more in front of him. He knew it would be no comfort to the Trojan prince. He had to see him. Just one more time, he had to see Paris's face, see it as he remembered it.
Too quickly for Paris to pull back, Achilles grabbed his arm, pulled him close. Paris gave a startled noise of distress that hurt Achilles more than he could ever understand. The feeling of his body against his own again was enough to make him weep anew. But he simply threw back the Prince's cowl. Paris tried to pull away, choking on tears, hanging his head to hide his face.
"Don't touch me," Achilles released the boy. Each breath he drew felt treacherous, but he felt time would stand forever still until Paris lifted his head and met his eyes. But the boy's strength had seemingly fled from him. He wrapped his arms around himself and was wracked with sobs. Achilles felt his heart tearing itself to pieces.
Paris collapsed to his knees in the sand, bent over, small and so smothered in grief that it threatened to kill Achilles, knowing as he did that he could never be a comfort and was in fact the cause.
He lowered himself down to kneel before him. Paris didn't move or speak. Tears dripped into the sand silently from under his unruly mop of dark curls. Achilles watched his own hand reach out as though it weren't his. He tucked a gentle finger under the boy's chin and slowly tilted up his face. Paris seemed unable to fight him.
The sight of his beautiful face so twisted with agony, his eyes shining with tears and tear tracks in the dirt of his smooth cheeks affected him far more than he was able to admit. He let his hand drop.
Paris breathed deep through his sobs, trying to steady his voice. He gazed straight into Achilles's eyes. The Greek warrior wanted desperately to look away but couldn't.
"Why?" Paris whispered. "How could you do that to me? You killed my brother…" Paris sat up straight and clutched his hands in his hair. "You killed my brother, you killed him and dragged his body through the sand. He was an honourable man, he was the finest man ever. You knew he killed your cousin by mistake. He wept for that boy, Achilles," his voice was fierce. "He wept for him. And this is your return to him? To me?"
"My prince,"
"No," Paris hissed. "There are no words for what you have done." His voice softened to an unbearably pain-stricken whisper. "After what we did…after what we had."
The silence was so thick with useless, unspoken sorrow that Achilles felt he might drown. There were no lights in his tent; it was the bleeding moonlight that shone off Paris's beautiful skin and flecked off every tear that smudged he across his face. This moment dampened and strangled all the wonder and glory that was their last meeting. Achilles knew that from now on, every time he looked back on what they had had that night, he would be unable to see Paris as he was then and only see him as he was now, bent and broken, a fallen prince, smeared with dirt and tears, defeated and destroyed through loss and betrayal.
And it was all because of him. Achilles longed more than life to touch him again, to draw him into his arms, wipe away the tears and drift off somewhere inside themselves where death, grief and malice did not exist. But he knew that even Zeus would be unable to achieve this for them, even if he felt so inclined.
"I have no words," Achilles whispered, "other than my tears." Paris blinked, straightened. His face grew set, cold. The steel in his eyes which had been so absent before was now scraping across Achilles's skin, as keen as a razor. "Your tears are not enough," Paris got to his feet, wiped his face on his sleeve. Achilles looked up at him, a silent plea in his eyes and wish stronger than any other he'd experienced that he had never been born. "Only your blood will be enough." Achilles blinked, feeling as if an arrow had just plunged through his heart.
"The next time we meet, son of Greece," Paris's voice was now steady and cold. "one of us will die." And he was gone. Achilles knew that nothing would ever fill the blackness that he had left.
FIN
(1)I'm not sure if this is the actual quote, lol, shall have to watch the film again! Oh well, guess I'll survive, lmao.