"Please, whatever Gods are out there: let the pain end. I do not want to suffer any more. Please just take my life now and end the anguish I am in. Please…please just let my suffering end."
Andromache could hear Briseis' praying in the depths of the woods. She walked slowly and quietly towards the noise, and paused when she saw Briseis, with her back to her, curled up on the ground, head bowed, sobbing out her plea.
Watching her, Andromache was moved at the anguish she was going through. She is my enemy! She thought angrily to herself, but when she looked at the wreck of a woman she could not help but have her heart fill with compassion and pity.
Andromache walked into the clearing, and Briseis looked up, startled and angry at having been seen.
"What is it?" she snapped nervously.
Andromache put her hands out and drew Briseis up.
"I…" she hesitated, trying to find the courage and strength to say what she needed to say. "I wanted to beg your forgiveness. I have been wrong in my treatment of you."
Briseis laughed hollowly. "You?" she asked incredulously. "You are asking for my forgiveness?"
"Yes. Why?" Andromache asked, slightly taken aback by Briseis' reaction.
"I killed your husband. I killed Patroculus, and I killed Achilles," she broke down into tears. "I killed them all Andromache," she raised a grief-ravaged face. "I killed them…" she sobbed.
Andromache recognised some of her own guilt in Briseis, and instinctively wrapped her arms around the sobbing woman.
"You didn't kill them," she murmured soothingly. "They made their own choices, and they decided to fight. They knew the price."
"How do you do it?" Briseis asked in a muffled voice. "How do you carry on each day without him?"
Andromache looked sadly at Briseis. "I have Astyanax. He needs me, and he is all I have left of Hector."
"But don't you want to forget it ever happened? Don't you want it to go back to how it all was before you even knew him?"
Andromache smiled sorrowfully. "I dream of him every night. I see him watching over me. I will not forget him, nor do I want to, for despite all the pain, he brought me so much joy that I could never wish to forget him."
"But the memory, it hurts so much!" Briseis said in an anguished voice.
"Yes," Andromache agreed. "But do you know what I do? Ever day, I tell Astyanax something about his father, so I will always have something to hang on to. I make myself remember him every day, so that I know that all the suffering was worth it." she looked critically at Briseis. "I think that you will soon be doing the same, will you not?"
Briseis blushed, and her hand crept automatically to her growing stomach.
"They will hate me for it," she said in a worried voice. "I will be cast out, and they will turn their backs on me."
"No," Andromache took Briseis' hands in hers. "No. For it is your child, as much as it is his, and they cannot take what is yours away from you."
There was a silence, and Briseis began to think of her unwanted child in a different way. Instead of a curse, it showed the signs of a blessing; instead of despair it was hope.
"How can you say it was worth it though?" she asked.
Andromache smiled, and something as simple as a smile, something that Briseis felt she hadn't seen in years, filled her heart with hope. "Would you have had it any other way?" she asked gently. "Do not weep because it is over. Smile because it happened."
A/N – well guys, that's it. Hope you liked it – any suggestions about ways I could change it will be welcomed tho! Sorry it's so long in coming – I was threatened with being 'unplugged' from the internet if I didn't get down and do some homework!