"Surely I am about to die," is all Patroclus can think, even in the perfect beauty and requiescence of his surroundings. "If not by bloody Prince Hector's hand, then my cousin, the lion, will have my head and balls when I am returned to him."
Patroclus is not a god or even a prince, but he knows as well as any foot soldier in the empire how males of the mighty Achilles' bloodline are treated in enemy camps. They are either culled, or executed, but mostly bartered. Men who are sired in the same pride as the lion are far too dangerous to be sent to the anonymity and chance fate of slavery. Following the blow, from what seemed to Patroclus to be Hector's almost inconceivably strong arm, which both landed the youth hard on his backside and signaled his defeat and subsequent brash unmasking on the battlefield, Patroclus had immediately been stripped of his cousin's brilliant, if rather too large, armor by Achilles' men. For reasons Patroclus could only attribute to dumb luck from the gods, Hector's blade had only just grazed his callow throat, leaving a clean stem of black blood weeping somewhat petulantly, if fervently from the resulting wound. The Trojan prince had been a Titan to Patroclus. A distant figurehead who seemed, even in his childhood in Phtia to be as mighty and stalwart as the gods, themselves, and just as likely to ever directly address him. However, when Eudoros, Achilles' captain, reached for Patroclus in knee-jerk shock and horror, a voice as broad and unwavering as the River Styx called out in unquestionable authority:
"Stop! Do not touch him!" The command came from Prince Hector's gleaming helmet, and then, softer, "Who is this boy?"
Silence, and then a grudging, gruff warning bark, not unlike a hyena's, from Eudoros. "He is Patroclus. Nephew of King Trolius of Phtia…" the old captain paused but soon gave in to the shining helmet's princely stare. "And young cousin of Achilles, The Lion," was added rather lamely.
The shining helmet gave no visible reaction to the taut crowd of warriors but rather knelt down by the wounded Achaean. Patroclus instinctively flinched away at the approach of such an intimidating form, and instantly hated himself for such a cowardly and embarrassing move. To his further humiliation, Hector's firm brown hand reached out and cupped Patroclus' seething face in his large palm, as one would a young girl's. Patroclus was surprised to feel sand-warmed flesh where he had half expected the cold, metallic touch of a statue. The prince's strong thumb had curled under Patroclus' jaw, gently tipping his head up, exposing his wound to the shining helmet's inspective gaze.
"Are you hurt anywhere else, child?" The shining helmet asked.
Patroclus could not keep his face from flushing pink at this further shame, but he could scrounge up his remaining audacity and scowl the most cynical scowl he could muster, spitting blood neatly at the shining helmet.
Seemingly unaffected the prince rose and beckoned for a staunch soldier Patroclus recognized as Glaucus, a commander of Troy and close advisor to Hector, to come forward. Prince Hector murmured some instructions to the commander, who in turn bent down and hauled Patroclus to his feet gruffly, but not without some sensitivity to the youth's injuries. Patroclus heard Eudoros and some of the other Myrmidons give shouts of alarm and protest, but these seemed to be instantly silenced by a sharp motion from the shining helmet.
"The boy is mine." The broad voice stated in tone of complete definiteness. "Won in fair contest. Your Achilles may be a lion, but he honors the kleos of battle."
And apparently that was it, for in his battle and sun weakened state, Patroclus could barely turn his head to look back at Eudoros and his cousin's other men before he was carted away between Glaucus and another, darker man, into the hulking bronzed mouth of the towering Trojan castle.
In the guts-and-glory-induced delusion of battle, the accent to the Trojan army had seemed a near stone's throw away, but now, after the full brute force of the mid-day Trojan sun and it's prince had been levied against him, Patroclus found his ankles buckling and his vision spinning, not fifty paces into their trek through the palace yard. Glaucus was strong as a horse, but no longer having the patience of a foot soldier, the commander soon called for a chariot with a gruff bellow. At Gluacus' grunting motion, the darker man on Patroclus' left bent down and pulled the boy's muck-laden sandals from his blistered feet, and deposited the Achaean into the chariot, before snapping the reins, leaving the general muttering in the dust, already thinking of his next command. Patroclus could remember almost nothing of the chariot's short, yet convoluted cantor through palace yards and stone alleyways. Soon, the dark man stopped the horse at a small back entrance to the palace, secluded from the prying hustle and austere ambiance of the front gates. In a tongue foreign to Patroclus he ordered two of the guards at the door to help his charge up the stairs and through a long, elegant breezeway. The small party halted before a great teak door, carved in an intricate maze of wild horses, each well oiled and gleaming in the torchlight. Patroclus had just barely registered the contrast in the cool palace luxury from his bloodily beaten, naked body and bedraggled, wind-torn hair. He could smell the light aroma of some costly ginger and lavender perfume wafting through the wood, along with the familiar rich, spiced musk of some unidentifiable incense. Some part of Patroclus seemed to recall the same sumptuous scent lingering on the shining helmet when Prince Hector, now his captor, gods help him, had bent down to him on the field.
Four soldiers, each marked as Hector's men by the horsehair tassel flowing proudly from their helmets, stood guard at the door's massive frame. They parted slightly and one nodded wordlessly to the dark man, while another removed the heavy bolt from the door and pushed it aside. The dark man voiced an order in the same foreign tongue, and the soldiers helped Patroclus over the threshold, into a airy set of rooms. The chambers were large and cool, even in the scathing heat of the afternoon, with sparse yet elegant furnishings. The soldiers and the man talked between themselves briefly before stretching the youth out on a clean couch. Even if Patroclus could have understood what his new jailors were saying, his body was so fatigued and weak from the blood loss, that he would not have registered their conversation. The dark man seemed to have dismissed the soldiers, for the next thing Patroclus knew, a clean linen rag of sweet water was being held to his bruised and cracked lips. Suddenly wary and unsure of his jailor's intentions, Patroclus shook his head feverishly away, and tried to speak. To his horror and frustration, he found he could not. Instead, Patroclus could only achieve grunts and growls without aggravating the suffocating pain in his neck and throat.
"Breathe easy, my young master, breathe," A steady, but gentle voice, heavily accented urged. "Your body is in shock now. I've seen it many a time before. Prince Hector used to return from training when he was a boy, beaten and bloodied just like you. I expect you've been dealt some man-sized blows on the field today, young master."
Patroclus' eyes rolling over to the dark man's face in anxiety. Once more he tried desperately to speak, only to have his grunts silenced by the damp linen.
"Don't you go trying to speak now," the man said, continuing to catalogue the Achaean's injuries, "That scratch on your neck was a mighty one, but I expect your voice will be back as soon as the swelling goes down, young master."
Patroclus looked at the linen, now stained pink from the dried blood and then back at the man with questioning eyes.
The man wrung out the cloth in a pottery bowl beside him and continued addressing Patroclus in his simple, steady way. "I'm Krishna, the head of Prince Hector's household. I see to the prince, whether he's here in Troy or at his own palace in Hatha." Krishna stood and retrieved a several small colored jars from a chest across the room. "I expect I'll be taking care of you now, as well, young master."
Patroclus snorted. "Imagine a slave being given another slave to serve. The idea is ridiculous, even if I'll only be a slave a few hours before Achilles comes to claim me. Oh may the gods help me."
Krishna did not seem to notice the irate look on his charge's face, busy instead with mixing some dried herbs from the jars into a large bowl, which he then carried through a linen covered archway, into an adjoining chamber.
He soon reappeared above the young Achaean, "You must bathe and wash the stench of war from you, young master. Can you walk?"
Patroclus nodded, but it seemed to take an unusual amount of effort to haul his legs over the side of the couch and coax them into standing. Upon achieving an upright stance, he almost toppled over again, instantly dizzy and flushed. Krishna caught him and clucked his tongue maternally, shaking his head for a moment before calling a young servant into the room with a sharp whistle. The two men helped Patroclus across the chamber, into the adjoining room, and into a white marble bathing pool of clear warm water.
"Here," Krishna muttered to the other slave, handing him Patroclus' torn and disguarded loin cloth, the only clothing he'd retained when he'd been captured, "Burn this, and the bedclothes from the couch too. They are soiled."
The slave disappeared behind the linen hangings at the door, and Krishna soon left as well, leaving Patroclus alone, his sore muscles and stinging injuries soaking in the silent chamber.
And that is where Patroclus lay now, bare save for the bruises that were fast turning purple and green all over his legs and chest, his long, proud golden hair slicked back by the bath water, against his shoulders. The young Achaean closes his weary eyes and allowed his the soothing perfumed waters was over his aching body as he prays to his cousin's patroness, the great goddess of war and wisdom, Athena.
"Pallas Athena, if the bards speak the truth, you love my great cousin above all warriors. I know I am not worthy of your patronage as he is, nor am I a hero or a king. But please- give me the wisdom of a warrior and strength, so that I might be worthy of the honor of carrying Achilles' blood be it in the hands of my enemies… or going to my death. Please divine Athena, let me act as a man and not a child so that I may hold my head up when Achilles comes for me. I could not bare shaming him any more-"
The sudden clatter of one of the herb jars falling on to the tile jolts Patroclus from his increasingly desperate plea and his eyes jerk open in alarm. There, standing silently at the side of the bath, watching him with large, fulgent brown-green eyes is Prince Hector. The two men lock eyes in a moment of sudden and careful stillness, each unable or afraid to look down and break the air. Patroclus had not noticed his nudity in the presence of Krishna or the other slave man, but now, under Hector's long, malachite stare, Patroclus is suddenly very aware of his own body. He feels bare and rawboned, as if he should cross his arms over his chest; strangely embarrassed of the bruises the prince, himself, had inflicted. Then Krishna comes through the linen hangings, effectively stirring the prince from his trance.
Hector turns towards the slave, his voice low, "How does he fare? Any broken bones?"
Patroclus would have scoffed, but there is an undercurrent of concern in the prince's soft voice that is utterly bizarre to him and makes him swallow the notion. Instead Patroclus shifts away from the men as far as he can in the water.
"No, My lord," Krishna assures Hector with an easy smile, all white teeth. "His bones are intact. Athena has been kind to this little Achilles."
"Thank Apollo I did not injure him further," Hector's eyes roll up towards the heavens for a moment.
No longer under blatant scrutiny himself, Patroclus takes this opportunity to study his enemy up close. He has seen Prince Hector only once without his battle helmet obscuring the man's features, and that had been from many leagues away. While the whole of the known world had heard praises sung of Hector's younger brother, Prince Paris's gentile beauty, Patroclus is somehow unprepared for how striking the eldest prince of Troy is. The ballads are right- Hector is as tall and solid as an yew tree, but he is also surprisingly graceful- his limbs muscled, but long and fine as well. Soft curls, the same dark titian color as his younger brother's celebrated locks, plate down around Hector's strong, sharp jaw and lean shoulders. His features are exceedingly well proportioned and yet completely different from Paris' feline brow and teasing mouth. Instead, his eyes are deep-set and solid over a nose that has healed stubbornly straight after being broken several times in combat. Hector's mouth is noble and remains closed and solemn when he is not speaking, so unlike Achilles and Patorclus' uncle, Trolius, who's mouths never quite shut but are always opening again, letting the next enraged epithet or command escape. Even through Hector's lose, Trojan linen robes of blue, his muscles ripple a sun torched brown, several shades darker than his brother's creamy completion. Once again Patroclus wonders how he has avoided death at the blade of this master warrior, this hero king.
"Is he in pain? Has he spoken?" Hector allows himself to glance at the battered youth lying in his bathing pool only briefly now. If he doesn't take care, he may find himself staring like a godless fool again.
Cocky though he was, Achilles- that cat, had been right: only a fool could have mistaken the young Patroclus for his famed cousin. As a royal prince, Hector has seen the extremes of both beauty and carnage paraded before his senses in his lifetime, but never has he seen the two so breathtakingly intertwined as in the young man he nearly murdered today. It was not honor that had caused Hector to fight today, but rather sheer, shameful fear. Fear for his fatherland, for his foolish brother and his ageing father, fear for the people- his people, and the suffering such an animal as Achilles could inflict upon them on a whim. Fear had blinded him from the sure signs he, the veteran soldier and master warrior, had ignored until it was almost too late. Again and again Hector has beat him silently in the hours since the battle, playing and replaying every move and attack. He should have noticed, had in fact noticed, the weakness his enemy's strokes. They were only a little harder than his brother, Paris' attacks, certainly nothing legendary. Hector had been so stupid, so afraid of what this uncalled war would do…
He had made himself return to his chambers after securing Achilles' blessing. He knew the boy would be there, recovering from the gods only knew what kind of injuries Hector had inflicted, and he was almost afraid to see him. And yet, Hector had felt a stirring need to see him, a need to know if the boy was alright. He had not felt such a feeling for anything except his country before, and could not quite understand it. Just as he could not understand what made him send Patroclus to his own chambers, a sacred place nobody but himself and a few trusted slaves were ever allowed, except that it had seemed to Hector at the moment, in his gut, that the boy would be safer if he were closer to him.
This strange inkling, this almost aching notion returned to Hector as he had stood, transfixed, watching Achilles' cousin rest in his own bathing pool. Patroclus was a mere two years younger than Paris, but when Achilles' helmet had been pulled from the youth's head, Hector instantly recognized with a warrior's practiced eye that the Achaean was an entirely different kind of animal. Patroclus' muscles were lean and long on his angular frame, his bones still a bit boyish and knobby, poking out underneath. He had the same golden skin and flowing tresses as his mentor, the color of divine apples. But his face lacked the arrogant, god-like reserve of the king, Achilles. Instead, the younger Achaean's eyes were an intense green, the color of Priam's most precious emerald, and lidded with lashes as long and thick as a girl's. But burning through them, had been a kind of hard, livid hunger Hector had never experienced in any warrior, alive or dead, before. They were feral eyes, like those of a starving wild dog. The youth's beautiful red mouth had curled back like the petals of a poisonous flower, daring Hector to come further. Yes, the boy had been wounded and angry, and it had been all Hector could do to not reach out with both hand and sooth the malice away from the fallen boy's shaking face and neck. Hector did not understand it at all.
*Author's Note*
Okay kids, (kid? Whatever.) kind of a weird place to stop, I know, but if I had kept on, who knows how long these two would make faces at each other and it would have ended up like Twilight (i.e. 500 pages of two people staring rather pointlessly at each other until they no longer have friends and their families want them committed to psychiatric wards. Twilight: Love makes mediocre people do banal and long-winded things. For Eternity.) and I wanted to write about this first part. Most of this chapter would seem to the untrained eye to entail my re-writing of Patroclus' last scene in the film, but it's really just a long list of descriptions. As a chronic shopper and former art student, I find descriptions of clothing and interiors to be the only things that get me through transition scenes. I have a very cinematic mind and I (egotistically) want my readers to see what I see when I envision Hector's chambers or Patroclus' body. On that note, I'm looking at really old pictures of Brad Pitt as inspiration for Patroclus, but even they are a bit too "happy" for what I envision. In my original work, I am forever going back through these descriptive paragraphs and switching phrases around. I naturally write in fairly long sentences, and I'm positive my commas are off. Somehow, editors really never agree on how commas are supposed to go either, so I'm just going to let that sleeping dog lie for now. Emotion is truly the meat of any good story, and I'm not feeling a ton of inspiration for what's going on between these two at the moment. However, there is something (I fell, at least,) very sensual about watching someone. People who are not lovers or lustful of each other don't sit and consider each other's bodies in the same way. It's a weird thing about romantic relationships- all of a sudden somebody else looks at your body more than you do. When I write descriptions of body/emotion relationships (such as Patroclus' eyes) I always wonder if I'm losing people. It's easy to get lost when you try to make the abstract tangible. I've had editors tell me I use too many adjectives, but my response is, and has always been- suck it bitches.