BOOK OF ASTYANAX
CHAPTER 1
“THE TRUTH ACHILLES SAW”
----------------------------------------
Before the Trojans even had a chance to react, the Greeks devastated them and began to sack their city. It was the accumulated, unbridled rage of a hundred thousand men that burnt their homes, slaughtered their men and children, and took their women.
“No… stop…!” Someone shouted, their voice drowned out by Trojan screams and the crackling sound of burning flames—the sound of entire houses being reduced to ash.
The soldier shouted as his shoulders were grasped. He flailed; he swatted away the arm that grabbed him and fell further back against the wall behind him with a heavy thud. Like a knife, the sensation of pain stabbed through his abdomen and he doubled over with a raspy cough. In his stomach, an arrow was embedded gruesomely into his flesh. It was not a fresh wound, but one that had not been treated. Even so, he survived this long while his comrades died long before. Nearby, their bodies lay scattered.
“It’s only me. Stand down, soldier! — Tell me, who did this to you?” The Trojan demanded. He steadied the soldier and attempted to shake him conscious.
“G-Get… away,” the soldier sputtered, desparately clawing at the Trojan’s arms. Red blood trailed from his mouth down to his chin. The Trojan tried to press him for more, but quickly paused. There was no more point, he realized, because the soldier’s eyes, still wide open, no longer saw light. His arms fell uselessly to his side.
“He’s dead,” the Trojan said. He brought his hand to the dead man’s face and brought his eyes to a final close with a gentle touch. It was the least he could do for one who fell in battle. To honor the dead… this was the responsibility of a prince of Troy.
Behind him, a group of soldiers stood silently and watched until one of them spoke. “But the Greeks retreated! They left an offering to the gods and fled across the sea!”
Deiphobus stood. “I knew it was foolish to accept their ‘gift’. They’ve taken our gate from the inside and given their allies the means to sack our city. Now we pay the price…!” he growled, gripping the shaft of the spear he wore on his back with an iron grip.
The men began to mutter amongst themselves. “What are we supposed to do now…!?”
Crack! — The butt of his spear hit the ground with an audible noise. “We only have one thing left to do. Fight! Until the Greeks are dead or none of us remain, we fight! I’ll kill as many of them as I can, until the streets of Troy run red with their blood and my late brother, down in Hades, is satisfied!” he roared. He turned to face the sound of chaos that had washed over his great city, raising his spear, and he—
…
A shrill whistle heralded the end of his campaign, and he stopped dead.
“…Deiphobus?” One of the soldiers called as they stepped close. He grabbed his shoulder, only to jump back as he stumbled back. Deiphobus’s body hit the ground hard, and cleanly in the middle of his helm, between the eyes, an arrow was spotted.
The soldier staggered as a gasp escaped his lips. Before he could decide how to react, the tip of an enemy’s spear impaled his chest from behind and his life was stolen.
※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※
ODYSSEUS
Before he even realized he fell into their trap, Odysseus felled their leader from afar, perched atop a rooftop with a drawn bow and a precise eye. Deiphobus, prince of Troy, brother of Hector, and one of Priam’s most honorable sons, died. I can only regret that our paths crossed under circumstances such as these, he thought.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Even so, there was no time to stop and mourn his opponent’s demise. The next soldier fell quickly after Deiphobus, but not at his hand. He watched as Diomedes, armored from head to toe, attacked the man from behind with his spear and then ripped it away from his corpse. He fell onto his stomach and tried to crawl, one hand grasping the gaping wound in his abdomen and the other slowly pushing himself away from his attacker. As he dragged himself away in a bid to survive, a trail of blood remained.
Odysseus saw no point in his suffering. He pulled an arrow from the quiver on his back and with great aim, he drew his bowstring back. Within a split second, his foe’s head was pierced. Without him even realizing that his end had come, his body stilled.
The rest of the soldiers were quicker to react. They unstowed their weapons as the rest of his men poured out from their hiding places, tucked in-between alleyways or underneath whatever nearby corpses they could find, and unleashed their battle cries. As if to muster up the courage they had left, they roared from the depths of their souls.
Before taking action, the first thing Odysseus did was take stock of his enemy’s numbers. Counting their leader, there were fifteen of them; with two of them already dead, that left thirteen. Among his comrades, there were only six. If they were lesser men, they wouldn’t have stood a chance. Luckily, they were led by Diomedes.
And, of course, they also had him. He quickly shot the next man; his arrow stabbed through his chest like butter, right through the heart, and he fell to the ground dead. Before he could choose his next target, the others were already trading blows, and Diomedes managed to fell at least four of them. Odysseus watched as he claimed a fifth head, launching his spear into his enemy’s abdomen and skewering him from a meter away, pinning him to a nearby wall. It was pulled from his corpse a moment later.
Seven left, he counted.
He aimed at the next man: a soldier who tried to take Diomedes, who was still rushing to recover his weapon, by surprise. His axe was raised high above his head, readied for the kill, when an arrow pierced the side of his head with little delay. His body fell limp.
He breathed in deeply, relaxed, and allowed his breaths to travel through his body. From the depths of his stomach to the very tips of his fingers, he felt it pulsate throughout each and every muscle. This act of breathing, of relaxing, was integral to a warrior of his caliber. To breathe was to slow down and to think… to plan one’s next move clearly.
It was in this state that he could best plan his next move. Time stopped around him—or, more, accurately, his thoughts quickened to a point of extremity, where every man’s movements on the battlefield stilled and could be tracked with the naked eye.
It lasted approximately one second. By the time his perception returned to normal, his next three targets were selected. Quickly, quietly, and calmly, his practiced fingers grasped an arrow and loosed it. Before it could even reach the first man, he had another at the ready, and after that would quickly come another.
Six. Five. Four. Almost all at once, their lives came to an end without even having a chance to curse their misfortune, for in their final hour they crossed paths with Odysseus of Ithaca, the man said to be blessed by wisdom and warfare.
× × × ×
It was only when all of their enemies were slain and the men celebrated their admittedly small victory that Odysseus allowed himself to lower his bow. From a distance, he could see them patting each other on the back and praising each other.
“But the battle goes on…” he muttered. Until Troy was pillaged and the Trojans were slaughtered to the last man, it wasn’t over. Around him, all he could see was blood and fire. That waited at the end of those ten long years. Was this the truth Achilles saw?
He simply sighed. A feeling of heavy fatigue washed over him… or maybe it would be more accurate to say that he was feeling the effects of an exhaustion that already existed. Effects he pushed away and suppressed. He ignored them, for the sake of a victory that he could now see unfolding before his eyes. Once Troy fell, the war would be over, his objective complete, and then, finally, the wish he yearned for for so long…
Click. The sound of metal reached his ears, interrupting his thoughts.
His fist gripped the hilt of his sword and, with one swift motion, the end of his blade edged inches away from the enemy who dared try to catch him by surprise.
“Who—!?”
The first thing he noticed was his attacker’s armor. Every inch of their body was covered in black plating lined with gold, distinctly Trojan in design. They were a warrior of a mighty stature, almost double Odysseus’s own height. And in their grip, raised high—
—A battleaxe that dwarfed his own shield.
A flash of silver followed a downward arc, the distance between them closed in an instant. His eyes widened before the impact, his mind quickening and his feet already in motion, but to no avail. What kind of mortal could dodge a blow like that?
His body lurched downward, his sword clattering to the ground meters away as the axe came down upon him with violent force. The armor that protected his shoulders and neck was rended to dust and scrap in an instant; the flesh beneath was a little tougher than butter in comparison. He hit the ground with a loud, resonating crack.
× × × ×
He remained motionless, sprawled out on top of that rooftop as Troy descended into further chaos around him. He wasn’t dead, and he certainly couldn’t be called ‘asleep’. In silence, he organized his thoughts. He wondered, When will Hades take me?
—But the sensation of ‘life’ never quite ended. Realizing that, he opened his eyes and stared into the black abyss above, the darkness of which was illuminated by the raging fire around him. It was then he noticed that the pain he felt from that previous strike was gone, and no finishing blow seemed to be coming to take his life.
No. That wasn’t quite it; it wasn’t that the pain was gone. Rather… he felt his shoulder, grasping it, but the armor that protected it was intact, as if no axe had ever pierced it.
There was no wound. And stranger yet, there was no warrior to inflict it.