Chapter Text
As in life, so in death:
It is always when Achilles is already late that the Fates conspire to delay him.
Achilles vaults past yet another perfect hedge to retrieve his spear where it came to rest, buried in the last of a regiment of warriors. He’s lost count of how many there were, which is vexing. Outside his master’s House, where at least there are candles to burn and mark periods, there is no way to gauge how much time has passed, yet he is certain he’s taking too long. Patroclus had requested his help at the end of the second shift and Achilles had vowed he would have it, but the fields of Elysium are ever-shifting. He has to estimate his progress by the number of chambers passed, and for each chamber, the number of champions in it.
This time he’s been through more than nine rooms without relief, and he can’t remember how many he has fought. It takes only a couple minutes to slay an archer, he thinks; their aspis-bearing companions, a great many more. In this room, he looks about to see no fewer than ten ghostly shields floating above the green, waiting for their idiots to reconstitute and claim them. Too damnably many these days-or-nights, and it seems to grow worse each trip. His name - and Patroclus’s - have spread to many tongues now that they’ve occasionally been spotted at the Coliseum.
Sometimes he wonders if it might be different, had he and Pat not given their spears to Zagreus’s cause. It probably would have, but he could have chosen no different. For all that Zagreus has blessed them with, he would give the lad the world.
Achilles brushes his sweaty hair back and looks to the exits. Three of them in this chamber, and it’s impossible to tell if any lead to what he seeks. He picks the leftmost door more or less at random and approaches it with head held high. In the outskirts of Elysium, the rules are brutal but efficient: triumph over all who stand in your way, and you become the one who sets direction.
“Please,” he says to the great bronze gate. It slides open with a noise like a sword freed from its scabbard. The chamber beyond is not Pat’s glen - of course it’s not, on this day-or-night when he actually has somewhere to be - but there’s no turning back once the decision is made. He knows from experience the other ways will be sealed to him, and the shame of cowardice is actively punished.
The next segment of field is much smaller, in the configuration he least prefers: a crowded ring of statues with vicious spears in hand. He has never met clever Daedalus, but his works are both wondrous and wicked. Should Achilles charge to confront his foes, as he is well-accustomed to doing, it’s all too likely he will step on the mechanism that causes these traps to swing their heavy weapons.
In a chamber this size he may not get much choice though. Already a throng of interested fighters are lifting their heads and weapons - swords and spears and of course shields, because the Fates never can spin their thread without laughing. Half these shades seem more memory than man, yet all their eyes bear the same ravenous glint. Achilles swears and drops into a defensive stance as the field around him turns to chaos, each warrior shrieking an unholy cry. In another life, the cacophony might almost be his name.
A loud gong cuts in through the din, startling the closest shade lunging toward him. Achilles takes advantage of the momentary distraction and deflects his opponent’s spear just as the whole chamber turns a deep, sickly green. Achilles has no time to react, no time for anything but this: a one-two side step. A counter thrust. A parry.
An overextension. Achilles harries a shield bearer too close to a statue and the other shades take advantage when he’s forced to leap away. A sword master jabs at Achilles’ exposed flank - only for a sigil to erupt over the shade’s head. It looks like a ghostly painter’s mistake: a glowing, disorganized streak of white. It hangs there for a moment, then resolves all at once in a thunderous crash. The warrior dissolves in a crush of unseen power, like the press of a temple fire’s heat.
All around Achilles the regiment howls as they meet a similar fate, one moment there, the next torn apart. Their spirits churn in dark, disoriented balls as they try desperately to remember having heads, limb, teeth. Achilles drives his spear through one of them as it begins to elongate. He whips around to seek another, but before he can so much as blink the entire battlefield goes dark . Elysium’s grass is just gone beneath him, replaced by a circular purple expanse so sleek it feels like a solid sheet of marble. Its edges burn with unnatural fire, edges that are marked with virulent purple glyphs.
Achilles abandons his stance and breaks for the edge of the spell. The souls of his opponents wheel past in disoriented clumps but he only has eyes for the sliver of light just beyond the border. Every memory of the speed he had in life compels him now in death and he launches himself into one final leap just as the magic finally kicks in. Achilles hits the ground and rolls as the chamber lights up with fel fire.
When he looks back, all the other souls are falling to ash.
Achilles rallies and rolls into a crouch, scanning the chamber for any sign of movement. Across a short, shallow section of Lethe, he finally sees the interloper. Death himself hangs over the billowing river, unnaturally straight up and down in the air - like a painting suspended in light. Every part of his golden regalia gleams, radiating glory. Only the slight flush of color at his chest shows the god has even exerted himself.
Achilles inclines his head, more or less respectfully.
“Could have warned me, my Lord,” Achilles says with a wry grin. Not that he doesn’t appreciate the assistance, but had he remained in Death’s grasp, he has no doubt he too would be floating down the Styx. The last thing he needs is to start over from the House.
Thanatos dips his head in response.
“I could have,” the god acknowledges. The ghost of a smile echoes on his own lips. “Though you do have a certain reputation.”
Achilles rises to his feet, shifting his grip to hold his spear politely.
“Would that I didn’t,” Achilles grumbles, glaring at the Exalted’s myriad weapons. “Would save us both a fair bit of trouble.”
“Well, maybe I can save you some more.”
Thanatos glances across the chamber to the exits, two this time. He gestures toward the one the left, half-visible behind the Daedalus statues.
“If I were you, I would try that one.”
Achilles breathes a sigh of relief.
“Thank you, O Death,” he says, and means it. “For all your tender mercies.”
Thanatos favors him with a tiny, proud smile, no less beautiful for its ferocity. There’s a dusting of faint gold spreading into his cheeks.
“Got to go,” the god says. It’s the only warning Achilles gets before the world flashes blindingly green.
When his vision clears, Thanatos is gone.
Achilles shakes his head and brushes the silt from his clothes, even though he supposes he could simply will them to renew. There’s a certain comfort in the verisimilitude of cleaning, same as drinking wine, or eating. He feels the most himself these days-or-nights when he goes through the trials of ‘living’.
Patroclus’s kisses are the sweetest trial of all, and they make his whole being burn.
Newly determined, Achilles trots toward the left passage as he’d been instructed.
“ Out of my way ,” he demands, and the bronze shield practically flings itself aside.
He is not surprised (although he is relieved) to see the next chamber is finally, at long last, a familiar glen, nor that he can hear Patroclus’s voice carrying over the Lethe. Pat is long given to talking to himself, a remnant of his previous isolation. Like the scar of a deep-seated wound, now the habit simply persists. What is surprising is the happy chatter mingled in with Pat’s quiet words, and two clearly different patterns of footsteps, one heavy, and one sizzling.
Well. He supposes he ought not to be startled. Where there goes Death, so there also must be Life, and Zagreus has been visiting since long before Achilles himself had the will to find this place. It stands to reason that on occasion his protegee would outpace him. The real mystery is what the hell they are doing, because when Achilles swings around the bend he has to stop and stare.
Zagreus and Patroclus are shuffling toward the River Lethe holding a length of fabric stretched between them, one of their hands at each of its corners. The green cloth -- Patroclus’s cloak? -- is piled high with rocks and sod, heavy enough that it nearly scrapes the ground. Achilles watches in bemusement as they come to the river’s edge and try to coordinate dumping the load. Pat is clearly ready to just let his side go, but it’s apparent Zagreus has other ideas.
“On three!” Zagreus calls out, excited. “One!”
“Two,” Pat says dryly, obviously humoring him.
“Three!”
They both release one hand from the cloak, letting their burden spill down toward the river. Zagreus lifts his other arm up with a flourish, exuberant in that way only Life can be. The sod falls away unevenly, tumbling into the cloud-like waves. It vanishes without so much as a splash.
Achilles waits until they have stepped well away from the river’s edge before he risks raising his voice.
“Ho, there!” he calls out.
Both of them turn toward him as one, letting the cloak fall forgotten to the grass.
“Achilles, sir!”
And oh, Life’s effortless, limitless energy. Zagreus always looks so excited to see him - to see both of them. He whips his head back and forth between Achilles and Patroclus like Cerberus waiting for someone to throw a bone.
Pat, for his part, offers a smile to rival Helios’s helm.
“Well, look who’s deigned to visit us at last,” Patroclus drolls. “I’d almost forgotten your face, stranger.”
Zagreus makes an exaggerated gasp.
“I’m wounded, sir,” he says, doing a little twirl toward Pat. “I thought I was your stranger.”
“Oh, never fear. You are eternally strange,” Patroclus teases back.
They look to each other and Pat’s gaze is so fond, so particular, that Achilles momentarily forgets he doesn’t need to breathe.
He wonders again, will he need to tell Patroclus to take the man to bed, or is Pat content to let this blossom at its own pace? It is such a rare flower in this sea of green.
“How goes the house?” Achilles asks instead.
He draws closer. It’s apparent the two of them have been working for some time. Neither of them are wearing their bracers and their arms are covered in dirt to the elbows. Zagreus even has a clump of mud stuck beneath his eye.
“Hold still a moment,” his beloved murmurs and raises a hand to cup Zagreus’s cheek. Zagreus wrinkles his nose as Patroclus attempts to brush the dirt away, only to leave another smudge in the process.
“You’ve made it worse,” Achilles laughs. “Come here, the both of you.”
Achilles unpins his own cloak and wraps a length of it around his hand. He cleans Zagreus’s arms and face first, smiling at the way he shivers, and then turns to his lover, indulging for the moment in the warmth of Patroclus’s skin.
“Where were you?” Patroclus asks, quietly tipping his forehead to meet Achilles’ own. Head to head, heart to heart. It was ever their custom in life. “I waited for you quite some time, I think.”
“The chambers were cruel today,” Achilles agrees. “I was starting to think I’d never reach you.”
Beside them, Zagreus is already shifting, each step sizzling the grass beneath his feet. Elysium is such that new blades spring up the second he’s burnt the last ones, ever-green.
“I can ah, take my leave now if you’d like, sirs,” Zagreus offers.
Patroclus squeezes Achilles’ arm once, then steps back.
“No, stranger,” Pat says. “Stay for a while, and confound your father further. After all you’ve done today, surely you deserve to make him wait.”
“I do love confounding my father,” Zagreus says.
His mismatched eyes flick to Achilles, then back to Pat.
“But only if you’re certain I won’t be intruding.”
Such a generous, sweet, sweet man. More than a man. Achilles puts little stock in the gods, here now at the end of everything, but if anything remains of his faith, he would place it all in Zagreus.
“You aren’t,” Achilles confirms. “I rather feel like I’m the interloper here. Did you two even leave me any ground to break?”
“Oh, there’s always something for you to break,” Patroclus says. “At least this time we’ve found a way to level the foundation.”
“Progress,” Achilles says, mildly surprised. In the days - weeks? - since Pat started his great construction project, it’s been a struggle just to keep the grass from filling in as fast as one can clear it. Elysium is committed to being ever-green, unchanging.
“Our stranger here figured it out,” Patroclus says. “Came upon me struggling and offered a hand.”
He waves impatiently.
“Come now, you two, and sit. We may not require drink, but this is thirsty work.”
For Zagreus , his quick glance implies. The prince may only be a scant quarter mortal, but his pulse quickens in a stronger way than shades’ do. There’s a rivulet of sweat curling down behind the lad’s ear.
The three of them take their places in a circle about Pat’s favorite spot, a paved vantage point near a bend in the river. The smooth tiles are more comfortable than the relatively spiky grass, and save them all from the scent of constantly burning vegetation.
“One moment,” Patroclus announces.
He gets up to search for something behind the great moss-covered statue to their left. It’s meant to look something like a giant’s discarded spearhead, but Patroclus uses it as a hiding place for the valuables he picks up from shades who come to the Lethe. Achilles has never asked - nor is he sure he wants the answer - how it is Patroclus retrieves these things. On the far bank, where there is no bridge, the shades are so very plentiful.
On the near shore, there are none.
“Here we are,” Pat announces. He comes back with three high-footed drinking glasses, broad-mouthed pieces ringed with decorative bands. In his right hand, he has a flask of deeply golden nectar.
“Your admirer was here again,” he tells Achilles as he sits. His dark eyes seem amused.
Achilles rubs the back of his neck.
“I see,” he says, slightly self conscious. He is never certain what to say to gifts these days-or-nights, which is a foolish problem. He is aware his beloved would think it foolish. In life, for pity’s sake, there had been times Achilles was worshipped. His brine-born mother was so beautiful men fell before her feet. Yet in death, he no longer has the arrogance of the invulnerable, and so he has difficulty being revered.
Especially by Death, who could bring both the heavens and earth to their knees.
“I ran into Thanatos in the last chamber, by the way,” he tells Zagreus. “He set me in this direction. Please do thank him for me. Both for his assistance, and for this nectar.”
A part of him is somewhat nervous, talking about Thanatos to his lover’s face, but Zagreus looks at him with nothing but affection.
“I will, sir, next I see him,” Zagreus says. “And…”
“And?”
Achilles peers more closely, but Zagreus doesn’t seem upset. On the contrary, the very tips of his ears have turned red.
On his right side, Patroclus’s gaze is so fond it hurts.
“Never mind that yet,” Zagreus says. He clears his throat, embarrassingly perfunctory. “You said you wanted to hear about the house?”
“Certainly,” Achilles says, with as much dignity as he can muster. He really wishes Pat would stop grinning.
In truth, this entire construction project is also Patroclus’s doing - not that Achilles blames him in the slightest. Achilles’ position at his Lord’s House affords him serviceable, if quaint accommodations. Patroclus, who has spent these years outside in the country, has no such comforts. He’d had no need of a house, he said, not without Achilles in it. And Elysium is never cold, nor is it hot, nor does it rain. Now that they have a life together, though, Pat has grown restless.
Nothing large , Pat had whispered in his ear one day-or-night, twisting a lock of Achilles’ hair by the Lethe. I have no need for Theseus’s eyesore of a palace. But I think I can build us a place.
And so ever since that has been their project, although the reality has been slow to match the dream. Achilles and Patroclus had been raised for warfare, for court life, for perhaps every other proper activity except building things. Achilles knows how to raise and pack a tent, to draw out a game of petteia and cleave a man where the bone protects breath. He knows next to nothing of laying rocks so they fit together, or shaping tiles so they’ll make a stable roof.
We’ve simply learned several ways not to make a house, Patroclus had said after the third attempt had plunged them both into the Styx. We might as well keep trying until we’re bored of it. He does have a point. Zagreus could surely bribe the House Contractor to craft them walls that don’t ignobly crumble, but then what would Patroclus do when Achilles is on shift with Lord Hades?
Surely Achilles wouldn’t get to see Patroclus and Zagreus like this, armor off and eyes wide, babbling something about pry bars Achilles really ought to pay attention to.
“-and that’s when I realized, the grass doesn’t grow back if we pull up the sod in one sheet,” Zagreus is saying. “So we started peeling it in strips -- like an onion! -- and then we could get the dirt to stay dirt.”
“That’s incredible, lad,” Achilles murmurs. From Pat’s expression, his beloved is absolutely aware that Achilles hasn’t been paying the best attention, but neither is he about to interrupt. Zagreus’s face - already beautiful - becomes something so truly transcendent with just the faintest hint of praise.
“It was Pat’s idea to get rid of it in the Lethe,” Zagreus says, suddenly modest. His eyes widen a heartbeat later. “Patroclus, sir ! Sorry. I meant no disrespect.”
“None taken, stranger,” Pat says mildly. Achilles takes the hint as well. He does hope Zagreus appreciates how rare it is for the lad to have earned this favor. Few men in life could claim the honor of speaking to Achilles’ best beloved with a diminutive.
Or perhaps that’s simply his old pride rearing its misbegotten head, Achilles reminds himself with a firm shake. Zagreus is a true god by birthright , the son of their Unseen Lord, prince of all that’s in this realm. It’s easy to forget that he had come to Achilles as a novice, yet even as a young man, Zagreus had already existed for more years than Achilles had lived.
At times he is also more human than Achilles ever was - more gentle, more caring. Always willing to help out a friend, even if it means digging up some thankless ground. Would that every foolish hero be blessed enough to know a Zagreus.
“Honestly, we can’t thank you enough, lad,” Achilles says, and means it.
“Agreed. We should have ourselves a toast,” Patroclus says. He uncorks the nectar, finally, and tips a third into each of their oversized goblets.
“To your new home,” Zagreus says.
“To Zagreus ,” Patroclus corrects.
They all take a sip to seal the blessing, sending a ripple of love straight through Achilles’ core.
Zagreus lowers his cup a moment later, rubbing his thumb back and forth against the rim. His brow is ever so slightly furrowed.
“What’s the matter, lad?” Achilles asks.
Zagreus offers a small, sheepish smile.
“Just contemplating. I did have something to ask of you both, but I suspect you would prefer if we discussed it while sober.”
Achilles and Pat both set their cups aside immediately.
“Ask away,” Achilles says.
Zagreus ducks his head a little. A sprig of his laurel pops a bright spark, sending a few incandescent leaves skittering.
“This may be a little awkward,” Zagreus admits. “I think I can say that right now. And if you’d prefer me to stop - at any point! - let me know, and we can drink until we forget this conversation ever happened.”
“Stranger, we lived through unending war,” Patroclus says, not unkindly. “I promise there’s far worse things for us to remember.”
That they always will, by virtue of their tie to each other. Remembering Patroclus means forsaking the Lethe, and all the theoretical comforts it brings. When the warriors of Elysium grow tired of their wounds, they can step into the waves and wash away even the memory of pain.
They may also come out fainter with strange angles, yearning only for the touch of a weapon.
Achilles looks again to the far shore and takes Patroclus’s hand.
Zagreus notices them twine their fingers together and dips his head, bashful. The sight seems to give him courage, though.
“You know how Thanatos and I are together,” he begins.
“Aye, lad,” Achilles says, outwardly. Inwardly, he’s already having a curious sense of doubling. Patroclus squeezes their palms together, sending a reassuring pulse through his veins.
He wonders if Pat has had this conversation already, or if it’s just Achilles who should have this honor.
Zagreus licks his soft, pretty lips. He looks directly at Patroclus.
“And you know, sir...how Achilles has helped us?” he asks.
Achilles has never been more grateful for the press of his lover’s hand.
“Of course,” Pat tells Zagreus. “Where my best beloved lies is his business. And his right. So long as his love is with me.”
Patroclus favors him with a gentle smile that Achilles does his best to return. It’s not the whole truth - not entirely. In life, he’d always known when Patroclus was taking someone to bed, and the reverse. And he’d never bedded someone so close to a man he does love. Gods help him, who among them could not love Zagreus? Even Patroclus tells him, the man shines like the stars. Zagreus had been worming his way through Pat’s defenses long before they’d realized they even had a common interest. They’d both felt guilty for considering the lad while separated, and then they’d both had to laugh at each other for worrying.
“You know my heart is yours,” Achilles promises his beloved, and squeezes their hands together until they ache.
Zagreus lets out a great sigh. Without his pauldrons, it’s obvious how much his shoulders relax.
“Good! Good. That’s good,” he says, stumbling repeatedly over his own words. Achilles snorts, eternally charmed in spite of himself. Zagreus can wield his tongue like a whip (particularly when his father’s about) but he is also adorable when tripped.
Zagreus fixes his odd eye on Achilles. The right side of his face is ever in some kind of shadow, no matter the angle or intensity of the light. It lends a certain seriousness to his tone, as he attempts to get the words out.
“Thanatos, he...appreciates all you’ve done for us, sir. Truly. It’s just…”
“Words aren’t his strongest suit,” Achilles finishes for him. “I know.”
“As do I,” Patroclus adds. He gestures toward his stash. “I’ve a whole pile of nectars for a handful of words.”
“What? Really!? Oh, Than…”
Zagreus runs a hand over his face. He looks so genuinely distressed Achilles nearly feels bad for chuckling at him.
“What is it though, stranger, truthfully?” Patroclus asks gently. Well. Gently enough for his wicked tongue. “Surely it’s not that you are dying, you do that all the time.”
Zagreus lifts his head from his palm.
“We’ve been having difficulties.”
“Difficulties.”
Achilles blinks. From everything he’s heard -- from what everyone’s heard -- the god of Death is utterly besotted. He’s even been on shift to awkwardly overhear Lord Hades reprimand Thanatos for ‘decreased productivity’. It doesn’t take Odysseus to connect Thanatos’s sudden schedule change to his new interest in being with Zageus. Unless -
He thinks back to that last chamber -- and Thanatos’s golden blush -- and goes stiff.
“If this is about me, lad-”
“Not at all!”
Zagreus’s eyes grow round as chariot wheels.
“No, it’s me ,” Zagreus says empathically. “I’m -- oh, this is embarrassing. Suffice it to say I -- we -- don’t have much experience and. We were hoping we could ask your advice?”
Patroclus nudges Achilles. His face bears a grin that should absolutely not be trusted.
“You instructed him in the martial arts,” he says in a low voice. “It seems he needed more help with the marital. ”
Achilles groans and lets go of his beloved’s hand so he can swat him.
“Hush,” he says. “That was terrible.”
“It really was,” Zagreus agrees, though he’s smiling a little. His ears are still as red as his crown. “But yes. That’s ah, the size of it. Guess I could still use some instruction from the greatest tutor I know.”
“Flatterer. I’m your only tutor,” Achilles says, although it really is nothing of the sort. Any other man he might suspect of buttering him up, beseeching endlessly to the ‘great Achilles’. Zagreus only ever says what he means.
“Hey now, Nyx taught me too!” Zagreus protests. "Not that I would learn this from her."
Patroclus brushes his hand against Achilles’ again, lending him his strength. Achilles still wonders why the Fates have this particular thread to give him, even after his death, when surely, their weaving should have ended. Then again, Zagreus himself had been cursed not to live. Kind-hearted, beautiful, deeply caring Zagreus, born to be his parents’ sorrow.
To Erebus with the Fates. He and his beloved, they go where they are needed.
“Well, wherever we can help, we will,” Achilles says. Patroclus nods.
“Though it’s my opinion, experience itself is the best teacher,” Pat says. “Sometimes it’s okay that these things take practice.”
Zagreus sucks in around his teeth, making the slight hissing sound Achilles knows as chthonic disagreement.
“That assumes that one can practice,” the god says. “Than, well...it’s not his fault, but when he’s uncomfortable, sometimes he shifts.”
“Shifts,” Patroclus says blankly.
“Vanishes,” Achilles supplies. “The children of Night disappear and reappear where they please.”
“Ah, yes.” Pat waves a hand vaguely. “‘Guh-dong’, that sort of thing?”
“That’s the one,” Zagreus says. “Big thundering clang right over your pillow. Not exactly conducive to a nice night in. And I…”
He shakes his head.
“I never want to make him uncomfortable. But I can’t change it. I don’t think I’m formed right to please him.”
Gods, he looks so embarrassed. So obscurely guilty, at the simple thought he can’t be enough for his lover.
It’s impossible not to want to hold him.
“Oh, no lad.” Achilles murmurs. “No, no, no.”
“It’s the truth,” Zagreus insists. “We’ve tried...a lot of things. Nothing’s worked so far.”
Again, that chagrined shimmer to his pretty voice. It’s a measure of the hero Zagreus is that he doesn’t shy from emotion. Unlike Achilles, who is ever the coward. ‘Fear is for the weak’, he’d always used to say. He had been too weak to face his lost Patroclus, without Zagreus’s tireless encouragement.
It’s Patroclus now who offers him reassurance, more eloquently than Achilles had. Pat, who is ever his better half, the heart of him.
“There is no law written on how lovers must lay together,” Patroclus says with some heat. “If he does not enjoy -- receiving you?”
Zagreus nods.
“Then you will find other ways to satisfy him. ‘Different’ is not bad, nor lesser.”
Zagreus shakes his head.
“He says that he wants to have me,” Zagreus says. The flush in his cheeks is spreading to his chest, disappearing beneath the edge of his garment. “He, ah. Likes it when I use my fingers. Or when Meg -- she has these harnesses, you see? She can switch hers out and they have different sizes? She let me borrow one and that was nice but, I got distracted because she was behind me-”
And oh gods, and if that isn’t an image for the ages. Megaera, First of the Furies, taking her pretty prince any way she pleases. He’s never going to be able to relax in the Lounge again because the next time she invites him to drink, all he’s going to see is her bending Zagreus over the table.
Patroclus is laughing now, deep and rich the way he so rarely bothers.
“Enough, stranger!” Pat says. He swings Achilles’ hand. “You’ll send him straight to the Styx.”
“It’s fine,” Achilles says, a little strangled, aware his face must also be a sight. It’s the curse of his mother’s pale, sea-born skin. Even in death, where he need not remember blushing, apparently his shade-body betrays him.
“Sorry, sir,” Zagreus says.
“Oh, the two of you,” Patroclus says, so full of affection.
“It’s fine ,” Achilles insists again. “Lad, I--”
He gropes for words, aware suddenly he is giving advice without having the faintest idea what he means to say.
“Have you tried that, then? Using Megaera’s implements?”
Zagreus bites his distracting lower lip.
“Yes? And also no. Than still says he would like to have me . And Meg, she -- she and Than, they’re friends, they get along but. He’s not interested in her, in that way.”
Patroclus catches Achilles’ eye with an unspoken question. Achilles nods his head in response. They’ve known men like that, who favor only certain sexes.
In Thanatos’s case, he suspects it might be even more particular.
“So it’s not helpful for her to be with you?” Achilles translates.
“Not so far,” Zagreus confirms. “Not Meg as such, no.”
He takes a deep breath. Closes his strange eyes, opens them.
He looks square at Achilles, and Achilles realizes, with a swoop in his stomach, exactly what Zagreus is going to say.
“Than wants to know if we can try being with you, Achilles. Sir. Even for a little bit. He said that when you were with him, you made him feel safe.”
Safe. The god of Death, ‘safe’ when embraced by him. No man but Patroclus had ever thought that in life. Achilles has ever been -- too much, too violent; too godly for mortals but a pale imitation to the divine.
He remembers Thanatos coming to him, all starlight and nervousness.
How he’d trembled in Achilles’ arms from the simple, everyday intimacy of having his hair touched.
Zagreus’s voice speeds up and jumps a register. His laurels are sparking so fast now the thickest leaves barely have a chance to grow before they’re shedding.
“Like I said, oh gods, this is awkward. It was just an idea. We can forget it, pretend I never said anything.”
“Stranger,” Patroclus cautions. “Let him answer.”
His hand is still so warm in Achilles’s.
Achilles squeezes it.
“Lad, I’m flattered,” he says. “I truly am, but -- I can’t. Not without Patroclus.”
Not for now at least, perhaps not ever again. In life, he’d shared so many beds, but in death he’d so long yearned for one. Patroclus can do as Patroclus pleases, but he cannot volunteer this for him.
Thankfully, his beloved has his own voice.
“And you would have me,” Patroclus says.
He snorts at Achilles’ blank stare.
“What? You think you get to use me as a cheap excuse? Or worse, you think I’m a foolish romantic?”
“Never!”
“Then don’t put it as such,” Pat says. “‘Not without Patroclus’. You are ridiculous.”
His eyes crinkle with the beginnings of a smile though, and his lips speak of nothing but amusement. Achilles wants to kiss it off his face, but he’s aware Zagreus is surely halfway to self-combusting.
He thinks of both Thanatos and Zagreus beneath them, Zagreus’s toes singeing the sheets where they curl.
“I am fine with it then,” Achilles says. “Where my heart goes, the rest of me follows.”
Pat reaches for his nectar again, forgotten as it had been on the green. He raises the cup as though he’s proposed a toast.
“So there you have it, stranger. The two of us, or neither. Simple enough, isn’t it?”
He leans back and solidly drains the cup.
“And bring that god of yours around, would you? Believe it or not, I would actually like to thank him for all these gifts you two have been bringing.”
Zagreus, slack-jawed, is still staring at both of them like they’ve sprouted Lernie’s heads.
“Are you sure , sirs?”
His voice is drawn so thin it might break. Achilles finds his own words a moment later, halfway to overwhelmed himself.
“Yes,” he says. All the gods help him, yes.
It doesn’t have to mean anything. It might not ever happen again. But the thought they might be there, to give both Zagreus and Thanatos something they need…
There are not many things a shade needs, but for the first time in a long time, Achilles wants .
“Now let’s get drunk enough I forget we have to go find more flagstones,” Patroclus says. “Utterly loathsome way to make buildings.”
Zagreus tips his head. His laugh, when it comes, is shaky but jubilant.
“Remind me why I can’t pay the Contractor for you?”
All three of them raise their glasses, and there is no more work done that day.