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Chapter Text

Odysseus didn't hear their screams, this time.

Before, when the Cyclops raised his club, when the crash of wood against bone cracked through the air, the cries of his men, his friends, his - Polites - had rung in his ears, shutting off all other senses, freezing him to the floor. Only Eurylochus had been able to cut through the sounds in time to save the others - and still, it was too late.

When the sea god raised the tide, crushed ships in walls of waves, Odysseus couldn't see, couldn't think, couldn't breathe as the cacophony of voices calling for their captain broke upon him, again, again, again. And then the silence.

In the lair, it had been almost a relief to know what was to come, to have a plan, even if it would bring death. To know that some at least would be saved. But as the torches had extinguished, each dying man’s solitary wail seemed louder than a hundred, and by the time Eurylochus’ voice joined them, desperate and accusing, Odysseus had shut down. Closed his ears, his heart. He had to get home.

So when the thunder bringer raised his bolt, it might have been the pressure, might have been the deafening crash, but Odysseus heard nothing as the last of his crew were ended. But gods, he couldn't close his eyes, not this time, and he saw their faces, contorted in fear, fury, betrayal, and then only pain as they turned to ash.

When darkness took him, he was almost grateful. It had been a false choice, then, after all. The gods delighted in such twisted games. Zeus hasn't meant to spare any of them. He was dead, with his crew, and the burden of impossible choice had been lifted. All he had to do now was wait.

No.

No.

No, he wouldn't accept it. He couldn't be dead. He /wouldn't/, wouldn't leave Penelope waiting for a husband that could never come home, Telemachus waiting for the father he'd never known. Not waiting like his mother, how could he have let her /die/ waiting?
He'd let too many die. So many, and all for nothing, but he couldn't have failed, it couldn't be over, it can't be! He had to get home!

He gasped for air. His breath was quick, shallow and short, eyes widening, chest seizing in panic. Dizziness filled his head. The mists of the Underworld hung heavy around him, grey and thicker than last time, clinging close. And the screams, again, all he heard -

But wait.

He was breathing.

Breathing, in the underworld.

And hearing, that clamor of souls that was all too familiar from his last doomed visit, when the prophet had pronounced their efforts for nothing, and Odysseus had resolved to change his fate. When he'd become the monster.

He looked down at himself. His tattered chiton was marked with scorches, his skin coated with a film of ash as gray as his surroundings. But he lacked the ghostly glow the souls had had, and when he made to rise, a stab lanced through his chest.

He forced himself up, grit his teeth, his mind starting to work again, spinning possibilities, searching for a plan. He had to find out what he could about where he was, /what/ he was now. He had to find a way to get home.

Chapter Text

The mists were everywhere, cloaking his sight. Thicker than they had been on their earlier journey, or maybe they just seemed so. Before, Odysseus had beheld the Underworld from atop the deck, the bow piercing the mists before them. It was in that clearing that he'd seen -

Oh, gods, they were here, and now so was he, not just passing through, anymore. Would he meet them? Would they recognize him? Would he be able to speak with them now, embrace them, would they ever forgive -

Stop.

Odysseus pushed the thoughts aside with almost physical effort. He couldn't linger here. He couldn't give up.

Penelope.

Telemachus.

He had to make it out, had to see them, or it all would be for nothing. Or they all would have died for nothing.

He pushed forward, eyes squeezed shut against tears. He couldn't see in these mists, so be it. He would rely on his other senses. The ground, cold against his bare feet, was mercifully relatively smooth, save for the scattered pools of water. He could feel his way forward, avoid any holes that might be too deep. It would be cruelly ironic to drown in the underworld, after surviving Poseidon. He walked.

***

It had been hours. At least, he thought it had been - time moved differently here, it seemed. And he was so weary. He'd been used to long marches in the war, in full armor, no less, but then, he'd been able to let his mind idle, the constant repetitive movement almost a respite for his churning thoughts.

Here, the need for constant alertness, navigating without sight, brought a fatigue that only deepened with straining his eyes - he couldn't help but try to see, after all, even if there was nothing to behold.

But wait. A light.

What was that?

Odysseus quickened his pace with renewed vigor, as the glow grew brighter, as he made out a form - slender, tall, arms outstretched.

It couldn't be.

On the ship, he had been the first one Odysseus saw. An entire underworld before them, but they’d happened to pass by the one person who'd been first in his thoughts since they entered the place - and now, again. Had Odysseus’ own mind drawn him?

Was he even really there?

But as he drew closer, his steps carrying him forward even as his thoughts froze, consumed by the ache that had held him in its grip ever since the club came down, he saw, sight clear at last even as his eyes filled with unshed tears -

That face.
Kind eyes, still so gentle, even filled with an unseeing, otherworldly glow.
His head, curls falling over his brows, wreathed by a strip of red cloth, darkened by blood on one side, blood that ran continually down towards his smiling mouth, his lips murmuring words Odysseus couldn't hear.

Polites.

The name left Odysseus’ lips before he realized, and slowly, Polites turned.

Could he - did he - hear him? See him?

The glow receded from Polites’ eyes, his brow furrowing. His beatific smile faded, replaced by a frown of concern. He squinted -

He doesn't have his glasses, Odysseus thought wildly -

And spoke -

“Odysseus?”

Polites. He was here. Not just the phantom seen from the ships creaking deck, the gentle voice caught in a loop of last thoughts. It was him, and he was here, and he - Odysseus rushed him, would have knocked him off his feet with his fierce embrace, but his hands passed through his friend’s form.

Odysseus fell, a shock of cold spearing his bones as his arms encircled only mist, Polites’ body flickering, merging with the shadows. Again, he tried, lunged from his prone position, but as he touched Polites’ knees, knelt like a supplicant before his friend, a jolt like ice shot through his chest. The shadows that were all that was left of his friend's body fled from his fingers, dissolving and re-forming.

Odysseus reached out a hand, but his head hung towards the ground, hair obscuring his face.

“Polites, I didn't want - I didn't mean - I - “
He stopped, lost, for once not knowing what to say.
The mists multiplied, swirling, a gentle pressure against his shaking shoulders.

“Ody.” Polites’ voice was soft. “I know. It's all right.”

No.

Polites’ voice held such sorrow, even in his reassurances. Odysseus knew his friend’s tone better than his own heartbeat, and he'd only heard it like that in the worst of moments. When his friend had been forced to harm, when the men he tried to heal died in his arms. When he knew someone was past saving.

“You're here, but you aren't,” Polites whispered. “What… what happened to you? “

He wasn't… Here?

No longer you.

It hit Odysseus then, the revelation a physical blow. For someone the goddess of wisdom had favored, how could he have been so dense?

He’d had to become the monster, and he thought he could. He'd worn the skin of ruthlessness as if it was his own flesh. His face had stayed stoic as he slaughtered the sirens. He'd barely felt a pang of guilt as he made the choice to slay six to save the rest, the cold calculation that would make his mentor proud, if she'd still been there. Because that would get them home.

Except it didn't. And he wasn't himself, anymore.

And Polites /knew./ Gods, he'd probably already seen the others, the last forty-two brothers he'd sent to their deaths. Shame choked him, his throat hoarse as he forced out the words.

“I couldn't do it, Polites. Open arms… everything went wrong. I had to choose - and I couldn't lose /them/. I had to - You were wrong, Polites.” His voice broke, and his next words were so low he could barely be heard. “In this world, only monsters survive.”

Odysseus’ knees dug into the ground, fists clenching the sludge at his feet. He couldn't look at his friend.

It wasn't enough that he'd killed Polites. It had been Odysseus’ own arrow that slew the sheep and enraged the Cyclops, his silver tongue that had failed to persuade, that had brought the club down.

It wasn't enough that he'd killed his crew.

But Polites had always seen the best in Odysseus, the good beneath the moral grime of war.
And now he'd killed that too.

He couldn't face him.

Not now.

Odysseus, king of Ithaca, the many-minded, the one who always had a plan.
He had no plan.
No way to get out of this.
He fled.

Chapter Text

In the Underworld, you couldn't run.

Odysseus was trying - his legs were moving, muscles burning, feet pounding against the ground, the strikes of his heartbeat frantic in his chest. But with the mists swirling so close, cloaking his sight, with those strange damp acoustics that simultaneously muffled sounds and amplified echoes, Odysseus couldn't tell if he was even truly moving.

/Polites knew./ He knew, he knew everything he'd done, and now -

Odysseus stopped, out of air - bent over, hands on his knees, chest heaving. He'd only meant to catch his breath, but suddenly he couldn't breathe at all, and the blackness around the corners of his vision grew.
His mind raced, thoughts tumbling.

/Breathe. Think. Put your emotions aside. Use your mind, Odysseus. Give me a premise./

He could almost hear his mentor (not mentor, not anymore). Her voice was always with him, inextricable, a commentary he'd gotten so used to it was inescapable, even now that she was no longer there to say the words. Some days he wished he could peel it from his skin.

But now it helped, shocking his system back into place, his tangled thoughts shifting into the familiar patterns of logic, as they'd practiced.

Major premise.
No mortal can see another's mind.

(How many times had he taken advantage of this truth? Wily Odysseus, Agamemnon had called him, admiring the way he concocted plans behind a stone-smooth countenance, never revealing the tricks til his targets were trapped.)

Minor premise.
Polites is mortal.

(too mortal, why, when he should have been raised to the stars upon death, the gods should have seen he deserved divinity)

Conclusion.
Polites cannot see into my mind.

(-though how often it had seemed he could-)

He inhaled slowly. Polites had said Odysseus wasn't here. That could mean Odysseus had changed, irrevocably - of course he had - but it didn't mean Polites knew how. Knew what had happened. What he'd done.

And he didn't need to.

Souls in the Underworld didn't seem to see each other. Odysseus had wondered at that, before. As they'd sailed through, each soul, seemed alone in its own small island, repeating a mantra - perhaps their last thoughts. But they didn't interact. Even his slain men, forever calling their captain in vain, hadn't seemed aware of each others’ presence - never touching, never glancing at each other, each alone in their pain.

Polites had probably not seen the crew.

(he felt his heart crack, at that - even in death, they could not reunite? They'd be waiting forever)
(waiting)

/Focus/. He wrenched his thoughts back.

He couldn't let Polites know of their fate. He couldn't let him see what he'd become. He owed him at least that, to save him grief, to spare him the view of a friend turned beast. Whatever Odysseus was here - dead, alive, undead - he had been given the chance to talk with his friend. To grant him peace for his rest.

He would have to lie.

His insides clenched at the thought of it. Polites had always been the one to see the truth in him, under the face of command, under the stoicism needed for war. He was like Penelope, that way.

It would be hard, but not impossible. He'd done it before, after all - after Troy, the wall, the child. It wasn't that he thought Polites wouldn't understand. Polites had always been /too/ understanding, too quick to forgive, to excuse. What Odysseus had done - he couldn't let himself take that forgiveness, as comforting as it would be. So he had stayed silent.

When he saw the light again, Odysseus closed his eyes, tears pricking behind the lids.
Breathed.
In.
Out.

Opened them to his friend’s face, radiating concern. A translucent hand, limned with light, reached out toward his shoulder to offer comfort he couldn't feel.

“You can relax, my friend.”

Chapter Text

“Polites.”

The name was a whisper, barely a breath.

Odysseus thought he had steeled himself for this moment. He had just seen his friend, overcome the shock. He had known Polites would seek him out, even as he fled. He had decided what must be done.

But what could he do when Polites looked at him like /this/?

Polites’ eyes were soft, kind - but so sad, his brows furrowed, jaw taut. Concern radiated from his entire demeanor.

Odysseus knew that look.

As the days of Troy stretched on, Odysseus had felt himself detatch, his mind still hatching endless plans, but his emotions faded, registering the bloody scenes before him only as obstacles to be overcome, his heart already half at home.

But Polites had never grown used to the war. He was brave, almost more so than anyone, Odysseus thought, his friend’s days spent in blood up to his elbows, tending to the injured, dragging comrades to safety. But each night, when battle ceased for the day and they retired to camp, Odysseus saw how it haunted him. Polites carried the grief his brothers could not let themselves feel. To Polites, Odysseus knew, every life lost - friend or enemy - was a blow.

Yet he never broke under the weight. He always checked in on others, encouraged them, left their hearts lighter. Including Odysseus. Especially him. He would have felt guiltier for it, for Polites’ selflessness, if he hadn't known it helped him, to help others. Sometimes, open arms helped him keep his balance.

So some nights, looking into those eyes, Odysseus couldn't help but unburden himself.

“Please, my friend.”

Polites’ voice was earnest, shot through with worry.

“Stay. You can talk to me. You know you can.”

His voice grew softer. His hands, suffused with light, rested on Odysseus’ shoulders, though he couldn't feel their warmth.

“Let me lift your burden.”

If only he could.

No. He wouldn't /let/ him.
Not this time, not when -

In his mind, wildly, he smelled ozone, heard the echo -
/I can take the suffering from you/

He shouldn't have looked up.

When Odysseus’ eyes met his friend’s, Polites’ gaze held him fast.

Odysseus broke.

Tears, held back since the lightning, overflowed, coursed down his cheeks. He lurched forward, hands on the ground, body racked with ragged breaths.

“I'm so sorry, Polites.”

The words wrenched themselves from his chest, opening the gates for a torrent more, and some part of Odysseus - who'd always chosen his words carefully, whose words were a tool deftly wielded - watched himself in horror, but he couldn't stop.

“Polites, I'm so sorry. He made me choose, I had to choose - again! - and I had to get back to Penelope, and he - he killed them - because I couldn't think in time, I couldn't think of anything else, but I - there should have been another way.”

Odysseus gritted his teeth, tasted blood in his mouth.

“Why couldn't I see another way!”

He clawed a hand through his hair.

“Why did he make me /choose/?”

He squeezed his eyes shut, a bitter smile curving his mouth before trembling overtook him again, and more broken words escaped.

“No, I know why, he's a god, and we're mortals, and what do they /care/ for our souls, we're just tools, playthings, it means nothing to them, but I could have -

I could have saved them, but I chose, and I killed them. Like the infant. Like the six I gave to Scylla. Like..

Like you.”

Odysseus’ head touched the ground now, his hands claws, nails raking the damp clay, its surface cool against his burning skin. Shame shuddered through his chest.
All the regret he couldn't admit before swirled in his stomach, pushed bile into his throat.
He couldn't speak now, only weep, emptied of words, lost.

Monsters weren't supposed to feel like this.

Monsters weren't supposed to /feel./

Odysseus waited for Polites to leave,
for the light he still sensed beneath closed lids to recede. Each breath felt stretched, the moments cold.

Polites would hate him now.
He /should/ hate him, he'd proven himself the opposite of his selfless friend, shown they were nothing alike.
He hadn't even been able to give him the gift of ignorance of his comrades’ fate, no careful words that could have brought solace in his death. Odysseus had been selfish, as always. Had granted only grief.

But the light remained.

Odysseus forced his eyes open, lids heavy, crusted with tears.
Looked up, and was surrounded.

Golden light flowed through the air, brighter than before, gleaming motes swirling around him. The underworld’s ghostly verdigris could no longer be seen. The air had grown warm, strangely so, and Odysseus realized slowly that Polites’ arms encircled him, embraced him from behind with a touch he still couldn't feel, and reluctantly, almost fearfully, burning with shame, he turned to face him.

Tears flowed freely down Polites’ face, but there was no anger in his gaze.
“So much guilt,” Polites whispered.

He tilted his head forwards, forehead touching Odysseus’ own.
“Ody. They're here too?”

Odysseus nodded wordlessly, more tears escaping. Met Polites’ eyes.

And Polites laughed softly - the sound almost tender, full of - was it relief? Then his eyes sobered, holding Odysseus’.

“Ody, you don't have to worry. If they're here, they're at peace. They -”
Polites paused, searching for words.

“The gods here are gentle,” he said. “I - I don't know if you'll understand how it works, you're not one of us yet, but - here, there's no regret. Here -”

He paused again, thinking. “Here, there are answers. We know why the Fates work as they do. Here, not only the prophets see paths.”

Odysseus searched Polites’ face, his own brow furrowed with confusion.
“Then why?” he burst out. “Polites, if you know, please - did they have to die? Could I have done something else? Could I have changed our fate? Why did I do… what I've done?”
Fresh tears streaked his face.
“Why… why did /you/ have to leave me?”

Polites reached out a hand as if to touch Odysseus’ cheek, eyes softening as his hand passed through.
“It's not your time,” he whispered. “You've got to get home to them. Ody, please, replace your guilt. No one here holds you to blame. You're still alive. You can get home.”

/Home./

The word rocked him, an almost physical force, pushing hope he hadn't known he'd lost back into his body, as the Underworld suddenly seemed to shudder around him, features now unclear, mists closing in again. Strangely, he felt sand under his feet. Smelled salt on a sudden breeze. Odysseus reached for his friend blindly, forgetting for a moment he couldn't feel his touch.

“Polites?”

The light grew brighter, searing now, and Odysseus had to close his eyes.

He opened them to waves and sky, to the sting of his sunburnt body against the sand.
He could get home.

He took a breath. Felt a trace of the guilt wash away with the tide that lapped at his back.

“Polites.

Thank you.”

Chapter Text

The waves were gentle on this shore.

Odysseus felt them against his back, his side - a soothing touch, almost human. If he closed his eyes again, he could almost imagine Penelope there, wrapping him in her arms as she loved to do, stroking his shoulders, folding her warm body against him, laughing. How he adored her laugh.

He could get home.

He almost had ceased to believe it was possible. Despite his desperate insistence to Eurylochus, home had began to seem a mirage. It was the vision he would forever strive for, thirst for, but every time it seemed close at last, it would vanish. He felt like the legend of Sisyphus, finally reaching the top of the cliff, feeling the weight of the boulder begin to ease - just as it started its new descent.

But Polites’ words, his presence, had kindled something in Odysseus. If his friend could now see all paths, as he claimed - and he said he could get home - Odysseus exhaled in relief. Maybe the prophet was wrong. Polites would be his prophet now.

But with the thought came a new wave of grief. Polites deserved to get home too, to live, to see his family, to fall in love - he never had before, a fact for which Odysseus had teased him, though gently. He should be starting his life anew on Ithaca’s sun-drenched shores, not left in the mists, reduced to a shade. No matter how at peace Polites said he was, now - though gods, he was glad he was at peace, at least that - his life had still been stolen. Odysseus would never forget that.

Tears glazed his vision again and fell, dampening the sand where the tide hadn't yet touched. But he steeled himself, preparing to force his body to rise to a seated position. He had to keep going, he owed it to Polites, at least. To remember him.

Pushing himself up, his muscles /screamed./ He almost fell back to the sand. He felt the jolt again through his bones, the lightning blasting the breath from him. He looked down at his hands, the bones jutting from his straining wrists, the fingers claw-like against the ground. Was he this weakened, that merely sitting was a trial? Still, he braced to rise fully, until a voice rocked him back onto his heels, sending him tumbling backwards again.

“You're awake!”

The exclamation ended in a delighted giggle, as Odysseus wrenched his neck around in the direction of the voice.

A woman.

Brown, springy curls bounced around a youthful face, dimples appearing as a smile stretched her cheeks. Her eyes gleamed.

“I thought you'd never wake! For a while I worried you were dead, but then when I touched your arm I saw you were dreaming, and oooh, you have so many people in your dreams! You talk to them, you know. Who's Polites? Eurylochus? Perimedes? And - huh, you have a lot of friends that start with P - who's Penelope?”

Odysseus’ mind spun - unable to process the whole stream of words, he answered only the last.

“My wife.”

“ Your…”

For a moment, her face fell, but then dimpled again, beaming. “Perfect!” Without warning, she grabbed his hand, and her form -

/shifted/ -

and his wife was before him, she was /there/, hand warm in his, her dark, intelligent eyes soft as she gazed at him, lips parted in that knowing smile, a curl slipping from her crown to fall across her face, and he almost wept as he reached for her, lifted a hand to cup her chin, and she pulled him closer and laughed -

No.

That wasn't Penelope’s laugh.

He wrenched himself back in a jolt, jerking away from her hand, ignoring the pain that shot through his body, and saw with horror her face shift back, becoming narrower, eyes changing from dark to silver, but her smile remained. She dimpled, shaking her head.

“I thought you'd like that, silly. You liked looking at her in your dreams. I can look like that too, you see! I can be her, or maybe your friend, the one with the headband, let me try -”

And he shivered as she touched his knee and suddenly, it was Polites’ weathered-but-soft hand, his strong fingers, his face smiling blithely beneath his forever-slipping glasses, and -

“NO!”

He pushed her hand away, breathing hard, fumbling for his sword, finding only an empty scabbard. But his mentor’s lessons on fighting unarmed hadn't been in vain, and he fisted a handful of sand, pitched it into her eyes, scrabbled back as he did, forcing himself up into an unsteady, pained, combat stance.

But she only laughed again, the sound riveting him to the ground, as the sand he'd thrown floated around her, hovering like sunbeams in the air, never touching her body. She lifted a hand, put it to her mouth, then brushed the particles away as if blowing a kiss.

“Silly mortal,” she giggled, her smile only widening. “It's all right. Of course you’re a little scared, it's only natural. Everything must be frightening for your kind, your lives are so short. You probably need time to adjust, you don't know me yet. But don't worry. I feel like I know you already. It won't be long. We have forever, after all.”

Chapter Text

Forever.

Odysseus stood frozen.
He did not fight, did not run. He did not feel the word rasp from his throat, his tongue paper-dry in his mouth.
“Goddess.”

The deity giggled again, bending in a playful curtsy, motioning that he should bow. “See, we're already getting to know each other. My name is Calypso, and you can count yourself lucky, little mortal - not many behold me and live!”

Odysseus stared. His breath was quick and shallow. His chest felt hollowed, but air wouldn't fill his lungs. A goddess.
Not again.
Would the gods never tire of using him as their plaything? He'd bowed to the thunder god’s cruel choice, he'd doomed his men - did that sacrifice mean nothing?

“Don't worry, love,” she laughed, her voice gentle. “I'm not one to go about smiting, not like the other gods. It's just, you're the first mortal who's washed up here still alive! With the others, I could practice, but-”

here she shifted again, her form changing rapidly -

A weathered sailor with sunburned skin, his wool chlamys revealing a scarred shoulder, a bleeding wound in his side.

A blue-clad woman with golden hair, her peplos torn, eyes staring, haunted.

A youth in armor, curls damp around a pale face, eyes closed, a bow clutched in one hand.

A haggard old man, knees bent inwards, beard tangled.

And then back to her own form, (was it her own?), eyes gleaming as she tossed her head to swing her shining braids, curling one around her finger as she spoke.

“I couldn't communicate with them like I can with you. There were no pictures behind their eyes. So dull.”

A pout curved her lips down, but she brightened and reached out for him again.

Odysseus stepped back without thinking, reeling a bit, the sand unsteady under his feet.

“Still so shy. It's all right,” she chirped. You're going to love it here, I know it. Here, come this way!”

She beckoned, curling a hand toward Odysseus with a smile.

What could he do? His mind raced. He couldn't ignore a goddess. Who knew how she'd respond to that kind of slight? If he followed now, made her believe he was docile, biddable, perhaps she would leave him be.

He took a step forward, then another, but the third sent pain shuddering through his limbs, and he fell, crashed to the ground, his legs tangled, the ache of lightning coursing again through his body.

Calypso’s eyes widened.

“Oh, but you're hurt! You poor dear, let me help.”

She lifted him as if he were weightless, a burst of soothing noises issuing from her lips as his whole body stiffened, pulled away.

“I know, I know, I'm so sorry,” she comforted, as he grit his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut so he couldn't see how she'd /changed/ again, the moment she touched him. But he could feel, through the pain, and the arms that held him were Penelope’s, strong and full, her callused weaver’s fingers cradling his body, achingly gentle.
He relaxed into them without thinking - then realized, tensed again.

/Open your eyes,/ he told himself, willing himself to stay conscious, to strategize, to think, to stop /feeling/.

But when he did, his eyes opened into the deep olive of Penelope’s neck, the edge of her chin set in determination as she carried him, and he was so, so tired. Could he pretend? Just for a moment?

She set him down on - was it a bed? A soft surface pushed against his back, but his limbs seized as he sank into it, a spear of pain shot through his body.

He reopened his eyes to hers regarding him, and they were Penelope’s, warm and dark as heartwood, lit with concern.

It’s not her.

/It’s not her, it's not her, it's not /her/, Odysseus repeated in his mind, ripping his gaze away from the eyes, darting glances from side to side, trying to think, to reason in between spasms of pain, to keep his mind.

The lightning hadn't hit him directly, so why were these effects still so strong? When it hit the others, they'd vanished, consumed in light as gold as the blood of the slain cow, illuminating their features in agonized detail before they were just - gone, himself left floating amid splintered wood.

He could still see the afterimage every time he closed his eyes, the scene bruise-blue against his lids.

He groaned, the memory sharp, and Calypso made more soothing sounds, mistaking his wince as she touched his jaw, tilting back his head, pouring something sweet, syrup-smooth into his mouth, caressing a finger against his throat.

“This will help you heal, “ she crooned.

The mouth he opened to protest swallowed involuntarily instead, and immediately, his vision dimmed.

He heard her say something more, but couldn't tell what it was, all senses subsiding.

His mind careened, thoughts flying apart into sensations that faded as soon as he felt them, impressions he hadn't known he'd remembered.

The bolt descending, the blaze crackling at the edges, suspended above them and upon them in the same moment.

The stench of his own singed flesh.

And seconds, eternities later, the peal of thunder, resounding in his ears, and one wild thought -

Thirty-four men had seen the bolt.

Only he had heard it.

And then emptiness, and he was drifting again, into the dark.

Mists swirled, again. Again, that voice.

“You're back.”

Chapter Text

It wasn't Polites.

The Underworld surrounded Odysseus once again, but this time, no light pierced the murk. Only a voice.

“Who are you?”

Odysseus’ voice echoed, bouncing strangely off the cavernous walls. For a moment, he wasn't sure it was his own.

“He told me you'd be here.”

The voice, deep but young, was familiar, but Odysseus couldn't place it. He turned, craning his neck, peering through the mists.

“Where are - “

A figure stepped forward, a slim frame, shaggy hair, matted with blood. His neck was slightly twisted, but his face was unpained, eyes bright.

Odysseus’ brows furrowed in a squint.

“Elpenor?”

The man laughed, a smile twisting wryly.

“Captain. So you remember me now.”

Odysseus felt his face heat with shame.
The youth had been one of the last Circe released from enchantment. Odysseus hadn't seen the men’s transformation, and Eurylochus had been in too much shock to elaborate once he'd told his tale - but if it had been as gruesome as the reversal, Odysseus understood his fear.

When Circe had brought in the pigs, a small nymph with braided curls herding them forward before scurrying away, she had put a hand on his shoulder.

“It won't be pretty,” she'd cautioned.

The pigs had blanched at the spell, paling, frozen in place, almost instantly starting to shake as their forms enlarged. Thick bristles disappeared into some of their skin, burst out in other parts as hair and beards. Their hind legs lengthened, extended, bones cracking audibly as the skin stretched and split, knees breaking through the remainders of hooves, legs split into thigh and calf, jointless ankles curling into feet. Their front legs stretched, gave way as bones pierced outwards, jointed limbs bending every way before settling into their sockets.

Every man came to themselves shivering, sweating, gasping. Some wept in relief or pain, others voided the contents of their stomachs onto the shining floor. And Elpenor, despite being one of the last returned, had stood on shaking legs sooner than the rest, launched himself across the room toward his crewmate, Perimedes. Throwing his arms around the larger man in an embrace, Elpenor had laughed, beaming, gripping his shoulders, eyes dancing. Perimedes had looked bewildered, still shaking off the effects - but before Odysseus had bent to comfort the others who now were also rising, he saw a rare smile cross the man's face.

During the preparations to embark to the Underworld, Eurylochus had said something about Perimedes being frantic, about a crewmate being missing, but Odysseus had only half-listened, lost in contemplation. And when they entered the Underworld, there had been no more thoughts to spare.

“How did you…”

Odysseus almost asked how he died, then bit the words back before they reached his lips. Even if he had looked for Elpenor on the island, ensured he was safe, he would have died only days later. If not to Scylla, then burned by the blast, or drowned in its wake. Still under his watch. Still his fault.

“You didn't notice.”

The youth said it matter-of-factly, no accusation in his voice - though his lips curled up on one side, an eyebrow raised.

“I mean, we knew you always had your eyes on the goal - getting us home. I guess I admired that. But… captain, with all respect… there was a lot you missed.”

Elpenor shifted his weight on his feet, a hand reaching up absently to run a hand through his hair, brushing his head wound. There seemed to be no physical pain in the Underworld - Odysseus’ own had been thankfully allayed since he had re-emerged here - but the youth still pulled his hand back, as if surprised at the wound there.

“We were celebrating.”

Elpenor’s voice was soft.

“Perimedes wasn't the only one who… wanted to forget, sometimes.” Elpenor’s hand rubbed the back of his neck, and he made a sound that was half a scoff, half a sigh. “I brought wine to the roof. I thought - I hoped he'd join me there.”

His eyes flicked back up to Odysseus, fixed on his captain. “And then I was here, looking at our ship. Wondering why I wasn't on the deck.”

Odysseus met his eyes with effort. He owed him at least that much, even though it was too late. He had deserved to be seen. Deserved, like all of them, so much more than the end they received.

“I'm so sorry, Elpenor.”

Odysseus’ voice was low, rough in his throat, though his eyes stayed steady on his crewman.
He had promised to remember them.
To keep their flame.
That they wouldn't die in vain.
Shame burned through him, and his gaze finally fell, fixing on his own hand, curling and uncurling at his side.

“I meant to bring you home.”

He didn't see Elpenor move closer, but he felt his presence, a hand just above his shoulder, stopping before it reached him.

“It's not all bad, Captain.”
Odysseus looked up, catching the flicker of a wry smile as it crossed the youth’s face.

“At least I have company.”

From another man, the words could have been bitter, but Elpenor’s tone was light.

“I didn't have to wait too long. You have quite a way with gods.”

The youth smiled now, a real one, his old humor in his voice.

“It's all right. Really. It's - restful, here.”

His eyes softened.

“I found Peri, and Polites. It took a while - but you learn how to find your way here.”

Elpenor dropped his hand from Odysseus’ shoulder, let out a sigh that seemed to echo in the absence of other breath.

“But you have a ways to go, don't you?”

He turned for a moment, looking over his shoulder, and stepped back, meeting Odysseus’ eyes with another half-smile before his form started to fade.

“Remember me this time?”

Odysseus nodded, didn't speak. His throat worked in a swallow as he watched the youth til the mists embraced him once more, til they shifted and parted, revealing someone else.

And his eyes snapped wide, his breath pierced his chest.

He wasn't ready.

Chapter Text

The mists receded around the man, haloing his form, mingling with the heat steaming from his body. Pale streaks of lightning snaked just under his skin, pulsing as if to mimic the heartbeat he no longer had. The strike lived in him. His eyes still held the storm.

“Captain.”

The word seethed between the man's lips. His eyes were hard.

/No one holds you to blame,/ Polites had said.
He must not have seen Eurylochus.

“Why are you here?”
Eurylochus’ voice was measured, a veneer of calm stretched over his words, though his jaw was taut, his bearing one Odysseus knew too well.

“I don't know.”
The moment Odysseus spoke, the cruelty of it struck him, that this was only the converse of the last words his brother had heard him say.

Eurylochus regarded him, his face flickering between emotions, brows furrowed.

“You didn't die.” The words were a statement and a question at once. An accusation.

“I didn't.”

Odysseus’ voice was almost a whisper. He wished he hadn't spoken. Wished he was back on the island, even, with the terrifying goddess, that this was one of her tricks. Then he could tell himself this wasn't real.

His heart beat deafeningly in his ears, louder than it had ever been, save once.

The Cyclops’ cave. The instant the club had come down, time had stopped for Odysseus. He couldn't think, couldn't see. Couldn't imagine a world in which this had happened, that Polites, of all of them, had fallen.

A nightmare. It must be.

He just had to awake.

So he had frozen, mind frayed, deaf to the frantic cries of his men, ears resounding with the club’s descent. In his mind, it landed on Polites, again and again. His last word, echoing. Until he heard the word in Eurylochus’ voice, cracked in desperation.

“Captain!”

A heartbeat.

He’d blinked once, and saw.

Eurylochus, his face splashed in blood, chest rising with rapid breaths.

Twice.

The men, some running, eyes bright with panic, some staring, limbs unmoving, still as the corpses that now littered the cave floor.

Seven bodies.

How had he only heard the first blow?
If he was to save his brothers, he had to act now. He'd had a plan. What had it been? His thoughts careened, crashed into each other. Nothing made sense.

Then, Eurylochus’ hand on his shoulder.
His presence, steady.
He was what had brought him back. What spurred his mind to action, jostled thoughts spinning together into pieces of a plan.
Eurylochus had trusted him.

Until he hadn't.

“Why didn't you listen?”

The words flew from Odysseus before he knew he had said them, hung in the empty air.

Eurylochus’ eyes flashed. One brow raised.

“I didn't listen?”

Eurylochus let out a sound, half scoff, half bitter laugh. He shook his head, closed his mouth, started to pace. He took five steps before turning on his heel, like always, a part of Odysseus observed. The length of their war tent.

He paced that length twice before turning again, stopping right before Odysseus.

“How could I? Tell me, would /you/ listen to a man gone mad? A man who - who you thought you knew, but you didn't anymore, because what captain lets a monster slay his friends and doesn't fight? Sacrifices six without a word?”

He turned away from Odysseus, as if to begin pacing once more. Odysseus took a step toward him, saw his back muscles twitch as his shoulders rose and he spoke again.

“Remember Aulis?”

Odysseus stopped, his foot returning to the ground.

Troy. King Agamemnon had sent him on a strange mission - to fetch his daughter, Iphigeneia, to their camp. She was to marry Achilles, he’d said. The king often sent Odysseus to talk to people who needed convincing. Odysseus was persuasive, diplomatic, and perhaps the girl would be nervous, unsure about a wedding to such a warrior as Achilles.

Odysseus was there to reassure her, he thought, and to convince her mother. And even if his silver tongue failed to assuage her nerves, he was living proof that a marriage could bring joy. They'd all heard him exalt Penelope at every opportunity.
It would be an easy task, he thought, and it was. The girl had come willingly, shyly excited, her mother proud.

Until her blood splattered the altar and Odysseus had realized what the king had truly made him do.

“You raged,” Eurylochus murmured. “Threw the table, after, back in our tent. Polites and I barely stopped you from doing something reckless, getting executed. You couldn't believe he had done it, and even more, that he had sent you and not told what he'd intended. How he could make her a pawn, like that. You said maybe she would have agreed, but it shouldn't have been like this. You said sacrifices should be willing.”

Sacrifices should be willing.

The words pounded in Odysseus’ ears. Guilt rose in him like bile, thick, bitter, and he couldn't - not now. He turned, stepped in front of Eurylochus, let anger fill his eyes instead of tears, let fury lift him so he wouldn't fall.

“You were going to do the same!”
Odysseus spat the words.
“On the island, you were all too ready to abandon our friends to Circe, when you saw her power. You would have sacrificed more. And I knew Scylla’s strength, knew we could never win. Why did you think this would be any different?”

“Because you were the one who showed me it could be!”

The shout tore from Eurylochus’ throat, seeming to almost surprise him with its vehemence. His shoulders rose and fell, rose and fell again, his eyes burning into Odysseus. When he spoke again, his voice was low, ragged, both the cold calm of before and the rage of the moment evaporated. The words flowed, more than Odysseus had ever known his brother to express.

(Or just more than he had let him express?)

“You did the impossible, captain - again.” Eurylochus held his brother's gaze. “You showed there was a way, that it wasn’t hopeless, even after so many slain. You know I never believed in Polites’ path. He would always choose open arms, we both loved him for it. But I knew, /you/ knew, the world wasn't that kind. He could greet the world that way because we were by his side. I had strength, caution. You had - that damned cleverness.”

Eurylochus shook his head, expression flickering somewhere between bitterness and amusement. “Ever since we were boys together. You slew that boar and I thought you could do anything, I would have followed you anywhere. And he - he did follow you, everywhere. And then, you…”

His words cut off, and he looked down for a moment. His eyes flashed beneath furrowed brows. He didn't say the rest.
He didn't need to.

Odysseus drew in a slow breath.
In the cave, he'd thought Eurylochus’ trust had been what kept him going. To find that that was the moment his faith had started to fade…

He closed his eyes, grit his teeth, ground them. His crew had been comrades, but he was their captain first. He knew he needed to lead with brilliance, to always have a plan for them, to mask any uncertainty, show no indecision. But Polites, Eury - he'd thought they'd known his human side. The part that wavered. The part that needed counsel. Needed his friends. Anger pulsed through him, again. Couldn't Eurylochus have allowed him one moment of weakness? One mistake? If he could only…

“I thought we were lost.” Eurylochus’ voice was low. “The Cyclops - Polites. The sea god - almost everyone, gone in an instant. And then the witch - I knew we were done for. When you insisted on going back in, I thought you'd lost your legendary mind.”

Something between a laugh and a choke forced its way through his lips. His eyes didn't meet Odysseus’.

“And then you did it. Somehow, gods know how, you saved us, again. You were back.”

Eurylochus released a breath he no longer needed, the sound heavy in the silence. “I thought you were back.”

“I was never the hero you thought I was,” Odysseus whispered. The words tasted sour.

“I wanted to be. But what worked in Troy, however bloody and cursed and pointless that war - the rules all changed when we left those shores. I - couldn't lead us home. Poseidon was r-”

“Poseidon was wrong!”

Eurylochus surged forward, eyes flashing, hand clenching to grab Odysseus’ wrist, closing, unable to take hold. Odysseus stood there. Looked down at his hand. His breath shook as it left his lungs.
Remnants of Eurylochus’ shout echoed against the walls.

“You didn't need to be ruthless,” Eurylochus said.
“You needed to let us fight by your side.”

His voice was soft now, the low tone of counsel that Odysseus hasn't heard since… before the sea god.

A weight shifted somewhere in Odysseus’s chest. Pain, and it wasn't the lightning.
Eurylochus hadn't been the one who had refused to listen.

“You tried to tell me that.”
Odysseus’ voice came out hoarse. Heaviness filled his chest, his eyes, his throat. His eyes stung.

Eurylochus nodded, wordless now, the torrent passed.

“I thought it was another challenge,” Odysseus whispered. “I thought you were losing hope. If I could just achieve one more feat, acquire the gods’ help, you'd believe again. All of you would listen, and we would make it through. We'd make it home.”

Eurylochus studied him. For several moments, neither man spoke.

“Do you remember what you said when you made me second-in-command?”

Odysseus raised his head, red-rimmed eyes staring in confusion.

Eurylochus’ voice was soft. “I told you it was a bad idea. Told you the men would think you'd done it because we were brothers, because of family ties and friendship rather than skill. And you said… That this was why. That no one else…”

“Ever told me my ideas were bad,” Odysseus finished, a watery smile on his lips.

“Then why?”

The words were raw, shot through with renewed anger.

“You said you chose me because I challenged you, was the only one who saw the cracks in your brilliant plans. But how can that be true, when every time I did, you shut it down?”

“Eury-”

“You told me to be devout. Devout, as if you were a god, as if even the gods-blessed don't make mistakes. And I tried, I watched as that damned pride of yours led us into danger again and again. True, you saved us, many times. You worked miracles. But we wouldn't have needed miracles if you'd just -”

“I know!”

Odysseus’ voice rang out in the emptiness of the cavern, louder than either had expected. Anger, mostly at himself, tangled in his throat, stalled further words. His mouth worked, his brows drawn in. He looked at his friend. When he spoke again, his voice was hoarse.

“I know. I should have listened to you.”

Eurylochus’ eyes widened. The clench of his jaw softened. But that was all Odysseus saw before the mists drew in around him again, blinding him. Before the pain crawled back into his body, spidering through his limbs. He opened his mouth - to speak? to scream? - and felt air rush into his throat. Light, sudden and burning, stung his closed lids.

“Odysseus?”

Chapter Text

Odysseus opened his eyes, and immediately squeezed them shut. The face that looked down at him was Penelope's, but the eyes, full of concern, were silver. The pain was back, muted but steady, a heavy ache permeating his limbs. Far sharper was the guilt that arced through his chest.

“Send me back,” he croaked through a throat dry with disuse. “I need to tell him-”

“Back where, my love?”

Odysseus heard the confusion in her voice as he registered it was farther away, and opened his eyes to see her several feet away, pouring water from a clay hydria into a cup.

“You were dreaming, beloved.”

She turned, and Odysseus couldn't look away, dazzled by Penelope's smile on the goddess’s face. Calypso approached him with the vessel, her hands moving with unnatural speed, one lifting his head, the other pouring a thin stream of water between his lips.

Odysseus gulped eagerly, only now realizing his thirst, grasping the vessel with both hands even as pain shot through his arms with the effort. It was only when he had drained it that her words registered in his mind.

“It was no dream. And I'm not…” He paused. He could ill afford to anger another goddess, especially in his weakened state. But her endearments burned. It was enough she wore /her/ face, spoke in her voice. He could not stomach it.

“Forgive me, goddess, but I am not myself. I am… distracted, when you wear her form,” Odysseus faltered, grasping for the formality demanded by the divine.

(all but Athena, she was always the exception, his mentor, his fr–)

His voice came out shaken, any confidence gone.

“Please, goddess, take no offense. But I - I have only one love. I beg you, do not use such endearments for me. I… am not worthy.”

The goddess’s brows furrowed, and she seemed to grow taller, to broaden and expand. Odysseus lowered his head, bracing for judgment, for more pain than already lanced through his limbs.

He startled as he found himself in an embrace, to strong arms pinning his arms to his sides, holding him fast. He looked up to eyes now a warm brown, to a brow drawn with concern, to a face he knew as well as his own, but without the thin lines drawn by hunger and grief. Without the turmoil that aged his friend beyond his years.

“Oh, but you are,” the voice said, and it was low, the timbre warm.
“Though she is not your only loved one. You wished to see me, then. The one in your mind before waking. You wanted to tell me something. Go on.”

And when her lips upturned, it was Eurylochus’ smile, from before. They had always been subtle, his smiles, always that slight curve, that glint of the eyes breaking through his usual solemnity.

Her likenesses were improving. His mind registered the fact, swiftly cataloging his enemy's strength, a strategist even as his gut recoiled in horror and dread pulsed through his veins. He knew this wasn't Eurylochus, /knew/ it, but his chest ached with guilt and his breath hitched. His eyes burned, and he looked away, unable to look at the lie that cloaked the goddess, his friend’s stolen face.

Eurylochus, the true Eurylochus, had been about to speak. His eyes had lost their accusing glare, the ice that had frozen them since Scylla. It was surely exhaustion, Odysseus thought. But maybe, maybe - the start of forgiveness? Could he hope? His gaze found the ground, studied the soil at his feet.

He did not deserve it.

Not after his choice.

When the thunder god laid down his decree, it had split his world jagged, two worlds parting the waves.

On one side, the prophecy. He would not make it home.

On the other, the monster.

His hand had trembled as he pointed to the crew. His body had felt as if it would shake apart.

But he had chosen, nonetheless. He let them fall, as he had released the infant from his grasp, as he had turned his head from the torches, from his sailors’ cries.

As he turned his gaze now, from his brother's too-soft eyes, from the hand on his shoulder, firm, reassuring. From the lie.

He shook off her hand, nausea rising in his throat.

The goddess sighed. Her form shifted again, the movement drawing his eyes. Her own held disappointment, petulance. Her hand found his arm again, clasped his wrist. A manacle.

“Must you be so difficult?” Her voice was crestfallen, pitch higher - almost a whine.
“I can make you happy, you know. I will, before long. You're in paradise, you're a goddess’ guest. What more could you wish for?”

Odysseus was silent, his body stiff. He would not meet her gaze.

After several moments, her frown deepened, smooth brow furrowing in annoyance. “Fine, then, be stubborn,” she pouted. “I can wait - I can wait years. They're nothing to me.” Turning on her heel, she took a few steps away.

Odysseus let out a soft sigh, relief relaxing his bones. But she spun on her heel, her face swiftly brightening. “Ah, but I have an idea. I know what will cheer you up!“

She almost skipped away, humming to herself, a lively tune.

Odysseus shuddered. Closed his eyes, as the ache he had forgotten in his fear shot sharp again, spasming the muscles in his shoulders. Gingerly, he lowered himself to the ground, braced his back against a rock. The sound of the ocean thrummed in his ears.

His lips moved, soundless. A litany, a ward against despair.

Penelope.

Telemachus.

My love.

My boy.

Again and again, the words formed on his tongue. He watched the sea. The steady tide.

It never ebbed. It crept, lacing the shore with foam, the shimmering blue reflecting the now-sinking sun. Even as it moved, waves tranquil and slow, it was still. A world without time.

He had to escape.

Chapter Text

Escape swallowed Odysseus’ thoughts, but his body was a barrier he could not break past. Whenever he tried to rise, pain shrieked under his skin. He had never before taken so long to heal. Never been immobilized like this. He was trapped, again, by the gods. The thunder bringer’s strike had sunk deep.

The goddess did not seem to understand.
Her own wounds healed in moments, from the scratch of an errant thorn to the gash on her knee from tripping over a stone. Her pain was fleeting, her winces soon replaced by laughter at her own clumsiness. She knew mortals could be injured, could die. But she seemed perplexed that healing took time, skeptical of his excuses for not following her to pick berries or dance in the surf. How could he convince her?

At Troy, when he’d had an idea that he was sure would work, but that the leaders might resist, when its merits were clear to him but he wasn't sure how to convey it to the proud king, he had thought of Penelope, and her tapestries. How her fingers coaxed fibers into scenes, shaped stories whole in her hands. She wove plans into reality - and, thinking of her, he’d found he could do the same. In Agammemnon’s nods of approval at the strategies he shared, in the way his schemes unfolded in battle, he had felt her eyes sparkle as she turned over her cloth, saw the knotted weft flipped to reveal her shining scenes.

His words were threads that wove him back to her.

But Penelope was farther now than ever, and his loom was bare.

Eyes fleeing from the goddess’ gaze, he grasped to tie together an explanation, some halting excuse. She did not seem to know much of the world, he mused. He could use that.

As a sailor, he told Calypso, he required waves, sun, and open air to heal. He had to stay on the shore.

Somehow, she believed him.

Perhaps her inexperience made her credulous, or maybe it was just plausible enough. Nymphs were often tied to elements, after all - the stories told of dryads bound to trees, of naiads who flourished or fell with their rivers’ fate. Why would mortal men be different?

Often, he felt her eyes on him, tracing his form, cataloguing the slow smoothing of his scars and wounds. How much time was left? How long till she tired of waiting?

He woke in the mornings to her singing. Her voice, velvet and clear, was almost enough to lull him into ease - he felt the spell stirring his skin, a shiver of breeze in the humidity that hung over the ground. Her song was sweet - sweet as Scylla’s.
Before the jaws closed.

The sea beast must also have seen into minds, Odysseus realized.

/Drown in your sorrow and fears,/ Scylla had sung to Perimedes, who paced the deck each night, fists clenched white with an anger that thrummed with fear. Elpenor had never been buried, and Odysseus knew how that haunted him. In the mornings, the man woke with hollows beneath his eyes, ever-deepening shadows.

/Choke on your blood and your tears/.
Her voice had been a growl as her eyes snapped to a young sailor, who froze in her gaze. Odysseus hadn't known him, not well. But in his collapse after slaying the sirens, his shoulders shaking as he covered his face and sank to the deck, Odysseus had felt the pang of Polites’ first kill, defending a comrade in arms.

/Bleed till you run out of years/.
Argyros, one of their eldest. Ten years of battle had turned his grey-black hair to white, his muscled form to stringy sinew. He was as strong as any of them, still - but Odysseus knew he longed for home, for rest. For the peace he'd not survived to feel.

Their screams swarmed his ears, crawled in itching, like mites. When he shook his head to clear them, his eyes focused again, found Calypso’s clouded face.

Her hand was gentle on his wrist, and it took everything he had not to shake it off.

“I know you see them, “ she said, her eyes shining with something far from tears. “Mortality is such a waste. But you need not worry, my love. Such a gruesome fate need never be yours.” She beamed, suddenly, the shift sending a shudder through him that he fought to conceal.

“I am a goddess, as you know.” Playful dimples deepened on her cheeks. “And as one, I have access to a certain elixir. The gods on high weren't entirely without mercy when they left me on this island - because they gave me this. Maybe they knew I'd meet someone to share it with.”

A small bottle appeared in her palm, of delicate crystal that sparkled as it caught the sun. Inside, amber nectar gleamed.

“It never runs out.” She chirped the words, eyes dancing. “The doves can't bring it like they do up there - they can't reach us. But I'll always have enough. Enough for you, too.”

She clasped her hands together. “You'll never have to worry about that nasty business again. Killing, death - eugh.” Her tongue protruded in disgust.

She held out the bottle, and her smile returned. “Go on, Ody. Try it! It could even help with…”
She gestured to his broken form.
“All this.”

Odysseus couldn't remember what he had replied.

He'd woken later to the darkened beach, the sun long set, nothing in his mind except a vague sense of dread - and relief that he was alone. His hands were trembling, and he wrapped his arms around his shivering frame.

The days passed, and Odysseus watched the sea. Half outside himself, his days echoed the tide.

He rose.

He waited.

He fell, into sleep dark and dreamless, that always seemed to end in seconds. He woke in the mornings with sand in his hair, salt stinging his eyes. In his brief slumber, he heard no crew’s cries. Not even nightmares would visit him, for now the screams saved themselves for the day, roaring in his ears, relentless.

The hours passed like waves.

Each day, the goddess came. He no longer startled at her approach, for he felt her presence as soon as her eyes fell on his bowed back. Felt her heat, oppressive. Her steps that never stirred the sand.

Each day, she proffered the bottle, the liquid inside golden, glowing. In its shimmer, he saw the glint of the trident.
The flash of a sword.
The blood of the cow that doomed his crew.

She held out immortality as a gift, her lips a smiling bow above its gilt, but her brows curved in inverse echo when, each day, he refused.

She offered life, forever. Life without /them/, a fate crueler than any he could imagine. Ensnared for eternity.

She spoke, she touched his shoulder, and he wanted to unwind the cage of his ribs, stretch each bone straight to shake off her grasp. He wanted to flatten himself into the earth, so that the winds might sweep him away, so that he might become dust.

There was no dust - not in this verdant land, where vines curled like bonds around his wrists and water seeped from a soil that sprung with life. No dust in this wind that carried the scent of the sea, that tantalized and denied. The plants were only movement, growing before his eyes, and the sea was only stillness, a cycle, a curse. Everything around him bloomed, burst.

Odysseus withered.

Chapter Text

He no longer ate.

Each night, she left food, sometimes as he slept, and he'd wake to find fish wrapped in leaves, scales gleaming, fruit bright with dew. He left it untouched, as well as the wine, pouring it out into the nearby stream when he ventured from the beach. But he refilled the vessel with water, again and again, drinking as if he could drown in it, his throat parched even as he gulped endless cups. She started to leave more vessels, now filled with water instead of wine, and he was almost grateful, til he realized it meant she had increased her vigilance. At no moment was he free from her gaze.

Until one day, her visits ceased. She left him alone. He would wake in the mornings, and the dread would ache through his bones as he waited for her, because surely any second she would appear. But the days rolled past, the tide rose and fell, and he remained alone.

It should have been a relief.

Yet it was somehow more cruel, not knowing, uncertain when she would arrive. He almost wished for the daily jolt of fear, because that at least would subside. The anxiety wouldn't stretch on like this, wouldn't crawl through his limbs that no longer physically pained him, prickle his back that no longer spasmed.
Despite the lack of food, the dread in his gut, new energy pulsed through him. He was growing stronger.

So he sought her out. He wouldn't dare to hope that she had truly disappeared, but he needed to know, in order to plan.

He did not find her.

He combed the woods, the pools, the caverns of shining gems. The places she'd lounged, weaving or singing or twining flowers into her braids, every haunt she'd excitedly shown him since he arrived. But she had left no trace.

Had she given up?

Wild with hope, he began to work, leaving the beach to turn new eyes upon the forest. The trees, straight and strong, could furnish a raft, the grasses could be braided into rope. The sheets the goddess had lain on him in his sleep could be turned into a sail.

He left the water vessels on the beach, for now he could drink straight from the stream, bending his neck til his whole head was submerged in the pond, gulping it greedily, feeling it cool his sweating skin. He ate again, fruit pulled from the trees, clams plucked from the surf. Fuel for his labor.

The raft found shape, the branches braced against the ground, the braided twine lashed tight. With each stroke of a sword now dulled by sawing wood, with each knot rolled between blistered fingers, he felt his loved ones call, their voices mournful but oh, so welcome in his ears.

Odysseus.
Husband.

Father.
Odysseus.

They called his name, and he almost wept, for though they sounded distant, they felt so near. He spoke to them, knowing they couldn't hear, but yearning with everything he had. He longed for even their phantoms, to attempt to embrace them, no matter if they flew from his arms.
“I'm coming home, my loves, my heart,” he whispered, and their calls grew faster, the syllables of his name blurring into the wind.

Why did they sound so frightened?

They should not be afraid, not when he was closer to them than ever. Not when the blade felt light in his hands even as the blisters stretched wide across his palms, when his breath pulsed stronger than ever through his chest, when his limbs no longer held the weariness of years. Wrapped in his work, the hours that just weeks ago seemed so endless now passed in a blink. He scarcely slept.

When he bound the final branch, secured the last knot, she appeared.

Her smile was sharp, smug, the curve of a sickle on her lips.

“My love,” she purred, twirling a curl between her fingers, her eyes lingering on his chest. “Your time on the shore has healed you, after all. You look… Well.”

Odysseus stilled, his breath suddenly shallow. The ooze of satisfaction in her tone prickled his skin. He closed his mouth, inhaled through his nose. Inclined his head, politely.

“Goddess.”

He lowered his eyes in attempted reverence, but not before he saw her smile waver, her lips press together into the beginnings of a sulk.

“Are you not glad to see me?”

His mind churned. She had been gone for so long. She would not have reappeared if she did not have some new scheme, some trick to try to win him. Weariness, all at once, settled on his shoulders, but he did not let them sag. He lifted his eyes to hers, stretched a smile onto his lips, turned his face open in what he hoped looked like delight. He thought of the siren, of ingratiating disguise.

“Of course!”

He paused, eyes wide in feigned curiosity. “Where have you been?”

She brightened, and sidled closer. He noticed she no longer carried the cup.

“Wouldn't you like to know?” A teasing smile crinkled her eyes as she pressed her hands together under her chin, almost wiggling with excitement. “Oh, I can't keep it from you any longer. It's too exciting!” She actually twirled, grabbing his hand as she turned again to face him. “I've given you a gift, you see.”

Odysseus’ smile fell.

“You wouldn't accept my offer, and I just kept wondering why. Why wouldn't you let yourself take the one thing all mortals desire? All fear death, and you're no different. Your friends perish quite violently in your dreams. They crumple, they drown, they bleed, they choke…so many ways your kind can end. It must be terrifying.”

She regarded him with pitying eyes, fingering a shining braid, flicking it behind her shoulder.

“Then I realized. You feel too much guilt, don't you? You think you should die, because your friends have. You don't know any other way. But it's all right, you don't have to worry.” The smile returned, lighting her face. “I've taken that burden!”

She flung her hands wide, encompassing the scene around her, the forest gleaming with dew, the sparkling stream. “You've been quenching your thirst with more than just water, you see.”

She stood there, grin flashing, eyes gleaming with pride.

Odysseus couldn't breathe.

The water.

Ambrosia.

How much had he consumed? For weeks, he'd been so parched, craving refreshment and taking it often. He'd thought it was the exertion, or the scorching sun. He'd drank so deeply, so much.

How much of his humanity was left?

Bile rose in his chest. His throat burned. How could he have been so dense? The line between naivety and hopefulness… the sea god had tried to show him.

Her absence was never the luck he had hoped for. It was the radiance of lightning, just before the thunder's crash. It was the promise of safe passage, with Scylla in wait.

Had he learned nothing?

His mentor’s voice filled his mind - the words she'd spoken every time he'd fallen, when he'd found a clever gambit he was sure would cinch a fight.

/Underestimating your opponent is the swiftest way to death/.

But here… it was the swiftest way to bar him from it. He hadn't counted on Calypso’s cunning.

She waited, expectantly.

Odysseus’ mind churned.

He had to make her believe he was grateful. She wanted to see the effects of her cleverness, craved his reaction. If not delight, which he knew he could not feign, then some other emotion. Let her think him moved.

Head bowed, struggling to school his face, Odysseus solemnly took the goddess’ hands in his own.

“Thank you, goddess,” he murmured. “This is more than I deserve.”

Below lowered lids, he chanced a glance up at her face. Her smile still stretched her cheeks, but her eyes held confusion. His reaction was too subdued. To disappoint her here would be perilous. He swallowed, stalling. Found words, his silver tools.

“I could not be more truthful when I say this, “ he said.
“This gift means more to me than you know. I… do fear my comrades’ fate,” he whispered. He hoped it sounded like a confession.
“Their screams are always in my ears.”

He forced a small smile onto his lips, warming to his story. “At least now, each time I hear them, I'll know their path is no longer mine. If I could tell them… perhaps they'd even cheer me on. I can almost see them now.”

She beamed, and he let out a breath, swallowing bile, nausea squeezing his gut. His vision lurched -

and at once the lie proved true, for Polites was before him, standing in the Cyclops’ cave. His headband was loosened over eyes wide with a terror Odysseus had not looked in time to see, but could not help but imagine. But the next horror, that he had seen - the scene that had etched itself behind his lids, that surfaced again now.
Polites, his face a red ruin.
His mouth, stripped of its smile, blood choking his throat.
He had drowned in it, lungs convulsing for air, finding only a single breath. He had given that breath to Odysseus.
A warning.
A prayer.

/Captain./

Odysseus did not need to reach for tears, his face contorting as his eyes sought the goddess, as his knees found the ground. With luck, she would take his emotion for gratitude, his collapse for worship.

He would not see him again. Somehow, the fact cut worse the second time. When Polites had died, Odysseus’ mind had crashed aground, insensible to the waves of his men’s cries. It was not until Eurylochus had intervened that he could steer himself back. But he had not broken, not then.

He broke now.

He wept, tears hot and fast and unceasing. The air was warm, but he shivered, could not stop shaking. He would never see them again. Any of them - never be able to embrace them, to apologize, to beg their forgiveness and hope they would understand. Never be able to see his mother, to give her comfort in her loneliness. To tell her her son had returned at last.

“My love?”

He felt a hand on his head, a soft pat, and Calypso stretched out a finger and lifted his chin, shaking her head fondly.

“My silly mortal. Of course you're overcome. You've been fighting me all this time - tormenting yourself, and all for nothing. But now you can relax, my love. I knew what you needed, didn't I? You don't have to worry anymore. I've got you.”

Her smile bared her teeth.

“You're not there yet, though,” she murmured, stroking his cheek.
“To fully join me, you still need more. But I couldn't wait any longer to tell you.” She clasped his hands in her own, her grip a sea-snake’s bite. “I knew you'd be happy.”

Not there yet.

Odysseus' breath stopped. It wasn't hopeless. If he wasn't yet immortal…
Everyone he loved was not lost. He could see his mother, his friends again one day. Could still, when he returned to Penelope and Telemachus, enjoy the years they had left together, even if they'd age as he stayed stagnant, even though he'd already missed far too much of their short lives.
He released his breath. He just had to find a way.

His tears ceased, and he smiled - and, remembering, turned its full beam upon the goddess. “I'm - just so relieved,” he whispered, his voice rough. “Thank you, goddess. Please, leave me so I can collect myself. I want to… find a way to show my gratitude.”

Calypso beamed, and nodded indulgently, patting his head again. “Of course, my darling.”

He watched her as she left, her steps light. When the last of her glow receded into the trees, he scrambled to his feet, eyes scanning the land.

There.

His feet found their way faster than before, the climb taking little effort. His weariness was nothing of the body. The firm stone under his sandals was a comfort, a surety, so different from the beach’s shifting sands. He closed his eyes, and could almost believe he was on Ithaca’s rocky shores.

The wind cooled his face, brushed back his tangled hair.

Below, the waves leapt against the bluff.

/This is your only way home./

Chapter Text

The waves beat against the cliff, their rhythm the thrum of Odysseus’ heart. His feet, bare, bore cuts from the rock, the shards the only sharp edges on this island of curves and false comfort. He welcomed their clarity.

His plan would send him home, no matter the way fate chose. If he lived, survived the fall, swam with his newfound strength beyond the borders of the island’s spell, he could see them, hold them again. He would brave Poseidon, claw his way through the tide, expend every breath to see their smiles.

And if he did not live?

He would see the others.

He would grieve, and so would they, and a groan rose in his throat to think of it - his wife, his heart, his beloved boy, waiting once more as he never came home. But it wouldn't be forever, not if he acted soon. They would meet him again.

He would wait for them.

He closed his eyes, drew in a breath. The breeze lashed cold against his face, a spray of sea. The howl of the wind subdued the screams, and other voices surfaced. He opened his eyes to their forms.

Polites, the day after the war, jubilant as they boarded the ship for home, asphodel in his hair. His face, open with relief, his smile a ray under wayward curls. His hands - empty, free of the sword he had thrown into the waves. “We can live again, Ody,” he’d whispered, eyes glistening. “Isn't that amazing?”

Eurylochus, that day, hoisting the sails, solemn. HIs eyes, still shadowed, his grip on the rope tighter than the task demanded. “You did it again, Ody,” he'd said. “The scheme to win the day.” He shook his head, the ghost of a smile on his lips. “But it's not over til we're back. We’ve had luck, but how long will it last?” He'd clasped Odysseus’ shoulder, then, his hand heavy. “We'd better be home before it runs out.”

Then, his mother.

He did not recognize this scene.

She knelt in the mud by a ramshackle hut. Her hair, blown by the wind, covered her face, and her shoulders sloped with sorrow as she pulled at a cloaked form. “Laertes,” she urged, her voice thin. “Laertes, get up. He will come back, I know he will. My love. Please. Don't leave me too.”

His father did not respond, only sat, a message clasped in his fist. His eyes were closed, rain lashing his face. She shook him once more, desperate - then the strength seemed to leave her. Weariness weighted her limbs, fingers fisting in her husband's cloak as her head lowered to his shoulder. Odysseus could barely catch her whisper.

“Odysseus. Come home, my darling, please. You can think your way out of anything. You can make it back to us. We're all waiting for you.”

Odysseus’ knees hit the ground. “I was too late,” he whispered. “For all of you.”
His eyes burned. He ached to close them.

But then, they turned, seemed suddenly to see. All three met his gaze.

“You can live, Ody,” Polites murmured. “You can get home.”

“Act while you can, Captain,” Eurylochus cautioned. “You don't have much time.”

“They're still waiting for you.” His mother's voice was warm, her eyes crinkling in an encouraging smile even as tears streaked her face. “Use that mind, my son. You'll find a way.”

“Odysseus?”

More than three voices spoke his name.

In an instant, Polites’ smile was sobered, brows drawn in concern. Eurylochus’ face went tight with worry. His mother lifted a hand to her mouth, fear in her eyes.

He whirled, and saw.

“Mom?”

He knew she wasn't his mother. /Knew/ it, with the certainty of grief. But she appeared as his mother had moments ago, hair disheveled from its upswept braids, the gold trim of her robe soaked in wet earth. Her thin frame, withered too soon, weary. Her eyes held despair.

“Don't make my mistake,” her voice begged, her hands clasping together, her eyes full.

His own eyes widened, as horror hollowed his lungs.

She had died of heartbreak, as he feared. But it had not been an illness of the body that stole her soul.

His hands were fists at his side. His nails pierced his palms.

How had she known? The goddess could see what he saw, what he dreamed. Where his thoughts rested when he was still. But she was bound here, did not travel like the other gods, seeing all.

Had he himself known, then? Had the knowledge been in him, pushed down into his gut, grief somehow merciful, veiling the truth?

Her eyes were empty. He blinked, her form flickered, and she was on the ground. Her neck, twisted, was gray with bruises. One side of her head glistened crimson, a shard of bone protruding from her skull. Her hand clutched her side, raw as fresh carrion on the sharp rock. Yellow bile leaked through her fingers.

His steps toward her were not a decision. They were a breath drawn in, a heart stalled in his chest. The goddess watched him, and his mother's lips twitched.

“Ody, please,” they said.

It broke the spell. Odysseus’ eyes narrowed.

When he was born, she had told him, his grandfather had chosen his name. His mother had laughed, at first.
“Anger Bringer? Father, do not tease. He is my firstborn. This is no time for jests.”
But then, she had seen, he was in earnest, his often-dancing eyes grave. In that moment, she had begun to fear for her son’s fate.

But she had always used his full name, each syllable whole and tender on her tongue. Never diminished it.

“You're no mother of mine,” he said, fury a mask on his face.

He turned back towards the cliff.

A shriek, at once angry and petulant, the shrill whine of a child denied, filled his ears. His head turned, and she was in her true form, silver eyes molten in rage.

“It won't help you, you know.” Her voice was bitter, her teeth bared. “You know it's in the water. That includes the waves. If you jump, you'll start to drown, but you'll swallow the sea. Your lungs will fill up with my gift, they'll burn, you won't breathe. But you'll live.” Her smile was cruel on her lips. “You'll live, and be mine.”

His stomach clenched, fear shooting through his chest. Of course. He cursed himself for not seeing it, not realizing the poison’s reach.

It was over, then.

The ocean lightened, gold shimmering into the sky, a false dawn.
Once more, screams filled his ears. This time, his was among them.

But. A light gleamed in the corner of his vision. A voice, warmth in the words.
“Use that mind, Odysseus.” His mother's words echoed in his ears.
“My polymechanos.”

Finder of ways. At once, Odysseus’ whirling mind cleared. The screams, now a softer roar in his ears, reminded him.

When the sea god had struck, sending tunnels of water bearing ships towards the sky, most of his crew had flailed, eyes wild and mouth open in their cries. Theyd drawn in water, voices choked as they died.
But not all.
Some of his men had gone limp in the air, before they touched the water, their screams silent in an instant. Their mouths and eyes had been closed as they sank, shock and calm somehow mingled in their features.

They had passed before they hit the waves, Odysseus had seen, the scene frozen in his thoughts. They had not taken in water. They had been slain - but they had not drowned.

A plan formed, a wild hope in his chest.

A presence. His skin felt cold, and it wasn't the rain. The air. A shimmer, so swift he almost missed it.

His whisper was raw, his voice almost inaudible.

“I know you're watching me.”

“See my plan, my mentor,” he murmured. “If we were ever…”

His voice caught, but his brows set. His shoulders pulled back in resolve.

“If we were ever friends… Aid me now.”

Odysseus leapt.

Chapter Text

When he hit the water, Odysseus had intended to swim.

When he had leapt, he had held his body perfectly straight, feet downward, limbs locked rigid and still. He had tensed every muscle, ready to launch himself upwards as soon as he landed.

He had expected the impact to be painful, but he did not realize how sharp it would be. Nor how cold the water was, a chill beyond ice that splintered through his bones. The island had been so warm, the sun carelessly bright, casting broad, languorous rays upon the unchanging shore. But in this ocean, the sun was a memory.

When he tried to swim, his legs were dull iron. They refused to move, to kick, though Odysseus had been a strong swimmer since his youth. His legs felt shattered, as if he had crashed into rock, rather than waves.

Had this been what the infant felt?

His hands remembered the feel of the swaddling cloth, too soft in his callused hands. Too light as it slipped from his fingers. Sometimes, on the wind of the island, he'd caught the scent of the olive oil on the infant’s tiny form. They used to bathe Telemachus, that way.

He surfaced, though his legs still would not move - the waves bore him to the surface, then below again. He clamped his lips shut. He would not let them take in the sea. But his lungs seared, his throat closed. Strange, how drowning could feel so much like burning.

His arms moved, though it seemed they had forgotten how. His once sure strokes were now shallow, barely below the waters surface. Each time a wave pulled him under, they lifted. Even underwater, his fingers touched the air.

The moments seemed to stretch between each breath, each immersion lasting longer. His thoughts whirled, images flickering through his mind. The sirens, bereft of their tails, mouths open in tuneless screams. Webbed hands reaching as they sank. Scylla, before her strike, waiting to surface, only the glint of her eyes alight in the gloom. Eyes that had met his, knowing.

But then, one picture lingered, settling behind his eyes. Telemachus, floating in the pond, Odysseus’ hands just under his back in case he began to sink. Penelope had balked at letting him in deeper water so soon after birth, but Odysseus had reminded her that all islanders must learn to swim. She'd relented with a nervous smile.

She needn't have worried. Their son took to the water without fear, beaming as if afloat on clouds. His hands had stretched up towards Odysseus, eyes bright and clear, a laugh on his lips. Later, he had reached up like that, smiled just that way, in the mud before the plow. Before Odysseus had ground it to a halt, knelt in the soil to hold his son, his eyes a burning flare toward Palamedes.
When the next day dawned, he had left for war.

But in this moment, Telemachus reached for him once more, not the grown man Odysseus knew he was now, but the tiny child, so impossibly light in his arms. His son. For the first time in twenty years, Odysseus felt peace.

His mouth opened to shape his son's name, and the water rushed in. In some distant part of his mind, Odysseus knew he should be terrified, knew he could not let this happen - but as he felt his lungs fill, he could not remember why. His body relaxed, and he felt himself drift - until hands grasped his arms, and air touched his skin.

Until his vision darkened, and the mists crept in.

—---

Odysseus opened his eyes to blinding dark.

Before, the underworld had been dim, cloaked in mist, but navigable. But now, though that mist still whispered against his skin, there was nothing to see.

Then, a voice. A child. A baby, his high, sweet babble ringing bright against the dark. Odysseus walked towards the sound, and it grew louder. His steps were cautious, fearing to accidentally crush a tiny limb.

There. The sound was so close now, and as he reached down, a small hand found his. The voice, one word emerging from the babble.

“Páppa?”

His eyes filled, spilled over, as a word burst from his throat.

“Son.”

Odysseus swept up the infant in his arms, cradled his small form. The baby laughed, and grabbed a curl of his beard.

Telemachus.

His son.

He'd almost despaired of seeing him again. He rocked him gently, and his arms felt almost whole. This is what his life was meant to be. His hands were not for gripping swords, but for lifting his son into the air. His legs were only made to bounce his child upon his knee. His voice, his silver tongue? They'd speak to soothe his son, to spin him tales and teach him everything he would need to know. He'd be a man of peace, so far from battle.

No. Odysseus’ mind drew level with his sprinting heart, and it fell within his chest. If Telemachus was here…

Oh, gods.

Telemachus had been a babe when he had left, twenty years before. He would be grown by now, a man of age. If he was here, and still a child, that would mean….

Odysseus drew the boy close, tears falling onto his swaddling clothes. For a moment, he saw the flicker of a glow around the bundle in his arms. Then, once more, only dark. He held him, rocked him, caressed his tiny arms, his feet, his hair.

Wait.

Odysseus’ hands stilled. He did not feel Telemachus’ tangle of soft curls. This infant’s locks were feathers in his fingers, the light down of fledgling wings. In an instant, he knew. Even blind from the dark, the face flashed behind his eyes.

Oh, if this child could have flown. The infant could have soared, transformed by the gods like the tales bards sang. A dove, a gull, a phoenix. But in his dreams, each night the infant fell. He fell, and fell again. Each time, he thought the crash would break the earth.

Tears coursed down his face again, breaths ragged in his chest. Finally, he knew the men of Ilium, not as pieces in a strategy, but as people - fathers, brothers, friends. His son. Hector's son. Their fathers never saw them grow. Hector could have held his boy, could have rocked him as he slept, as Odysseus had rocked his own son, laid him in his mother's arms one last time before he left.

Before the war had torn them both away.

Odysseus held the infant fast inside his arms, as if he could reverse his fall. Broken apologies fell from his tongue, hollow, purposeless. Too late.

Then, a strangled gasp, a scream. The infant was torn from his grasp. He felt four gashes rip his face - but when he lifted his hand to his cheek, his skin was smooth.

“You will never lay a hand on him again,” a woman growled. The voice was a Fury in the dark, a wolf’s snarl. The aegis of a mother.

Andromache.

“What right have you to weep?” she hissed. “Murderer. Caenum. Cursed Laertiades. Murderer!”

Her voice was anguished, ripped tattered from her throat.

“How are you here, and not in Tartarus? I will drag you there myself, for what you did.”

He felt her fly at him, felt the ghost of hands against his throat, fists against his chest - but the sensations quickly faded, and she screamed in sharp frustration.

“Hecuba, Persephone. Demeter, you who are a mother like me. Help me! Let me have vengeance!”

No answers met her calls.

She beseeched them, again and again, but at last, her voice broke, and he heard a hollow sound as her knees hit the ground. Her next words were shattered things.

“Never,” she forced out between her teeth. “I will never, never forgive you.”

“I know.”

Odysseus’ voice was barely a breath.

“You should be damned,” she whispered.

He closed his eyes, and the darkness did not change.

“I know.”

The air hung heavy, ragged breaths the only sound. Odysseus could not tell if they were hers or his own.

“Do you know how long I begged Hector to stay?”

The question pierced the dark, a bite.

Penelope had pled the same.

“He was the greatest of Ilium. But against Achilles - I knew he would fall. But he put on war like a cloak of office, wore command as a laurel wreath. He was past hearing.”

Her words stilled, her voice flat from exhaustion. Silence stretched in the shadows.

“His helmet frightened our son,” she said suddenly.

“He thought his father had grown a horse’s head. Astyanax was always afraid of horses.”

Odysseus could feel her eyes sharp through the dark, twin sword-strikes to his chest. Her words flew with them.

“He was right to be.”

The silence did not break, this time. The seconds fell like arrows into water, rippled into hours.

“I married again,” she said at last.

Bitterness sat heavy in her voice.

“I never wanted to. But after being enslaved - it was all I could do. You men can choose everything, anything for yourselves. And you choose for others, split their lives without a thought. We women have only two options. Embrace captivity, in one form or another… or choose death.”

She murmured a few words to her son, her voice turned soft, a caress, and by the sound, he must have shifted in her arms, babbling a few contented syllables.

When she spoke again, it was with low disdain. “Our children are all we have. But you, Kephallenian - a murderer, like them all - you steal even that from us.”

Odysseus released a shallow breath. Guilt choked his lungs, sent tendrils through his veins. There were no words, only a name, clamped tight around his shoulders. The name he'd taken for himself.

Monster.

He wanted to kneel, to grovel before her. To fold himself into apologies, turn arachnid to re-spin the Fates’ short threads. To unspool himself, take back what he had done.

But neither could see the other in the dark. And Odysseus, word-weaver, had no tongue.

Chapter Text

Odysseus knelt, wordless, in the dark.

Andromache had fallen silent, either seething or too exhausted to continue. He could still hear the infant, cooing softly in the stillness. Astyanax. When Odysseus had taken his life, he had not even known his name.

What could he say? What words on earth or above could soothe the endless ache of a mother sans her child? Yes, they were reunited now, but the boy was trapped in infant form. Astyanax would never become the man she'd hoped he'd be. How many mothers had he forced into this fate? How many children followed their fathers here, only months past their first breath?

He longed to speak, carve out his deep remorse from his chest and lay it before her, the fragments drowned in blood. But even as he thought it, he knew it could not help. A murderer’s regret would be only one more burden to the grieving mother, another weight to take upon her shoulders. And like Atlas, she already bore the world.

“You have nothing to say?”

Odysseus startled, jolting upright. Took in a sharp breath. His eyes peered into the direction of the words. Her voice seemed closer, stronger.

“Go ahead,” she said, her voice less taunting than tired. Bitter, but brittle. He could almost feel her eyes, molten spears against his skin.

“Tell me, king of Ithaca -if you ever had a reason, beyond just senseless slaughter. Why did you kill my son?”

Odysseus rocked back upon his heels, lifted his head from his hands and clawed one through his hair. He could not raise his eyes - not even in this utter dark, with no chance of meeting her gaze.

“The gods decreed I must.”

He winced as his own words reached his ears. How frail was this excuse? He had not even believed it, at the time. He'd hoped to challenge the gods’ choice, to think and cajole his way out.

/You rely on wit…/

“The gods order many things.” Her voice was a scoff. “Since when did you decide to follow them?”

It was true. In their second week of sailing, Agammemnon had come to find him brooding below deck, had clapped a too-warm hand on his shoulder. Odysseus had almost growled in answer. He had to show all deference in public - but in private? This man ripped him from his home. “Look, I had to go to Palamedes,” Agammemnon had said, uncharacteristically awkward, his hand fidgeting with his rings. “You're my best strategist. We need you.”

Odysseus had grunted, unwilling to reply.

“Also… I couldn't let you break your oaths and risk the gods’ wrath.”

As if he had done him a favor.

Odysseus had bit back an ill-considered retort, instead running his fingers along the smooth slope of the helmet in his lap, the motion grounding. Agammemnon was selfish, prideful, but he had always been pious. Preemptively so, as if he anticipated some future crime for which he'd need to atone. Perhaps he truly did worry on Odysseus’ behalf.

But Odysseus had been ready to risk the gods’ fury, to stay with his child. He'd have braved Poseidon's tsunamis so Telemachus might play in a tide pool, felled a forest of trees amid Zeus’ lightning so his son could taste the rain without fear. He would have let Athena’s title fall insouciant from his shoulders - what use was a warrior when his boy would stay far from battle? But he'd keep her careful strategies, the tricks and use of guile. He'd need it, to outwit their retribution.

But his plans would have ended in death. It took Astyanax for him to realize that, when Zeus had thundered his decree.

“I… I tried to refuse,” he stumbled. “Tried ways to escape it, to save him. But that god… he can't be tricked.”

He swallowed, and his throat felt aflame.

“He was going to kill my family.”

Andromache was silent, for a moment. The seconds between thunder and the crash.

“I can see the paths,” she said, her voice flat. “I know what he threatened. But tell me, when you sacrificed my child to save your own… didn't you ever consider that the gods can lie?”

Odysseus’ breath was sharp, a sword in his throat. “I… I didn’t think….”

“Wily Odysseus.” Her scoff was bitter.
“I saw your solutions.”
Derision laced the word.
“You could raise him as your own? Send him far away? Did you forget he had a mother?”

Guilt spiraled upwards from his gut. He had known. But in that moment, the choice stark and bleak before him, he had not spared her any thoughts. He'd chosen not to spare.

“You never even thought of leaving him in peace. Even if he had been a captive too, one more prize of a ruined city, he'd be with me. With the only loved one he had left.”

Her voice cracked. “He was the only one I had left.”

Odysseus stared into the ground, the formless dark. Blinked through burning eyes. Had the war been reversed, had it been Hector who'd hidden in the wooden beast’s bowels - would he have done the same? Would Penelope scream, Telemachus torn from her arms? Or would she go still as they approached, icy calm as armor on her frame, tucking their child gently in his blankets, the soldiers’ grip a cradle to his closed eyes? She would spare him the pain, or try to. Or would Hector have chosen another path?

He was an honorable hero, they'd said.

When Andromache spoke, her voice was fractured, soft.

“Yes, my child might have killed you, when he was grown. Yes, he might have slain your kin. But… Twenty years. We would have had twenty years together. You, and your loved ones. Me, and my son.
To see them grow, even if they stretched up toward death - would some time not be better than none?”

“You're right.”

Odysseus’ fists were full of soil, of damp clay and blood under his nails. The dark seared close, like flame against his skin.

“I could have spared him.”

The words fell from his mouth like bile. He tasted tears.

“I… I’m sorry.”

Andromache did not speak. The infant coughed, then cooed. Silence pulled tight around the air.

Odysseus’ eyes were closed. He kept the quiet clear - his hand against his mouth stifled all sounds. But the dark - he'd sensed a shift. A glow pressed against his lowered lids.

He blinked. Looked up.

The light, that golden blaze. Polites. Here, once more. Did Odysseus’ shame somehow summon him? Was this a punishment, once more, his closest friend viewing his vilest crimes?

Had he leapt and sunk to Tartarus, lowered on his victims’ cut-short threads?

Polites’ back was to Odysseus. In the glimmer of his light, he could see Andromache at last, sitting stiffly, as if frozen, on the floor. Her hair obscured her face. Polites knelt by her, a hand upon her rigid shoulders, whispering soft words he could not hear.

Under his touch, Andromache seemed to soften. Her shoulders lowered, her head lifted, and her hands that tightly gripped her child loosened to cradle his back.

“You found him?”

Her voice was a winged whisper, a flutter of hope in her throat.

“Where?”

“On the border,” Polites told her, his smile warm in his eyes.

“He was waiting for you. He expected you in Elysium.”

A faint smile formed, hesitant upon her lips.

“He always said I won a battle, too. Our son, when he was born.”

She swallowed, rocked him lightly in her arms.

“We almost found the Underworld before our time.”

Polites inclined his head in a nod, gaze solemn til he smiled.

“He's waiting for you.”

A smile like lamplight lit her face. Polites held out a hand toward the right, and slowly, soft at first but brightening, a beam of light formed, leading into the distance. Andromache’s eyes widened, and her eyes met Polites’ with gratitude.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

Before she turned, her gaze fell on Odysseus. His shoulders drew in, arms around his chest. He trembled, but he met her eyes, remorse written on his features.

Did her eyes soften?

Andromache took a step towards him. Lifted a hand, which wavered, palm up, as if deciding whether to strike him or lift him to his feet.

She did neither.

Instead, her hand found his shoulder, her grasp strong, almost bruising. A warrior’s grip. Her gaze burned, intent, somber. One word left her lips before she followed the light.

“Remember.”

Odysseus stared after her in wonder.

Mercy.

It was not what he deserved. Anger had still marked her features. But she had offered it, still.

He turned to Polites. “You still save everyone,” he said softly. “Even in death, you open your arms.”

Odysseus smiled faintly and let a breath escape his lungs, the sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob.

“Polites,” he managed, then bowed his head again, his voice a broken thing.

Polites knelt by him, wrapped his insubstantial arms around Odysseus’ trembling frame, his hands so strangely warm in the Underworld chill.

“I killed him,” he said through the tears he finally let flow, gasping breaths racking his chest.

“I tore them apart, like Palamedes did to us, my family, rent by war. But they - they couldn't hope to reunite. I took that chance from them.”

Guilt clawed up from his gut, wrapped hands around his limbs, crawled through his lungs, his crashing heart.

“I didn't become the monster,” he choked out. “I already was one.”

“Odysseus.”

Polites’ voice was soft as his touch, too gentle, too kind. Odysseus stiffened in his arms. He didn't deserve this compassion.

“Ody, at Troy - I didn't know. You did not need to bear this alone.”

“You can't forgive me,” Odysseus whispered. “You shouldn't. You hold every life sacred. How can you excuse this?”

“I don't.”

Odysseus’ eyes found his, saw their solemnity, their sorrow.

“It was a terrible act, my friend. I won't pretend to lighten its weight. But through this - you not only saved your family. You saved our brothers.”

Polites’ hands moved to his shoulders, holding them. Holding him.

“Andromache was right, that in some paths, you chose to spare the child - and though he slew you later, you each recieved years of life that could have been cut short. But there were other paths, more likely than those.”

Odysseus lifted his eyes, held Polites’ with something like desperation.

“In some paths, you chose kindness, spared the boy,” Polites said. “But Neoptolemus - he had no qualms. In so many paths, he takes the child from your arms. He runs swift-footed towards the wall. And then… Astyanax falls.”

“Sometimes it is Perimedes,” he added, brows drawn in. Pain flickered in his eyes.
“In almost every path, the infant is slain.”

“It's still not right.”

Odysseus’ voice was clearer, his tone colored with the certainty he hadn't felt in years.

“If it's true, if there are so many paths… then we don't have to live this way.”

Polites looked at him, a smile radiant on his features. His eyes shone. He drew Odysseus closer, his embrace somehow firmer even as his shade’s hands passed through his back. Odysseus felt their warmth inside his chest. Polites’ next word was soft in his ear, his smile light against Odysseus’ shoulders.

“Exactly.”

Chapter Text

Odysseus lay curled in Polites’ arms, and felt himself relax.

He did not know how much time had passed while he lingered in his friend’s embrace, or if time even existed in this place. Absently, he wondered again if he had perished. It almost did not seem to matter.

For the first time in so long, he felt the guilt loosen in his limbs, settle low within his body, like silt filtered through sea. It still remained - he knew it would not ever leave, and it should not. It was his weight to bear.

But now, it did not drag him to the depths. For so long, he had held it as an anchor, a tether to what humanity he still held. The last part that had not become the monster. But now?

Maybe there was still another way to be.

Penelope, Telemachus. For them, he'd traded everything, and the exchange might have been futile. But if they still lived, if he could make it home, change the color of their future from the red the prophet saw? He'd do everything he could. But he would not do anything, not anymore. If he was to return to them, it would be as the husband and father they deserved. As the protector his people deserved, the leader he hadn't been in so long. Looking at himself straight on, little of that man was left. But Odysseus was a man of twists and turns.
He could make a path.

“Polites?”

His friend hummed a note of answer, and shifted to meet his eyes. A warm smile wreathed his face.

“Do you know if…”

He paused, the question clinging to his tongue. Did he truly want to know? He swallowed.

“Am I here like… like before? Or is this…”

“It's not the end,” Polites said softly, his hand brushing a reassuring drift of warmth over Odysseus’ fingers.

“Your luck hasn't all left. Your plan was clever,” Polites said, his mouth a tilted grin.

“Dangerous, but smart. As always, really. For a moment, I thought you might be back here for good. Or… never.”

His laughing eyes sobered.

“She almost had you trapped.”

“I know.”

Odysseus felt a shudder cross his shoulders.

“I couldn't. They say it's what all men dream of. I knew many who talked of it, at Troy. And after…”

His eyes welled, and he squeezed them shut.

“So many of the ones Poseidon slew. They spoke of it, when we were past the Cyclops’ cave. They were so grateful to survive. And then…”

He clenched his fists.

“They were the first to fall.”

Polites took his hands, his voice a balm he did not deserve. “You've kept their flame,” he said. “Our flame. We’ve found our peace. You mourn, I know, and I can't promise that will fade. But Ody, please know they don't resent you. Some were angry, it's true. Some still are.”

His smile again, lopsided.

“But they hope you make it home. They cheer you on, you know.”

A lambent thumb caressed Odysseus’ nail-bit palms.

“If you make it… so do we, in a way.”

Odysseus’ fists loosened on his lap. He blinked, and a tear trailed down his cheek.

“Thank you,” he whispered. For a moment, neither spoke.

“I don't know where to go from here, though.”

His words were murmured, soft upon the silence.

“I'm not even sure where I am, back there. If I'm alive, I still might be wrecked upon the rocks. I might be back… with /her/.”

He shuddered.

“And if I did escape. The sea god might be waiting, past her shores. I will try to go around him. But if he waits at home, if he gets there before me?”

His eyes flashed fear.

“What if he chose to punish me - by hurting them?”

“You can find a way, my friend.”

Polites’ voice was sure.

“You'll find a plan. And… it might not be too long til someone comes for you.”

Odysseus’ eyes widened.

“Who?”

As if in answer, Odysseus heard a laugh, carried light across the mists.

Of course. His great-grandfather dealt with more than earthly travelers.

“Hermes?”

That laugh again, and the god entered into view. White wings upon his gold-laced sandals fluttered, lifting him just above the ground, setting his cloak waving in their breeze. His arms stretched as wide as his playful smile, the curls above it shadowing his eyes.

“My boy!”

He swept Odysseus into his arms, and Odysseus startled in the brief embrace. Hands on his grandson's shoulders, Hermes drew back and peered into his face, grinning.

“Your tricks are almost as clever as my own. Though not many’d run away from such a gift.”

Odysseus frowned, though his taut shoulders relaxed.

“Why are you here?”

“What’s a charming god doing in a dull place like this? Well, you know my job,”
Hermes laughed. “And Polites is lovely company, to be sure. Always a pleasure to see you, my friend!”

Polites grinned in answer, embracing the god lightly, without hesitance.

“Always.”

“But today, I'm here for you. You've got an advocate above,” Hermes said, his eyebrows wiggling.

Odysseus’ forehead creased.

“What?”

“I've been sent by none other than the so-called king of the gods,” he quipped. At Odysseus’ expression, Hermes chortled. “Oh no, *he* is definitely not the advocate. But, turns out even Zeus can be convinced. So, I'm here for your rescue. Just in time, it seems.”

Hope flared so fast it stung Odysseus’ chest. “My rescue?”

“I've already had words with your host.” The god's mouth twisted in annoyance, before resuming its smile.

“She complained quite a bit. No doubt she'll still be waiting by the cliff, pouting that her ploy didn't turn out.”

Odysseus stiffened. “But she'll let me go?”

“It's not exactly up to her.”

Hermes stretched an arm wide, beckoning.

“Come along!”

Odysseus felt his feet begin to rise, and looked down to find his own pair of winged sandals, their feathers fluttering eagerly.

“Wait.”

He turned to Polites, reached for him once more. Somehow he seemed more solid, even as a shade. He felt his friend’s forehead touch his own as Polites gripped his upper arms.

“Go find them,” Polites said, eyes soft above his encouraging smile. “Bring us home.”

Odysseus smiled through sudden tears, throwing his arms around his neck in an embrace. “Thank you,” he breathed again.

Hermes tugged on Odysseus’ shoulder, flipping in the air in a playful whirl. “Ready now?”

Odysseus hugged his friend once more, and Polites returned the embrace. When he pulled back, his friend’s smiling face tilted in a nod. He squeezed Odysseus’ hand, and it felt as if he held a sunbeam.

“Let's go!”

The sensation of flying was something Odysseus had never expected to experience. It felt somewhat like floating on the sea, before the tides had all turned deadly. The air’s currents rocked him slightly as he flew forward, a spear thrown into waves. The green mists spiraled around his limbs in playful coils, so like and unlike the island’s curling vines. Those had been confining, but these made him feel free, a sensation he'd not felt since the day they'd left Troy’s shores. Full speed ahead at last.

“I fixed your raft,” Hermes called from ahead, looking backwards with a grin.

“You did a fine job on it! But when I told her why I was there, she kind of smashed it in her sulk. So, that was the second thing I did when I arrived. If you could have seen her face when she saw it pop up good as new! Better, in fact.”

The god giggled, somersaulting in the air.

“I made some small adjustments. And loaded a little cargo… you might say I packed very light.”

Mischief gleamed in his face.

“Ah! Almost there!”

The god banked his flight, pivoting upwards as he sent a current back to pull Odysseus behind him. Odysseus could see the sun above, eyes watering in the sudden brightness as the light’s full force beamed toward him.

“And, here we are!”

Hermes laughed, and Odysseus felt the wings drop from his feet, followed shortly by his body falling groundwards. For a moment, his arms windmilled, til Hermes caught him in a carry. Odysseus flared briefly with embarrassment, smiling sheepishly despite himself. Then, he looked down, and realized the reason for Hermes’ silliness. He was trying to distract him.

She stood below.

His heartbeat pounded sharp against his ribs. Suddenly, the air felt cold.
He couldn't catch his breath.

As they drifted towards the earth, Odysseus jumped at a sudden touch, but it was Hermes’ steadying hand upon his arm.

“It will be alright,” the god said softly, voice strangely sober, understanding in his eyes.

Odysseus closed his eyes for a moment, steadied his breath as their feet touched down upon the sand.

The goddess’ wail resounded, voice volatile with fury. Her eyes were silver scythes that sharpened when she spoke.

She bared her words like teeth, a seething whisper.

“You dare.”

Chapter Text

The goddess stood there, incandescent. Her fury seemed a physical force, a looming tide that pulled the sand from under Odysseus’ feet.

He thought his knees lost strength from fear, and that was why he was on the ground - but at Hermes’ sharp-drawn breath, he realized he was back in his body, and far more injured than he'd thought. His legs, twisted at impossible angles, sprawled on the sand, a bone protruding from his calf. When he breathed, pain pierced through a shattered chest.

His feet had hit the water like stone.

Fighting to pull in a shallow breath around his cracked ribs, Odysseus barely registered Hermes kneeling by his side.

“So you suddenly care,” Calypso sneered. “You come back with his shade, just to steal him from me.”

“Father’s orders,” Hermes said, his tone light, but distracted. “I told you.” Glowing hands skimmed across Odysseus’ form, hovering at points - but there was no relief yet from the pain.

“I could heal him,” the goddess snapped. “I've done it before.”

“Not yours to save.” Hermes’ words were flippant, but his voice stretched taut.

She stepped closer. Through the pain, Odysseus felt her stare like a strike. Nausea roiled low within his gut, crept into his throat.

“He was mine.”

Hermes ignored her, hands still searching over Odysseus’ skin. At last, he hummed a pleased note. Odysseus felt warmth seep through his chest, and the pain eased. He took a breath, and the air filled his lungs at last. Relief relaxed his limbs, but when he lifted his head, he froze again.

Calypso was seething, drawn up to her full height. But her eyes were not on Odysseus.

“You sky gods.” She spat the words.
“Why do you get to do everything you want?”

“Not all of us.” Hermes smiled wryly. “Mainly Father.”

“You had your Crocus.”

In her mouth, the name held venom.

“Not that you could keep him.”

Hermes’ eyes flashed, the bronze of armor. Glinted - a discus’ edge. His voice was suddenly low, danger on his tongue.

“Never speak his name.”

“Why?” Calypso bared her teeth. “Your mortal didn't want you either, after all.”

Hermes rose, stepped forward. His caduceus began to glow, pulsing violet in his hands.

She backed up, fear crossing her face, but stared him down.

“Seems we’re both cursed to lose the ones we love.”

Hermes advanced a step, raised the staff - but a shadow crossed his face, a spasm. He turned away, barked a laugh that came out bitter.

“Let's go.”

Odysseus pulled himself up, his body aching, but lungs clear. He welcomed the pain as a friend, the mortality that tethered him to those he loved. Strange, to almost lose your death before your life. He stumbled, half-drowned lungs still weakening his frame, but hope flared power through his veins. He was almost free.

“Wait.”

Calypso’s voice had lost its fury. Her call was broken, genuine sorrow in her tone.
Surprise made Odysseus turn his head. For seven years, he'd heard her coax, plead, threaten, cajole. Seen her playful, forceful, wrathful, petulant. But he'd never heard this… grief in her voice. Despite his fear, his fury, his heart twinged. Her pain was too familiar.

“If you go… “

He saw her wince at her own words. This was the first time she had acknowledged that he could.

“If you go, I'll be alone.”

Her voice was small. A child's again, but not her usual pouting sulk, nor the wrathful tantrum.

“I've always been alone.”

Hermes scoffed. His hand, steady on Odysseus’ shoulders, pushed slightly, nudging him toward the sea. But Odysseus’ feet felt buried in sand, too heavy to move.

“They left me.” She said the words without looking at him, silver eyes blank into the distance. “I fought for him, my father. I was sure he could win - he was always so strong. I never doubted. To me, he could hold up the world. But when he fell…”

Her shoulders sagged. For a moment, a mortal's weariness wavered in her eyes.

“He let them take me. Let them lock me away. They said it was mercy, paradise instead of Tartarus. That I should be grateful.”

Her eyes flashed. “After a hundred years… A cage is still a cage.”

“Then why did you cage me?”

Odysseus didn't realize he had spoken aloud until both gods spun to face him. For a moment, terror held him in place, frozen stark like a storm-struck tree. Had he truly just said that? He'd not been so bold since… Since his mentor. And then, he'd lost everything. Even when he taunted the Cyclops, he'd waited till he was safe on the deck. Had he learned nothing? He braced for divine wrath.

But Calypso only stared at him. She no longer seemed angry - the fury had fallen from her like dry leaves, and she was left bare.

“With you, it was no longer a prison,” she whispered. “It could have been paradise, together. If you'd only taken my gift - we would have been happy.”

Odysseus regarded the goddess.
The prospect of divine punishment had struck him with fear - but to see her like this? As if she was the one wounded? He lifted his chin, felt his fists clench in his cloak.

“I would never have been happy with you.”
His voice was low, tight, a bowstring drawn.

Calypso’s lips parted, a small gasp escaping.

“How could you say that?”

Her eyes flickered with something like hurt.

“You were a wreck of bones when you washed up on my shore. I healed you, fed you, bedecked you with my gifts. I gave you your life - ”

“You chained me!”

At his shout, Hermes’ eyes widened slightly. He looked between them, from Odysseus’ reddened face and heaving shoulders to Calypso’s stunned eyes. His mouth twitched upwards.

Odysseus’ breaths came fast, his face hot with the rage that he finally allowed himself to feel.

“You told me there was no way out. You stole the faces of my family, my friends. You tried… you tried to trap me forever. I don't want an eternity. I don't want your paradise. I want…”

His voice stopped, and he swallowed.

“I want to go home.”

Calypso crossed her arms.

“You'd have died without me,” she muttered. “If you leave, you still will.”

“Then I'll die with my family.”

Hermes put a hand on his shoulder, and Odysseus turned to go. He did not look at her, his eyes on the sea. He stalked toward his raft.

“Wait.”

Footsteps pounded the damp sand, and she was by his side, her hand clasped desperate on his arm.

“Please.”

Her voice was broken. He turned, and she grasped his cloak, looking up into his face. The goddess had fallen to her knees. Her eyes, brimming with tears, turned bark-brown, then hazel, then mottled blue. Her body flickered, shifting between forms so fast they blurred. Elpenor, Eurylochus, his mother. Polites. Penelope.
Each face was tight with panic.

“I can be them all for you,” she said. “It will be like you never left. Don't go, you can't go. My love. Please.”

Odysseus looked at her, a goddess debased. Almost to his surprise, pity flickered in his chest. Though she'd now resumed her own form, for a moment, Odysseus saw Penelope, her pleading eyes before he'd left. She had not beseeched him to stay - she knew nothing could be done. But she'd clutched his hand, this tightly, and silent tears had streaked her cheeks. She'd stayed standing, til he boarded the ship, til she thought he couldn't see. But he hadn't been able to turn away. He couldn't speak, address the crew. His eyes saw nothing but her face. He saw her waver, fall to her knees.

Then her form shrank to a pinprick on the shore.

Odysseus looked at Calypso.

“I can't.” His voice was soft, almost gentle as he regarded her. “I'm sorry.”

He extended a hand to lift her to her feet, and Calypso stared at it.

“The thunder god is cruel,” Odysseus said. “To all of us.”

The goddess’s face twisted, the hurt in her eyes hardening to cold amber. She glared.

“You think you'll get home.” Her voice, splintered, forced itself into a sneer. “But you'll see. And even if you do - do you really think they'll still be waiting?”

Odysseus regarded her, silent. Turned on his heel.

The raft stood ready.

Chapter Text

Odysseus held his breath as the raft launched. He was not sure he believed it would work, that he could truly leave.
But as gleaming ambrosia shallows gave way to wine-dark waves, he felt his jaw unclench, felt relief race through his limbs. Hermes clapped a hand on his shoulder and grinned.

“We’re on our way.”

Odysseus let out a breath, and a laugh escaped. The first in seven years. He was finally on his way home. The wind rustled the makeshift sail, played with the folds of his cloak. He ran a hand over the mast, the wood smooth and shining, polished in a way his rough sword-strokes could not achieve. Hermes had done more than just repair the raft.

“Hermes?”

The god hummed in acknowledgment, the sound sliding into his musical laugh.

“What did you mean, when you said you loaded extra cargo?”

Odysseus’ eyes searched the raft’s surface, the tight-bound logs. The food he'd squirreled away before Calypso had returned was secured in a corner, bags of fruit and salted fish. He’d brought nothing else, save his clothes. He wanted no reminder of that place.

Hermes smiled, a gently teasing grin. “I brought something you misplaced. Or rather, I refilled it.”

The god sank into a squat and picked up Odysseus’ cloak, which he'd discarded on the deck. A familiar bag lay on the wood.

Odysseus’ breath caught in his throat, and his eyes filled.

“The wind bag?” He stared at his great-grandfather in wonder. “But, how?”

Before Hermes could answer, Odysseus’ brow furrowed, and he started to pace as his mind untangled the clues.

“I used up the rest escaping the sea god- then lost it, in the waves. I don't remember when. I… wasn't thinking straight, after… after it all.”

He swallowed, blinked back tears.

“So if you have it… then, the wind god. That must be who you meant, when you said someone fought for me. But - why would they favor me? I lost their game.”

Hermes smiled. “Oh, Aeolus likes you more than you might think. Good tricksters recognize each other, after all. But they weren't the one who fought for you, either.”

“Then who?”

Odysseus grimaced. Every time he asked that question… he never seemed to get an answer.

“Listen.”

The god had been reclining on the deck, relaxed and playful, but he sat up now, regarded Odysseus with an expression uncharacteristically grave. Odysseus opened his mouth to speak, but Hermes held up a hand.

“No, I mean listen , this time.”

Odysseus turned from the sail he'd been adjusting, and sat upon the raft, cross-legged, eyes searching his great-grandfather's face.

“You're about to face danger, a kind you haven't seen before. You don't have your crew, this time. Don't have a patron god to help you. Your advocate is… indisposed, right now.”

A hint of worry flickered on his features.

“And I can't help you, here. When Zeus agreed to release you, he gave us conditions. None of us could aid you more than once. I could get you out, Aeolus could refill the bag. But I'm already pushing it, staying here with you this long.”

Odysseus furrowed his brow. If each god could help him once, and he didn't know his advocate - perhaps he had regained the favor of more than just Hermes. Could it be Aphrodite, moved to help him rejoin his love? The thought brought a faint smile. If so, they say the god of slaughter was her lover. Perhaps…

Hermes pushed him, lightly, nudging his shoulder to shake him from his thoughts. “You need to take this seriously,” he said. “You can't afford mistakes, or recklessness, or… mercy. You've got a lot more trials ahead.”

Odysseus saw the god’s eyes darken with concern. He sat up straighter, pressed his nails into his palms.

“I'll do it.”

He was surprised to hear confidence in his tone. He hadn't felt this certain, this resolved, since…

He winced, clenched his fists tighter. Since Troy, when he'd told the thunder god that he was ready. Since before he'd seen the choice he'd have to make.

“I'll do everything I can. But, grandfather…”

He stopped, for a moment. When had he returned to addressing gods like friends? Like family?

“I won't be ruthless, not anymore.”
He set his jaw.
“I'll find another way.”

Hermes frowned. Filled his cheeks with air and puffed out a long sigh. He dragged a palm down his face - a strangely human gesture.

“So stubborn.”

But then a smile crinkled his eyes, his good humor returned.

“I don't know why I expected anything else.” He shook his head, eyes fond.

“Youve got too much of me in you, like your mother, like your grandpa, too. You all insist on doing things your own way.”

He laughed, softly.

“And most times? You succeed. But you've got to use your cleverness, in this - more than you ever have before. Use every trick you know, and while you're at it, think of several more. This journey’ll take everything you've got.”

Odysseus reached for the god’s hand on his shoulder and squeezed it. A brief smile flickered on his lips.

“I've got this.”

Hermes was already starting to float upwards, the wings on his feet and shoulders fluttering. Their breeze moved the bag closer, and Odysseus grasped it, held it close.

“Thank you, grandfather.”

—-------

For a while, the seas were calm. At first, Odysseus was vigilant, braced for danger, eyes darting at each movement in the waves, every faint shape on the horizon. But the sea was still, the waves a tranquil rhythm. The raft drifted, and so did he. He had not slept since Calypso’s isle.

He woke to a wall of waves. When he opened his eyes to a dense grey haze, he thought at first he'd found another storm - but the sea before him rose dark and high, glistening like sharkskin, not moving with the tide.

This was the danger Hermes had foreseen.

For the first time in his life, he was afraid of the water.

The vortex would devour him. He knew it, as certain as he knew his name. Once more, his lungs would burn with held breath til they burst. His bones would break again, battered. He'd swirl, puppet-limp, in the sea.

The pounding in his chest echoed in his ears. Between each beat, his crew cried out again.

He would rejoin them.

Fear curled around his ribs, snaked through his chest. His eyes were wide, wild. His breath was wind trapped in his throat.

For a moment, he thought he glimpsed Ithaca in the waves. Shining, its columns tall, it still seemed to shrink under the tidal wall of sea that could crush it in a stroke. It was vulnerable, mortal as a man. Under the ocean’s might, it could crumble.

The water roared and receded, only to reshape itself into a churning spiral. Odysseus’ raft slid towards its center.
Then, he saw it.

The water-wall had drawn back to form the whirlpool, pulled itself low. Behind it, a cliff loomed. The water had beaten upon it, ruthless, relentless, so that jagged, broken rocks protruded from its side. Roots split stone, reaching towards the water. And there, stretching low from a ledge - a tree.

It was a fig tree, leaves glistening with salt spray, trunk bent out from the bluff. Dizzy with fear and the whirlpool’s spiral, Odysseus forced himself to block out the fright.

Put your emotions aside.

The tree was almost low enough to reach, if he could find his footing enough to jump. So as the current drew him in, as he spun towards the cliff, he gauged the distance, braced himself, and leapt.

His feet left the raft just in time. As he pushed off toward the tree, he felt the wood crack, logs loosed from their ropes. His hands reached for the lowest branch - and he grasped it, his knuckles white against the bark.

He did not have the strength he'd had at Troy.

Despite his recovery from the thunder god’s strike, despite the sweat he'd poured out in labour for the raft, Odysseus’ strength was far from what it had been. He was lighter, frame weak from hunger and weary from lack of sleep, sinews strained from the taut stretch of constant vigilance.

His fingers slipped.

One hand tore from the branch, scraping the flesh raw in his desperation to maintain his grasp. He swung, now held only by the stem of one clenched hand. A leaf before the wind, before it fell.

He would not fall.

When Penelope wove, sometimes a thread would snap. Frayed, pulled beyond capacity, the broken end would slip unfettered through the weft, lost among the weave. The careful creation would threaten to unravel. The first time he saw, he'd thought she would be frustrated, groan or curse or slump. But she had done neither. Carefully, with the gentleness and surety of a spider trailing silk, she'd track the loose thread through the fabric’s weave. Somehow, she knew the winding path it had taken, and her fingers deftly wove it back and tied it through. He’d marveled at her patience, at her strength.

He called upon that power now, as the branch dug into his hand like a gash, as his arm felt as if it would tear from its socket. She was waiting. Had been waiting, for so long. He'd already let so many loved ones fall. If he fell, so would she.

He would not let her fall.

His arm cracked as he clenched it, bending it, pulling himself, impossibly, upwards. He felt as if the bones in his forearm would break through his skin. But he pulled, and he felt his body slowly rise, til at last he swung his leg onto the branch, hoisted himself onto its broad bark. He lay there, clinging to it with all four limbs, trembling with exertion. His relief was so great he forgot, for a moment, the funnel, the abyss below.

It could not reach him. The water whirled, spun, roared. In its desperation to engulf him, it seemed a living thing. Its walls rose higher, its nadir deeper, and the spray lashed his skin. But he was safe. He laughed, and his strained lungs wheezed.

“You'll exhaust yourself, if you keep that up,” he shouted, grinning.

He was giddy from relief, he knew, and that could be dangerous. He admonished himself for it. What had happened the last time he had called out to a monster in triumph?

The water hissed its rage, bubbled its frustration in rabid seafoam. The tidal wall had reached so high that he could see the ocean floor. A crab scuttled there; an octopus flexed its indigo tentacles and retreated into the wall’s watery sides. A shadow moved across the seafloor, a shape.

Wait.

It was a face.

Chapter Text

A face, in the water.

A child's, round and frowning. Her cheeks, prickly with spines, were puffed out, and though her skin was a cool blue, he could see she was flushed in frustration. Odysseus peered down at her.

Her eyes snapped up to meet his.
A stream of bubbles escaped from the sea-child's nose as she glared at him. Her small arms lifted, and the water rose further upwards.

Still, it could not reach him.

Odysseus’ forehead wrinkled as he clutched the bark. He'd heard so much of Scylla, so many tales - but almost less than nothing of Charybdis. Sailors’ tales were only glimpses of an endless whirlpool, of capsized ships sucked into the sea. Of an insatiable hunger.

He'd no idea this force might have a soul.

But he felt it, her desperation, her fury. He saw it in her flashing eyes, her straining cheeks stretched translucent, turning pale. A memory floated in his mind as if aloft, carried on the ocean’s splashing spray.

Ithaca, fifteen years ago. He’d been racing with Ctimene. He'd meant to let her win, he really had, but she was swift, and his competitiveness had sparked. He reached the rock a second before her, slapped his palms against the stone and lifted them in stinging triumph, but Ctimene had insisted that it was she who won, demanded he admit it.

“I'll hold my breath,” she’d threatened, her short arms crossed, feet planted firm. He was sure she'd meant her expression to be fierce, but her pout was more amusing than intimidating. He'd smiled, shrugged, and her face had flushed with frustration as she puffed up her cheeks.

A full minute later, a prickle of anxiety had crept into her glare, and he worried she was beginning to turn blue.

“Come on, Ctimene,” he'd coaxed her. “There's no shame in losing.”

She’d huffed, and shook her head. But the small exhalation was too much for her, and she wavered as her mouth opened unbidden, as the air rushed in and her legs collapsed. He'd caught her in her faint before she hit the ground, guilt spiking in his stomach. Carried her to their mother, his face flushed with embarrassment. He was supposed to look after her, to not let her face danger. But when the danger was her own stubborn spirit?

She was too much like him.

And this tide, this churning vortex, was like her. Only a child, obstinate and determined. She would expend all her strength to win against him - even if she would not survive.

What happens to a sea which swallows itself?

He stared down through a maelstrom turning grey with silt and seafoam, clouding the child’s frantic eyes. Fury and fear rippled in turn across her face. But she would not give in.

“Wait.”

He found himself shouting over the tumult’s roar, as the wall of water touched his back, licked at the tree, as her eyes scrunched shut and her cheeks strained, thin as a bubble. She would implode. His fear was no longer for himself.

“I admit defeat. You've won.”

He raised a dripping arm in proof, balancing on the branch.

“You've caught me.”

The whirlpool-wall faltered, lowered slightly. Small funnels left its spiral, spinning the other way. The child blew out some of her breath, sending a helix of bubbles toward the surface.

“I won? But you're not slain yet.”

He had not realized how loud her voice would be. It was the howl of shrieking storms, the crack of splintered masts. Each word crashed like a wave. Yet Odysseus heard confusion, too.

“You're a hero, aren't you?” A small current creased her brow. “I'm supposed to slay the heroes. That's my task.”

“I'm no hero,” Odysseus said softly. She did not hear.

Her chin lifted in pride. “My new purpose.” Her swift-current-arms fluttered in excitement.
“It's my second chance.”

“Your second chance?”

“I made a mistake, in my last task,” she said, her features blurring for a moment as she grimaced in remembrance.

“I was good at helping with the floods. I squashed so many little buildings, and filled so many fields the plants didn't have a chance!” She laughed, a burst of effervescent bubbles.

“But I might have gotten too excited. Uncle went to Father, told him I was stealing all his land. But I was just doing what Father told me to do!”
A bubble floated from her pouting lips.

Odysseus paled. Flooding? Father? An uncle who possessed the dry land?
Danger prickled on his skin. Another child of the sea god? He cut off his thoughts, forced their channel towards Charybdis.

“So Uncle sent me here.”
She frowned again, then brightened, small vortices forming at each fingertip as she trailed them through the water.

“He told me my new task. And I've won every fight since. The only problem is… Father never comes to see me.”

Odysseus’ eyes softened. This force of nature, this devourer - it was another child abandoned by their father, banished for his mistakes. The gods were ever careless of their children.

Though he himself, away so long… Telemachus must think his father had forgotten him, as well.
When he returned to Ithaca, when the sea god struck - would the trident pierce just him - or spear his son?

But she was still speaking. “So that's why I must defeat you.” Her eyes narrowed, mouth closed tight, determined. So I can show him all I've won.”

Her waves pulled back again, stretched upwards to bare a new swath of ocean floor. Revealed a graveyard.

The wreckage was a realm, another world. What Odysseus had taken for spires of coral were spikes of splintered masts, the bed of sand studded with shredded planks. Fish swam through the scatters of bleached bone.

He couldn't breathe. This would have been the scene after the sea god, the ruthlessness that crushed his crew. Against these forces, mortals had no chance.

Yet still his mind snatched at solutions, grasping, then discarding each in turn. Before, he would have drawn his stratagems, sharpened his tongue’s blade and blinded her with silvered words. But he'd tried that, before. He'd tried to charm the Cyclops, placate Poseidon, both in vain. With Calypso, it may have kept him alive - but the cost had worn away at his soul, had scraped him raw.

You lean too much on wit,” Eurylochus had warned. “You will run out, someday.”

But he didn't have to. There was one choice he still could make - and he didn't even have to move, to say a word. He watched Charybdis as she swelled back up with water, spun it back into a vortex, strained her breath. The tree was still too high for her to swallow. She'd shown she'd suffocate, before admitting failure. He could escape.

It wouldn't be the first time he'd chosen himself over a child.

Tell me, is this how we're supposed to live?”

He caught his breath. With Polites’ words, guilt stung him, and he remembered. He'd resolved against ruthlessness. They didn't have to live this way.

He looked down at her, at the monster, at the child, and decided.

This could be fatal foolishness. Could be madness. It was certainly the inverse of the warrior of the mind.

“You can lower your guard, you know,” Polites had said, on the island. “We've left the battle, now. Don't carry it with you.”

Odysseus untangled his legs from the branch, released their hold. He hung by just his hands.

“Charybdis,” he shouted over the roar of waves. “You can stop.” He felt the vortex falter.
“Here I am, and you can show me to your father.”

He let go of the branch.

Chapter Text

Odysseus held his breath as he plunged toward the sea.

The funnel loomed beneath him, wide and whirling, and for a moment he thought he must have lost his mind entirely. Why else would he willingly have leapt into the void, sacrificed his chance at home, at reunion with his own - for what?
To save an already-cursed creature?

Open arms.

Polites’ voice, soft in his mind but somehow still audible amid the roaring waves. It seemed to lift him, even as he plummeted downwards. It took a moment for him to realize he was no longer falling.

He opened his eyes to a spray of seawater, crashing over his head and drenching him. Blinking through soaked strands of hair, Odysseus realized he was suspended in the sky, floating atop a tendril of water that extended from the sea. The tendril lowered him, almost gently, depositing him on the remnant of a broken raft. The child’s face rose up before him, confusion rippling through her features.

“What are you doing?”

Her voice, still that crashing shout, held notes of curiosity, uncertainty.

“Surrendering.” Odysseus almost smiled as he said it, wondering at himself.
“You've won. I'm defeated.”
He spread his arms wide, let a smile break on his lips.

“You said that before.”
The child’s eyes narrowed, but interest, more than suspicion, colored her tone.

“And now here I am.”

“Don't I have to slay you?”

Odysseus paused. A memory caught him, held fast. Troy, and the supplicant. Dolon. When they'd caught him, the man had shuddered, paled in terror, fallen to his knees. “Please, take me alive,” he'd begged, grasping Odysseus’ robes. Desperate, he'd offered information, spilled it all like a libation, a stream of words poured out upon the dust. And Odysseus had reassured him, promised they would spare him. But when Dolon finished, Diomedes cut him down. Odysseus had lifted up his severed head, displayed it before Athena with a pang of guilt. When she'd smiled, pride replaced it.

When, on the ship, he'd seen the shrieking souls, their screams in his ears, their accusations, Dolon was among them.

Odysseus closed his eyes, let out a breath. Opened them to meet the child’s.

“Not anymore.”

The child brightened, eddies swirling happily around her. Then, a flicker of confusion.

“But… if I don't slay you, how can I show Father?”

“Tell him of me.”
Odysseus smiled.
“Tell him that you defeated one who's escaped so many monsters before. That you were the one who made him yield.”

Charybdis’ vortex rose higher in the water, triumphant.
“But who did I defeat?”

Upon the scrap of raft, Odysseus pulled himself to his feet.
“My name is -”

A shape stirred beneath the sea. A voice - low, sharp as the crash of rising tide.

“Odysseus of Ithaca.”

Odysseus’ breath stilled. His heartbeat shook his ribs. His thoughts left him, his mind floating somewhere far he could not reach. He felt himself shrink, dwarfed by the giant that rose before him, that wall of lashing waves, the flash of golden eyes. He was the ocean, fathomless, unyielding, and Odysseus was one drop in the expanse.

A slow smile curved on the sea god’s lips, crooked like a scar.

“There you are.”

“Father!”
Charybdis’ voice was eager, rippling with triumph.
“I defeated him! See? The other heroes were easy, but this one was tricky - he climbed up on that tree. But I didn't give up, I was relentless, like you told me. I held my breath, and he surrendered!”
Her spiked cheeks puffed with pride.

The sea god cast his gaze upon his daughter. His eyes, sharp with malice as he looked upon Odysseus, had been the pale, cold glint of a trident’s point. But now, as they rested on his child, something shifted as he inclined his head. A nod - approval - and Charybdis beamed.

He was a father, too.

Odysseus had almost forgotten. After the island, Poseidon's ambush had been swift, his fury held at bay just long enough to lull them into hope. He'd condemned them for the Cyclops, but his scorn seemed to fall on his son as much as them. His progeny was weak as the mortals he failed to slay, and in return, they hadn't even given him the dignity of death.

He'd said they should have killed his son.
If he knew Odysseus had spared his daughter - would it enflame or dull his rage?

“Mortal.”

The sea god’s voice was cold, almost indifferent - but a hint of curiosity colored his tone.

“She said you climbed that branch.”

Odysseus’ eyes flicked to the fig tree, then returned to the god.

“Yes.”

The god’s eyes narrowed.

“Charybdis cannot reach that tree,” he said. Suspicion laced his words.
“You could have escaped.”

Poseidon's eyes scrutinized his frame, and Odysseus felt the chill of frozen seas.

“Why did you surrender?”

Odysseus’ mouth was dry, his lips cracked with a crust of salt. For a moment, he was not sure he could speak.
Had he made the same mistake, again? Dishonored a god’s child by refusing to finish a fair fight? To Poseidon, mercy was dignity denied.

Odysseus had refused ruthlessness. He would refuse it, still. But what would be the consequence?
His fear supplied the answer.
Telemachus.
He swallowed, throat tight. Would his own child be the casualty, a trade for those he saved? He raised his eyes with effort, made them meet the sea god’s.

“Because… our feud is between us,” Odysseus said. “This child is not to blame. We've traded retribution for too long.”
He set his jaw, even as his limbs trembled, his lungs scooped shallow in his chest.

“She did defeat me fairly,” he said, and at his side, Charybdis glowed, pleased ripples swirling in her wake.
“She sunk my raft and reached me with her waves. She fought with honor. So… I couldn't let her die.”

“I wouldn't have died!” Charybdis protested, her cheeks flushing blue, puffing out in indignation.
But at a glance from Poseidon, she deflated, conceding. “Maybe.”

Odysseus might have imagined the slight curve that quirked the sea god’s lips. A second later, it was gone, replaced by that looming glare, that flash of jagged teeth. The shark about to strike.

“You have learned nothing.”

Poseidon's voice was ice, spearing him as deftly as a fisherman's pole. Odysseus’ gut writhed under its point.

The god rose higher from the waves, a waterfall reversed. Columns of water shot towards the sky, and Odysseus could almost see again the ships of his fleet, each lifted, crushed, released in scattered splinters to the sea. The sea god had a thunder deeper than Zeus’ at his command. His lightning moved in creatures far below the waves.

“You've forgotten my lesson.”
Poseidon loomed, the fig tree a twig at his feet.
“If you won't kill -”
He bent at the waterfall of his waist, waves of robes shifting on his form, drew closer til Odysseus could taste the salt of the god’s breath in his throat.
“Then you'll die.”

“Father!”
Charybdis’ voice was reproachful, her roar small beside her father's.
“You're not playing fair.”

“We are gods.”
He bared his teeth, an eel’s grin, stretching his mouth too wide.
“The gods are never fair.”

Chapter Text

The sea devoured him, and Odysseus twisted in its throat.

Poseidon had never even moved. Only stood, imperious as the wall of waves that thundered in his wake. His smile sliced the air as his eyes met Odysseus’, their gold blank and blinding. There would be no escape.

The ocean opened under his body.

Odysseus fell.

Charybdis had been only a ripple against this yawning gulf. It swallowed him, and he whirled in its currents, its funnel that spun him tight in a choking cocoon and pinned his arms to his sides. His lungs burned with held breath. The gasp of air he'd gotten fluttered small inside his chest.

His eyes were open. They had not had time to close, and now they seared against the ocean salt, seeing everything and nothing - the acrid green-black of storm-whipped water, the pale of churning foam. The maelstrom pulled him, down and down and down. He thought his ears would burst with pressure, and he wondered distantly how far there was to fall. This ocean seemed to have no floor. His lungs felt shrunken, curled around his final breath.

When he heard the scream, that breath was gone.

He felt his lungs collapse, fill up with sea instead of air, felt his body fight, his limbs flail and seize. Sensed something cold and ancient, more than sea. Then -

Nothing.

He had no body, no form that he could feel. His eyes no longer saw. But he heard, too clearly.

Captain.

One word, one torn, tormented sound. He did not recognize the voice. It faded, then returned. Louder, this time. And another word, too soft to hear, but echoes carried it back, sent it sharp into his mind.

Captain.

Why?

The thing that was Odysseus had no body, anymore, so it could have no heart. Still, he felt it tear the space inside him.

More voices joined, echoing, repeating in a hundred anguished tones. The words cut through his senses, rang out, relentless.

Captain.

He saw, without eyes.

His shattered fleet, each splinter sharp against the waves. The bodies floating, mouths open and eyes wide.

Captain.

Eurylochus, in the cave, his eyes pleading as more cyclopes appeared.

Captain.

Polites, his side smashed in, his blood wine-dark against the rock.

Captain.

Eurylochus, hand gripping his arm as he’d started to ascend the rope into the clouds.

Captain.

Perimedes, wild with worry, searching for the friend his leader forgot.

Captain.

Eurylochus, frozen upon the deck, face streaked with blood not his own. Begging his brother to deny what he'd done.

Eurylochus.

Eurylochus.

Eurylochus.

Eurylochus, the last time. Eyes soft with sorrow, one final caution on his tongue. The truth that had always been within his words, finally laid bare.

“But we'll die.”

He realized he could see again when his vision blurred with tears, six shapes before him narrowing to peaks of flickering flame. Realized he had a body again when he smelled ozone, saw thirty-six souls reduced to bolts of gold.

And now he had a head, to bow in shame. Had knees to fall upon, had arms to brace against the ground. Had skin to chill at the touch of six hundred haunted souls, the rake of clutching hands against his flesh. There was no ship to shield him from them now.

His hands against his ears shut out their screams, but now they turned to whispers, their question snaking through the cracks between his fingers.

Why?

“I'm sorry,” he said softly, but the clamor continued, their whispers hisses in his ears, desperate and accusing.
Polites had said they didn't blame him.
Polites had sought to spare him guilt.
Polites had never lied before.

“Forgive me.” His voice was louder now, a broken plea. “My brothers. Please.”
Their voices raised in turn, becoming shrieks, each cry an arrow.

Why?

Why?

Captain.

Why?

They would not stop until he answered, but his words fled like shadows, ash upon his tongue. They called him captain, demanded the reasons he could not express, for he'd had only one aim, all this time. And his men had no part in it.

Tears trembled in his eyes, escaped down his cheeks as the words burst out at last, a strangled shout.

“I had to get home.”

The voices ceased.

Their sudden absence stripped the air, and Odysseus heard only the rhythmic drip of water onto stone, only the echo of a wind that wandered lost inside the caverns.
Then, a presence, and steps he knew too well.

Eurylochus did not join him on the ground.
He clasped Odysseus’ forearms, drew his hands from his face. Pulled him to his feet. His grip was firm.

“I know.”

Odysseus looked up, into eyes dark as tilled earth. Eyes that held his, eyes as soft as his grasp was strong.

He did not deserve the gentleness in that gaze.

“Captain.”

It was a word utterly different from the screams. In Eurylochus’ voice, the name bore all the warmth of their first days, from boyhood when the title had been teasing, to war when it turned true. The trust of a friend who knew he was never as confident as he pretended - yet believed in him anyway.

“Eurylochus.”

His weeping split the word, four broken syllables, and then he couldn't speak at all. His body shook, shoulders trembling under Eurylochus’ hands. His friend was silent, now, his body still.

He wouldn't make it home. Eurylochus had known, and Odysseus hadn't wanted to believe. He'd sacrificed his friends, their blood spilled out behind him in his wake. He'd thought he could outwit the gods, but he'd only multiplied their destruction. Six hundred souls. It all had been in vain.

Then, Eurylochus stepped forward, releasing his grip, and Odysseus almost crumpled to the ground - but his brother caught him. Lifted him, once more. Pulled him into a tight embrace.

Odysseus broke against him.
He bowed his head against his brother's chest and wept, his tears cascading down his cheeks, his hands clutching Eurylochus as if clinging to a mast. If he let go, he would capsize.

Eurylochus did not let go. He held him up, held him fast, rubbed small circles on his back. Stayed, as Odysseus spilled the apologies he'd longed to give, poured his regrets upon the ground. Eurylochus anchored him to the earth.

When his tears slowed, he looked up to find Eurylochus regarding him, his eyes troubled. But they held no anger - not anymore.
How?

“Ody.”
The name was soft, a balm.
“It's all right.”

Odysseus looked around and wanted, wildly, to laugh. They were dead. Trapped in the Underworld. Behind them were the souls, quiet and condemning. Eurylochus, before him, stood streaked with lightning-scars, the slash of Odysseus’ wild sword-swing on his face. Odysseus’ hands were rimed with blood. It was so far from all right.
Then he met his brother's eyes again, and knew he saw it too. A bark of a laugh escaped his lips, and Odysseus could not help but join him.

How long had it been since they knew what the other was thinking?

How much time - longer, still - since they had shared a laugh?

When they finished, they were sitting on the ground, Eurylochus with an arm still around one of Odysseus’ shoulders, both catching their breath, tears on both their cheeks, but, somehow, they were smiling. The souls had not reacted to the noise, and Odysseus looked at Eurylochus in confusion.

“It's not really them,” Eurylochus explained.
“If they were trapped like this… I would not be consoling you.”

He still wore a smile, but Odysseus knew he meant his words. Eurylochus had always, more than anyone, been the advocate of the crew. It was one of the things Odysseus most appreciated about him. Eurylochus’ concern for each one of the men had never made him shrink from danger, but had always made him carefully consider every outcome of a plan. So many times, about to embark on an ambitious scheme, Eurylochus had made Odysseus pause, brought up some point he’d not considered, and he'd adjust his strategy. The plans still would have worked, without it. Athena would still have approved. But without Eurylochus’ words?
Far more would have died.

When had he forgotten that?

Odysseus’ eyes found his friend again. “Not them? What do you mean?”

Eurylochus drew in a deep breath, running a hand through the stubble of his shaven hair.

It had never had a chance to regrow, Odysseus thought with a pang.

He closed his eyes for a moment.

“How can I explain this?”

He sat for a moment, blew the breath out. Lifted his hand from Odysseus’ shoulder, clapped it back down.

“You see how we're… more solid ... than the last time you were here?”

Odysseus nodded. He had noticed, of course - he could not help but feel the pressure of Eurylochus’ arms around his, so different than when he'd met glowing Polites and tried in vain to embrace him. Even as the hug brought him comfort, it also cemented his grief - it was proof that he was finally, actually dead, no longer passing between this world and the one above.

“I thought… I drowned.”

Eurylochus nodded. “You might have. But - you wouldn't come here first.”

He paused, his next words low, almost to himself. “Though there were times I thought you would.”

He shifted, gripping Odysseus’ arm with his other hand, turning him to look into his face. “This is Tartarus, pit of the conquered titans and… of some mortals, when they die. Not many enter here.”

Odysseus’ brow furrowed, but Eurylochus kept speaking.

“These phantoms” - he gestured towards the floating shades - “they're not our men.”

“Then why - ?”

“They're a vision,” Eurylochus explained. “You've heard the tale of Tantalus - how he was bound here for his crime? Every day, trees bend to offer fruit and wine, but when he reaches, they pull back.”
He smiled without mirth.
“But what tree could grow here?”

A vision. It made sense, but, if so, then why…

“Their accusations aren't all meant for you.”

Eurylochus released a puff of breath, and closed his eyes.

“Some are here for me.”

Odysseus’ eyes widened.

No.

There had been a time he’d cursed Eurylochus. On the island, sometimes, when Calypso was out of sight or hearing, he'd raged. If Eurylochus could have just waited - waited for them to get home, without foolishly opening the bag, without recklessly slaying sacred cattle - everything could have gone right. Odysseus had thought it out a thousand times, charted their paths back from those moments if another choice was made. It was hubris, trying to untangle the fates’ threads. But he'd indulged, nonetheless.
It was easier than thinking back on choices of his own.

But he could not blame Eurylochus for too long. His own mind was too sharp to let self-sent lies distract it, and all the hours alone had laid bare for him the truth. What Eurylochus had done? It was foolish, but not more so than his own actions. Odysseus had launched the spear. How could he complain of where it struck?

But this crowd of souls, that had seemed to be a multitude, was smaller than six hundred.
And they'd stopped only when Eurylochus had entered.

“It can't be,” Odysseus burst out. He gripped Eurylochus’ hands. “You shouldn't be here. You weren't the one who slew them. You acted without thinking, yes, but you weren't the one who-”
He stopped. More tears formed in his eyes, and his gaze fell, directed toward the ground.
“You were the one who always tried to save them.”

Odysseus heard his brother's quick intake of breath. When he looked up, Eurylochus was regarding him intently, eyes questioning Odysseus. He must have found what he searched for in his gaze, for his eyes softened, and Odysseus realized.

His brother hadn't known he no longer blamed him.

The barest smile flickered on Eurylochus’ face before he gave a nod.

“I'm not trapped here,” he said. “Not like that. But the dead - we wander, wander always. And sometimes we walk straight into regrets. This place? It confuses your mind - but it also knows your mind.”

He gestured with a hand that quickly fell, then laughed again, no humor in the sound.

“Did you think you were the only one with guilt?”

Odysseus stared at his friend. In the Underworld, the first time, on the ship - he'd been so caught in his own visions, the sight of Polites, of his mother, of the crew, he hadn't even thought what Eurylochus might have seen, the revelations he could have encountered. Of the heaviness his brother carried, too.

They both were haunted.

“I was their captain for a while, remember?” Eurylochus rose and started pacing, his steps quiet against the ground. “That's why they call to me. I was the one who decided to land on the island we found, the one who saw the statue, knew the cattle might belong to someone divine, but thought it would be worth it. Even if we'd be struck down, we'd at least first eat our fill. And maybe the gods wouldn't notice.”

He paused, rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.

“I thought maybe, for once, we could choose.”

“The gods never give real choices,” Odysseus said softly.

Eurylochus looked at him, eyes shadowed.
“I know.”

Odysseus ached at the resignation in his gaze. He felt familiar frustration well within him, the same as every time his brother had said his plans would never work, when he'd been determined to prove to him they could.

“The blame should be mine,” Odysseus said, almost defiant. “You shouldn't have to…”
He swallowed.
“You were right, not to trust me. After Scylla.”

Eurylochus stopped, peered down at him. Held his gaze for a moment, intent. Then sighed, lowered himself to the ground beside him, and laid a hand upon Odysseus’ shoulder.

“You can't carry all the blame,” he said. “You bear a lot of it already. But everything after the lair, the monster?” He swallowed. “I brought us to that island. Killed the cattle. I was the reason the thunder god slew the rest of us.”

Odysseus opened his mouth, but Eurylochus stopped him with a hand.

“I see the paths, now, remember? And in them, once I drew my sword… there was no going back. If you had chosen yourself to die? Zeus would have killed us, still.”

The gods were never fair.
Poseidon's words, but Polites had said much the same, with the infant - and now, Eurylochus, as well.
So many impossible choices dangled by the gods.
So many times they had been only men.

They sat in silence. The souls hung in the air before them, still and staring. Their blank eyes seemed to watch both Odysseus and Eurylochus in turn.

“Where are the others?” Odysseus asked. “Our crew. The real ones.”

Eurylochus nodded at the mists over his shoulder.
“Back there - most of them.”
He drew in a breath he did not need.
“In the asphodel. They wander - they're themselves, still, though often confused, but none of them come here, as far as I know. Only…”

“Only?”

Eurylochus released a sigh, rubbed his forehead. He did not look at Odysseus with his next words.

“Me. And Polites.”

Odysseus’ eyes widened. Polites? In Tartarus? What evil had he ever done, in life? He'd slain in war, but victory in battle glorified the gods. They would be proud, not condemning. He had never killed a kinsman, never harmed a friend. He had welcomed every guest, perhaps even too readily than xenia demanded. He was… Polites.

“He blames himself for the cave,” Eurylochus explained.
“How his trusting the lotus eaters caused death, caused your grief. He's been worried for you, every moment.”

Odysseus shook his head, not wanting to believe. Polites, out of them all, deserved to be at peace. Polites, who'd advocated mercy even as he fell. Polites, who'd saved him even after death. Polites, who was still a light, always - helping Elpenor and Perimedes find each other, reuniting the infant and his family, guiding Odysseus when he'd thought he was lost.
Polites held this much guilt?

“How?”

“How can he feel guilt?”
Eurylochus shrugged.
“He's human. What else is there for us to feel?”

Odysseus was silent.

It was true. Polites, Eurylochus, himself.
Human, in a world where the gods made men their playthings.
Human, and driven to defy that fact - to prove that they could change their fate, to untangle their own threads before they're cut, to steal gods’ fire and make it light their way.
Guilt tore at them as punishment. But they still kept the flame.

Odysseus reached a hand out, set it on Eurylochus’ shoulder. Wondered, for a moment, at its solidity. Eurylochus still had not explained why they had their aboveworld substance. Then, he raised himself into a squat, then to his feet, reached his other hand out to Eurylochus to pull his brother up.

“It doesn't have to be like this,” Odysseus said.
“We’ll always bear the cost of what we chose. We should remember them - but not like this.” He gestured to the fog of souls.
“They wouldn't want to be a voice to haunt someone's dreams.”

They all had had their goals.
Elpenor, youthful and excited, had hoped for glory. Perimedes had craved treasure. Achaemenides just wanted to survive. Macareus had hoped to find a wife, after the war. Argyros longed to see his grandchildren. Polites had wished they all could stay together once they made it home. And Eurylochus had vowed they'd all make it home alive.
None of them had found what they'd hoped for.
But all of them deserved to be remembered for themselves.

“They're still here. Let's go find them.”

Eurylochus stared at him as if he'd lost his wits - then, he let himself be pulled up to his feet. He shook his head and smiled, a slowly spreading curve across his cheeks.

“You're back, Captain.”

Odysseus tightened his grip on his hand, then released it.

“Thanks to you.”