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Eurylochus looks up to the night sky and the stars scattered upon it.
Laying beside him, so near their shoulders brushed, is Odysseus.
Odysseus, with eyes as dark as the storm-tossed waters, his hands calloused from the sword he trains with, his mind sharper than any blade. Odysseus, who laughed like the sunlight on a summer day, who boasted impossible feats with such confidence that Eurylochus had to believe him, who was chosen by Athena herself to be her Warrior. Odysseus, who his heart leaned towards, like a ship towards its home port.
Odysseus pauses in his speech about his latest aspirations to turn on his side, facing Eurylochus properly. “You’re quiet tonight,” he remarks. His gaze is warm and unguarded, though focused intently on Eurylochus. “Is there something on your mind?”
“I am merely listening,” answers Eurylochus, which is true in every sense. He listened not only to the words but to the cadence of Odysseus’ voice, to the way he breathed between sentences, to the pauses where his thoughts lingered.
Odysseus grins. “You always listen,” he says fondly, lying back against grass, one arm folded behind his head. “I don’t think I’ve ever met another who knows my mind so well.”
Eurylochus hesitates for but a moment before he settles again, their shoulders touching once more. He keeps his gaze on the sky, on the swirling map of gods and legends above them, lest Odysseus see the truth in his eyes. “If I do,” he says softly, “it is because you have given me leave to know it.”
For a long moment, Eurylochus wonders what he will make of that declaration, but Odysseus merely turns back to the sky. “Do you see that one?” He lifts a hand to the vastness above them, fingers tracing an invisible shape in the darkness. “The great bear, drifting along with her son.”
Eurylochus follows the gesture, his eyes settling on the constellation that Odysseus names. Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. He is familiar with the story of Callisto, of her son, of Hera’s unrelenting wrath—and the stars burn in their shape. Odysseus turns his head slightly, the movement so small, so quiet, that Eurylochus feels it rather than sees it.
“Wandering the sky,” muses Odysseus. “Forbidden from touching the rivers. Never finding rest.”
He wonders if Odysseus realizes how often he speaks of wandering, of journeys that have not yet begun. If he understands that his very soul is restless, that he belongs to motion, to adventure, to the horizon. That no island, no matter how beloved, could ever keep him. He does not say this.
Instead, Eurylochus lets out a soft breath and points toward another cluster of stars. “And there, the dragon,”—Draco—“a creature of endless coils.” His voice is steady, though his chest feels too tight. “Watching over the golden apples of the gods.”
Odysseus lets out a quiet laugh, barely more than a breath. “A guard who could not keep his post,” he says, the corner of his mouth twitching in amusement. “Heracles bested him, did he not?”
Eurylochus hums in agreement. “As he bested all.” He tilts his head, studying the slow arc of the celestial dragon. “Do you think the gods tire of us mortals? Of our endless trials, our endless wars?”
Odysseus does not answer immediately. His gaze is still lifted, but his body is relaxed, his arm folded behind his head, his fingers drumming lightly against the stone. When he finally speaks, his voice is softer than before. “Perhaps,” he says. “Or perhaps they admire us for trying.”
Eurylochus turns his head then, just enough to look at him.
Odysseus is still looking upon the endless stretch of those shining stars. Even now, when he lies still, his heart is elsewhere, carried on distant winds. And yet—yet he is here. Odysseus is here, beside Eurylochus, with the stars above and the earth beneath them, with the night stretched wide around them. And Eurylochus, who has long since learned to love in silence, commits this moment to memory.
He points again, directing Odysseus’ gaze back to the sky. “There, the twins,” he says. Gemini. “Brothers bound together, never parted, even in death.”
Odysseus hums. “You would wish for that?” he asks, a faint smile tugging at his lips. “To never part?”
Eurylochus’s breath catches. He forces himself to laugh, shaking his head as if the weight of the question is nothing at all. “I would wish for many things,” he says.
Odysseus grins, shifting slightly. “And yet, you never ask for them.”
Because they would be foolish things to ask for. Because to ask would be to name them, to make them real, to open himself to loss. And he could not bear to lose Odysseus, not to what he fears would be overstepping. So Eurylochus does not reply. But he does not move away, either. He never could. He never does.
“You know,” says Odysseus, “if I were a god, I would make my own constellation.”
Eurylochus smirks; a smile upon his lips before he can even think to suppress it. “Of course you would,” he murmurs, turning his head slightly. Odysseus is still staring up at the sky, but his grin is gentler now, softened by the hour.
“Don’t mock me,” Odysseus says, nudging him lightly with an elbow. “I would be a great hero. And when I was done, the gods would honor me, place me in the stars so that all of Greece would look up and remember my name.”
“And what shape would this constellation take?”
Odysseus hums as if considering. “A ship, perhaps. To guide voyagers home.”
“And if the gods refused?” asks Eurylochus, rolling onto his side, studying the boy beside him. “If they did not place you in the stars?”
“Then I would carve my name into the earth itself,” he declares. “So that even when the world forgets, the land will remember me.”
And he thinks: Odysseus does not need the stars to remember him.
Eurylochus will do it himself.
“You dream too much,” he murmurs.
Odysseus turns his head, and the sudden weight of his gaze is nearly unbearable. “And you dream too little.”
Eurylochus swallows. He has no answer to that.
He does not know how to tell Odysseus that his dreams are not of victory, not of conquest, not of his name carried on the tongues of poets. His dreams are here, in the quiet places, in the small moments, in the warmth of another beside him beneath an endless sky. Odysseus exhales and rolls onto his side, mirroring Eurylochus without thought. They are close now, so close that their breath mingles between them, their limbs nearly tangling in the space between wakefulness and sleep.
Above them, the stars shine, patient and eternal.
Odysseus lets out a soft sigh, his body settling, his fingers brushing—just barely—against Eurylochus’s wrist. “Perhaps the gods have already made us constellations,” he murmurs, his voice edged with sleep. “And we do not yet know their names.”
Eurylochus does not answer. His throat is too tight, his heart beating too loud against the hush of the night. Instead, he lets his eyes slip closed, lets the weight of sleep take him, lets the world still beneath the stars.
Beside him, Odysseus does the same.