#why must this poor boy be plucked for a fate and destiny he did not choose?

[ghostyv]

There are tears in my eyes it’s too late to be crying

rest now, hero

till we meet again

[justfandomwritings]

By The Norns (Part One - Soulmate!Loki)

Pairing: Loki x Reader, Soulmates AU

Word count: 2.1k

Warnings: Nobody was harmed in any way in the making of this story... but there was some arson.

Summary: She wasn’t a goddess. She wasn’t even an elf or a dwarf. She was a mortal, a Midgardian, a human. To Odin, she was a curse. To Loki, she was a second chance.

Notes: Don’t worry. Despite what the chapter and the description may make you think anyone whose read my stories before will know I am not a fan of soulmate aus that take away the character’s choice. This chapter is set up. Stick with me on this. I promise. Posted in honor of @muna1412​ being very excited at the prospect of another soulmate au.

This is not related to Loyalty in any way... I just have an unhealthy obsession with Soulmate aus. 

Fate was a funny, fickle thing. Loki knew that much. After all, he’d met her. 

Them, to be more precise. The Norns.

Urdr, Skuld, and Verdandi were their names: Past, Present, and Future, as they should be known.

It was they who watered the tree, and they who grew its leaves. The task fell to the Norns to write, shape, create, and control the fate of every being under the branches of Yggdrasil. 

A poor, dwarven craftsman working on the surface of Nidavellir, a beautiful, golden elf living on a hill in Alfheim, a meager, puny human scurrying around the surface of Midgard. It was they who made the dwarf rich, who killed the elf in his sleep, who let the human sow the land. They did not exchange the gold; they did not wield the dagger; they did not draw the plow. But it was by their hand, by their grace and mercy, that the worlds turned, that life waxed and waned, that the Realms drew breath. 

Every birth was through their will. Every death was by their hand, and everything in between was because they decided it would be so.

All fell under the gaze of the Norns. The kitchen cook, Andhrimnir, who served the Aesir’s table at night, owed everything to the Norns. They allowed his birth into Asgard. They raised him above the station of a lowly tavern boy. They gifted him the family he cradled so dearly to his chest.

Odin, King of the Nine Realms, Protector of Asgard, owed everything to the Norns. He was born by their choice. He survived a thousand battles because they said he would do so. He married Frigga because they put her on his path. His sons… 

Well, one of his sons.

Loki knew the exact moment Odin stopped looking at him as a son, the exact moment Odin chose Thor over him, the exact moment Odin turned his back on him, the exact moment his father marked him disappointment.

It was, like all things, the doing of the Fates. The Norns.

Fates were theirs to command from the highest branches of Yggdrasil down to its very roots. From king to beggar, slave to master, aristocrat to pauper, farmer to merchant, sailor to soldier. From Loki to her. She was their doing.

Love was an inevitable part of life. Not even the Norns, with all of the power of the gods and then some, could stop that. Humans, Aesir, Elves, Vanir, the sentient beings of the Nine Realms felt an overwhelming urge towards emotion, and one of the strongest, one of the most inevitable, was love.

They couldn’t stop it, but they could direct it.

It fell under the purview of Fate to decide who one loved. People, god and mortal alike, fell in and out of love all the time. 

Sometimes, though, every now and then, the Norns would reach down and touch two beings. The Norns would take two souls in two bodies and braid them together, weave them together, mold them together, as if they were one.

Those who knew magic well, those like Loki, could see them, watch them, doing this. 

They could see Urdr floating, invisible amongst them, deciding the pair. They could see Skuld, plucking up their souls. They could see Verdandi tying them together.

Loki watched them when they took his soul.

“Mother, Mother,” Loki tugged on his other’s silk skirts and pointed up into the rafters of the Grand Hall. “What’s that?”

Frigga followed her son’s gaze and gasped. Magic was not her proficiency, though what little she had she wielded well. She had enough to see the Norns, floating ghostlike in the air over her younger son. She had enough to see his soul in their hands, and another at their side. 

In the old days, before that fateful night, it was considered an honor to be chosen by the Norns. It was a guarantee of a great, powerful destiny in the future. It was a promise of passion, understanding, and respect on the horizon. It was the mark of one who would know true love. 

The Midgardians called them soulmates. The Aesir called them the destined. 

“The Norns have touched Loki,” Frigga whispered to Odin at her side. “They are gifting him a match.”

“With who?” Odin asked because he could not see them for himself.

Frigga squinted in the direction of the apparitions tying together Loki’s future. “I cannot tell. She appears to be…” Frigga’s eyes whipped around to Odin, “Midgardian.”

Odin turned up his nose and sniffed.

Midgard. The word, the world, that had sentenced Loki to a lifetime of second best. 

His ‘destined’, his ‘soulmate’, his curse.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was centuries before the soul tied to Loki’s found the body it would spend its own life in.

(Y/n), her parents named her. 

They weren’t sure why they named her that. When asked, they said they saw the name once in a book. Or was it on the tv? Or in a dream? 

Neither could really remember. All they knew was that, as she grew, the name suited her perfectly. Almost as if fate itself had chosen it for her.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For centuries, millennia even, her soul had been lingering on the edges of reality, existing but not quite feeling. She floated through time and space, following the ties that bound her to existence, waiting.

By the time her soul entered her body on Earth, she had existed longer  than any other Midgardian ever had or would in all of history. She had lingered for years just out of reach of one of the most powerful beings on Asgard, her soulmate. Lifetimes had passed her by in the blink of an eye, and though she didn’t remember any of them, they remembered her.

Her soul hovered above its mate, basking in the magic that dissipated into the air around him like smoke. She breathed it in, soaked it in, drew it in.

In many ways, even subconsciously, she showed her age, her mate.

Even as a baby, she never woke her mother up screaming, to the jealousy of her mom’s friends. She was the model toddler, even through her terrible twos. She almost never cried and rarely threw temper tantrums. They called her a prodigy when she started speaking in full sentences before time doctors even expected her to be learning her first words, and they called her a genius when she learned to read full children’s books while other kids were still struggling through their first alphabet flashcards. Even though she ran around playing in the mud or splashing in puddles, somehow her clothes were always pristine. She taught herself faster than the teachers could and skipped two grades in elementary school alone. She was suspiciously charismatic for such a little girl and made, literally, hundreds of dollars off her lemonade stand. She listened to a family speaking another language in the store once and ran up to them to answer a question they had; when her parents asked her how she’d learned to understand or say that in another language, she had no idea what they were talking about and seemingly hadn’t even realized she’d done it. 

And yet there were other things, darker things. 

When she was born, the nurses didn’t question the little shock of static that jolted through them as they held her. No one commented how, in the right light, the baby’s eyes could look terrifyingly aware. She lied as easily as she breathed and almost never got caught. A girl made fun of her friend's hair once at school, and that night ended up being rushed to the hospital by her parents with all the signs of a heart attack in a five year old child. She liked having things her way, and even when her parents refused her, they always found themselves oddly compelled to do whatever it was anyways. She had an affinity for snakes that often found her letting them in the house. The pranks she pulled on her little brother sometimes got out of hand and often resulted in loud crashes and screams, though by the time any adult arrived nothing ever seemed broken. Her father used to joke that she must be some kind of shape shifter because he swore that, from day to day, her eye would change their color. Sometimes, when he looked in them, he swore they weren’t his daughters, but when he blinked and looked back they always returned to normal. 

Most of it was written off as the simple oddities of a child or exaggerations of first time parents. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Superheroes did not exist when (Y/n) was a child. 

It would be another decade before Tony Stark would stand on a stage and proclaim before the world, “I am Iron Man.” It would be even longer still before Peter Parker would put on a red and blue jumpsuit and call himself, ‘Spiderman’. Bruce Banner hadn’t even begun his research into the serum that would be his ultimate undoing. Dr. Stephen Strange was finishing up med school. Thor hadn’t made his presence known. Wanda had just been born. Hawkeye and Black Widow were still assassins working in the shadows. No one outside Wakanda had ever heard of the Black Panther. Vision hadn’t been built yet, and Captain America had been dead for decades. 

Even if they did exist, it wouldn’t have helped (Y/n). Most of them weren’t born super. Most of them became so by lab experiments or radioactive insects or training or technology. 

In the world (Y/n) grew up in, there were no superheroes. And if there were no superheroes... then what was she? 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

She was 12. 

It was her big day. 

Not her birthday, she didn’t particularly care about birthdays. Something about them just felt off to her. When she turned 11, she asked her mom if she could have two of those candles that were shaped like the actual numbers, and she’d put them pressed against each other on top of the cake. She ran around all day telling everyone she was 1,111. Some people laughed, but mostly to humor her.

That was why she hadn’t had a birthday party when she turned 12. She didn’t like people fake laughing. It felt like lying. She didn’t particularly mind lying herself, but she hated thinking that people were lying to her. Especially because she could always tell when they were. 

No, instead, she had this. The Science Fair.

She’d won first prize the night before. She knew she had because one of the judges had told her she’d won.

That morning, they would be handing out the awards, and she was so excited for everyone else to know the secret, to know that she was the best, even better than the older kids in her class.

The judges were walking up on stage, and any moment, once they got past the category winners they were going to call her name.

“In third place we have Jesse Martin with his project in the biology category!” 

A cheer went up that, judging by the pitch, absolutely must have been from Jesse’s mom. The other parents in the room clapped while Jesse ran towards the stage, turning red in the cheeks from his family’s overzealous encouragement. 

“Congratulations, son,” the Dean smiled as he bent down to shake the boy’s hand. The mike picked up a small bit of Jesse’s anxious thanks before he ran to join the line of winners.

“And in second place we have, (Y/n)! With her wonderful….” 

Second place. 

But Mr. Sellers, the science teacher had told her she won. 

Was he lying? Did he honestly think second place was winning? Was he just saying that to shut her up? Or was he being mean? Did he want to laugh at her when his real favorite won? 

The parents were cheering her, including her own. Her father was nudging her towards the stage, but she didn’t at all appreciate the gesture.

No. They told her she was going to win. 

Her face screwed up in pain, and she balled her hands into fists.

At the back of the room something exploded. 

A scream went out. 

“Fire!” Someone shouted. “Fire!”

The poster boards up and down the hall were catching fire. It jumped easily from paper to paper. It didn’t help that there was no smoke, for some odd reason. That the sprinklers, that the fire alarm, didn’t turn on.

Someone grabbed (Y/n) by the waist. Her father no doubt. 

(Y/n) barely noticed. She was still upset staring at the trophy on the stage over his shoulder. 

Slowly, before her eyes, it began to melt.

She smiled. Good. If she couldn’t have it, no one could.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

“She caused the fire.” He whispered, staring down at the floor in front of him with glassy eyes. 

“Wayne, that’s crazy; you know it is.” 

“I saw it with my own eyes, Elle. She clenched her first and suddenly Christina Danvers poster exploded. She gets second, and the first place project explodes the moment she throws a fit?”

“Our daughter doesn’t throw fits.”

“Not normally, but she did today. She was about to, and then everything caught fire.”

“Wayne, you can’t be serious about this right now.”

“She was smiling.” He whispered. “When everything burned down, she was smiling.”

(Y/n) listened silently from the hallway as her parents talked.

She loved to eavesdrop on her parents late night. They never knew she was there. It was another one of those odd coincidences of her life that (Y/n) was the only person in the house who never made the steps creak when she walked up and down the stairs. 

She was old enough to know what they were saying, what they were implying. It should’ve bothered her more than it did.

(Y/n) walked back upstairs, silent as the grave, and opened her closet.

She needed the duffle bag her father kept tucked away in the top of her closet, but she was nowhere near tall enough to reach it. As the door slid open, the bag teetered on the edge of the wire shelf and fell to the floor. 

“How convenient,” (Y/n) mumbled to herself. 

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Hey Kid,” The man shouted at her out the window of his semi-truck. “What’re you doin’ out here at night? It ain’t safe!” 

(Y/n) shrugged. “Not safe at home either.” 

The man gave her an understanding look. 

(Y/n) watched him carefully as he opened the door of his rig and offered her a hand. 

Her mother had always told her not to talk to strangers, but (Y/n) had found she could always tell what people wanted. Besides, she was pretty sure she was a greater danger to them than they were to her. 

“Where ya’ headed?” The man asked.

“West.”

“I can take ya’ as far as Texas.” He offered. 

(Y/n) hopped off the curb and grabbed the man’s offered hand, hauling herself up into the passenger seat. 

She didn’t know where she was going or why she was going there. But something inside of her told her she had somewhere to be.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

Next Time On.... Part Two

Thank you very much for reading! I hope you all enjoyed. I have just come back from a hiatus and a great deal of why I went on said hiatus was the stress of managing ‘added features’ for lack of a better expression. I like writing. I don’t like formatting or managing the blog side of things. 

As such, no taglists. Please don’t ask me to be on a taglist. Keeping track of it stresses me out too much. I don’t feel like doing it. I don’t appreciate being pressured into doing it. In the olden days of tumblr, people used to follow each other, and I promise you that feature still works. If you follow me you will see part two when it’s posted. 

[elderbloodlore]

Calanthe was not a racist homicidal tyrant: a useless and bitter rant of someone whose favourite character ever got mercilessly butchered.

WHY ARE YOU WRITING THIS? 

Well, let me give you a little bit of a backstory. I first read the Last Wish and the Sword of Destiny in 2012, when I was 14 years old. I instantly connected with the character of Calanthe, and after her death, it took me nearly a year to be able to pick up the saga itself. Ever since, she remained my favourite fictional character ever. As a little girl in misoginistic Poland, I was so lucky to have her as a role model. Because she fought for herself, she took no shit from anybody, she had love and respect of the people around her, and yet she had such tenderness and kindness about her that many strong woman-trope characters are missing these days, and that is exactly what happened to Calanthe when she was being translated to the screen. In 2015 The Wild Hunt was coming out and there were rumours of Ciri being included, so you can imagine my absolute glee and the hope I was filled with to have some more content with that one woman that meant so much to me growing up. And you can imagine my disappointment when all we got about her were a couple tiny mentions, even though the events of the Wild Hunt happen not even a decade after her death. Then the show by Netflix was announced and, once again, I had super high expectations. I wanted to see the wise, kind, beautiful Queen brought alive. December 2019 rolls in, and my hopes are being steamrolled. So here I am, 22 years old and crying over a fictional character, because one of the best written female characters ever (in my opinion) entered mainstream as a bullish, racist, homicidal tyrant. So let me address the biggest changes the show made to my beloved Calanthe Fiona Riannon, the Lioness of Cintra.

THE LOOKS 

That was obviously the first thing that threw me off. I was quite enthusiastic when the cast was announced, but then as the first promo pictures were released, my enthusiasm was slowly dying down. In the books, Calanthe’s looks are adressed very often: 

 “As before, the queen wore emeralds matching the green of her dress and her eyes. As before, a thin gold crown encircled her ash-gray hair.” Sword of Destiny. 

I tried to convince myself that Jodhi May won’t be a bad Calanthe so hard that I actually made this poor ass EDIT to feed my delusions and cheer myself up. In comparison, HERE is my personal favourite art of Calanthe that I find is the most accurate to the book portrayal. 

Even when the first trailer dropped I was still trying to convince myself that even though she has none of her Elder Blood features or her iconic emerald green, that she wore exclusively in the books, she couldn’t be that bad. Right? Wrong. 

THE DEMEANOR 

This is probably the biggest change. Calanthe was one of the wisest, most gracefully-written characters in the entire saga, and I really hoped to see that on screen. She was quick-witted, calculating, but at the same time caring enough to let her daughter choose her own destiny in the end (even if it was to be with a hedgehog-headed man twice her age). Her smiles were said to always be full of kindness, she was acting very proper and clearly cared about her image. I’m not going to be getting too much into it with my own words, let these examples speak for me:

'Ah, Geralt,' said Calanthe, with a gesture forbidding a servant from refilling her goblet. 'I speak and you remain silent. We're at a feast. We all want to enjoy ourselves. Amuse me. I'm starting to miss your pertinent remarks and perceptive comments. I'd also be pleased to hear a compliment or two, homage or assurance of your obedience. In whichever order you choose.' [...]  'Hochebuz,'  said Calante, looking at Geralt,  'my first battle. Although I fear rousing the indignation and contempt of such a proud witcher, I confess that we were fighting for money. Our enemy was burning villages which paid us levies and we, greedy for our tributes, challenged them on the field. A trivial reason, a trivial battle, a trivial three thousand corpses pecked to pieces by the crows. And look - instead of being ashamed I'm proud as a peacock that songs are sung about me. Even when sung to such awful music' Again she summoned her parody of a smile full of happiness and kindness, and answered the toast raised to her by lifting her own, empty, goblet. Geralt remained silent. The Last Wish.

'Aha,' said Calanthe quietly, clearly pleased. 'And what do you say, Geralt? The girl has taken after her mother. It's even a shame to waste her on that red-haired lout, Crach. The only hope is that the pup might grow into someone with Eist Tuirseach's class. It's the same blood, after all. Are you listening, Geralt? Cintra has to form an alliance with Skellige because the interest of the state demands it. My daughter has to marry the right person. Those are the results you must ensure me.' The Last Wish.

‘Very well then. As queen, I shall convene a council tomorrow. Cintra is not a tyranny. The council will decide whether a dead king's oath is to decide the fate of the successor to the throne. It will decide whether Pavetta and the throne of Cintra are to be given to a stranger, or to act according to the kingdom's interest.'  The Last Wish.

'Pavetta!' Calanthe repeated. 'Answer. Do you choose to leave with this creature?' Pavetta raised her head. 'Yes.' The Force filling the hall echoed her, rumbling hollowly in the arches of the vault. No one, absolutely no one, made the slightest sound. Calanthe very slowly, collapsed into her throne. Her face was completely expressionless. The Last Wish.

Guards, armed with guisarmes and lances, ran in from the entrance. Calanthe, upright and threatening, with an authoritative, abrupt gesture indicated Urcheon to them. Pavetta started to shout, Eist Tuirseach to curse. Everyone jumped up, not quite knowing what to do. ‘Kill him!' shouted the queen. The Last Wish.

CINTRA, RACISM AND MURDERING HER OWN PEOPLE 

In the books, Cintra was often mentioned to be obiding by the rules of the elves: 

‘Dear child,’ said Vesemir gravely, 'don’t let yourself get carried away by your emotions. You were brought up differently, you’ve seen children being brought up in another way. Ciri comes from the south where girls and boys are brought up in the same way, like the elves. She was put on a pony when she was five and when she was eight she was already riding out hunting. She was taught to use a bow, javelin and sword. A bruise is nothing new to Ciri—’ Blood of Elves.

There were many elves and dwarves living peacefully within its borders. Calanthe’s two names - Fiona and Riannon, come from her ancestors that are respectively a quarter and a half elf, and known to be that. Calanthe was the one who taught Ciri that non-humans are not dangerous:

‘I’m not afraid at all!’ Ciri suddenly cried, assuming her little devil face for a moment. ‘And I’m not parrotised! So you’d better watch your step! Nothing can happen to me here. Be sure! I’m not afraid. My grandmamma says that dryads aren’t evil, and my grandmamma is the wisest woman in the world! My grandmamma… My grandmamma says there should be more forests like this one…’ Sword of Destiny.

There was no actual reason nor basis for the showrunners to make her racist and make her murder elves. Having her walk into her own daughter’s birthday party, bathed in elven blood, while she knows that the same blood flows in her own veins, at least partially, was completely unnecessary. Even in the polish version of the show from 2001 Calanthe said: 

RELATIONSHIP WITH GERALT 

This probably hits me the most on personal level, because I feel like Calanthe had a huge impact on Geralt’s growth as a character, and with such a drastic change to their relationship, I’m unsure as to he will now proceed to develop. Calanthe was, in large, one of the first people in the books that treated Geralt as anything more than a mutant. Here are some of my favourite scenes between the two, in comparison with how their relationship was portrayed in the show:

"At times, no, for years at a time, I deluded myself that you might forget. Or that for other reasons you might be prevented from coming. No, I didn't want anything unfortunate to happen to you, but I had to take into consideration the dangerous nature of your profession. It is said that death follows in your footsteps, Geralt of Rivia, but that you never look behind you. Then... when Pavetta... You know already?" "I know," Geralt said, inclining his head. "My sincere condolences..." "No," she interrupted, "it was all long ago. I no longer wear mourning clothes, as you see. I wore them for long enough.” Sword of Destiny.

He slowly pushed the cup on the table so that the clink of silver on malachite would not betray the uncontrollable trembling of his arm. "You don't deny it?" "No." She bent to seize his hand with vigor. "You disappoint me," she said, giggling prettily. "This isn't voluntary," he responded, laughing as well. "How did you guess, Calanthe?" "I did not guess." She did not release his hand. "I said it at random, that's all." They broke out in laughter. Sword of Destiny.

"I will not take it. It is too great a responsibility, one that I refuse to assume. I would not want for this child to speak about you the way... the way I..." "You hate this woman, Geralt?" "My mother? No, Calanthe. I doubt that she was given a choice... or perhaps she had no say? No, she had, you know, enough formulas and elixirs... Choice. There is a sacred and incontestable choice of every woman that must be respected. Emotions are of no importance here. She had the indisputable right to make such a choice. That's what she did. But I think about meeting her, the expression on her face then... it gives me a sort of perverse pleasure, if you understand what I mean." Sword of Destiny.

A rosebush grew next to the gazebo. Geralt plucked a flower, breaking its stem and then knelt, his head bowed, presenting the flower in his hands. "I regret that I did not meet you sooner, white-haired one," she said, accepting the offered rose. "Rise." He rose. "If you change your mind," she went on, sniffing the flower, "if you decide... Return to Cintra. I will wait for you. Your destiny will be waiting for you, as well. Perhaps not advitam aeternam, but for some time, no doubt." "Farewell, Calanthe." "Farewell, witcher. Look after yourself. I... I sometimes feel... in a strange way... that I am seeing you for the last time." "Farewell, my queen." Sword of Destiny.

FALL OF CINTRA AND CALANTHE’S DEATH 

We were robbed of so many epic scenes that truly took away from Calanthe’s millitary accomplishments and showed none of the strength and determination she originally had: 

"The Nilfgaardians dealt the first blow," he began after a moment of silence. "There were thousands. They met with the armies of Cintra in the Marnadal valley. The battle lasted all day: from dawn to dusk. Cintra's troops valiantly resisted before being decimated. The king died, and that's when the queen..." "Calanthe." "Yes. Seeing that her army had succumbed to panic and scattered, she gathered around herself and her standard any who could still fight and formed a line of defense that reached the river, next to the city. All the soldiers who were still able followed." "And Calanthe?" "With a handful of knights, she covered the troops' crossing and defended the rear. They say she fought like a man, plunging into the thick of the battle. She was impaled by pikes when she charged against the Nilfgaardian infantry. She was then evacuated to the city. What's in that flask, Geralt?" "Vodka. Want some?" "Well then, gladly." "Speak. Continue, Dandelion. Tell me everything." "The city wasn't properly defended. There was no headquarters. The defensive walls were empty. The rest of the knights and their families, the princes and the queen, barricaded themselves in the castle. The Nilfgaardians then took the castle after their sorcerers reduced the gate to cinders and burned down the walls. Only the tower, apparently protected by magic, resisted the spells of the Nilfgaardian sorcerers. Even so, the attackers penetrated inside four days later without making camp. The women had killed the children, the boys and girls, and fell upon their own swords or... What's is it, Geralt?" "Continue, Dandelion." "Or... like Calanthe... head first, from the battlement, the very top... It's said that she asked to be... but no-one would agree. So she climbed up to the crenelations and... jumped head first. They say they did horrible things to the corpse afterward. I don't want... What is it?” Sword of Destiny.

I understand that this happened because of limited screen time, probably, but the whole Fall of Cintra had been squeezed into what seemed to be a single day, a crushing defeat for Calanthe’s forces, and probably in some way, punishment for her pride. 

AFTER CALANTHE’S DEATH 

While reading the rest of the saga, these little snipits of people talking about Calanthe, mentioning her, often with respect and reverence, mentioning how her people mourned her and swore revange for her, truly kept me going through. I wished that, at the end, Ciri would find it in herself to return home and liberate it, as back then I had no way to spoil myself the ending. In the books, you can really feel the outrage almost all of Continent feels after the murder of Calanthe: 

[...] Cintra is a symbol. Remember Sodden! If it were not for the massacre of that town and Calanthe's martyrdom, there would not have been such a victory then. The forces were equal — no one counted on our crushing them like that. But our armies threw themselves at their throats like wolves, like rabid dogs, to avenge the Lioness of Cintra. Blood of Elves.

[...] Bear in mind that these men left their homes and families, and fled to Sodden and Brugge, and to Temeria, because they wanted to fight for Cintra, for Calanthe’s blood. They wanted to liberate their country, to drive the invader from Cintra, so that Calanthe’s descendant would regain the throne. Baptism of Fire.

In the show, there is none of that. In fact, people seem to be full of disdain and hatred for her, saying things such as: 

which, in turn, fills me with dread for the upcoming seasons, because I can already feel all the further butchery coming my beloved Queen’s way.

IN CONCLUSION

In all honestly, there is very little the Calanthe from the show has in common with the one from the books, the one I originally fell in love with. Which is not to say that Netflix’s Calanthe is not a great character in her own right, because who doesn’t love a badass sword-wielding Queen, but as a portrayal of the greatest ruler within the Witcher universe, and one of, in my opinion, best written female rules in literature, she falls flat, and that’s what pushed me to write this useless and slightly bitter rant, in hopes to maybe interest more people in the original version of Calanthe and maybe, just maybe, prompt some of you to read the saga or, at the very least, the short stories. 

[fweeble]

Courtly Love

Title: Courtly Love Fandom: Ao no Exorcist Verse: I Wanna Be Your Knight Pairing(s): RinBon, ShimaBon Warnings: slight canon divergence post-Kyoto arc, navel-gazing, unbeta’d Summary: If people were shapes, Bon would be a line— simple, direct, untangled, limitless. Renzou is a Celtic knot— circular in nature, turning in on itself endlessly without a start or end. If people were shapes, Renzou would be made up of Bon. -- In which Bon is many things to Shima; Shima is a singular thing to Bon. A/N: I heard there was a mysterious chapter 90 for AoEx that has yet to be posted on Mangapark. And then I had ShimaSugu feelings that I didn’t know what to do with. So I didn’t sleep and wrote this.  Tumbles has been messing with my formatting, so an alternative is reading it on AO3. 

 --

 If people were shapes, Bon would be a line— simple, direct, untangled, limitless.  Renzou is a Celtic knot— circular in nature, turning in on itself endlessly without a start or end. 

  If people were shapes, Renzou would be made up of Bon.

  --

  In the end, everything comes back to Inari. 

 Before he had been ordered to capture Kamiki, he had been so sure. He could throw away his chains, break free of them and fly away like he had always dreamed. Mephisto had given him the map and the Illuminati had given him the key— he knew he was dancing along a precipice, but it hadn't mattered either way. He didn't want to die but he wasn't afraid of dying, and while he had no real allegiance to the Illuminati, they offered something that Myou Dha did not. Choice. Freedom. Nothing in Kyoto was worth going back to. He would play spy, double agent— triple, quadruple, quintuple— to his heart's content. Because this was the game, the grandest game, and there was no losing, only winning. Heads, he had fun, freedom, and lost nothing; tails, he had fun, freedom, and died.  

In the long run, he'd rather die than return to Myou Dha and its responsibilities.  He had nothing to lose.  When Bon shouts his name was the first time that he questions himself. Still, he climbed into the helicopter, towards his new duty, one he chose for himself, and away from Bon. 

He watched as his friends fought for their lives against monsters that could not die, no matter how much the poor souls yearned for death. He watched as Konekomaru was nearly eaten alive by an amalgamation of pain and suffering, as Shiemi was plucked from the floor by her leg, and he squashed down the fear, the anxiety. This would have all had happened whether or not he had been a part of the Illuminati, he knew— the organization was too large, too influential, too deep inside the True Cross Order for her kidnapping to have been prevented. He had no illusions— he knew what his job entailed, had known that walking down this path had meant forsaking friends, family, everyone he loved. But he had known it'd be worth it, had known he could throw it all away. That was why he was a perfect spy, after all.  None of them could have stood by and watched— not Bon, not Rin, not Konekomaru, not Shiemi, not even Izumo. But he could. He could watch them die. He could watch everyone die. Watching Bon give the writhing mass of limbs and mouths its funeral rites had made him realize—

He could watch everyone die, even Bon, but he would never forgive himself if they did. 

Bon's anguished cry, the desperation that seeped into the words, they were what made Renzou realize that there was something worth returning to, something that was worth more than anything else.  That day, when Bon asked him if it had been his fault, Renzou had been honest. Renzou chose his path and there's no going back now, even if it means leaving behind what mattered the most.  He doesn't think Bon will ever understand. He knows Bon will never forgive him. Bon isn't made of secrets and lies, he doesn't understand the yearnings of another life, of another world. Bon has only ever lived in the sun, has only ever been loved and adored.  Still, as Renzou lies in his bed, in the dorm he shares with Bon and Konekomaru, he finds that it doesn't matter. Bon can hate him, can distrust him, can revile him.  Renzou can live with anything as long as he lives on in Bon's heart, a mark that never fades. 

 --

 According to Christian scripture, there are seven sins. Bon would argue that Renzou's sin is sloth, Konekomaru would insist is lust, his father would correct them both and declare it pride. 

The truth is that Renzou's greatest flaw is his envy. He envies the freedom those born outside of Myou Dha; he envies how they can choose their own path, how their blood is not a chain that ties them to what they can never run away from. As a child he imagined growing wings, of flying far, far, far away from where he is told he must protect a boy with his life, that he must live up to the memory of a brother he does not know. He dreams that, instead of stern words at his sloppy form, the grip on his khakkhara, faceless parents praise him on mastering a weapon at such a young age. Instead of a destiny protecting a lineage out of duty, he dreams of a life where everything he achieves is a small victory.  He envies Konekomaru who does not live under the burden of his family's expectations, of the ghost of Shima Takezou, of the name Shima. He envies Konekomaru, who even without a family, is beloved, both by the Shima family and the Suguro family.  He envies Rin, who chose the life of an exorcist and was not raised into it. Rin, who can declare just as proudly and earnestly as Bon that he will defeat Satan. Rin, who has never lived in anyone's shadow, even as he chases after Shiro's. Rin, who after realizing his love for Bon, throws himself wholeheartedly into playing white knight and winning the princess's favor. Rin had done what Renzou could never bring himself to do and had been honest with Bon. He envies Bon, who embraced the role Myou Dha gave him, who strove to meet their expectations and exceed it, who built his dream around their plans for him. How they chafed, the weight of his responsibilities, how he resented them— how he resented Bon— only to watch as the other boy thrived under it while he suffocated.

Shima Renzou has lived with envy his entire life. He does not know how to live without it.

He does not know of a love without it. 

 --

 Konekomaru would be a right angle— plain and unremarkable, but reliable and sturdy. Renzou knows that, without him, the two of them would have fallen apart love before they reached the True Cross Academy. 

  --

 Bon can't look at him. Bon, who knows etiquette as well as anyone reared by an owner of a traditional ryokan has to, cannot look at Renzou when they have meals in their room now. Even when he speaks to Renzou, he cannot life his eyes from his bowl. Never in his life has he seen Bon scowl into his bowl and while asking Renzou to pass him the ponzu sauce.  And Bon knows it, he knows he's being immature and petty, and that only causes him to implode further, spiraling into himself with indignation and frustration.  Renzou can't help but be amused. Bon, always so serious.  He wants to lean over the table and press a finger against the deep ridges of the other boy's furrowed brow, to tease him for being ridiculous. He wants to needle and prod Bon until he explodes, because at least then Bon would look at him— when had he started craving the other boy's attention? Maybe he had always craved it and it wasn't until he lost it that the hunger wriggled its way into his consciousness.  "Rude, Bon, so rude~ You should talk to the person you are talking to~" He holds up the ponzu sauce tantalizingly, swinging it to and fro just so Bon would look up at outrage about condiments being treated inappropriately at a dinner table.  Instead, Bon just sets his bowl and chopsticks down and excuses himself from the table.  Renzou watches Bon on his bed, curled on his side, facing away from the Renzou and the dinner table, reading a book.  In this small, cramped dorm room with three people in it, Renzou has never felt more alone. 

  "Shima-san," Konekomaru says softly, "could you pass me the ponzu sauce?" "Of course Koneko~" Renzou sings happily, passing it with more cheer than he actually feels.  Konekomaru refills his own sauce plate before quietly doing so for Bon's abandoned one as well. 

Later, after Renzou exits the shower, he finds Bon's dishes empty and Konekomaru clearing up the table. 

  --

  Renzou doesn't know a life without Suguro Ryuuji. 

His entire life, he has been Bon's side because of blood, birth, and duty. He has been raised with Bon, educated with Bon, trained with Bon, taught to be devoted to Bon.  He has spent his life resenting Bon, for his existence which dictated his fate. Bon. Pure, selfish, hard-headed Bon. No one knows Bon better than Renzou. Bon pushes himself beyond his limits, sets impossible standards for himself, expects miracles from himself because he loves them— because he loves his family, Myou Dha, and he wants to give them everything. He wants them to be loved and well-respected like they once were; he wants to give them the world.  Bon, like the sun, tries to pull everyone into his orbit.  He tries to make everyone's problems his own. Bon is what Myou Dha made him. 

 -- Bon sits by his bedside, hunched over himself, his elbows braced against his knees as he looks at the floor. There are dark circles under his eyes, and he looks so distraught that even his panda joke rings hollow in Renzou's own ears.  "It wasn't a lie," Bon says to his feet. "That demon doesn't tell lies." Renzou leans back into the pillows at his back, looks forlornly at the mostly-empty tupperware that held Rin's apology cookies and wishes he could eat them, if only to have something to distract him from the guilt that was gnawing at his innards like one of Gedouin's creations.  "Nope," he says, popping the p. There's no point in softening the blow, not with Bon.  Bon doesn't say anything for awhile, and Renzou is forced to marinate in the silence and his own guilt until the other boy finally moves.  "So it was my fault," Bon says finally, running a hand through his hair, laughing. And that's the biggest punch to the gut— —not the confession he made while possessed, not the way he had sidled up to him and professed his love for Bon in the same breath he had used to declare his hatred for Bon, his family, Myou Dha—

—it's the way Bon laughs now, self-deprecating, filled with self-loathing. "Look, it's not as simple as the demon made it sound— it's.... it's all sort of," he sighs, tries to recollect his thoughts, tries to figure out a way to order words that would make sense to Bon, that wouldn't just make everything a bigger mess than it already was.  Bon just shakes his head as he gets up, his voice thick as he says, "It doesn't matter, Shima. It's my fault." He looks away from Renzou and out the hospital window, as if the horizon held answers that Renzou cannot give. "I've been pushing and pushing and— Konekomaru's right, I can't push you all into... into being friends or family. I can't push you out of being a spy or into returning to Myou Dha... or even leaving the Illuminati." Bon looks at him and Renzou realizes his eyes are just a bit wet and something warm and selfish unfurls in his chest, because Bon didn't cry when his father was wounded and dying while the Impure King ran rampant, but Renzou, he's struggling not to cry over him. It's unfair and cruel, the happiness he feels about the unshed tears in Bon's eyes, the way the other boy looks unmade and broken by the truths Renzou had cruelly thrown at him while possessed.  Renzou can't bring himself to say anything.  "Shima— Renzou, I..." Bon lingers at the doorway, struggling with words he can't seem to figure out how to say. "I'll change. I will. I'm sorry. "Renzou... I won't stop trying to rebuild Myou Dha, I can't. But it isn't for me, and it isn't for Myou Dha; it's so everyone has a place to come home to." Finally, Bon stops looking at his feet and meets Renzou's eyes. He squares his shoulders, straightens his spine as he takes a steadying breath, hand braced against the door frame. "So come home whenever you want. I'll always wait for you." With that, Bon swiftly spins on his heel and stalks out the door, carefully shutting the door behind him.  It's as if all the air in the room had left the room with Bon— for a few minutes, Renzou can't breathe.  The place Renzou has always longed for, a place for him, has always been with Bon.  Bon is home. Bon loves him. Renzou will always be in Bon's heart.

  Bon isn't a liar like Renzou.

  --

   Shiemi would be circle fractals— its beginnings are simple, but as it grows and expands, so does its beauty, until it encompasses everything, unearthly in its simplicity, in its entirety.

  Renzou often finds himself in awe of her, in the kindness that suffuses her and how it is her strength.

  --

  Shiemi has lunch with him while he is in the hospital.  Her smiles could stop wars, he thinks as she watches her talk about the classes he's missing, her hands doing as much talking as she is as they flutter like butterflies in flight. Shiemi is almost defined by her smiles, Renzou can count on his hands the number of times he has seen her without one.  "I'm so lucky to have such a beautiful girl visit me every day! And with lunch!" Renzou tries his best to swallow his mouthful of sprouts and bread without choking— it wouldn't do, after all, to pepper a specimen of loveliness with half-chewed pits of vegetation. "How've you been? How is the shop?" "I've been well!" Shiemi tilts her head in consideration. "Rin is well, too! He's been worried about Yuki-kun, though." She frowns, her mouth pursing together in the way it does when she chews on the inside of her mouth. "I have been too..." Renzou bites his tongue— these secrets aren't his to tell, even if he should. She tilts her head to one side, hands that fidgeting in her lap as she says slowly, "I saw Suguro-kun yesterday. He came in for more ammunition. He seemed... troubled." "Don't worry about him, Shiemi-san. Bon's a worry-wart, you know that. Just give him time and he'll get over what's bothering him." Renzou tries to fight down the surge of joy when he remembers Bon's words. "Besides, he's got me!" He grins, it's irrepressible, and he can't fight it even if he wanted to.  It's irresponsible, promising to be there for Bon, it's stupid. It's impossible.  Shiemi just smiles at him gently. "I know, Shima-kun. We've all got each other." She squeezes his hand gently as if she knows all his secrets and accepts him for what he is, twisted, envious, treacherous, lying creature that he is. 

  Whenever he's with Shiemi, Renzou feels like he can be better than he is. 

  --

  Rin would be a circle— incomplete until finished, filled with endless possibilities and potential. Renzou remembers Bon once telling him that everything in the world is contained in a circle; in pi. 

   --

  Between reporting to the Illuminati and Mephisto, missions for the Order, and trying to mend burnt bridges, Renzou discovers that he and Rin have become something different, something more than what they used to be. "Friends and rivals in love," he says into his can of soda, breathless with laughter. "What are we? Two lovelorn souls sitting on a rooftop, bonding over impossible love?" Rin looks at him, determination in the line of his body, in the tilt of his smile. "I'm not like you. I haven't given up." Giving up. Is that what he's doing?

"I'm the black knight," he reminds Rin. "You have rules to follow; I don't. That's the boon of being a spy, you see. I don't follow the rules— I bend them to suit me." The stars are bright tonight, the cloudless sky seemingly endless. He loves nights like this, where the world seems tiny, insignificant, and he— so close to the stars— feels like he can capture those faraway lights if he just reached out for them. "Giving up, not giving up— that's not what this is for me." "Then what is Bon to you? Now that you aren't mind-controlled by green-eyed demons," Rin says cheekily, fangs glinting as he grins. Rin is easy to talk to, comfortable, a kindred spirit. That's what makes him dangerous, Renzou knows, Rin makes it easy to share secrets and Renzou is nothing but secrets tied into delicate knots with one another until they take another form. Rin picks at them, guileless and genuine. He's not a creature of the shadows despite his parentage. Shiemi had said Rin's flames were warm, kind. That's the problem, Renzou thinks. Because Rin is like Bon.  Straight and true.

  And Renzou—

Renzou is anything but.

  "Bon," he says lightly, eyes tracing constellations as he stretches out against the roof, "is Bon."

  --

 Rin doesn't dream of a perfect life together with Bon, but he hopes for a day Bon will accept his love. He strives for a day when they can build a life together. Rin believes in a day where he will hold Bon's hand and he will smile at Rin, softly squeezing his hand back.  Renzou doesn't dare have these hopes and dreams.  His biggest wish has already been granted— Bon will always wait for him; he will forever exist within Bon's heart. That is the biggest difference between the two of them. Renzou plays every angle, he plays the probabilities, he hedges his bets, he doesn't take his chances on a miracle. 

Rin does. He believes in the impossible; he believes he can defeat Satan, he believes he can win the heart of the princess.

And maybe that's what makes a knight a white knight and not a black knight. 

   --

   Kamiki would be a star— its lines crossing over itself endlessly until it became whole, incomplete until the end met the beginning, giving birth to itself. 

Renzou finds her beautiful and familiar, enchanting in a way he is not.

   --

   Kamiki still looks at him like he is scum, but there is something familiar in her eyes now, something achingly intimate. Understanding.  They had been outsiders looking in, playing their part, a part of but removed from everyone else in the cram class— now they are both unmasked for everyone to see. He had liked her from the beginning, he had sensed her for what he was— both of them were dressed themselves in their secrets. She wore them like armor protecting her from a past she could not flee from; he wore his for a future he yearned for. Her armor was her own weakness, a flaw in its design, a flimsy protection in truth. He loves her for it; he has never felt closer to a person before her. She looks at him and sees him— a boy running towards or away from something, he can never be sure. He looks at her and sees her— a girl who cannot outrun her past no matter how hard she tries. Her past has caught up with her, and with it, she has lost her armor and he has lost some of his, but they are kindred spirits.  Kamiki will never forgive him, she will never hesitate to cut him down if he threatens this new family she has now. Still, he loves her more for it, for the strength she found in her own abyss. 

  "You and Rin both," she says derisively, rolling her eyes, because she is like him; she doesn't just look, she sees.  "Yeah, me and Rin," he says laughing, allowing his eyes to follow Bon and the way he tilts his head back just the slightest as he lets out a laugh, full and loud and unrestrained. They're alike, he and Kamiki, similar in the ways they differ.

  She is so beautiful his heart aches.

   --

  Bon falls in love easily, as quickly as the sakura fall after they bloom.  Renzou doesn't remember when Bon fell in love with Juuzou, just remembers the the sight of Bon, round-cheeked and bright-eyed, with a fistful of fresh cucumber looking up at his older brother with simple adoration. He remembers Bon's chubby legs straining to keep up with Juuzou, his childish, high-pitched laughter as he ran after the older boy. Bon idolized his father. Bon admired Juuzou.  Years before the fat melted from Renzou's own cheeks, he had known the line between admiration and love were blurry for Bon.  It had been funny, a secret he carefully guarded within himself— a joke only he knew. Now, as he watches Bon— older, wiser, taller, broader— chasing after Lightning, a flush high on his cheekbones, it isn't funny.

  "I've fallen for him." 

 Couldn't you have lied? Just to yourself? Renzou watches Bon's back as he gets farther and farther away, bile sour and bitter in the back of his throat. Of all people, why Lightning?

  --

 Lightning is Rorschach blots— changing, fluid, misleading, unknowable.  Renzou can't stand the idea of stains blurring the crisp, beautiful edge of Bon's line. 

  --

 Lightning smiles like he knows all the secrets and every secret is a joke he will never share. Lightning calls Bon "Ryuuji" as he cheerfully leads the boy astray, down paths so dark not even Renzou has access to.  Lightning will get Bon killed, or worse. Bon might change.  Bon had changed for Juuzou, had decided to become the kaname the older boy had told him he was.  Bon, simple, straightforward Bon who falls in love so easily and without question.  He falls in love like snow melts in the spring, as if it was inevitable. He molds himself for those he loves, because he has never truly grown up from that little boy who liked to show off how easily he memorized sutras, looking for praise, recognition. If Lightning tells him to become someone other than he is, Renzou is convinced that Bon will do that, just like Bon has for him, Konekomaru, and the rest of Myou Dha. 

Bon returns to the dorm one night after helping Lightning unusually withdrawn and distant. After glancing at Konekomaru and catching the other boy worriedly staring at Bon's hunched form, Renzou finally gives into the apprehension that had been plaguing him since he had seen Bon with Lightning outside the Order's secret library.  "Bon." Bon doesn't move from where he sits on his bed, curled forward, arms crossed, chin tucked in. "Bon," Renzou tries again, making his way to Bon's bed. "Bon." Finally, Bon responds. "Yeah, Shima?"  Bon is still pensive, eyes staring unseeing at the floor before him. Renzou stops before Bon, places both hands firmly on Bon's shoulders, and says, "Bon, if this thing with Lightning is messing with you, you oughtta stop. All the knowledge and power in the world isn't worth whatever this is doing to you." Beneath his hands, Bon's shoulders stiffen. When Bon finally speaks again, his words are stiff, "I'm fine, Shima." "You're not, Bon," Konekomaru says from behind Renzou. He takes a breath before continuing, "At first, it was okay, you know. You looked after him but you still came back..." You. 

Renzou's grip tightens, "Look, Bon— I know. I know..."  What would be the right way to word this? "We know you admire Lightning a lot. We know you think you can learn a lot from him, and that... You tend to..." Renzou looks to Konekomaru for support. The smaller boy just shakes his head after awhile and looks back at him, apparently unaware of any way to word the situation delicately as well. "Uh, go above and beyond what the situation calls for when...it...involves..." The look on Bon's face when he finally looks up at Renzou— uncomprehending, before something akin to surprise flickers across his face— causes him to relax. Unfortunately, the next heartbeat is when, enraged, Bon shoves him onto the floor, face a perfect picture of fury as he exclaims, "Really?  Do you still think I'm six and chasing after Juuzou, confusing admiration with love?" Bon stands up, scowling, looking from Renzou to Konekomaru. "Do you really think I am so stupid? So naive?" Renzou stares from his place on the floor, mouth flapping soundlessly. He turns to look at Konekomaru who looks properly chastised, smiling awkwardly as he says, "Sorry, Bon... You've just... We've been worried." Bon seems to deflate at Konekomaru's words.  "No, it's my fault too..." Bon frowns at the floor once again. It's the look he always gets when he's thinking hard, when there's something important on his mind and he's on the verge of making a rash decision. For once, Renzou hopes he'll make it, that Bon will snap and tell them everything.  But Bon just looks up from the floor and at Renzou for several long seconds before sighing, running a hand through his hair and settling back down on the bed. "I can't say it's nothing. It's not." He looks at them and gives them a small, strained smile. "I never thought there'd be a day when I couldn't tell you guys everything..." It hits Renzou hard, then, how much he despises Lightning for the changes he's causing in Bon.  The smile melts into something like a grimace as Bon continues, "And this isn't something that can stay a secret forever... But I can't right now. When the time comes, I'll tell you." "Bon..." Konekomaru looks as if he'll protest, but after a moment he seems to change his mind. "We're here for you, always," he says instead. He smiles, just as brittle as Bon had.  "I know," Bon says, smile finally something familiar, real and true. "I am, too." Renzou hates Lightning, he decides as he looks takes in all the subtle tells of wear and tear on Bon's features, the slightly hunted and haunted look that has slowly started to become common on his friend's face. He hates Lightning more than anything he ever has in his life, including Myou Dha. 

  --

 At night, if the moon is bright enough and the stars aren't hidden behind clouds, SRenzou can see Bon from his own bed. He can see the rise and fall of Bon's chest, can hear the soft breaths of both Bon and Konekomaru as they sleep. Tonight, he sees Bon flat on his back, eerily still late into the night. Whatever Lightning has been doing, whatever he has been dragging Bon into, it has gone too far, Renzou thinks as Bon spends another sleepless night staring at their ceiling.  Renzou turns over, tries to still the maelstrom of emotion cluttering his mind as he wills himself to sleep. He thinks he hears Bon murmur "Okumura" before he falls asleep. 

  --

"What would you do if saving someone meant making them hate you forever?"  Rin looks at him strangely, as if he can't understand why Renzou would be asking such a strange question. Maybe he can't— they both know Renzou would do it in a heartbeat, that Renzou is fine with being hated.  Still, Rin ruminates over Renzou's question for awhile before saying, "I'd do it." He meets Renzou's eyes and repeats himself slowly, confident and sure. "I'd do it. I'd rather they live and hate me than die still loving me." Rin falls flat onto his back, spread eagled, looking up at the night sky. "But I'd rather they didn't, you know? I'd try explaining everything to them, afterwards." He laughs, a sudden snort of exasperated fondness as he says, "Although, if it's Suguro, he'd probably deck me, no matter what." "Yeah," Renzou agrees, leaning forward, resting his chin on his hand. "He would, wouldn't he?" "He doesn't like being reminded he's a princess." "No, he doesn't." White knights and black knights are both the same in the end, he realizes as he stretches out beside Rin, gazing at the night sky.  He closes his eyes.  "And what will you do if you never win the princess's love?" Rin laughs.  "That's simple. I'll still love him." "Yeah," Renzou says softly, smiling. "That's what knights do."

   --

  Maybe Lightning's dark blots will mar the perfect, crisp edges of Bon's line; maybe his shape will change and evolve into something different, something less defined, less definite.  No matter what new form Bon will take, Renzou is convinced he will still be made up of Bon. After all,  Bon is home, friend, family, and love.  --

[madeeoutoflight-blog]

I took heart from his eyes on mine

Achilles knows his destiny, has always known it—it has been written since before he was born. There is one detail the prophecies have left out, however, and it turns out to be the most important of all. (AO3.)

words: 3329 tags: canon compliant, character study, Achilles POV note: I have posted this once before under a different url; I’m starting afresh, so here it is again

I am not used to being surprised. My mother is a goddess—why should our men not fear her, and honor my father, and expect great things of me? The boys in the dining hall tumble over each other, trying too hard to catch my eye. My spear and sword are feather-light in my hands and I keep up with my horse as we race down the beach, side by side. I play the lyre and my teacher has nothing to teach.

I am not surprised. Why should I be?

And then there he is.

He does not fit the mold and is painfully aware of it, fidgeting and forcing himself not to. He isn’t broad like the other boys, isn’t tall, isn’t brash. Large, dark eyes under a mop of unruly hair glance around, framed by lashes as full as a girl’s, always observing. I wonder what he sees—he does not smile the way the others do when they see me, he does not attempt to talk to me. He looks and then looks away, casts those large eyes down.

I remember his name. This is the first time he surprises me. The other boys have names, too, but I cannot summon them from my memory so easily. Not like his. Patroclus.

That is why I search for him after overhearing the master’s complaint to my father. He is small, wedged between amphorae, startled eyes like a doe’s—but he is not small when he speaks. There is a strength in those words, proof of his character. He calls me “prince” and I am surprised again. Not because he knows, everyone does, but because he does not seem to care. He only suggests to use it like a tool, something I have and not someone I am.

I am not used to being surprised. I find that I like it.

Therapon, I have named him, and now he is always on my heels, quiet when we are not alone, bright when we are. At first, I worry that as I grow to know him he will no longer surprise me, he will become normal, like everything else. Then, I discover that he does not. He sees so many things, with those large dark eyes, that I cannot and tells me of them—he has words for every color of the sky and sea, he knows the boys that we spend so little time with, he describes the music of wind and waves and rain on roof-tiles.

He says I have a better way with words than he does, but it is only true when we have company. He has been hated into silence by his father and will not speak if he does not feel safe. I am glad for my strength, glad for my skill, because I know I can protect him, and he knows it, too. Maybe I should tell him that I will also keep him safe in the presence of others, so that they might hear him—but I am selfish when it comes to him. I want his words to be for my ears alone.

If one day songs are written about my deeds, I would want him to do it. I know no-one else who can so carefully put to words the things they see, and I know no-one else who sees me the way he does, as someone I am and not something I have.

Still, when he leans in on the beach and kisses me, I am surprised again. It is my first, as it is his, and I have always known it would be him—I did not know it would feel this way. I have been warm, but not like this, and cold, but not like this, and full, but not like this. Then he pulls back and I register the smell of the sea, the angry lashing of the waves at the sand. I know what comes next. Not here, I think, not right in front of him. So I turn around and run.

My mother catches me on the garden path, growls, bares her teeth. I try to straighten my shoulders, but I am breathless in a way I’ve never been before. She tells me I must go and I have no words to object.

I do not ask Patroclus to come. This time, I am afraid that he will surprise me and say I can’t. I leave without saying goodbye, but I leave slowly, never spurring my horse to a gallop, dragging my feet through the dust after I dismount and continue on smaller paths. I am prepared to be late, I know Chiron will not turn me away. My mother is a goddess, after all. And if he will have me, then he will have us both.

There is no surprise when he does, only relief.

It is hard to know the most precious time of your life when you have not yet lived all of your life—but I cannot imagine a life better than the one we learn to live together, high up on Mount Pelion where my mother cannot see us. I feel a vague guilt when I think this, but it is true. She does not see the hours I spend watching him talk and listen and walk swiftly across the grass. She would say they are hours wasted. I know they are not, even if I do not know what comes a year from now, or two, or ten. I know I will not miss these hours; I will never wish that I spent them doing something else.

“You look older,” he tells me, and it surprises me, because I have only seen him.

“I do?”

“Yes. Do I?”

“Come over here,” I say, because I don’t know how to tell him, only show him. I have words for courts, and kings, and things, but not for him. The words I know are not enough.

I trail my fingers over his skin, softly, pointing at what I see, lingering in places, smiling at the sight of his large eyes growing larger, until he stops me. Things are changing, more than just our bodies, and there is enough time to let them change. We are not yet sixteen. One day my father will call us down, but we will have changed before then, and even my mother cannot stop it.

There are other things that can.

The messenger comes too soon, we are whisked away, and suddenly, the world moves fast around us. War beckons—not me, but him. My mother’s advice is fickle like the sea she carries inside her. First she wants me to go, not with him but for myself, to gain the honor that will make me a god. Then, she wants me to stay, not with him but for myself, or maybe for her. I do not understand. All I know is that she does not care for him, and she does not care that she rips me apart when she plucks me from the bed we share and drops me on an island.

Deidameia’s eyes and hair are dark, like his, but small and empty, and for a moment I am, too. I miss him more when I am with her; she is a poor reflection of him, and I am a poor reflection of myself. I curtsy, I cast my eyes down, I melt into the shadows of white dresses and veils. I do not know how I hold myself together. Maybe it is because my mother is a goddess. Maybe it is because I tell myself that he will come, he will come, he will see you again.

I have never felt powerless before, but I do now, and it is because he is not beside me. I am not surprised.

My strength comes back with a surge when he does, not a moment too late—I need it to explain, with words that refuse to leave my mouth, why I am here, and what I have done, and how I will be ripped apart all over again if he does not forgive me. There is a wildness in the way I look at him, I know. His large eyes see it, too. I drink them in, the darkness of his irises, the long lashes, the faintest spark of something that does not belong there, anger mixed with hurt. And then we both cry, and we are all right.

Of course, the war still beckons and the future calls for us. Odysseus arrives with Diomedes at his shoulder; my mother and he fight over prophecies, but the choice is mine. Except that it is not. I weigh the options on a scale that determines not just my life, but his as well. If I go to Troy, I die. If I do not, I wither. Chiron’s words are on my mind—that it is harder to be left on earth when the other is gone—and I know: whatever I do, I will be gone.

There is only one way out, and it is my mother’s. Troy will have to be the battlefield where I can claim my fame, earn enough for the gods to notice me. I will make them see, and maybe, maybe—maybe they will see him, too.

If they don’t, I do not want to be a god.

My resolve trembles when I see the sorrow in his face, as if he has already begun to mourn. The alternative to godhood is death, which has never been this apparent to me before, but I cannot think about it now. I must not be afraid, for both of us. As long as he stands beside me, I will prevail, and I will win eternity for us. Win, or die trying.

“Will you come with me?” I ask.

He does not hesitate to say yes, and I am not surprised.

I am surprised when he goes to the sea, scratching his hands raw on the rocks to seek out my mother. I am surprised that he coaxes the answers out of her, answers she will not give me. Hector. I repeat the foreign name in my head, as if the practice will make it easier to recognize him beneath the walls of Troy—to paint him as the one target I must always ignore. Patroclus looks at me eagerly, large eyes urging me to understand.

“And you think to steal time from the Fates?” I say.

“Yes.”

“Ah.” I smile, slowly. “Well, why should I kill him? He’s done nothing to me.”

His eyes widen and his mouth drops open, just a little. I have surprised him this time—and this is what makes me sure, so sure, that we will steal the time we need, we will twist the prophecy, we will have hope.

Of course, there are times when I forget. Iphigeneia. The evening after the first raid, the bitter curling of his lips, the way he turns his eyes away. His first day on the battlefield. The dreams I start having, of my spear in Hector’s throat. My first word-duel with Agamemnon, as the soldiers grow restless and their promised victory does not come. The new prophecy, foretelling another death in our camp. Briseis, and her wish to have a child with the man who is mine.

Every one of these times, it is Patroclus who convinces me this is another thing we can overcome. He holds my face in his hands and looks at me with his doe’s eyes—my father calls him owl, and he sees as much as one, but he is a doe to me, soft and slender and sweet—and just before he presses his lips to mine, he says my name. First, we kiss open-eyed, and the spell of his eyes strips away everything that I am not. Bloody, bloodthirsty. Cruel. Murderous. Nothing beyond an iron-tipped spear and the sharp edge of a sword.

Then, as our eyes slip closed, he brings my hands to his chest, to his hips, and he reminds me what they are really made for: to hold him and touch him, to let my fingers play across his ribs, carefully, like the plucking of strings. I know every response his body has to my caresses, have long since mastered the art of making him sing—and moan, pant, writhe, and breathe my name. This, I think, is the only song I want written about me. This will forever be the most beautiful song of Achilles.

In this bliss it is not my hope that I forget, but my destiny, and that is when it comes crashing into me, like a wave swept high by a storm and suddenly released upon the coast.

Agamemnon takes my honor. He has been greedy, vain, and bitter since the war began. He cannot stand me. I cannot stand him. I have always thought I am not alone in this, but the men do not take my side, and it chokes me. After everything I have done for them, these ten years of my life I have given them, these are my spoils of war—betrayal and humiliation?

A wild panic seizes me. Is this the death of my fame? Is this the death of my chance at godhood, my chance at eternity? Is this the death of my desperate attempt to keep us together, even after everything ends? I cannot let that happen. I will not let that happen. My, our, downfall will not come at the hands of the wretch Agamemnon, if it is decreed that it must come at all. My mother is a goddess, and I will win.

Patroclus surprises me again. If he had stabbed me in the chest it would have hurt less, I would have bled less. Why would he seek out Agamemnon? Does he not understand—he, who always sees everything? I want to scream it at him, I am doing this for you, for you, for us, do you not see, but then I look into his eyes and I know that he does not see. For once, he does not see. Not me.

I cannot speak of my plans to him anymore. I speak to my mother instead, and she tells me I am right, although she does not share my reasons. She promises her help. I know what Patroclus would say, I can conjure his face in my mind and the way he bites his lip in warning. She is a goddess, and ever-changing like the sea, and she has betrayed you before.

So have you, I think.

He thinks I do not care when the losses come. I turn away as they carry corpse after corpse into the camp and lay them to rest on their pyres, breathing in the salt of the sea until it mixes with the smell of burning blood and hair. I did not swing the sword or throw the spear, but these deaths are on me. Still, I force my limbs to stone, my face to a mask. I cannot turn back now. They will call for my help soon. I will save them, and in return the gods will grant me my wish. They will grant me him.

Hubris, his voice whispers in my ear, but I refuse to listen. Is this not what I was born for? To fight, to gain honor enough to lift me up among the stars? He will surpass his father. I will. I will be famous and happy, I will surpass even Heracles, I have promised myself and him so many years ago, and no-one will stand in my way.

They will call for my help and then it will end.

“Save them for me,” Patroclus says, and he kneels at my feet, which he has never done before. “I know what I am asking of you. But I ask it. For me.”

I look down at him, drawn to his doe’s eyes, and my head is no longer clear. For me, he says. He still does not see that I am already doing this for him. This is the only choice.

“Anything else,” I say. And he surprises me again.

My armor is too big on him, and despite his healer’s muscle he is too soft for the bronze—a doe, he is a doe—, but he is brave as he has always been and holds his head high when I slide the helmet down over his dark, unruly hair. The kiss we share is sweet, promising. I hold him close and tell him, breathlessly, that he must come back, because I have always come back to him. He nods. Then the lashes flash across the horses’ backs and they speed away. The sun ricochets off my helmet; for a moment, he is caught in its light. It is the image on my mind as I wait, a fragment of the future I dream of—him, and me, under a bright sun, as one.

The image crumbles to ashes when the makeshift pallet is set down before me. Menelaus tries to speak to me, but I do not hear. Odysseus stands behind him, but I do not see. Antilochus grabs my shoulders, but I do not feel. Patroclus’ eyes swallow me whole.

They are broken.

For a moment, I think nothing comes next. What can come next, after the sun has gone down for the last time? I am suspended in time, trapped in all-encompassing grief. Patroclus. I remember how it surprised me that I could remember his name, the first year his life touched mine. It is the only word I know now.

Anger releases me from my state of frozen shock. I scream. My throat is raw and bloody, but I do not stop until my voice gives out. I am vaguely aware of my body moving—in my pain, I am too fast for myself. A red veil falls before my eyes. When it clears, the tent is trashed. Shards of a bowl are on the floor, fruit spilled out and flattened, benches overturned, three of my spears stuck in the ground. The only place left untouched is the pallet with him on it, lying spread out on his back, and it does not look like he is sleeping.

I know what he looks like when he is asleep. I climb onto the pallet, gently rearranging his limbs until he is curled around me, our legs intertwined, one of his arms slung over my hip and his face buried against my chest. I pull a blanket over us both and shut out the world. I am selfish when it comes to him. He is mine. Death cannot have him.

Why, I whisper soundlessly against cold collarbones, must you always surprise me?

Do it again, I whisper soundlessly against cold ribs that used to house the warmest heart in all of Greece, surprise me again, come back to me. Surprise me.

He does not, and that is when I know it’s truly over.

I did not swing the sword and throw the spear, but this is on me. I have lost him. I have done this. And I was doing it for him, but not for this, not like this, it cannot be like this. I bury my head in the hollow between his collarbones; it fills with my tears, then overflows.

For the first time in my life, I truly understand the prophecies. I understand why heroes are never happy. Because they are not heroes until they face their destinies, and they do not face their destinies until they are prepared to lose—or have already lost. Together, he and I have stolen time from the Fates. Now they claim it. I touch my fingers to his eyelids and close them.

Hector falls, my spear in his throat. I am not surprised.