Achilles&Briseis: A Novel

Prologue

    The ceremony was irregular. Blessing royal children and sacrifices to determine their future were standard. In this case the irregularities had to do with who was missing; the child's mother. The queen was there, looking stoic as the babe being honored was not hers. Not only was this child illegitimate but the baby girl was the only child the king had. A bastard set to inherit a kingdom, and to make matters worse, a bastard whispered to be of divine origin.

    King Briseus had strayed from the marriage bed. A common enough thing for kings to do. What really rubbed salt in Queen Vhasti's wound was she'd been unable to give the king any children during their fifteen year marriage. As the girl was half divine there was no mortal mother Vhasti could have banished or make disappear entirely.    

    Vhasti's nostrils flared as the king announced what the name of the child would be, Briseis. Similar enough to his to be ego stroking, but it was the meaning of the name which set Vhasti's teeth on edge.             

    "My King," the priest of Apollo entered the room quickly and with a sour look. He carried a wooden bowl with a dead dove in it. "The entrails are not auspicious and more than that, something unusual is present." 

    "Stop speaking in riddles," Briseus said.

    "The omens speak of a destructive time, a lowering in status, taming of a wild beast, and then the omens split. This child is burdened with a dual fate. One is just as likely as the other. Having been born under a black sun this child is unlikely to bring prosperity to the kingdom of Pedasus." A heavy silence filled the room. Thankfully the king kept this blessing ceremony small so only his most trusted advisor, the queen, and a few select others had been allowed to enter the chamber.     

    "What details of the dual fate?" Vhasti asked. 

    "I can't tell, the omens aren't clear," the priest shot a nervous glance at the king. Briseus was well known for having little patience with messengers of the gods. If it was true that his daughter was part divine, the priest couldn't fathom which goddess had produced her. King Briseus was often critical of the Olympians in private. The gods saw everything however, and yet Briseus never suffered any of the horrific fates others did for speaking out. Curious, but it had to mean at least one and a powerful one at that, looked on him with a favorable eye.   

    A howling wind tore through the nursery and without obvious cause the dove in the bowl caught fire. It happened so quickly that the sleeve of the priest's robe also went up. Crying out, he tried to smother the flame and with his flailing knocked over the ceremonial bowl. Several guards rushed forward to help but were too late.

    A crack rang through the room as the bowl split in half on contact with the stone floor.

    As the priest fell to the ground his arm still alight, a vision flashed before his eyes. He floated before a palace, a palace he'd never seen before. Lagus had never traveled outside Pedasus during his young life so the unfamiliar palace wasn't a surprise. He floated above a balcony overlooking an oddly silent city.

    No, that was wrong. The city wasn't silent, there was a strange rhythmic banging coming from far off. It was muffled from distance but clearly there. His perspective turned and he was facing a different direction. From this new view he observed the wall which seemed to encircle the city. The tall, wooden and sturdy gates of that wall were shuddering violently.

    A small group of soldiers stood maybe a mile back from those gates. Blockades of wooden debris blocked all the cross streets so the invaders would only have one direction to run, and he could view traps behind the defensive soldiers in case the defenders failed and those knocking at the gates broke their lines.

    "Briseis," a man spoke. Lagus was startled at the harsh tone of voice. His perspective shifted again and Lagus stood on the balcony behind a woman with long dark hair. She hadn't been there a moment before but she was looking at the same gate he'd been taking in only seconds before. She was dressed in fine clothing, black ink of tattoos in swirling lines and shapes extended down the woman's left arm. "Brisies!" The unseen man was more forceful now.

    The woman turned and Lagus gasped. Briseis, he could only assume the same Briseis he'd just given a prophecy for though he'd never seen the child, she had glowing yellow eyes. The mark of heaven was an unmistakable sign of a demigod, it was proof of divine origin as all who were children of the gods were born with such eyes.

    It was the heir of Pedasus he faced many years into the future as a grown woman. She was perhaps somewhere in her middle twenties, but it was difficult to tell as another perk mortals with godly blood had was a slower aging process after reaching adulthood.

    "The Black Shields will break through any minute," Briseis said coldly. "As Prince it's your duty to face them, why are you still here?"

    The man put on the helmet he'd been carrying. It had a purple plume cascading from the top. "I'm not going to survive this battle," the man said bluntly. "Take this." He held out a silver dagger to her. "The heir is suppose to hold this as a symbol of their authority. As your husband I ask you to do me one favor," Briseis snorted as he called himself her husband but the man continued anyway. "Use it to kill Achilles and end this assault on the Troad. Has everyone been evacuated?" he asked as Briseis took the knife. If the man really was Briseis' husband one could be forgiven for thinking otherwise. His tone and look held no affection for the woman before him.

    "Yes, Kegarta is seeing to the last of the people now," she said. Briseis turned back to the shuttering gates in the distance.

    "Very well," the man said.

    The gates shook again and shouting from behind them filled the air. Lagus' eyesight was greatly enhanced in this vision as even from this distance he could see the wood of the gates begin to splinter. And with that the man left. Briseis didn't turn to see him leave. Briseis set the silver knife on the balcony railing. Seconds later a horse bearing the man burst through the palace gates and toward the waiting soldiers. His purple plume from the helmet made it easy to track him as it flapped in the wind. She watched, seemingly detached as the man who was her husband went to his doom. He weaved the horse in strange patterns to avoid the traps set around the only troughfare that hadn't been blocked off.

    It seemed just as the man from the balcony jumped from his steed the gates failed. With a thundering crashing the twin doors hit the stone road. A sea of black shields flowed into the street and took positions. They stopped as one man came forward. He was taller than anyone else in the army on either side. His bright gold locks shimmered in the sun though they dripped with sweat.

    "You'll have no glory in this victory, Achilles," the man from the balcony screamed at the lead invader. "Return to your ships and less of your Myrmidons shall die!"

    "There are no agreements between lions and men," leader of the black shields shouted. Both sides screamed as they rattled their weapons and ran at each other.