drabblewriter

Patroclus snorts in soft amusement. “You sound as if you’ve just fought a battle.”

“He didn’t want to sleep. Aren’t children supposed to take naps?”

Patroclus laughs. “He’s twelve, Achilles. That's a little old for regular naps.”

“But he spent all morning training. It was clear how tired he was."

Patroclus reaches for his hand. "That sounds like someone else I know."

Achilles doesn't blush, but he does lean in for the offered kiss. "Well, he is my son."

The words come out a little uncertain, like everything related has since Neoptolemus was brought to the Greek camp at Troy. Achilles hadn't quite anticipated that, and Patroclus knows he's struggling trying to find the part of him that can be a father when he's much more familiar with the role of warrior.

Achilles frowns, the soft teasing falling away for a too-common moment where he looks far older than he is. "I wonder sometimes..."

"What?"

Achilles sighs heavily. "He is mine. He's following in my every footstep, and I wonder...is that right? He's only a child. And he's been drafted into a war."

"He's your son," Patroclus says. "You could send him away, send him to safety."

Achilles groans, head tipping forward, hands clutching into his hair. "I know that. But there's the prophecy. We need him to win this war. You saw how much morale improved when he arrived. Everyone thinks we're near the end now."

Patroclus can't argue that, but he can't let the point go either. "Is that worth his childhood? His peace? His life?"

Achilles's face spasms, and for half a second, Patroclus is sorry he said it. But it is the truth. The very real risk.

Achilles's voice, when he speaks, is soft. "It's another way he's following me, isn't it? Prophecy."

Patroclus doesn't point out that those prophecies are different. That while it is said Neoptolemus will bring the Greeks to victory, Achilles is guaranteed only personal glory and death. It's a sore spot that flares between them sometimes, a prescient grief. He wonders what will happen to Neoptolemus then.

There's silence between them for long moments, nothing said, nothing decided. What is there to do? Prophecy has a strangle-hold on them; they feel like the playthings of gods and fate. Patroclus hates it, and he knows, deep down, Achilles does too.

"Father?"

Achilles's eyes widen as they snap to the tent, where the boy is lingering half in shadow, hesitant. "What is it?"

Neoptolemus's eyes flick to Patroclus, then back to his father. "Will you - come in?" he asks.

Something in Patroclus's chest aches, soft and warm. Perhaps it was a bad dream, or maybe something else. Either way, something Neoptolemus is willing to share with Achilles but not Patroclus. The thread between father and son may be new and tenuous, but it is there.

"Go to him," Patroclus murmurs.

Achilles hesitates for a moment, then nods and crosses the space, disappearing into the tent with his son.

Patroclus gazes after him, sitting in the bittersweetness of the moment. Cruel fate may be coming for both of them, but in this moment, just for now, the growing care between them is real.