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“Who’s that?”
The celebration is raucous, a blur of dancing and singing and wine as the final ships hit ground; the beach swarms with good Greek men, and the bonfires burn bright as the sun slips over the horizon and the last of the main barrack-tents are raised. Patroclus looks at Achilles, eyebrows raised; the firelight colours his skin rich chestnut-brown. “Who’s who?”
Achilles tilts his head to the Myrmidon’s tent, across the fire. There, lurking alone, half-leaning against a newly-sunk post, is a dark figure, eyes flashing in the flickering glow. “That one. The tall fellow. ‘S got – silver hair, must be older than Phoenix.”
Patroclus squints. “Don’t see anyone there.”
“He’s –” Achilles gestures, a bit too broadly, some wine spilling from his cup and down his wrist. “Hells. He’s not one of ours or I’d know him, but, you know.”
“I know what?”
Achilles makes a face.
Patroclus grins. “I know that I remember more names than you? That I’m smart and socially adept while my little prince –”
“Paaaaat,” Achilles groans, shoving at him. “I just want to know who he is. He’s been looking at me all night.”
“Everyone’s been looking at you all night.”
Flushing, Achilles slaps at Patroclus’ exposed thigh where his chiton has been creeping upward. “Stoppit. I’m a married man, you know. Can’t be gallivanting around with the boys anymore.”
Patroclus breaks into a delighted laugh, eyes sparkling. “I almost forgot! You hadn’t mentioned it in, what, at least three minutes.”
Achilles kicks at his ankle, and in return Patroclus grabs Achilles’ hair and yanks. Achilles, of course, yelps, and tosses his cup aside to leap at Patroclus, knocking him to the ground.
Across the fire, a tall figure chuckles and slips back into the shadows.
*
Achilles blinks hard. The wine they’ve been drinking is much less watered than he’s used to, for all his bragging. Patroclus can’t stop giggling, and has wound up leaning on Cousin Ajax’s shoulder while Cousin Ajax makes cow-eyes at him in a pathetic sort of way, even though he’s only just met Patroclus tonight, and he’s far too old for Patroclus besides. The roar of flames has quieted a little, but the older men are sat in clusters talking in deep voices about the war and all their battle-plans, which seems like a waste when they’re going to sit down in the morning and do it all over again. Achilles nudges his knee against Patroclus’. “Are you tired?”
“Achilles,” Patroclus cheers, wheeling about to catch Achilles’ face in his warm hands. “Hello, Achilles!”
“Hello, Patroclus,” Achilles grins, and Patroclus presses a sloppy kiss to his cheek, patting at his jaw, before pulling away. The smile that crests over his face is gorgeous, all gleaming white teeth and soft lips and deep-folded corners.
“We’re here! We’re at Troy!”
“We are.” It’s strange to think of this journey, this wild tangle of fate that drew them in; Achilles feels like a ship blown off course all the way to its destination. “I’m tired, though.”
Patroclus tries to smother a giggle and fails utterly. “You’re tired? You great bore, you want to go to bed already?”
“Hey,” Cousin Ajax protests, clapping Patroclus on the back with one of his weirdly big hands. “C’mon, stay a while longer – Little Achilles can go take his nap if he needs to.”
Achilles squints. “You’re a bastard. Give me back my companion.”
“He’s his own man,” Ajax says, mild as milk.
Patroclus actually snorts this time, which is a bit hurtful. “Maybe you should go to bed. You’re getting grumpy, little prince.”
Achilles can feel himself pouting, and tries to turn it into a dignified frown, but it apparently doesn’t work if Patroclus’ fresh peal of laughter is anything to go by. “Fine. Fine then, maybe I will. I will go to bed and you will just have to sleep alone tonight. I hope you and your hand enjoy themselves.”
There’s a chorus of ooohs from the other men, and a few whoops. Patroclus is wheezing into his palms, and Cousin Ajax has started to snigger under his breath.
“Bastards, the lot of you,” Achilles proclaims, and stands a bit too fast, dizzier than he expected. He half-stumbles out of the firelight, aiming vaguely for his private tent, only tripping on his sandals a little bit. The sand is cold and uncomfortable where it sticks between his toes.
He’s focussing so hard on placing one foot in front of the other that it takes him a good few minutes to notice he’s wandered past the Myrmidon tents and out into the common soldier’s sleeping area. There’s no one interesting here, just foot soldiers and moonlight on steady, lapping waves.
“Prince Achilles,” rumbles a deep, purring voice.
Achilles turns, head spinning. “Whozit.”
A figure melts out of the shadows. Tall, broad-shouldered, and heavily muscled, the man is clad in fine, pale armour and bears a set of bright swords. The moonlight slips over his dark skin, gleaming off the band of white over his eyes and cheekbones. And – yes – his hair is white as Nestor’s.
“How, now, Grandfather,” Achilles says, not bothering to bow.
“Grandfather,” the man chuckles. “Really, now.”
Achilles squints. “From which contingent are you? I don’t – I don’t recognise your,” and Achilles sort of gestures to all of him.
A low, rolling laugh, like a grand bell, and the man prowls forward. “No contingent. I fight for myself.”
“A mercenary, then?”
“Perhaps.” The man offers his forearm in greeting, and Achilles clasps it thoughtlessly. It’s thick, corded with muscle and vein, and hot under his palm; his grip barely reaches halfway around. “I thought we ought to speak in private, you and I, before the festivities begin.”
“We just had the festivities,” Achilles notes, “but I’m sure there is still wine and a seat by the fire for a friend.”
The man’s hand wraps fully around Achilles’ arm in a tight grasp, and all of a sudden Achilles feels quite young. “Oh, I know. But wine is not my… vice of choice.”
Achilles raises his brow the neat way Phoenix used to when confronted with silliness. “That sounds as if you have other business here.”
He grins, and his teeth are white and sharp. “Follow me, my Prince.” Still clutching Achilles’ arm, the man tugs him forward, past the row of soldiers’ tents and into a small clearing amidst the beach grasses. Achilles tries to keep up, only tripping twice, but the man holds him up as if nothing’s happened at all.
They stop by the side of a lone, unfinished tent by the edge of camp. The smell of smoke has faded into cool seaside breeze. Achilles blinks blearily, and the man releases his arm only to catch him by the shoulders.
“Such a beauty, my Aristos achaion,” he says, and runs his huge, warm palms over Achilles’ collarbone and up his neck to hold his jaw, tilting his head back and forth as if to examine his features. “A triumph for us all. And not yet a hint of beard.”
At that, Achilles frowns and tries to pull back, but he’s held perfectly still. “Grandfather,” he murmurs, “what exactly do you – wish to speak of?”
That broad grin blooms over the man’s face. He runs the long pad of his thumb over Achilles’ lips. “Look at me, Princeling. See me truly.”
Achilles… blinks.
Oh. Oh, Gods.
“Lord Ares,” he chokes, shrinking back from the sudden flood of divine power before him, cupping him tenderly between its hands. His heart pounds. War itself, blood and bronze and flesh and arrow-shaft, holds him still, even as he quails. “I. I cannot – you – my Lord, what would you have of me?”
“Oh, lovely boy,” Ares chuckles, smoothing his thumb again over Achilles’ lips. It’s rough with sword-callous and hot as flame, catching on the small wind-chapped points of Achilles’ mouth, pulling down to expose Achilles’ teeth. “What wouldn’t I have of you?”
Lightheaded, Achilles lets him, hands dangling at his sides. The God of War himself is touching him. Has come to him, and him alone. Is looking at him with singular focus, as if he cannot bear to look away, and his eyes – his eyes are unnatural scarlet, fresh-blood and saffron and poppy. Looking into their depths, Achilles feels his whole body tense and shiver, a rabbit before a wolf.
The wolf grins. His eyeteeth are sharp as fangs. “There you are, my little warrior. My lovely chosen boy. Now open for me.”
Achilles swallows hard, and blood rises hot in his cheeks. He lets his jaw relax, and Ares’ thumb pries past his lips to hook on his teeth and yank, shoving it open, baring his mouth to Ares’ scrutiny.
His breath is shaky. His head spins. He wants to laugh, or bolt, or bite down. He doesn’t.
Ares hums, low and rumbling, pressing on the cutting edge of Achilles’ teeth. “Good, for a human; your mother must be proud, to have such a perfect son.”
Something in his tone hits Achilles square in the gut, and a little groan bursts from his throat.
Ares’ eyes narrow, and his sharp grin gets sharper. He presses down on Achilles’ tongue, the pad of his thumb rough and thick. The taste of blood fills Achilles’ mouth. “Very good,” he purrs, and Achilles has to close his eyes against the wave of hot-tense pleasure that ripples through him. Ares rubs at him, playing idly with his tongue as if memorising the texture, exploring every corner of his mouth as thoroughly as a mapmaker.
It feels good, like being kissed, or when Patroclus lets Achilles take him into his mouth – a strange floating sensation that works its way up from his thighs to his guts to his head, leaving him buzzing and giddy with it, flushed all over. He curls his tongue up just a little around the intrusion, feeling the heavy, immovable width of it, and looks up at the God of War through his eyelashes.
“Tsk. Greedy boy. Eager for it already.”
Achilles nods as best he can. Whatever “it” is, he wants it, wants to give everything to the being before him who gifted him favour and skill and might – who picked him, of all the men in the world, to appear before tonight.
A deep, throaty laugh, and Ares withdraws, running his spit-wet thumb over Achilles’ hot, bruisey lips. “On your knees, then.”
Achilles folds down easily – a little too easily, with all the wine he’s drunk, and he almost loses his balance, but Ares catches him by the back of the neck, guiding him down until his knees hit sandy beachgrass. “My Lord Ares,” he says, breathless, “do you – ought I pray?”
Ares laughs again, the rumbling chuff of a tiger. “So naïve, still?”
“’M young, not naïve,” Achilles murmurs, instinctive, and reaches forward, flushed and fumbling, for Ares’ pteruges. The thick leather is a strange texture, smoother and harder than Achilles’ own armour, and he wants to pause and inspect it – but Ares brings one huge hand down to ruffle through his hair, and the shiver that runs down his back distracts him entirely.
“Like gold thread and fire,” Ares muses, and he makes a fist, tugging softly.
Achilles’ eyes nearly roll back in his head. He tips forward, catching himself on Ares’ enormous, dark thighs, face smushing up against Ares’ armour. “Aahn,” he says, intelligently.
Ares doesn’t tease; he shoves, steering Achilles more solidly into the white leather strips.
There is a strong, unfamiliar smell: sweat and blood and something sharply other, all hidden beneath a distinctly masculine scent that tingles in Achilles’ nose. It’s heady and thick as poppy milk, and if Achilles weren’t unstrung by wine and the prickling tug against his scalp, he would beg for more, dizzy and giddy and nonsensical. He pushes forward, nosing past the pteruges to get to the chiton below –
There’s no chiton below.
“Mm. Not naïve at all, are you, my prince?” Ares rumbles. “You know exactly what you want, don’t you.”
Achilles nods, head spinning, lips dragging over – over Ares’ thick, filling prick, over dark, blood-warm flesh and velvet skin. Ares, God of War, is filling for Achilles, for the sight of him on his knees. A rush of nervous, shivering want runs over Achilles like warm water, and he tugs against Ares’ hold to nuzzle into the length before him. It’s soft, and hard, in the way that pricks are soft and hard; he lets his tongue fall out of his mouth to lick up the front of it, and it tastes overwhelmingly of skin and leather.
Ares growls and rocks forward, driving his prick into Achilles’ face. It slips off Achilles’ tongue to bump into Achilles’ cheek, weighty and full. The head leaves a wet streak over Achilles’ jaw.
Mouth filling with spit, Achilles groans and leans against the hand in his hair, relishing the pin-sharp pain of his scalp. He parts his lips to give the manhood before him a wet, open-mouthed kiss, and another, and a third, slicking the whole side of it until Ares gives his head a sharp jerk.
“Enough of that. Prove to me how good you are, little Pelides. Show me your obedience.”
“Yesss,” Achilles slurs, clinging to Ares’ thighs to keep from slipping backward and dangling from his hair. “What – what d’you want?”
Ares grins that same wolf’s grin. “Open your mouth. Let me see that pink little tongue of yours.”
Under his chiton, Achilles’ prick jumps. With a happy shiver, he tilts his head back, letting his jaw hang open, sliding out his tongue and holding it flat, even as drool threatens to run down his chin. He tries to bat his lashes, looking up through them like a pretty girl might.
Ares growls. He shoves his pteruges aside with a clatter of stiffened leather, and with one hand pulls out his stiff prick. It stands, proud and rigid and flushed dark, ruddy brown at the head, shameless and irresistible. “Yes, like that,” he says, and tugs Achilles back, off-balance. He gives himself a long, slow pull. Achilles has to cross his eyes a bit to see it, thighs and belly held tight to hold himself up; his mouth waters, and he stretches out his tongue as far as he can, not quite reaching it.
Carefully, Ares sets the head of his prick to Achilles’ tongue.
The taste is strong, almost bitter in its intensity, like sweat and blood and spend and leather and skin, and Achilles moans with it, reaching down to grab at his own hardness. Ares doesn’t let him tilt forward, or even close his mouth around it; he holds himself back, rubbing the smooth tip of himself over Achilles’ tongue indulgently. “Good boy,” he murmurs. “That’s right.”
Achilles tries to memorise the feeling of it, the weight and heft flavour of a God against the weight and heft of his Patroclus. It’s… stronger. More intense. Almost more real, somehow, though that could be the drink. He fumbles with the skirt of his chiton, reaching beneath to pull frantically at his cock – he’s hard, harder than maybe he’s ever been in his life, and the long, slow embers of pleasure in his pelvis roar up into a blaze of need. He whines.
“There, there,” Ares says, slipping his cock to the side, and pulls him forward to his groin, until Achilles is pressed with cheek against the thick root of his Godly prick. It’s warm as sun-hot rocks, sending heat through Achilles’ whole body, and the crinkle of pure-white curls against Achilles’ nose has him reeling, dizzy with scent and texture and taste. With his palm, Ares presses the shaft of his prick against Achilles’ cheek and thrusts.
He’s – pleasuring himself. With Achilles’ face.
Achilles moans, helplessly, and his fist flies over his own cock, too rough and too dry but he can’t stop himself. He’s got to come. He’s got to have more. He’ll go mad without it.
Velvet-soft skin and hot, stiff flesh rub over Achilles’ cheek, back and forth, the head leaving streaks of wet that cool against Achilles’ cheekbone and even the edge of his ear. Ares clutches at Achilles’ hair, holding him perfectly still as he rocks against him, tangling his huge fingers in Achilles’ curls and pulling just enough to tease.
“Please,” Achilles gasps. “Please can I please I want to. Let me taste you. Please.”
There’s a rumble, deep in Ares’ chest, like the purr of a leopard. “You shall.”
For an agonising minute, Ares rocks himself slowly and steadily against Achilles, dragging himself over Achilles’ yet-unbearded skin, and Achilles can’t stand it. He sticks his tongue out again and licks what he can reach, leaving long stripes of wet along Ares’ prick as it moves, sloppy and graceless and eager. He watches Ares’ expression, eyes tilting up to watch the slow curl of his lip as he snarls like a wolf.
“Keep it open,” he growls.
“Yessir,” Achilles pants, not quite sure what Ares means until he yanks Achilles backwards, dangling him by the hair, and aims his prick at Achilles’ mouth. His scalp screaming, Achilles drops his jaw open, gaze fixed on Ares’ face as his snarl gets deeper, his brow creases, and –
With a low roar, Ares spends.
A thick rope of seed splashes across the bridge of Achilles’ nose, tingling-hot, then another down his cheek. A string of it hits his tongue in a burst of bitter salt, almost making him cough, then a second, then a third over his lips, dripping down over his chin. A final spurt of it catches him on the eyelid, dripping down to clump his eyelashes. The scent of Ares is overpowering, thick and heavy and masculine, and Achilles whimpers, nearly spending from the sharp taste of seed alone.
“Swallow,” Ares snaps, and Achilles does, eager and hungry; the slide of spend down over his cheeks makes Achilles shiver all over, and he opens his mouth to plead for – something, anything, to come, perhaps, but Ares isn’t listening. He’s lowering Achilles down to sit on his heels, and releasing his head.
His scalp aches, and he’s coated in spunk, and the God of War himself towers over him like a great temple statue, and his head spins and spins and spins.
Gently, Ares leans down and wipes a cool cloth over Achilles’ face, smearing away the traces of his divine seed. “Where did you,” Achilles slurs, mouth sticky, but Ares just chuckles, warm and low.
The cloth disappears somewhere, and Ares lifts Achilles back to his feet as easily as one would lift a child. The ground lurches under Achilles’ feet, and he stumbles, but Ares catches him. “Easy, now,” Ares laughs. “Where shall I put you, little warrior?”
“P’troclus,” Achilles pouts, and the ground lurches again, and there’s the fire.
Cousin Ajax leans in to whisper into Patroclus’ ear, and Patroclus cackles. The firelight does lovely things to Patroclus’ eyes, and to the curling black of his hair; he’s lovely all the time but especially at night, in their tent, while the fires burn low and cast dramatic shadows against the walls. Patroclus, grinning, turns. “Achilles?”
“Pat,” Achilles bleats.
Patroclus scrambles up, unsteady, and rushes to him. “Hello, love,” he crows, “you’re back!”
Achilles hauls him in and kisses him, hard and hungry, pulling him down to plunder his mouth, grabbing at his collar with both hands.
“Eugh,” Patroclus says, making a face. “You taste like spend.”
There is a cackle from the men still about the fire.
Achilles just grins, wobbling a bit.
Patroclus sighs, smiling back. “If you wanted to go get off you should have just said.”
“Patroclus I want to go get off,” Achilles says.
Someone whoops, and someone else shouts, “Looks like you won’t be alone with your hand tonight after all!” setting them all off again.
“Mm, I don’t know,” Patroclus pretends to consider. “You did leave in a bit of a huff. I might not want to take you to bed. Did you ever think about that?”
Achilles yanks Patroclus back down to the proper height (not his summer-long growth spurt nonsense which was just patently unfair), and whispers into his ear: “I’m going to pin you down and suck you til you spend right down my throat, and then I’ll get you hard ‘gain so you can fuck me blind.”
Blinking rapidly, Patroclus nods. “Yeah. Yes, I can. Do that,” he says, half-choked.
With a broad, innocent smile, Achilles waves to the men and takes Patroclus by the hand, pulling him away to where their tent probably is.
Behind them, soldiers cheer – “To the fall of Troy!”
“To the fall of Troy,” Patroclus echoes, snickering, following, as always, in Achilles’ footsteps. “Let it be quick and bloody.”
Achilles, mouth still full of war, grins.