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Time shot irretrievably forward, as time tended to do.
Odysseus blinked, and it was his third day on Ithaca. He turned his head, and it was his fourth. One meal became another, one step bled into the next, the sun shot across the sky in its golden chariot, rushing around him. He still felt transient, untethered to the earth, and every evening he would feel like clay thrown at a wall, its velocity stopping dead, its surface cracking into a hundred pieces, and the tears would come unbidden, no matter how certain he’d been that he would do better that day.
That was when Odysseus felt the most present. Held in his wife’s arms as he broke, a great thunder rolling in his chest, forcing it open from where he’d kept it hunched close. It felt like it would never end. It felt like no matter how many tears he shed, he would never feel lighter.
Still, he felt at home like this, and that was worth the world.
He was learning to feel at home with Telemachus, too.
“Father,” that sweet voice would call, and Odysseus would freeze every time. His heart recognised that voice before his ears did, jumping in his chest with a love so sharp it seemed to lay his skin open, as though every touch of wind would send his ragged flesh screaming again.
He would turn, senseless and helpless, and wait for his son to approach. More often than not he would come running, his dark curls bouncing all around his head, and he would stop before Odysseus as if he were still running, words streaming forth, hands reaching for him. Always he had something to say, something to show him. Always there was some place to drag Odysseus by the arm, leaving him to throw apologetic glances over his shoulder at Penelope, who looked just as soft with love as Odysseus did.
He would show Odysseus the island as if he had not grown up there himself, pointing out the plants and animals, the sharp curves of the landscape. He would show him all the things Argos could do, sit and fetch and stand on his hindlegs, performing whatever task Telemachus asked of him in return for food and a scratch behind the ears. He would take Odysseus to his room, where the night sky was painted on the ceiling and a thousand ancient tales were hidden in every corner, and Odysseus would stand there stunned, his son’s words rushing in and out of his ears.
“He has waited half his life to be a father to you,” Penelope would explain every so often, when she was there to see him like this. She would place her hand on Odysseus’ shoulder, bringing him back to reality, to where his son was looking at him in confusion.
Truly, it had been much less than half his life, but he was grateful for the simplification. It did feel like he’d waited a lifetime. It felt like his life had begun with his son’s birth, and he had waited a thousand years to hold him again since.
“Ody,” said Eurylochus on the fifth day, catching him in this rapid, streaming passing of time. “A word?”
Odysseus blinked. It was morning, and he’d been about to rise from the breakfast table. He threw a glance to his side, to Penelope—and felt a bit embarrassed about it the moment he did, becoming aware of how lost he must have looked, his eyes asking his wife for leave like a boy begging to be dismissed so he may go and play. Penelope only smiled, because of course he did not need her permission. He would not get it, for he was king, and it was him who would decide who he would dedicate his time and attention to.
Similarly, it was not him who would remove himself so he may have a moment of privacy. Before he knew it, both the servants and Penelope herself were gone, leaving him and Eurylochus alone at the table.
“Yes?” Odysseus said, trying to wrangle his lagging mind into some sort of shape, searching for purchase. Eurylochus was standing, so Odysseus stood as well.
“I have spoken with some of the men,” Eurylochus said, holding on to the back of his chair. “Or rather, they with me.”
Of course, Odysseus thought. Few words had been exchanged between himself and the men since they’d arrived on Ithaca, but it had always been Eurylochus who would carry forth their voices to him, channelling a hundred wills into one. When a man’s wish reached Odysseus through his second in command, he could be certain that it had been brewing for a while, honed and refined for days and days until Eurylochus deemed it important enough to bring to his captain’s attention.
“What are they saying?”
Eurylochus gave a long exhale, his eyes leaving Odysseus’ for a moment. Odysseus knew, then. Not exactly, not in any detailed way, but he knew what sort of message his men had for him. “Do you remember the feast we promised?” Eurylochus asked, and Odysseus nodded. “Most of the men would stay and contribute to the arrangements. Pay our respects to the god to whom we may owe our lives.”
Odysseus waited. Most.
“After the celebration, they would request a final act of generosity from you.”
“They want ships,” Odysseus said, the moment he realised this. Of course they did. Soft beds and warm meals or not, they had families to return to. They had miles to put between themselves and him—and those who were at home on Ithaca, well, they would likely try to go about their lives without ever encountering Odysseus again.
It looked like it pained Eurylochus to say it aloud, to mention this thing that had hung over them all along. “Yes.”
“And what of the others?”
Eurylochus bit his lip for a moment, a flash of white teeth on dahlia-black ground. “The others would leave soon. Before the feast.”
Odysseus did not know what he’d expected. The feast for Hermes had been a distant, faraway thought in his mind, entering his realm of awareness every so often before being brushed off in favour of other things. Penelope, namely, or Telemachus, or the next meal, or the one thousandth instance of realising he was finally home, meddling with the avalanche of emotion that would come with it every time. He was not surprised to hear that his island would be a lot emptier once the feast was over, that the men he used to call friends would pack what little belongings they had and set their sights to the horizon, on to lands beyond what Odysseus had to offer.
He was, however, surprised that they were so eager to do so that they would risk a god’s wrath for it. Hermes was not a god whose anger was short-lived; Odysseus had never been subjected to it, but any man with half his wits knew to fear him. To ask a favour of him, one that he benefitted little from, to pray purely for selfish gain and then neglect to show proper gratitude when he deigned to comply, was surely a death sentence. Mortals had been struck down for less than such blatant disrespect.
All these men would have to do to avoid it was stay a few more days to sing the god’s praises, and then they would be on their way all the same with minimal delay.
Odysseus had not realised how desperate they were to get away from him.
Then again, he supposed it was foolish to be surprised at all. They’d have seen him dead. Had they not arrived on Ithaca straight away and had instead stopped by yet another island, giving the men more time to consider how they felt, Odysseus was not sure he would ever have made it home.
“Ody?”
“It will be as you say,” Odysseus said, simply because he knew there was no use in trying to change any minds. For what? To salvage some long-gone friendship that had died alongside their first losses? To beg for a chance to redeem himself when he already bore the proof of these men’s certain, steel-hard hatred of him?
They had made their heart’s truest desire more than clear. Odysseus had no choice but to grant them the next best thing.
“I will speak to the shipwrights,” he told Eurylochus. “How many would leave before?”
Eurylochus passed a hand over his head, that blunt crop of hair. “Ten,” he said. “Maybe twelve. Some of them would go together, so there would be… six, seven ships.”
Seven ships. And a dozen more afterward, leaving Ithaca’s port in heavy silence, because he and the men had nothing left to say to each other.
Very well, he thought, about to leave this conversation as it was, but only a moment later he realised with a start how this would all look to outsiders. He’d have been content to send the men off, for there was nothing to be gained for them or him if they stayed, but what were the passing fishermen to think when they watched their king’s brothers in arms flee the island so soon after arriving? What would his glory-hungry citizens think when there was no flaunting and bragging of their feats in the war, and instead all they got were empty, hardened faces that looked only at each other?
What would Penelope think? Would she ask?
There was no stopping it. Odysseus knew that. Penelope had said nothing of his wounds, had gracefully kept her eyes to his face even when all of him was laid out in front of her, her patience unending, her support a steady stream, but now she would know, because she would see it for herself. What crew would leave the captain who’d led them through war without thoroughly celebrating first? What crew would resign themselves to the rooms they’d been given or play games among each other instead of emptying their captain’s wine stores and drinking till morning? What crew would keep their eyes to the ground and only speak to their captain through his right hand?
A crew who no longer had a captain to begin with.
Odysseus met Eurylochus’ eyes and found only sorrow in them. He couldn’t stand it. He turned, about to leave, when Eurylochus took a step forward.
“Ody,” he said. Odysseus stopped. A moment passed, then another, a thousand words ringing unsaid. Odysseus didn’t know what he was saying; he didn’t know what Eurylochus expected him to hear, other than the echo of camaraderie that had been trudging toward death for a long, long time. “I’m staying.”
Eurylochus, his oldest friend. Eurylochus, who had once promised to follow him to the ends of the earth, to heed his word like gospel. Eurylochus, who’d had so little trust in him that he had not been able to wait an hour longer before assuring himself that his captain had not actually been keeping treasure to himself. Who had sent five hundred and fifty men to their deaths, and risked dozens more. Who had openly questioned him in front of the crew at any opportunity. Who had looked Odysseus in the eye while his men ran him through from behind.
“You know that, right?”
Who had fed and cleaned him on the journey home, yes, and spoke to him with fondness now as if nothing at all had happened, but Odysseus found that this did little to mellow out his bitterness. Instead, the false warmth of his words was kindling, catching like parched leaves.
“Of course,” he said, looking at Eurylochus over his shoulder. His smile did not reach his eyes. “We could use the extra pair of hands.”
Eurylochus looked at him, searching, as if expecting something else. As if there was any more Odysseus could give him. As if he had anything left that Eurylochus might take.
“Have you had someone look at your wounds?”
Odysseus had no time to stifle the laugh before it was rushing out of him, all the air being punched from his lungs in one mirthless burst. “I will.”
If Eurylochus had anything else to say, Odysseus did not stay around to hear it. He left him there and went outside, where the sky stretched out its empty, cloudless hands, and found his son waiting there for him, ready for another adventure.
The way to Eurycleia’s room was not long, but it did seem to shift as Odysseus walked it. The section of the palace where the servants slept was blurry to him; he’d only ever seen it in motion, being chased up and down the halls by Eurylochus when they were children. They became real in front of his very eyes, and much smaller, too, the ceilings hanging lower, the tops of the door frames no longer out of reach. He’d been jealous, back then, that Eurylochus could touch them without jumping.
There were many doors, many small rooms packed into the space available. Eurycleia’s was at the very back of the hallway, next to a staircase that granted easy access to what used to be Odysseus’ nursery.
He should have done this sooner. And yet, a part of him hesitated, afraid of what he may find: the silence that might meet him in response, Penelope’s face when she found him here and gave her condolences as she led him away from yet another thing that had shrivelled and died in his absence.
A shuffling sound rang from inside the room, and Odysseus’ heart only had a moment to seize in his chest before the door swung open.
She had always known him by the sound of his footsteps.
There was a brief moment where Odysseus wanted to cry, to leap into her arms like he used to and press into those many layers of robes that smelled of lemongrass and earth. Eurycleia stood before him, that small but fierce mass of a woman, her pockets full of sweets and herbs that cured every ailment, her features soft and kind whenever she saw him.
That is until they shifted into something harsher, and Odysseus swallowed.
“What a surprise,” she said, her voice even thinner than he remembered, her mouth casting great lines across her face as it moved. She pointed a finger at him, bony and flecked with age spots. “Almost a week it has been, and not once have you come to see me.”
Odysseus bowed his head, feeling hot with shame under that gaze, that unending love that made her strictness sting all the more. She would forget about her hurt in a moment, but for now, Odysseus felt like a boy again. “Forgive me,” he said, but before he could go on, he was being ushered past the threshold and into the room. It smelled the same. It smelled of her and all her tinctures, all the things Odysseus’ father had forbidden in fear of witchcraft.
“So,” she said, fixing him with that piercing gaze, one of the few pairs of eyes he’d never been able to deceive. “Why didn’t you come?”
“I—” he began. Where would he begin? His gaze flitted back and forth across that room he had spent so much time in as a boy. “I am not yet used to being home.” For now, that had to be enough. “Time passes quicker than I can catch it, so much is happening, and—and besides, I thought that maybe—” He paused. There was no tender way to say it, but—
Eurycleia clicked her tongue. “Young Odysseus.”
“Not so young anymore,” he attempted, but Eurycleia would not be swayed.
“But still stupid as a boy if you think you will outlive me.” It was no way to talk to a king. Others might have had her killed for it, but Odysseus loved her all the more. “I will nurse your son’s children, and their children, too, and when the last stream of blood in your family has dried up, then I may let death take me, and not a day before. Are we clear?”
Odysseus laughed, shaking his head. “Understood.”
“Now come here, you foolish boy.”
She opened his arms for him, and Odysseus bent down until his back hurt to meet her. He was almost afraid to crush her, but there was surprising strength in her hold on him, her hand lifting to cradle the back of his head. Odysseus sighed into her shoulder.
“Your son is a gift,” she told him.
“He is.”
“But how I’ve missed you.” She swayed him gently, and Odysseus squeezed his eyes shut. Eurycleia had cared for his son the same way she’d cared for him. Of course Penelope had had no raging husband who would try to stop her from being in Telemachus’ life, but there would still have been moments where her duties as queen might have taken away from her being a mother, moments where she could not be all that Telemachus needed. Odysseus imagined his boy in Eurycleia’s lap, looking up at her just as he had, enamoured with her games and winding tales. He imagined him glowing with that infinite love she had to give, treating her as the grandmother he’d hardly ever had.
He imagined Telemachus growing up being loved by all around him, a future king who would earn his people’s respect, rather than demanding it through violence and fear.
Pride was too weak of a word. He was overflowing with it, not just the love he had for his son, but the joy of knowing Telemachus was loved by everyone else, too, that he was impossible to dislike, that he’d grown into a bright and charming boy who enchanted the hearts of all who met him.
“Thank you for taking care of him,” Odysseus told her, and he felt her chest jump against his as she laughed.
“Oh, there was not much caring involved, dear. He takes after you. You saw how determined he was to walk before he was ready; he hasn’t slowed down since.”
Odysseus squeezed her, as much as he thought he could afford to without hurting her. “Thank you.”
She pulled away then, holding his twisting face in her hands as if she knew any better than he what to do with it. She probably did. “I’ve missed you,” Odysseus told her, and she ran her thumb across his cheek, smiling softly.
“Welcome home, Odysseus.”
Odysseus’ skin prickled, a shiver running all over his body. Home. He almost thought he didn’t want to get used to it, that he might want it to strike him like this every time, but he supposed he would never be well again that way.
When her legs began to ache, Eurycleia eased herself back into her chair with trembling arms, but Odysseus knew better than to try and help her. He took a seat on the stool before her, where he used to sit and listen to her stories in between training and duties.
“Tell me, then,” she said. “What troubles you?”
Odysseus shrunk a little under the question. He had almost forgotten how well Eurycleia knew him, how little he had to say for her to understand. He’d always come to her when something was eating at him, when he needed advice that no other could give. Days had passed and he had not come to see her; now that he did, there must have been something wrong.
He sighed, forcing his shoulders down from where they’d risen. “I have some wounds I need you to examine.”
In an instant, Eurycleia was on her feet again. “And you’ve waited a week? By the gods, Odysseus, have I dropped you as a babe? Go on, let me see.”
She was right. He should have come to her right away. Only—
“I believe divinity was involved,” he told her. Still, he unclipped his tunic at the shoulder and slipped it off so she may see for herself. He had little reason to be ashamed in front of her. This woman had bathed him when he’d been a child, cleaned fluxes and bile and dirt from him with such love in her eyes, fed him at her own breast when his mother had been too troubled to do so. Whenever his father had forbidden her from seeing Odysseus, it’d been Eurycleia who would step in and be a mother to him instead. It felt strange to be seen by her as a man now, but he did not shy away from it. Not from her.
When Odysseus followed her eyes to his stomach, he saw exactly what he’d expected: near flawless scar tissue, broken only by the occasional scab. No infection, no evidence that his injuries were anything more than a distant memory. As if he had been nicked instead of pierced clean through from one end to the other.
Eurycleia traced his skin with her hands, just short of touching, as though she might judge the nature of his injuries by receiving their energy. When she reached the cut across his stomach, she pulled back, looking up at him with concern.
“Whatever happened to you, my dear?”
He considered lying to her. He considered making up some half-truth that would satisfy her curiosity but leave all the aching parts untouched, like stories of war that one might tell to a child, sparing all the details of gore and decay and grieving families that would try in vain to grow around the gaping rift torn through them. But he had never been able to hide from her. Those gleaming grey eyes saw all.
“My crew and I had a disagreement.”
He did not know how else to say it without bending the narrative. He had sacrificed six of the weakest men so that the best may live. He would have lost six men either way, for Scylla’s hunger was insatiable and she had never once let sailors pass without paying their dues. He’d needed the strongest men to row so that she would not return for seconds. It was not his actions that he and his crew had disagreed on, but the thought behind it: whether or not value could be ascribed to a life based on its use, whether a weak man was less deserving of life than a strong one.
Odysseus did not know how to explain that it had not been about that. Not for him. He did not know if anyone would understand that a man in charge of soldiers had to make difficult decisions, that saving all was not always an option. Those who would have understood were either dead or had their own kingdoms to run and would not waste their time thinking about the past.
He did not tell her any more, but it was like she already knew, as if she had been there to see for herself. “Well,” she said, seeing that purulent hurt, that starving void inside that had grown with every friend he’d had to bury or leave behind. “Clearly someone has been looking out for you.” And, as always, she tried to shine light on the hope left remaining. Only this time—
“Pallas-blessed as always.”
She was wrong.
He would talk to her about Athena during his baths, interrupted only when he had to dip his head underwater to rinse out the soap. He would wear the hurts he’d carried from training with pride, recounting the entirety of his day to Eurycleia, his words unending.
Odysseus swallowed, his eyes fixed to his feet, and Eurycleia clicked her tongue. “You had a disagreement too.”
He nearly laughed at how simple it sounded when it was said aloud. A mere difference in opinion had been enough to get his mentor of twenty-five years to leave him forever, just like it’d been enough to get his brothers to try to take his life. Magically healed though it was, the wound still hurt, tugging sharply whenever he moved wrong. He could not look Eurycleia in the eye, but he felt her touch, warm and tender, travel up his arm as she rose from her kneeling position.
“What a difficult journey you must have had, my boy,” she said, sitting back in her chair again, swinging back and forth on its curve. Her eyes rested heavily on him, sinking through his skin. There were no words. There were too many. Odysseus was sure there was no need for them in the first place, for she already saw right through the tangle of thoughts, all the half-digested feelings he had no name for.
“Be careful, Odysseus,” she told him. “Do not let it fester.”
She had seen it, the unlikely state of his wounds. Odysseus knew she did not mean his body.
Evenings had always been Odysseus’ favourite time of day.
It had taken him some time to overcome his father’s voice ringing in his head, the one that would reprimand him when he was not the last one to retire to his chambers at night, when he had to excuse himself for any reason at all, when he allowed himself time for pleasures of food and laughter and love that could otherwise have been spent doing—well, whatever it was that he’d done. Rarely had he shown Odysseus what a proper king should do; instead, he’d only ever punished him for doing the wrong thing, or doing the right thing the wrong way.
But Penelope had helped. He’s not king anymore, she would tell him when she noticed him hesitating, that soothing touch against his side when they were in public, or her entire body draped across his back when they were alone, her hand searching his heart where it stuttered in his chest. You are. He would forget it sometimes, that he no longer had to wait for his father’s permission before making decisions. That he was allowed to interrupt meetings when he was tired and request them to be continued at a later point, and that he got to have wine outside of official occasions, and that his wedding bed did not exist solely for sleeping and producing an heir every three years or so.
He was king. And so, when the sun set on his kingdom, that small spot of land that stood as tall and proud as its mountains, Odysseus would feel the most kingly when he got to be with his queen.
The days ran fast, and Odysseus would spend them waiting for the moment when he got to be in their room again, watching Penelope sit at her vanity and brush her hair until it shone like polished obsidian, lulled halfway to sleep by her lovely humming.
The sun hung low in the sky, submerged to its middle in the sea, casting rays of fiery gold all the way to their room, and Odysseus knew no greater joy than this comfortable silence, broken only by the whisper of the brush through Penelope’s hair. His wife. Home. The point where it all slowed down and Odysseus got to exist.
Penelope laid her brush aside, combing through her hair with her fingers now to sweep it over one shoulder. “Eurylochus told me you planned a feast.”
Odysseus suppressed a wince. That name spoken into the peace of their evening, shattering it like glass. “Right,” he said, in an attempt to catch up. “Yes, we… we were all desperate to be home, and—” He paused for a moment, rethinking his words. “We promised Hermes a feast in exchange for safe travels,” he said, because to say that it had actually been everyone but him would have prompted questions. Questions of why he had not joined, why he’d been out of commission. Questions of what had happened.
No, that was best kept under wraps for now.
“I have written to Ctimene,” Penelope continued, turning around on her stool to look at him. “Though I haven’t sent the letter yet.”
Normally, Odysseus would have been grateful. His return had come with work that had to be taken care of: all the people that must be informed that the king of Ithaca was not in fact dead, friends, family, nearby islands who they traded goods with, all the implications that came heavy in tow. Penelope had been taking care of most of it, unprompted, without being asked, always tactful in all matters, carrying Odysseus from one moment to the next. He did not know what he would have done without her.
Well, no. He did.
But there was so much she didn’t know. Ctimene would visit to celebrate with her family, and she would be just as overjoyed to reunite with her husband as Penelope had been, and she might take Odysseus aside during a quiet moment and offer her open arms, delivering dreadful news that he already knew. How would he tell her? How was he meant to react when he’d seen her, when he’d heard his mother’s last words repeated endlessly in that roaring darkness, when he knew she might not have succumbed to her grief if he’d come home sooner?
How was he meant to look Ctimene in the eye, knowing it’d been her husband who had set them back years?
“Odysseus?”
“I’ve missed her,” Odysseus blurted, reaching for the easiest thing. Penelope didn’t know. Ctimene would bring the news to her as well, and Odysseus might have to pretend to be devastated, shattered with a newfound sadness, when all he felt was bitter numbness, when loss had already sunk into him like gangrene. “How is she?”
Penelope softened. “She is well,” she told him. “She visited often. We spent many afternoons talking.” She laughed, and Odysseus felt a little lighter at the sound. “She might owe you some apologies for the stories she told Telemachus.”
“What sort of stories?”
“From when you were younger.”
Odysseus smiled, flushing. Nothing good ever came of that; he and Ctimene had rarely seen eye to eye as children, only truly making up and finding love for each other as they grew older. “Well, I have some of her stories to share, too. I shall get my revenge soon enough.”
He watched his words get away from him as soon as he spoke them. So easily had he agreed to have Ctimene visit, there between the lines. Penelope would send the letter; it would reach Same within a day, tied to the neck of one of their pigeons to be delivered right to their door.
Already it was beginning.
Odysseus tried to hold on to the vow he’d made to himself, his promise to not let the future taint the present, that he would take each day as it came. He would figure it out as he went; he always had.
This was different. He knew that. But he had no other choice; he would rather suffer once than twice, would rather take the disaster coming his way when the time was right rather than bringing it into his home when it had not yet arrived.
That morning, Odysseus woke to the sound of Penelope’s loom. The rasp of the bar, the hushed breath of the shuttle as it slid back and forth, guided by capable hands. Odysseus hummed into the pillows before arching off the bed, stretching until his spine cracked.
“Gods,” Penelope laughed. She would always tell him he’d split himself in half one day.
Odysseus knew where he was, recognised her voice. This was progress, at least. To know the morning for what it was: wonderful routine, that which he had ached for every day for the past thirteen years. To wake up beside his wife and hold her close, or stir when she had already risen and allow her to shower him with kisses and talk of this and that, the everyday topics that kept coming back.
“How was your sleep?” he asked, his voice rough as grit but full of his smile as he lay there, arriving in consciousness. Outside, he could make out the caress of waves along the shoreline. Gods, how he had missed that sound.
“Fine,” Penelope told him, “although—” and here she stopped, and Odysseus made out the sound of scissors, the shuffle of fabric. He made himself open his eyes then, blinking against the sudden brightness of the room, and he sat up to watch her. Most of her work was covered by her body, her back turned to Odysseus, but he recognised the motions from other projects, clumsier ones she’d made when she was young, rugs and tapestries she’d made him just so they would have something to fill their home with.
Gathered in her lap, the length of fabric she’d woven was a wonder. Odysseus rose, throwing on his tunic from the previous day so he would not have to step into the morning chill unclothed, and looked over Penelope’s shoulder, pressing a kiss to her head in passing. There she worked, cutting the threads that kept the cloak fastened to the loom, freeing the finished project at last.
It did not look like much yet, folded up and with its threads still sticking out like this, but Odysseus knew what his wife was capable of, and even now the work was impressive, the fine details of winged horses in gallop chasing across the edge of the work, the seamless transition between colours, the striking crimson that made up the background, the entire design bathed in red.
“Thirteen years in the making,” he said, half to himself, half to Penelope. She’d had him pick colours and a design before leaving, would use words to paint pictures of his glory when he returned, all the eyes he would draw at feasts and meetings.
“I unravelled it whenever I got close to finishing it,” she told him, and Odysseus frowned.
“Why?”
Penelope laid down the scissors, turning to look up at him, those clever eyes so rarely giving away her inner world. Now they shone pink, full to brimming. “Because I told myself that when I was finished, you would come home.”
Odysseus deflated, shattered. He motioned for her to move and sat with her on her stool, the two of them squeezed close together in that small space. Penelope leaned into his touch as soon as his hands were within reach, bringing them to her face, roughened though they were. She did not fit into them as well as she had all those years ago, but still Odysseus held her.
“Penelope,” he said, his own eyes burning with the weight of it, of getting to say that name and be heard by more than empty air. Penelope turned her head to place her lips to his palm, tears overflowing. How long she must have waited. Not just for her husband to return, but for the relief to finally set in, to grieve all the years they’d lost. She had been so strong, so brave for him, catching him in his many moments of weakness ever since he’d arrived. How heavy it must have weighed on her to continue to be queen when all she wanted was to be a wife to her husband.
“You wonderful, shining star,” he said, smiling through the ache, because he was here. The waiting had come to an end. “Best of wives and best of women. Love of my life.” He leaned in to kiss her damp cheeks, that mass of hair that had yet to be pinned up. “I never stopped, you know,” he told her, bringing his forehead to hers. “Coming home. I never lingered for longer than I needed to. You were always the wind in my sails, guiding me back.” Another kiss to the tip of her nose, the space beneath her eye. “It was always you, Penelope. There was no one else.”
Her brows drew together at that, and Odysseus ran one hand through her hair to cradle her head. “Never, love.”
“I know,” Penelope said, giving a small smile. “I believe you.”
“I doubt I could have, anyway, had I wanted to,” he told her, just to see that smile again. “Everyone knows you did not marry me for my looks.”
A laugh, then, sweet and damp, breathed into the thin space between them. It had always been a joke among Odysseus and his men that he had been given his sharp mind to make up for his face, his height, his stubby legs. Every man has a gift, they would say, whenever such things came up. Achilles’ speed, or Diomedes’ ferocity in battle, or any other man’s beauty, for there had been many that were beautiful. And another would say yes, and we all know what Odysseus’ is not.
Penelope had been the first to not see past his looks in favour of his shrewdness, and instead found something in them that she enjoyed alongside his gifted mind. She laid her hand over Odysseus’, her eyes lifting. “But they’ve grown on me,” she told him, her gaze wandering over his crooked nose, his dark-rimmed eyelids, his scarred mouth. “And I've missed them very much.”
Odysseus exhaled. She would never know how much he’d missed her. He was not sure he had the means to show her.
But he could try. Perhaps he would manage to scrape the outermost edges.
He wiped the last of Penelope’s tears, relishing even that, painful though it was to see his wife cry. At least he was here now, to hold her, to be strong when she could not, just as she did for him. Odysseus could only imagine the weight that had been pressing down on her all these years, the pressure of responsibility and lone motherhood and yearning.
All this time, there had never been certainty for her that her husband had not died. This truth reached Odysseus with delay, but for three years after news of the war’s end had been carried to every part of the land, Penelope had lived on faith alone, on blind trust that he would somehow make it home to her.
Odysseus cradled her head in his hands like the most precious thing in the world, like a flower that bloomed only once in a lifetime, because that was what she was. A complete and utter miracle that had found its way into Odysseus’ life by pure chance, a wild thing he’d had to chase and coax and earn and was worth it a thousand times over.
He would never let her go.
For once he did not feel giddy as a boy when he leaned in, thrumming with excitement as if it was the first time. For once he felt the age he was, sobered by the sight of Penelope’s tears, by the realisation of all he had missed, all that this small crack had represented. Odysseus followed the drag of his eyes to her lips, and he met them like it had not been an eternity, like he had not fallen terribly out of practice, like he’d been present and steady all along and had only reassurance to give her. He would learn to be hers again if it killed him.
Penelope melted like wax in his hands, and Odysseus caught her where she faltered. Her hands found their way into his hair, so much longer than when she’d last felt it, and Odysseus wound his arm around her waist, pulling her close, before realising that redistributing their weight in any direction was risky. They swayed for a moment on the seat of that stool, Odysseus holding on to the loom for balance, and he felt Penelope smile into his mouth.
In a matter of seconds, she had dragged Odysseus to his feet with her and led him backward until he was flush with the wall, the cloak forgotten on the floor. “My love,” she spoke into the space between them, and her voice slid down Odysseus’ spine, smooth and honey-slicked. He had to remind himself to breathe; desire pooled low in his gut, warm and familiar as anything, though it had been a long time since he'd been in the state to hold it for longer than a fleeting moment. He had never been able to keep up when Penelope was like this, when she threw elegance and form to the wind and followed only her own tune.
Very well, he thought, smiling up at her as she crowded him against the wall of their shared bedroom, this space that was theirs alone. Odysseus was more than amenable. He had always been happy to follow her lead.
Her lips were soft and smooth as they glided over his, retracing her steps to find that familiar rhythm. Her hand travelled to his waist, tugging him forward and into her, and the movement sent a shot of heat through Odysseus, urging him to follow suit, to envelop her in his arms and press her close like how he’d been wanting to for years. Years and years. And now he was back. When she was this close, flush against him in all her soft warmth, it was impossible to deny that he was home. The reality of it sank easily into his mind this time, meeting no resistance. He was here, and he was hers, and if this was the way she needed it in order to believe that he was real beneath her hands, Odysseus was more than eager to give it to her.
Penelope sighed softly, and her lips slid lower to find his neck, the beating pulse of him, alive against all odds. Odysseus’ brows drew tight at the slightest touch, that weak spot only she knew, and he bucked without meaning to, felt the bones of his hips connect with Penelope’s.
“Forgive me,” he breathed, as if making a mess of him had not been her intention, as if he could at all be blamed.
She smiled against his heated skin, the hand on his hips drifting lower still, with intention, taking a hold of him where he was filling out. “Make it up to me.”
And Odysseus had never been able to resist that tone. That casualness with which Penelope carried her power, the way it suited her so well that it sank into him without resistance, so comforting it made him ache. He had come home to her, was with her now, given into her capable hands that would take care of him—and take care of her by extension, for she had told him once that there were few things that brought her greater joy than having him at her mercy, trusting her fully, showing her all there was to see.
She hesitated, then, just for a moment. Her eyes found his again, a question in the dark depths of them, and Odysseus could not stand to be looked at like that. He could not stand to think about how they’d missed each other, or all the things that might stop them now. He could not stand to have her doubt if he wanted this.
It was Odysseus who pulled her in this time, and that seemed like enough encouragement for Penelope. Already she was walking him forward, bringing him along to chase her tongue with his own, his entire body tilting into the wonderful, life-warm shape of her, pressed as close as they could get, each of them eager to prove to the other that they were alive . It was, at its core, about that, Odysseus thought. She was showing him that she was there, living and healthy and not leaving—and, just as importantly, she was showing him that he was alive.
In one fluid motion she turned him around and sent him backward with a shove to his chest, bringing him ungently onto the bed, the force of it buzzing warmly just under his skin.
Penelope watched his face as she climbed him, that consuming smile that was more eyes than lips, those dark coals that could’ve burned through the world. She was so beautiful it ached, so fierce in her barest state, her hair undone, her face unpainted, all her marks and contours laid out before him. Odysseus met that possessive, wanting gaze with his own, and he reached out to touch her, but at that moment she leaned down to kiss him once more, brief and open, before sucking a chunk of his neck into her mouth.
A high sound made its way up his throat as she bit, his entire body arching up to meet her, to touch her at every point, weak and wanting, to give himself to her, since that was what she wanted. He angled his leg just so, his thigh growing slick as it slid between Penelope’s, his stomach becoming wet to match. Penelope used to love teasing it out of him, seeing how much of a mess she might get him to make before he reached his peak.
More often than not, it was this. She did this so easily, moulded him to her liking as artists moulded clay. Odysseus liked the nights where he got to lay his lips to every inch of her, where it was him who made her soft and pliant beneath him, but he had to admit he liked this just a little more. To give away control and forget everything around him, to lay down the burden of his kingly duties and be a man and a man only.
He desperately pulled her closer, dragging her down, his skin aflame at every point of contact as though it was committing every sensation to memory, buzzing with the realisation that he was here. They were here, and this moment was theirs. His hands found their way around Penelope’s body easily, up the delicate curve of her spine, tugging her by the back of her neck for a moment, before reaching the clasps at her shoulders that held her chiton together.
She lifted herself up onto her knees to assist, working the fabric out from under her legs before tossing it aside without care for where it might land. For a moment Odysseus could do nothing but look at her face, those dark waves that cascaded over her shoulder, those heated, shining eyes, her lips kissed red. He thought he might burst into tears at the sight, at the thought that he would smell like her again, that he would bear her marks again, his hair mussed up from her hands, his skin painted with bruises just beneath his clothes. He would be hers again, wholly and undoubtedly, never again out of reach, and all he had to do was let her in.
Please, he might have said, baring his throat to her and revelling in the passing glances he caught of her as she had her way with him, the lovely flush of her milk-white skin painting her from ear to sternum, that smile that made him weak. But he feared that the moment he said it, a million other things would come out with it. Please, he would say, and it would mean please don’t let me go again, please keep me with you, don’t let anything take me away from you, please tell me I’m still yours, tell me I haven’t changed, please let me be your husband, let us start over, let us pick up where we left off, please be patient, I am trying harder than you can ever know to be myself, please, if ever there was any love for me in your heart, when you find out who has come home to you, be gentle with him. Everything he did, he did for you. Anything for you, anything, anything.
Please let there be nothing else.
Penelope stripped the clothes from him as soldiers stripped the armour from the ones they killed, fierce in her desire, working against the dead weight of him, and Odysseus did not know what happened, then. All at once her touch seemed to brush against something so tender it twisted with pain, like venom shot straight into the vein. All at once Odysseus froze, staring wide-eyed up at his wife where she sat atop his legs, a knee on either side of him, framing him, trapping him. He only barely resisted the instinct to throw her off.
“Darling,” came the voice of the woman he loved, and Odysseus could only whimper in response, broken and wretched and wanting still, shame blending into his arousal, horror at its very existence when all he wanted to do was run and hide and fight the very world. Penelope moved away from him, kneeling beside him, her hands flat on her thighs. Steady. Not going anywhere. “Odysseus, love, will you take a breath for me?”
He gathered his numbing legs from where they were stretched out, crossing them under him, digging his fingers into them, kneading them with his hands in some frantic attempt to bring himself back into his body. Squeezing his eyes shut, he made himself breathe, trying to wipe the blood from the backs of his eyelids. His body did not feel like his own, heavy enough to fall over in any direction he was tipped toward. The wet spot on his stomach felt icy cold, as if all his living warmth might stream out of his body through that point, out into the world, leaving him dead in his own bed.
“There you are,” Penelope told him, though he very much was not. Not there, not here, not anywhere, locked away somewhere deep within himself, kept from all that did not involve him. Odysseus felt lost inside his own body, with nowhere to go. He felt as though a thousand eyes were watching, waiting for him to act so they might tear into him where he’d laid himself bare.
The bed dipped beside him, and Odysseus was overcome with dread and longing at the same time. He knew the offer before he heard it, and he wanted nothing more than to accept, while also knowing that there was no use. “Would you like for me to hold you?”
Odysseus sucked in a breath, forcing his lungs past their comfort. Penelope had arranged herself beside him, not touching just yet, but open for him. Waiting. Odysseus knew that if he refused, he would only crave it more.
Without another word, he twisted around to find his place in her arms, and together they slid down to lie flat, sinking into the pillows. Penelope was warm, her skin silk-soft. Odysseus closed his eyes and tried to channel all his focus into that.
“I don’t know what came over me,” he said. He didn’t know why; as an apology, perhaps, or to let her know he was not hiding from her. He really did not know.
And then, because that did not feel like it was enough: “I’m sorry.”
Penelope ran her hand along the curve of his skull, shushing him softly. “You have nothing you need to apologise for, love,” she told him. Not asking him to explain, nor in any way upset. “You are safe with me.”
Odysseus did not feel like he was. He felt like there was no place less safe than with her, because this was where he was vulnerable, where his defences fell away, where he was the least prepared for danger, should it come. Not once on the battlefield had he been so unsafe, not with men swarming the camp in ambush, nor with swords and hands and daggers at his throat.
This was another danger entirely, when the barely stitched-together parts of him were torn open anew, laid bare to the world and all who wished to look.
Odysseus closed his eyes and burrowed into that expanse of warm skin, praying it might make him feel just a little less flayed.
It did not.