Page 11 of The Song of Achilles

“You do that well,” he said.

I looked up, quickly. Was he mocking me? But his face was sincere.

“Catch.” A ball came back to me, just like the fig at dinner.

My part took no great skill, but I enjoyed it anyway. We found ourselves smiling at the satisfaction of each smooth catch and throw.

After some time he stopped, yawned. “It’s late,” he said. I was surprised to see the moon high outside the window; I had not noticed the minutes passing.

I sat on the pallet and watched as he busied himself with the tasks of bed, washing his face with water from a wide-mouthed ewer, untying the bit of leather that bound his hair. The silence brought my uneasiness back. Why was I here?

Achilles snuffed out the torch.

“Good night,” he said. “Good night.” The word felt strange in my mouth, like another language.

Time passed. In the moonlight, I could just make out the shape of his face, sculptor-perfect, across the room. His lips were parted slightly, an arm thrown carelessly above his head. He looked different in sleep, beautiful but cold as moonlight. I found myself wishing he would wake so that I might watch the life return.

T HE NEXT MORNING, after breakfast, I went back to the boys’ room, expecting to find my things returned. They were not, and I saw that my bed had been stripped of its linens. I checked again after lunch, and after spear practice and then again before bed, but my old place remained empty and unmade. So. Still. Warily, I made my way to his room, half-expecting a servant to stop me. None did.

In the doorway of his room, I hesitated. He was within, lounging as I had seen him that first day, one leg dangling.

“Hello,” he said. If he had shown any hesitation or surprise, I would have left, gone back and slept on the bare reeds rather than stay here. But he did not. There was only his easy tone and a sharp attention in his eyes.

“Hello,” I answered, and went to take my place on the cot across the room.

S LOWLY, I GREW USED TO IT; I no longer startled when he spoke, no longer waited for rebuke. I stopped expecting to be sent away. After dinner, my feet took me to his room out of habit, and I thought of the pallet where I lay as mine.

At night I still dreamed of the dead boy. But when I woke, sweaty and terror-stricken, the moon would be bright on the water outside and I could hear the lick of the waves against the shore. In the dim light I saw his easy breathing, the drowsy tangle of his limbs. In spite of myself, my pulse slowed. There was a vividness to him, even at rest, that made death and spirits seem foolish. After a time, I found I could sleep again. Time after that, the dreams lessened and dropped away.

I learned that he was not so dignified as he looked. Beneath his poise and stillness was another face, full of mischief and faceted like a gem, catching the light. He liked to play games against his own skill, catching things with his eyes closed, setting himself impossible leaps over beds and chairs. When he smiled, the skin at the corners of his eyes crinkled like a leaf held to flame.

He was like a flame himself. He glittered, drew eyes. There was a glamour to him, even on waking, with his hair tousled and his face still muddled with sleep. Up close, his feet looked almost unearthly: the perfectly formed pads of the toes, the tendons that flickered like lyre strings. The heels were callused white over pink from going everywhere barefoot. His father made him rub them with oils that smelled of sandalwood and pomegranate.

He began to tell me the stories of his day before we drifted off to sleep. At first I only listened, but after time my tongue loosened. I began to tell my own stories, first of the palace, and later small bits from before: the skipping stones, the wooden horse I had played with, the lyre from my mother’s dowry.

“I am glad your father sent it with you,” he said.

Soon our conversations spilled out of the night’s confinement. I surprised myself with how much there was to say, about everything, the beach and dinner and one boy or another.

I stopped watching for ridicule, the scorpion’s tail hidden in his words. He said what he meant; he was puzzled if you did not. Some people might have mistaken this for simplicity. But is it not a sort of genius to cut always to the heart?

O NE AFTERNOON, as I went to leave him to his private drills he said, “Why don’t you come with me?” His voice was a little strained; if I had not thought it impossible, I might have said he was nervous. The air, which had grown comfortable between us, felt suddenly taut.

“All right,” I said.

It was the quiet hours of late afternoon; the palace slept out the heat and left us alone. We took the longest way, through the olive grove’s twisting path, to the house where the arms were kept.

I stood in the doorway as he selected his practice weapons, a spear and a sword, slightly blunted at the tip. I reached for my own, then hesitated.

“Should I—?” He shook his head. No .

“I do not fight with others,” he told me.

I followed him outside to the packed sand circle. “Never?”

“No.”

“Then how do you know that . . .” I trailed off as he took up a stance in the center, his spear in his hand, his sword at his waist.