The Song of Achilles

by Madeline Miller

Our land was one of grass and wheat. Tumbles should not hurt. I am making excuses. It was also a land of rocks.

Those seconds, half seconds, that the line of our gaze connected, were the only moment in my day that I felt anything at all. The sudden swoop of my stomach, the coursing anger. I was like a fish eyeing the hook.

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.

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?

“There is no law that gods must be fair, Achilles,” Chiron said. “And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone. Do you think?” “Perhaps,” Achilles admitted. I listened and did not speak. Achilles’ eyes were bright in the firelight, his face drawn sharply by the flickering shadows. I would know it in dark or disguise, I told myself. I would know it even in madness.

His eyelids were the color of the dawn sky; he smelled like earth after rain.

I could recognize him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world.

He was spring, golden and bright. Envious Death would drink his blood, and grow young again.

You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature.”

His eyes were green and brown as forest, and even in the dim light I could see the gold.

“That’s the strangest of all. I look down at his blood and know my death is coming. But in the dream I do not mind. What I feel, most of all, is relief.”

Chiron had said once that nations were the most foolish of mortal inventions. “No man is worth more than another, wherever he is from.”

“He is worth more to you, perhaps. But the stranger is someone else’s friend and brother. So which life is more important?”

He is half of my soul, as the poets say. He will be dead soon, and his honor is all that will remain. It is his child, his dearest self. Should I reproach him for it? I have saved Briseis. I cannot save them all.

“At last, when her city was falling and her friends dying, Cleopatra could bear it no longer. She went to beg her husband to fight again. He loved her above all things and so agreed, and won a mighty victory for his people. But though he had saved them, he came too late. Too many lives had been lost to his pride. And so they gave him no gratitude, no gifts. Only their hatred for not having spared them sooner.”

“Briseis,” I say, “if he is dead, I will not be far behind.”

“Then promise me something else,” she says. “Promise me that whatever happens, you will not leave Troy without me. I know that you cannot—” She breaks off. “I would rather live as your sister than remain here.”

The last thing I think is: Achilles.

Sobbing

Patroclus, he says, Patroclus. Patroclus. Over and over until it is sound only. Somewhere Odysseus is kneeling, urging food and drink. A fierce red rage comes, and he almost kills him there. But he would have to let go of me. He cannot. He holds me so tightly I can feel the faint beat of his chest, like the wings of a moth. An echo, the last bit of spirit still tethered to my body. A torment.

Achilles weeps. He cradles me, and will not eat, nor speak a word other than my name. I see his face as if through water, as a fish sees the sun. His tears fall, but I cannot wipe them away. This is my element now, the half-life of the unburied spirit.

“I hope that Hector kills you.” The breath rasps in his throat. “Do you think I do not hope the same?” he asks.

“There are no bargains between lions and men. I will kill you and eat you raw.”

For the first time since my death, he falls into a fitful, trembling sleep. Achilles. I cannot bear to see you grieving. His limbs twitch and shudder. Give us both peace. Burn me and bury me. I will wait for you among the shades. I will— But already he is waking. “Patroclus! Wait! I am here!” He shakes the body beside him. When I do not answer, he weeps again.

SOBBING

“Philtatos,” Achilles says, sharply. Most beloved.“Best of men, and slaughtered by your son.”

“It is right to seek peace for the dead. You and I both know there is no peace for those who live after.” “No,” Achilles whispers.

Will I feel his ashes as they fall against mine?

Do not let it be so. Do not leave me here without him.

Maybe her gods are kinder than ours, and she will find rest. I would give my life again to make it so.

You said that Chiron ruined him. You are a goddess, and cold, and know nothing. You are the one who ruined him. Look at how he will be remembered now. Killing Hector, killing Troilus. For things he did cruelly in his grief.

I am made of memories. “Speak, then.”

“Go,” she says. “He waits for you.”

In the darkness, two shadows, reaching through the hopeless, heavy dusk. Their hands meet, and light spills in a flood like a hundred golden urns pouring out the sun.