For You My Brother

A/N:
First, I'd like to thank my lovely betas, Wolfsbride and Kouryuu.
And of course, I need the token...
Disclaimer: This is all a product of my own mind. I'm not suggesting that anything I write here is implied in The Iliad or in the movie Troy. The characters are not mine, and I'm not making any profit from them (face it, writing fanfiction doesn't pay so well). I borrowed them and will put them back when I'm done. I also have borrowed certain phrases from the Iliad, and would like to extend a heartful thanks to Homer.

If you would like to review and aff.net isn't working, or if for some reason you just wanted to drop me a line, my e-mail is daughter_of_elua@yahoo.net

And now, the story:

My brother, life is a prison without you. These walls of Troy protect us from death, true, but they are the same walls that separated me from you the day you fell to the might of Achilles. Since that day, I have waited here with my bow, in the same spot where I watched you die. I watch for one man: Achilles. I know that none expect me to succeed. They have called me a coward for ten long years, and I have done little to change their minds. All have thought this of me, all except you, the brave one, greatest in everyone's eyes. I longed to be like you, to be your equal, but I knew that could never be. I have never been brave or strong like you. All I hoped was to always be at your side.

Because of our love, brother, you did not send Helen back to Menelaus, and now you are dead. The bond between us was greater than all else I have known, yet in the end it was my love that killed you. That is why I wait here on the wall: not for honor, not for revenge, not for Troy or even for Helen. It is for you. Before I knew you as my brother, you were just Hector. I loved you from the first moment I saw you on the slopes of Mount Ida. I was a simple shepherd boy then, and you were a warrior and Prince of Troy. At night in my arms we forgot and you were simply a man.

Hector and I stand side by side, watching the sun sink beneath Mount Ida. He slides one arms around me and kisses the top of my head. "I have to be leaving soon. My father expects me back in Troy in time for the games."

"Let me come with you this time. I'll miss you too much if you're gone."

"Won't your foster-father mind?" he asks.

"He doesn't need to know I'm gone."

"If you wish. I don't see any harm. And you know I don't want to separated any longer than necessary."

I sink into Hector's embrace, hoping these arms will always be there to hold me.

Our love was young and innocent, as were we, until that fateful day you brought me with you to the games and our father King Priam claimed me as his son. Since then, I tried to love you as a brother, but I will never forget you were my first love. I know you felt shame for what we had done, but by then it was too late for anything else, nothing could separate us. It was our secret.

And yet, those around us would never forget we were kin, too close to love without shame. For those who would call our feelings sin or abomination, I simply say this: our love was the purest thing I have encountered in this world. Who will judge us, the gods of Olympus who marry one another, brother or sister though they may be? Zeus Thunderer and White Armed Hera are born of the same womb, and they rule heaven side by side.

That day, when you learned of the truth, did you remember the prophecy made at my birth of the destruction I would bring?. How could you have known that someday you would have to choose between the two things you loved most, Troy and myself, and you would choose me? Since the dream came to my mother that I would be the destruction of Troy, it seems my life has been governed by fate I cannot control. I can pray, but if the gods seem indifferent to our pleas for the present, what hope is there for changing the past? By chance it seemed we met on the hills of Mount Ida, by chance again I went with you to the games in Troy, and was it by chance that Cassandra recognized me and Priam chose to ignore the prophecy? I do not believe in chance any longer.

Was it fate that brought me to Helen? If so, fate was cruel as ever. I do not deny that she is a woman beyond compare, but I doubt if the happiness we had together was worth such destruction and misery. All joy of our love is gone. Each day she begs me not to leave her, not if I care for her, but I still do. I love her, you of all people knew that. You treated her with kindness for my sake, and I loved you all the more for it. You were at my side the day I first saw her. Did my infatuation hurt you, the way your caring for Andromache always wounded me? I remember well the day you knew I loved her.

The boat is rocking gently in the breeze, while the sun beats down on us. I see beads of sweat gathering on Hector's forehead and I would wipe each one from his face, but we no longer touch. I try to remember to act only as brothers now, but we were lovers first, and some part of me cannot forget that. Now instead of pleasing him as I desire, I am about to anger him.

"There's something you should know. I brought Helen with me. She wanted to come." I see the change in his face, the anger, but I hardly hear his voice rising as he tries to control it.

"There will be war... This is madness! She is Menelaus' wife; she cannot be yours..."

"Like you?" I think, but then I realize I have spoken aloud, and he looks to me, his face flushing.

"You swore to me... We promised never to speak of this again!"

"You are ashamed of me, like everyone else, then?"

He greets me with silence. I know his heart is beating, know the exact rhythm I would hear if I put my head to his chest.

"I love..." I stop, intending to say Helen, but knowing what I really mean is, "you, Hector." "I love Helen the way you love Troy."

"You love her that much?"

I nod, wondering if he now is experiencing what I feel every time I see him with Andromache. His face is stricken.

"You think I love Troy above all else? If that is true, I would send Helen back to her husband now. She will bring war on Troy."

"But you will not?"

"If I y loy loved Troy I would."

We stare at one another, each unsure what the other will do.

"But I will not. I will take her with us back to Troy, but only for your sake."

Before either of us knows what we are doing, I am in his arms, my lips just touching his. He hesitates, "We..."
I put a finger to his lips.

"There's no other way to express my gratitude." He sighs, but almost smiles.

"You always get your way Paris. I'm not sure if it's having a good effect on you. You're becoming...demanding." When he chuckles and strokes my cheek I know he will not stop me, and I don't wait any longer.

"It's been too long since I kissed you. I need to make up for lost time."

He runs his fingers through my hair with a sigh of exasperation.

"I never can resist you when you're like this, and you know it. You have an unfair advantage."

"And I'm going to use it. It's not my fault I'm irresistible," I could easily be lost in Hector here on deck, but he pulls back and takes me by the shoulder.

"I know you like to make a show Paris, but for once maybe you don't want to be the center of attention."

I laugh. "I like you when you're in one of your commander moods. Should I call you General Hector?"

"At least one of us has the sense to remember we're in public. We wouldn't want any... indecency after all."

I stroke his face with one hand, touching my thumb to his mouth, finding his lips, so soft against his beard.

"Of course we wouldn't want anything indecent. Of course..." He takes me by the arm and leads me toward the bedroom.

A moment ago it was as if I were beneath deck with you, now I am standing at the wall again, still smiling, but with the knowledge this cannot go on for much longer. You no longer with me, but soon, even today, we could be rejoined. "Hector, is a world like the one I live in now any better than Hades?" I long to ask. What is there for me to live for now? The people's eyes are filled with desperation; they are starving for food and for hope. Troy cannot last much longer. You were their general, the next to be king. All Troy had faith in you.

I know Helen blames herself for your death. She feels guilty for all the blood spilled, as I do. I know she grieves for you, but I do not think she understands the depths of my own sorrow. Today we quarreled. As I left her in the bedroom this morning, she pleaded with me to stay as she always does. I kissed her, promised her, said what I always say, but she would not be dissuaded. Instead she flung herself at my feet and wept, crying out, "Don't be like Hector. What good will your death do? Stay with me!" I knelt beside her, smoothing her hair back from her face, all wet with tears.

"I will never be like Hector. He was the greatest man I have ever known. Do not compare me to him. I am not deserving!" Helen wrenched herself free from me and pushed me away.

"I'm not blind, I'm not a fool! w thw the way you looked at him all along. That night was no coincidence, as you would have me believe, was it?" I watch the way she recoils at the thought.

"I... Helen.." She crawls into our bed and pulls the covers up around her, turning her back to me. I'm leaving, but I stn thn the doorway. "Don't tell me you didn't want to. It's not as if you were forced. You enjoyed it. It was your idea." Helen sits up and looks at me, tears running down her face, then picks up the shuttle from her weaving and throws it at me, missing by a wide margin.

"Go, now! Leave me in peace. I never want to think about that night again." That night... Oh Helen. Oh Hector.

"I don't want you to keep any secrets from me," she said.

"I promise you Helen, I have no secrets from you."

"All man have secrets, don't they? You know, when I first saw you that night with Hector, you two seemed so close, I would have thought you not brothers, but lovers. I'm not the only one who wondered. Would you believe Menelaus trusted you alone with me because he thought you would have no interest in a woman?"

"Where is this leading, Helen?" If she began to say something she stopped too quickly for me to hear, her eyes widening. I turned around and saw Hector there, standing in the doorway. I could not look at him then, or I felt I would betray myself.

"I've noticed," Helen said, walking right up to Hector. "It's not entirely brotherly the way you look at him. I should know, Paris gives me the same kind of look. And so do you." Before he had time to react, she leaned forward and kissed him full on the mouth. When she pulled away from him, she looked at me. "It's what you want too, isn't it?"

"Helen, why are you doing this?" I said.

"It's what you want too, isn't it?" She looked at me, her eyes daring me, telling me they knew everything. I stared at her without speaking. "Why don't we invite Hector to join us tonight."

"Helen!"

"It's what you both want. No one ever needs to know."

Her words echo in my head while I leave our rooms, as she asked me. There was a time when such a thing would have been unimaginable, that I would leave Helen after an argument without mending our quarrel passionately. But things are different now. I have lost you, and the thought of losing Helen can barely pain my numbed heart. Are the two people I have loved most in the world now gone? Perhaps I have too much time to think these days, but what else is there to do while I wait. I think of Achilles, the one even the gods say is heartless. My bow is ready at my side, with an arrow intended for him. I will fight fou, ou, my brother whom they called manslaughtering Hector, tamer of horses, a god among men. You did the same for me, even though I pleaded with you, much like Helen has pleaded with me, like Andromache must have begged you.

"Your courage, your passion will be your downfall Hector." Your love for me was your downfall, brave one. I brought the god's anger against this city, and yet at the end before you went to fight, in the battle that your love for me had allowed, you came to me. That last morning I awoke at your side. I watched you wake and dress for war, knowing today you would face Achilles, and knowing I could never be half the man you were. Hector the great-hearted, you embraced me before you left and whispered in my ear, "The people may say: 'Hector believed in his own strength and ruined his people.' I need you to know that I do this for you. I will face Achilles. If I die, I want you to know my last thoughts were of you."

"Hector, you are the bravest man I will ever know."

"I am brave when I think of your love for me."

We had no choice it seemed then, you and I, bound by honor, and most of all by love. I watched you that day, saw you flee before the wrathful Achilles and fall at his hand on the plain before Troy. The last words you spoke were to that murderer, but I heard them, when you swore that with the aid of Apollo I would slay the great Achilles. And so the citizens of Troy wept for you, Hector of the shining helmet, breaker of horses.

There are no words that describe the days until my father ransomed your body and brought you home to be prepared for burial. Oh my brother, handsome and noble even in death. Today I swear I will slay Achilles. He will not walk this earth while you, noblest in spirit, are but a shadow in the fields of Elysium. Today I see the golden hair and shining armor of proud Achilles, and I pray to Apollo as I fit an arrow to my bowstring. Perhaps Achilles and I are the only ones who might understand each other right now, for we both have been robbed of the ones we love. I know people say that Achilles loves war above all else, but I feel in my heart that he fights on for Patrocles. The way I fight on for you.

I do not know if Apollo heard my prayers, but I shot the arrow without a tremor, and today the mighty Achilles fell on the battlefield. In the end, the mighty Achilles lay in the dust in his own blood. May all the Greeks come to such a fate.

I Paris, the coward, the bringer of destruction, at last have done something to make the children of Troy proud. I know none would be prouder for me than you my brother. I have derived no happiness from Achilles' death; these days I wander the palace of Priam as if my very soul were lost. I do not believe I will outlast Troy. Oh Hector, will it be today I see you again in the underworld? I walk to the gates of the city and stare into the sun, unsure what I expect to see. Then I glimpse what my heart has desired all along: you at the wall, real enough that I could touch you. The breeze stirs in your hair, and you turn so that you look directly at me, that face so similar to my own in many ways. When I move towards you, you vanish. A gift of the gods or a curse, if there is a difference. I know that if not today, very soon I shall be with you and I pray that we shall meet again. And if such a thing should come to pass, I will be able to look you in the eye and say, "For you, Hector, my brother. For you."