As a prince, my only contact with the other boys was under the architraves of the dining hall. During those few slim hours, a huddle of elbows, knees and arms would knock and fold over each other to inch close to me. And it didn't matter what I was doing - peeling fig skins, or spitting out raisin pits, their unblinking eyes would stare at me in wonder.
They're either mindless statues stuck in place, who laugh autonomously and hang on like dogs to my every uttered sound, or else they gather up their courage to entertain me, recounting grandish tales, boasting or else juggling grapes to try and catch my eye.
But it is none of these boys that satisfy my need for companionship. They cling to me like seafoam to the shore, solely for my role as the King's son, but they do not value me as they do one another, and I feel like another object that father puts out on display, to admire and stare at, but never to know.
...
Tonight, after a day of meetings with my mentors and a particularly sour parry with my trainer, I find myself unable to emerge into the sea of bodies that is the dining hall. I slink past the kitchen, sneaking a piece of dried bread and a handful of olives. I duck past columns and through the boy's quarters. I was seeking solitude until I heard him.
Behind thin walls I heard the soft sound of falling bread crumbs and spat pits. The figure was lean and slouched against the marble, his head a mess of curls and snapped off twigs. Patroclus.
He noticed my presence, and his movements stopped, as if he had been caught for a heinous crime. He said nothing, but kept his dark eyes fixated on me. He did not touch the rest of his food.
He stared on as I tore open my bread and stuffed it with olives.
We sat like that for a while, his eyes never leaving me, my food slowly leaving my hands.
And when he finally spoke, when I had dusted off the last of my breadcrumbs from my sticky fingers and the shadows on clay walls elongated into strings, only one question left his lips.
"What are you?"
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Olives - Achilles x Patroclus
Fanfiction"It's hard to love him. And it's hard because I think about him all the time. Patroclus. Patroclus. Patroclus." The love of Achilles and Patroclus told from Achilles' perspective. Starting from their first meeting till their descent. Separate from...
