The blood on his hands will never dry.

That little baby, already so loved that he had inspired a nickname from his father, his people- “Astyanax”, detailing what he; as the firstborn son of Troy’s heir apparent, was set to become- king, ruler, overlord.

And Odysseus had killed him.

Not because he wanted to, but because he is, at the end of the day, just a man. A selfish man who loves himself and his soldiers and his home, but not nearly as much as he loves his son and his wife.

And the only thing that had broken him from the harrowing thought that a like-minded man might be doing the same thing to his own son miles away was a broken wail cutting through the silence.

Odysseus had turned, feet heavier than his heart, hesitant to see not what, but who he already knew was coming- Andromache, running towards him. He had seen her, wrapped in loose white robes, arms held close to her chest, tears running down her face, closer and closer to him- barefoot and broken.

And realized that she wasn’t coming at him, not for some measure of score-settling, but instead for the rim of the stone wall that her son was dropped from, intending to plunge the same misty heights and fade into the swallowing vale below.

She leapt in a blitz of white silk, looking so much like an angel that Odysseus nearly missed his chance to reach for her in a sort of awe- though her beauty paled in comparison to his Penelope, it spurred him to try and catch the grieving wife, mother, queen.

Instead, he had managed, by pure miracle, to grab you from her arms, leaving the despairing woman to die alone on the rocks below.

That time, there had been no god to chime in his ear a prophecy, leaving Odysseus on the edge of a very welcoming ledge, eyes heavy and feet unsteady, and-

Polites, his faithful second in command, ever loyal and kind, calls to him, beckoning to hasten his return to two names the king is weak to- Telemachus and Penelope.

So the king wraps you back up and heads for the stairs.