Chapter Twelve...The Feast (continued)
Hector brushed his hair off his forehead with the back of his hand as all the men traded defensive and offensive tips,
for both Thebe and Troy, though Troy was remote enough that not many of the men had actually seen it in person.
Just heard about it and its high walls and its warrior horsemen.
If he had to have a 'favorite' part of wars, it would be the thinking part, the strategizing. It had been a good deal of his
schooling when he was younger, south of here near Sparta.
"Oh people have tried to scale Troy’s walls, certainly." He said to a general. "But they're too high, and they're too
smooth. And they're bordered by archers' rows. Our landscape is flat, so we'd see you coming anyway. Most never
get within grappling range of Troy, not that many have tried lately."
"Agamemnon will try." One of the generals said, about the king of Mycenae, who even at this very moment was
unifying Greece under his iron hand.
Hector shrugged. "He's welcome to. But if I remember right, he's on the portly side. Doubt he could find a rope to hold
him to even try to climb our walls." He joked and looked over at his wife, who was standing with the women off to the
side and smiled at her.
"I should hate you." Marika stated comfortably. Watching the way the prince of Troy smiled at his wife.
"You should." Andromache agreed amiably, her own lips softening and curving for her husband. All the way across
the room and yet nothing in the world existed for the moment but him and the look in his dark eyes.
"He and Eetion have managed to change the whole mood of the dinner." Lucia noted. "Music's down, dancing girls
actually getting a chance to eat. Drinking’s died down a bit too" she added with a 'huh' sound in her voice.
"Dancing girls don't eat." Dori stated scornfully. "They can't wiggle properly if they're full."
"Formidable." Marika said, still watching Hector. "Its small wonder Troy is fast becoming the only city-state
Agamemnon's hordes dare not threaten."
"Not a bad place to live." Lucia stated, watching Andromache with a sad, content look on her face.
"It’s a beautiful city." Andromache agreed. "And its people are wonderful. But I could live in a tent with him watching
sheep and be just as happy."
Dori giggled. "Sheep."
Andromache gave her a grin. "Goats would be better?"
Eetion made his way over to his newest son in law. He'd never thought once in his entire time in Troy of matching this
man to his daughter. He had to have been thrice blind. Luckily, the prince hadn't needed his interference in the
matter. He clapped Hector on the back and then drew him a bit away from the others.
"It’s a fine gift." he stated first. Sitting in the center of the city he'd helped raise with his own hands and rebuild a
hundred times over, Eetion was aware that there were blind spots he missed simply because he'd stared at them too
long. And he was aware that the prince in front of him hadn't insulted him with diplomacy and fancy dancing but had
given him an honest assessment. Man to man. As it should be. "Especially since we both know Andromache would
draw you a complete map of our underground passages if you asked." There was no fault or shame in that. She
belonged to her husband now and that was the way it should be. "My son is going to challenge you eventually."
Eetion smiled. Boys were boys after all. "Don't let him kill you. But don't bother hold back either. When you meet as
warriors its for yourselves. Not for our kingdoms."
"Theoretically speaking only." Hector said. "Were I to invade your city, I wouldn’t do it with Andromache's help. In fact
I'd probably do it behind her back and hope she never found out." He didn't involve her in the arts of warfare.
He looked over at Athanasios. "I'll try to avoid it if I can. At least tonight." Tonight he had no doubt he could easily
take his brother in law. Hector was sober. Athanasios...not quite so much. "But you're right. We probably will." It was
the way of men after all. One challenge after another. "But I think I have him distracted with how to shore up the north
wall right now. Should keep him occupied for a long time."
"If you decide, one day, that Thebe needs taking, you should use whatever tools you have at hand." Eetion stated
roughly. He looked at the room in front of him. His people. "Every city falls, prince of Troy. Eventually - every city falls.
And I think I've seen enough of your approach to realize you wouldn't fall on my people for your own pride. Not the
way some would."
Agamemnon was not so very far away. And Troy, and its supporting army was. If it came to war, by the time news
reached Hector across the sea, Thebe would already have fallen or driven off its attackers. And Troy was in no
position to march into Greece and exact pointless revenge.
"But if you ever do take Thebe, realize that no conquered city stays conquered forever. Especially not people as
stubborn as these." He looked over at the young man next to him. He'd been talking to him the way he talked to his
own sons. Now he gestured to his oldest daughter across the room who thought she was being surreptitious as she
caught one of the hurrying stewards and suggested a change in the food courses being served.
"She pleases you, doesn't she?" he asked. "I've never seen a man act the way around his wife the way you do." He
shook his head. Honestly puzzled. "I wouldn't have given her up, you know. Things don't run as smoothly around here
as they did when she lived in Thebe. But I couldn't keep her here either. Not when she deserved a life of her own and
children." He looked at the man next to him. Admitted as if it were a weakness. "I always found her easy to love. Even
as a child she asked for so little it made me want to give her more. Daughters..." he said the last word as if they were
a mystery men weren't meant to understand.
"She more than pleases me, Eetion." Hector said, fondly, following the king's eyes over to his wife. "She completes
me, and loving her is easier than breathing. The rest of you just haven't been as lucky as me, I guess, to find that
other half of your soul. Even if she was hiding across the ocean in the mountains for most my life."
"But I'm glad you gave her up, Troy's all the richer for it." He said with a smile for his father. "And for that, I will always
be in your debt." He knew about the troubles spreading across Greece, but short of moving a contingent of his army
here, something Eetion wouldn't even consider, there was nothing he could do but hope the king from Mycenae
would be defeated by Eetion.
"Hopefully soon enough I'll know what you speak of in terms of daughters and sons." He said. They were certainly
'working' on it in any case.
Eetion shook his head at Hector's declarations about his daughter. That was nonsense. Made up for bards and silly
women. Wives were for breeding and running the house and keeping a man warm. Anything more took a man away
from what his purpose truly was in life. That was the way of the world.
But when he saw the way his son in law looked at his oldest daughter, and he heard the way his voice changed when
he talked about her... The man was most likely a fool. But he'd never seen his daughter smile the way she did now.
Or the soft light that was always in her dark eyes. If Hector was a fool for loving his woman then Eetion had to admit
to being one for loving his daughter enough to be happy for her about it. He rubbed at his beard and snorted a laugh
at himself. And the prince next to him.
Maybe they were getting soft in his old age.
"Sons are easy." Eetion stated. "It’s the daughters with their big eyes and bright faces and impossible to understand
thoughts that are confusing. You love your sons but you get twisted around your daughters. Somehow its harder to
hear them cry than it is one of your boys. I march into battle all the time. Fight giants and overwhelming odds and wild
men. After each birth I hold the son I've been given in my hands and feel triumphant. I've only panicked once. When
they set my first daughter in my hands and she looked up at me and I realized I had no idea what to do with her." He
chuckled. "Luckily, she always let me know. Have sons, prince of Troy. Only sons. And have many." He thumped
Hector on the shoulder and then turned back toward the crowd that had moved on to discussing the difference
between winter warfare and summer campaigns.
Andromache moved over to join her husband then, slipping close and offering him the goblet of chilled wine.
"Was he telling you how to 'properly' conquer his city?" she asked with a smile.
"Something like that." Hector said with a smile as she came over to join him, taking the goblet for his had long since
warmed. Oh he knew Eetion's opinion on him , and he didn't care.
"So have we stayed long enough, or am I to stick around and wait for Athanasios to challenge me to something?"
Hector asked with a chuckle. "If I'm lucky it will be something like eating, or drinking." But he knew it would probably be
wrestling, or swords.
Andromache looked for her older brother, taking a step nearer her husband instinctively and spotted him using a
handful of unshelled nuts to illustrate a battle formation on the table in front of him. Her face clouded momentarily.