“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?”

“And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone.”

“Later Achilles would play the lyre, as Chiron and I listened. My mother's lyre. He had brought it with him.'I wish I had known,' I said, the first day when he showed it to me. 'I almost did not come, because I did not want to believe it.'He smiled. 'Now I know how to make you follow me everywhere.”

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

“Odysseus inclines his head. "True. But fame is a strange thing. Some men gain glory after they die, while others fade. What is admired in one generation is abhorred in another." He spread his broad hands. "We cannot say who will survive the holocaust of memory. Who knows?" He smiles. "Perhaps one day even I will be famous. Perhaps more famous than you.”

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

“I will go,” he said. “I will go to Troy.”The rosy gleam of his lip, the fevered green of his eyes. There was not a line anywhere on his face, nothing creased or graying; all crisp. He was spring, golden and bright. Envious death would drink his blood, and grow young again.He was watching me, his eyes as deep as earth.“Will you come with me?” he asked.The never-ending ache of love and sorrow. Perhaps in some other life I could have refused, could have torn my hair and screamed, and made him face his choice alone. But not in this one. He would sail to Troy and I would follow, even into death. “Yes,” I whispered. “Yes.”Relief broke in his face, and he reached for me. I let him hold me, let him press us length to length so close that nothing might fit between us.Tears came, and fell. Above us, the constellations spun and the moon paced her weary course. We lay stricken and sleepless as the hours passed.”