Chapter 61 #2
I could do nothing but watch as Melanthius began crawling on his stomach, desperate to get away, while Odysseus calmly discarded his dagger for his sword.
With unhurried steps, the king of Ithaca kept pace with Melanthius, then kicked him onto his side before bringing his blade down on his bound wrists, then his ankles, striking again and again until each hand and foot was hacked clean off.
Lastly, he took his blade to my brother’s groin, and only then did I look away.
“Wait until he’s dead, then hang the others,” Odysseus instructed, sword clattering to the ground.
“Should we not kill him now?” Telemachus asked weakly.
Odysseus’s eyes were utterly empty as he turned to his son. “No. Let him bleed. Let him suffer. Then feed the pieces to the dogs.”
A scream ripped from my throat as I finally wrenched my hands free, tugging the noose over my head.
I ran to my brother, falling to my knees, desperate sobs cleaving my chest as I stared down at his mutilated body.
He was still breathing, too-thin breaths, each one sounding more painful than the last. Around us, the pieces of him were strewn across the ground—his hands, his feet, and other parts I could not bear to look at.
The acidic tang of vomit crawled up my throat.
“Melanthius.” I wept, cradling him to me. “I’m here. Melanthius.”
His eyes were glassy, his face, so like my own, now barely recognizable. He tried to say something, but no sound escaped, just a steady river of blood pooling into his mouth from the hole where his nose had been.
“It’s all right. Don’t speak,” I told him.
But still he tried, eventually managing a small, choked word: “Forgive—”
“Shh. Don’t talk. Just rest, Melanthius.”
“Forgive…me…”
“It’s all right,” I whispered, desperate for his final moment not to be one of shame or guilt. “There is nothing to forgive.”
I glanced up to see Odysseus watching us, his expression eerily distant, hands trembling at his sides. Next to him, Telemachus looked as if he were fighting back tears. The prince met my gaze, and a memory cut through the chaos of my grief.
“Your child, Melanthius. Your daughter. I never told you her name.”
My brother’s breaths were growing fainter now, but I saw his eyes slightly flare with recognition.
“Your daughter,” I repeated, forcing my voice to steady itself. “Her name is Alcippe, and she serves as the handmaid of Queen Helen. She is a beautiful girl, with curly hair like ours.”
“Alcippe,” he murmured.
“That’s right. She’s your daughter.” My tears splashed onto his ruined face. “Your beautiful little girl. She lives, Melanthius. She lives.”
“Alcippe.” Her name escaped him in a final, sighing breath as his eyes slowly dulled, his body growing slack beneath me.
I stared at my brother, scarcely able to comprehend the sight of him, so lifeless in my arms. My brother, who had only ever wanted a better life for his child, yet the world had denied him at every turn, had punished him so cruelly.
I bowed my head, whispering two trembling words as I closed his eyes forever. “Be free.”
Slowly, I looked to Odysseus, and the hatred in my glare seemed to knock him back into his body, throwing the king into motion.
“Do you think I wished for this? Do you think I wished for any of this?” he was shouting now as he stalked toward me, hands still shaking. “Was I not a benevolent king? Did I not treat you with compassion? All I asked for was your loyalty. Your respect. Still, you chose to defy me.”
A wild cacophony of fury and grief ripped through me as I spat at his feet.
“You will never have my respect. You who abandoned your throne, your wife, your child, your home, wasting twenty years feeding your own ego. You who returned to these shores without a single one of your soldiers, men you swore to lead, to protect. You who calls slaughtering innocents ‘justice.’ Where is the glory in that? Where is the honor? You are no hero. You are a disgrace. You are—”
Odysseus lunged for me, rage devouring his features. His fingers caught my hair, wrenching my head back.
“You know nothing of what I have done, what I have suffered.”
“I pray that suffering never ends,” I snarled back. “I pray you never know peace.”
He laughed viciously. “Peace? She abandoned me long ago.”
“I hope you rot—”
“Enough!” His hands were at my throat, and a horrible pressure swelled inside my head, so intense I thought my skull might explode from the force of it.
I kicked and thrashed beneath him, trying to gulp down breaths that would not come. Panic shuddered through me, growing hazier with every jerk of my body. I could hear familiar voices screaming my name, but they were frighteningly faint…the world shrinking away…darkness bleeding outward…
And I couldn’t breathe.
I couldn’t…
I…
Come back to me.
Penelope. Her name was a shimmering thread, tying me to this body, this world.
She would not let me go.
Come back to me.
I wanted to. Oh gods, I wanted to.
I didn’t want to leave her.
I didn’t want to die.
But I couldn’t find my way back. Everything was too murky, melting into a sea of hazy, thick shadow…and I was sinking…sinking…
Until I heard it. A scream.
It ripped through the darkness, through my mind, my very soul.
Her scream.
Then…air. Sweet, precious air filled my lungs. I gulped it down desperately, my throat feeling as if it were being carved open with blades of fire.
Slowly, the world seeped back into focus, those shadowy waves receding to the edges of my vision.
“Penelope?” a voice murmured.
Her name was no longer a thread but a bolt of pure lightning in my veins, forcing the life back into my body. I pushed myself to my knees and saw a figure standing before me, etched in silvery moonlight, hair billowing on a midnight breeze.
Penelope.
I tried to call her name, but only a hoarse gasp escaped me. Her gray eyes cradled mine, shimmering with shards of love and pain and rage. I reached for her, and she moved toward me. But then a shadow fell between us, blocking her path.
“Penelope,” Odysseus repeated, softer now.
“What is going on here?” she demanded.
“You are not supposed to be here,” he said. “This is no place for a woman.”
She dared a step forward, moving back into my line of vision. “What are you doing to my handmaids?”
“You must leave.”
“I demand an explanation.”
“I will not ask you again,” Odysseus warned, a dangerous edge creeping into his voice. “I will explain everything in time.”
A silent war was waged across Penelope’s face as her gaze swept around the courtyard, from Melanthius’s motionless body to our weeping friends to her trembling son. Finally, those gray eyes settled on me.
I’m sorry, they seemed to say. Forgive me for this.
“Odysseus?” Penelope suddenly gasped, turning to peer at him through the gloom. “Is…is that really you?”
A peculiar timidity crept over the king of Ithaca then, seeming so out of place on his bloodied, brutal body.
“I…I did not wish for our reunion to be like this,” he muttered, glancing away.
Penelope’s hand flew to her mouth, and with a dramatically feminine flourish, she crumpled to the ground. But Odysseus was there to catch her, and I could do nothing but watch as that monster cradled my whole heart in his murderous hands.
“It is you,” Penelope whispered, reaching up to touch his face. She spoke in a voice that was not her own, soft and cloying. “Odysseus. My Odysseus.”
“It is me,” he murmured, holding her tight. “I am here, Penelope.”
He leaned in then, perhaps to kiss her, but Penelope turned her face away.
“I feel unwell.” She pressed the back of her hand to her forehead. “This…this is all too much.”
“You must go to your rooms,” Odysseus agreed. “I will fetch Eurycleia—”
“I do not think I can walk.” She gripped him tighter. “Will you carry me to our chamber?”
“I have matters to attend to here.”
“Let Telemachus handle them.” Penelope stared at her son. “He knows what he must do.”
Odysseus looked reluctant. “Penelope—”
“Please.” She stroked his face with such tenderness.
I wanted to scream or vomit, yet all I could do was stare dumbly at them, gulping down breaths into my ruined throat.
“Take me to our marriage bed—the one you made for us,” Penelope whispered. “Please, husband.”
This request seemed to strike Odysseus like a blow, causing his face to crumple. He began to cry then, tears streaking clear paths down his bloodied cheeks as he lifted Penelope into his arms. He carried her so gently, with hands capable of such violence.
“I tried to return to you sooner. I am sorry, I—”
“Let us not talk of this here,” Penelope murmured.
Odysseus nodded, then looked to Telemachus. “Hang the slaves, then burn the bodies. I want nothing left of them.”
Telemachus nodded. “Yes, Father.”
Penelope’s eyes reached for mine, our hearts shattering against each other’s as the king of Ithaca carried his wife away.