By the time they reached Paris’s room, the alarm had sounded – the Achaeans had managed to silence all but one of the bells, which left many of the Trojans wondering if it was a prank, but then the sun rose above the walls and cast its light down on the beach. The Greek fleet had sheltered behind Tenedos in the darkness, and returned once the horse had been carried into the city. It had disgorged what was left of the Achaean army, and they were now marching up to the red gates of Troy – which were standing wide open thanks to Teucer and Ajax the Lesser. While the city turned into a boiling cauldron of chaos and fear, five of the war’s main actor’s squared off, Aphrodite and Paris against Nemesis and Menelaus, with Helen forced to the sideline.
Helen's heart wrenched in her chest. She badly wanted to be free of Paris, but simultaneously couldn't bear the thought of life without him. She also knew, somewhere deep inside, she still loved her husband, Menelaus, although that feeling was like a quiet whisper being shouted down by her years of torturous passion for Paris. Now it seemed that one of the men would surely die. Helen wanted to want it to be Paris, but even imagining the pain of his loss was too much to bear, and she almost struggled not to hate her husband.
And now there was her mother, Nemesis, standing there staring down Paris's patron goddess Aphrodite. The only parents Helen had ever known were King Tyndareus and Queen Leda, the rulers of Sparta before she and Menelaus took the throne. Neither parent had the bloodline to explain Helen’s flawless appearance and fantastic strength, but a few years ago she’d finally learned the truth. Helen was the daughter of two full-blooded gods - Zeus, the King of Olympus, and Nemesis, the much feared enforcer of the gods' will in Greece.
Or at least, that was who she’d thought Nemesis was - now the tall black-haired goddess stood between her and Aphrodite, spreading her wings and brandishing her talons like a raptor defending her hatchling. Electricity curled from the tips of the goddess's claws as she stood her ground against the Olympian goddess of love, who’d donned Achilles’s golden armor.
"Release your hold on my daughter," Nemesis snarled, "Or I will dress this room with your entrails, and parade your head through the streets of Troy."
"Impudent brat," Aphrodite said to Nemesis, "how dare you threaten me? You are a vassal to Olympos, sworn to the service and protection of its masters - myself included."
"For hundreds of years I was, but then my 'master' betrayed me, stalked me, and raped me,” Nemesis reminded Aphrodite, “all with the help of his whore sister."
"Whore?" Aphrodite quirked an eyebrow, "If you want to insult me, you're going to have to try harder, dear. And what do you think you were created for? Nyx might have birthed you, but it was Hera who made you, turned your flesh into a device to satisfy our needs. You were made to be a whore. It's just unfortunate you proved so inept at it. Perhaps you could benefit from the sort of... re-education I gave your daughter? I’ve made her a very good whore."
Helen seethed with rage and shame. She had hated herself for abandoning her family for the childish prince of Troy, and it hadn’t taken her too long to figure out what happened. The necklace Paris had given her as a gift a decade ago had come with a curse. Helen had tried to resist its power but doing so had nearly killed her. After that, she had given up and accepted her fate.
"Then it's true!” Menelaus shouted, pointing his spear at Aphrodite, “You bewitched my wife and took her away from me! Took her away from our daughter, and sold her off to this whinging ponce."
"Tough words coming from the man I've been cuckholding for the past decade," Paris held his bow steady, aimed at Menelaus's head.
"Shut up, boy," Menelaus said, "the adults are talking."
Paris's face twitched, "Am I a mere 'boy,' that has been laying with your wife for all these years?"
"And now we know that's the result of divine intervention," Menelaus said, "Apparently it's literally a miracle that you bedded a woman."
Helen was frustrated that the two of them were talking like she wasn't there, though she might as well not be, mightn't she? She had no control over her fate, so what did it matter what she wanted to do or say?
"Enough," Aphrodite waved her hand at Menelaus and he suddenly faltered, staggered, and dropped to his knees. "Hormones are such a fickle thing, aren't they? They make men of boys and women of girls, but they do so much more. Throw them far enough out of their natural bounds and the whole body turns on itself."
Helen didn't know what 'whore moans' had to do with Aphrodite's magic (though on some level the association did make sense), but the effect was clear - Menelaus was turning red and struggling to breath under his armor.
"Save your witchcraft for me," Nemesis hissed and lunged at Aphrodite.
Aphrodite dodged backwards deftly. The goddess's forte was manipulation, psychological and (when necessary) physical, but she was still an Olympian, among the oldest of their little clan, older than Nemesis, and with that came strength and speed far beyond the abilities of mortals. And Achilles's armor simply made her more dangerous.
Nemesis clawed at Aphrodite like a feral animal, striking her with her talons and the spikes on her black armor. The goddess deflected her blows with the golden plates of Hephaestus’s creation, and drew a dagger forged by her ex-husband. She struck at Nemesis; Nemesis dodged, but the blade of the dagger released forcefully from its hilt and struck like a viper springing from its den, Nemesis deflected the ballistic blade with one of her gauntlets, but the poison-laced iron blade skipped off the black plate and struck one of her wings, cutting and burning her. With a flick of her wrist, Aphrodite brought the blade back to her on a thin cable made of Hephaestus’s miraculous steel alloy, and then whipped it around, lashing Nemesis with it again and again.
Nemesis tried to fend off or dodge the blows, but the poison was a sedative - the same one Aphrodite had used on her four decades ago when she'd helped Zeus rape her. Nemesis became sluggish, her senses dulled, but the sensation brought those memories to the fore like a spear striking from the back of her mind. The pain, the humiliation, the divine rage that had propelled her to follow Athena down this path. The anger welled inside Nemesis; lightning flashed in her veins and began to burn the poison out this time.
Aphrodite lashed at Nemesis again, and this time - as much by luck as skill - Nemesis managed to break through the haze and grab the blade as it came at her. Her taloned hand wrapped around the razor sharp iron - the cold, dark metal burned her flesh and boiled her blood as it poured out of her hand. Despite the pain, Nemesis gripped the blade tightly and unleashed every amp of electricity stored in her body. The energy burst from her, a lightning bolt that rushed through the metal blade, up its cable, and straight into Aphrodite. The goddess convulsed violently as her muscles seized, and the armor amplified the effect, overcharging from the electrical burst. Aphrodite flew backwards against the wall of the room, cracking the granite stonework with the forceful impact of her resilient body. The overloaded armor released from Aphrodite’s body and folded back into a cube to reset itself.
Nemesis released the blade and started to close on Aphrodite, but she was clumsy and slow from the poison. Paris took aim with his bow and fired one of the iron-tipped arrows Aphrodite had given him straight at Nemesis's head. The goddess would have met her end right there were it not for the intercession of Menelaus's shield. The jolt Aphrodite had taken had apparently weakened the goddess's hex on his body enough that he was able to throw himself back into the fight, although he now felt more exhausted than he had in the entirety of the ten year long war; it felt as if he were trying to fight while holding his breath.
Menelaus trudged towards Paris. The young man was the source of a decade of pain. The blood of Menelaus's men - his friends and followers - had been shed in rivers because of Paris's abduction of Helen, and Menelaus had very nearly matched that in tears in the dark of the night, every night, when he remembered his daughter asking him what she'd done wrong to drive her mother away.
Paris tried to fire another shot with his bow, but Menelaus threw his heavy bronze shield at the man, snapping the wooden arrow shaft in Paris’s hand and knocking the bow from his grasp. Menelaus seethed as he closed on the man, sword in hand. Paris drew another arrow, but rather than stand and fight Menelaus, he tossed the iron-tipped projectile to Helen.
"Kill me if you want old man, but it won't change how she feels. She'll die for me, and if she can't do that, she'll die with me."
Menelaus didn't understand what Paris was getting at until Helen pointed the arrow at her heart, tears rolling from her eyes.
"No!" Menelaus cried, "Helen! Drop the arrow and let me end this!"
"I can't!" she cried, "I can't live without him!"
"Gods damn you!" Menelaus spat at Paris.
"Actually," Paris said as he hefted a vase and threw it at Menelaus, "the gods have generally been good to me of late. I even killed Achilles, and Zeus - his own father - didn't raise a finger to stop me. What chance do you think you have?" He began throwing whatever he could grab at the Spartan king, the seasoned warrior afraid to fight back lest his wife be forced to end her own life. Finally, Paris reached a sword hung on the wall and drew it, prepared to end the one-sided fight.
Aphrodite recovered, and found that her acolyte was besting his opponent while her own attacker was struggling to get back to her feet. Nemesis was resisting the poison far better than she had before, but it was still sapping her strength and will. Doubtless that little display of power she'd unleashed was a last desperate scream in the face of fate - a fate which would now, appropriately, be ended with a string.
Aphrodite clutched the steel cable of her weapon in her hands and walked calmly over to Nemesis. She rammed her heel down on the woman's jaw, and then kicked her in the throat. Nemesis gasped and tried to roll over, to bring her talons to bear, but Aphrodite stepped down on the woman’s back, her foot squarely between her enemy’s black wings, and looped the metal cable around Nemesis's neck, drawing it tight against her throat.
Nemesis gasped and strained for breath.
"You know, I was actually there when you took your first breath?" Aphrodite laughed, "Your poor mother, she tried to hold Knossos against us. She actually did surprisingly well, considering she'd already given up her legacy. She fought us until it came down to just her and Zeus. She might even have won, but she went into labor in the middle of their duel. I guess you just couldn't wait to get out and see the world. So hungry for life back then. I still remember that incessant wail you made as Hera carried you away. It might actually have been more pitiful than your mother's pathetic cries as we dragged her down to Tartarus."
Adresteia nearly got her talons under the steel noose, but her grip slipped and the noose drew tighter, "Stop fighting it," Aphrodite whispered, "Just let it happen. There was never a place in this world for you, baby sister. You were born at the end of an era, your parents and uncles and aunts all sealed away in Tartarus. I thought we should just stick you down there too, but Hera seemed to find you, our half sister, fascinating..."
Aphrodite twisted the cable once more, but was suddenly pulled backwards so hard that she released her weapon. One powerful hand held fast to her forehead, and another wrapped around the base of her jaw. The hands began twisting her head, and Aphrodite clutched at their wrists, but she was still weakened by the lightning Nemesis had struck her with. She grasped and struggled, digging her finger nails into the arms pulling her head around. Blood welled in the wounds and dripped down Aphrodite's white tunic.
"What are you doing?!" Paris shouted at Helen, breaking off the fight with Menelaus, "She's my patron, my shield against the fates! If you truly love me, you'll release her now!" It wasn't so much an ultimatum as a command, and that was enough affront to give Helen the strength she needed to finish the job.
"If." Helen growled as she twisted Aphrodite's head back around to stare straight into her terrified eyes. Ligaments tore, bones cracked, and the goddess's spinal cord ripped apart under the torsion. Aphrodite blinked in disbelieving horror, but her body went limp, the air left her lungs, and within seconds she passed from the mortal world.
The amulet Paris had given her years before in Sparta, the one she couldn't bear to take off, suddenly felt... lighter. Trivial. She ripped it off and tossed it to the ground with Aphrodite's corpse.
"What have you done?!" Paris wailed.
All of the seemingly inexplicable feelings of passion Helen had carried for ten years dissipated, leaving behind only the rage at being imprisoned, the humiliation of being treated as a toy and trophy for Paris's enjoyment. Helen picked up Menelaus's shield and tossed it to him, "With it or on it, husband."
Menelaus caught the shield, and smiled - the woman he loved more than anyone in the world was back.
While Helen calmly helped her birth mother up from the ground, Paris looked for an escape, and when he found himself lacking one, he desperately struck at Menelaus with his sword. Menelaus deftly disarmed the younger man. The happiness he'd felt at finally having Helen back was quickly overcast by the fatigue of war, the decade of carnage that had soaked the Trojan beaches red. Paris was, in Menelaus's mind, the beginning and the end of it, all of it.
"I offered you a man’s death once, on the plains outside of this city. But you don't deserve it," Menelaus said as he cast his own sword to the ground and raised his shield. “You’re vermin Paris, a roach to be crushed under a man’s heel!” Menelaus brought the heavy bronze disc down on Paris with all the force he could muster, "This is for Achilles!" he struck him, "For Menesthius!" he struck again, "Euchenor and Deiochus! For Greece!" Menelaus panted with exertion as Paris tried to crawl away, blood pouring from horrific fractures in his once beautiful face and infamous bow arm. "And this... this is for your brother, Hector, and all the other good Trojan men and women who died so you could rape my wife." Menelaus rolled Paris onto his back with his foot, and pressed the edge of the bronze shield to the man's throat. He slowly forced it downward, until Paris's head rolled freely across the floor like a bleeding melon.
Menelaus staggered backwards; with the adrenaline leaving his body he felt anxious, keyed up, but also horrified by his own brutality. Most of all he was exhausted and, underneath everything else, relieved.
With her mother steady on her feet, Helen approached her husband. The man's armor was slick with red gore, his cape - though already blood red, was soaked with Paris's vital fluids.
"I..." Menelaus didn't know what to say. Finally, he half smiled and said, "In case you're worried, I have learned to do my own laundry." Helen didn't laugh, and Menelaus immediately regretted the joke. "I'm sorry Hel, I... I know this must be hard... if you felt anything at all for him..."
"I didn't," Helen said, "it was all gone the moment Aphrodite died. A part of me feels like I should miss the feelings she cursed me with, but I learned to hate my love for him long ago." She picked up her dead lover's head, as coolly as any Spartan woman picking through the aftermath of a battle, "His death doesn't restore the years of my life he took, or erase the... violation of that witch's curse, but I honestly couldn't abide the thought of him leaving this room alive."
The corners of Helen's eyes twitched as she looked at his face - underneath the shattered bones and dead meat, she could still see the beautiful face that had - she thought - seduced her all of those years ago. Her stomach churned, and she smashed Paris's head into the room's granite wall with her god-like strength, splattering it across the stonework like a ripe tomato.
Menelaus was quiet for a moment, "I'll understand if it takes you some time to work through all of this."
"Thank you," Helen didn't smile visibly, but the warmth for her husband was stirring back, "Now please, take me home to our daughter."
Menelaus, Helen, and Adresteia walked out, but ran into Aeneas on his way to get Paris.
Menelaus drew his weapon, but Helen waved him down, "I'm leaving Aeneas. I was never here of my own freewill."
"My mother bewitched you didn't she?"
"Yes," Helen said simply, "Now please, let us pass."
Aeneas stood aside while the king and queen of Sparta walked away, but Adresteia lingered for a moment.
"Is my mother..." Aeneas started to ask.
"Dead," Adresteia said, "I don't know if it matters to you, but she fought well, and when the end finally came, it was quick."
"It's all gone... all... lost," Aeneas said, "Troy, my family. My mother who was... a terrible mother, but I at least thought she'd be around forever."
“Odysseus will be at the southern gate,” Adresteia said to the Trojan hero, “He's trying to get Hector's wife and son out of Troy before Agamemnon can have the boy executed. They'll probably need your help.” With that she turned and followed her daughter away from the carnage.
Aeneas walked into the blood soaked room. Paris had been decapitated, and his head was nowhere to be found. And then there was Aphrodite, a goddess, laying dead on the ground, her head twisted backwards. Rationally, Aeneas knew it didn't matter, but for some reason he couldn't bear to leave her like that. He shut her eyes, rolled her over, and then gently eased her head back into place. Her jaw fell open and gray cloud rolled from her mouth.
Aeneas tried to shake it away from his face, but it seemed to cling to him, pulling itself down into his lungs as if animated by its own volition.
Damn, I'm dead, Aeneas heard his mother's voice.
"Aphrodite?" Aeneas wondered allowed.
Shush son, the voice answered, People will think you're mad if they hear you talking to a dead goddess.
"I don't understand, is there some way I can save you?"
Aeneas felt an odd surge of warmth, a feeling of maternal comfort and affection he'd never experienced before.
You're a good son, Aeneas. I never appreciated you as I should have. But it's too late for me. I lived like a god and died like a mortal. But it's not too late for you, Aeneas. So, let's focus on getting you out of this city alive.
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