Into Darkness

ㅤㅤThe cold night air hit like a knife. It had taken them nearly a day to reach this point. They had crept through the sacked city as the sun bled across the sky, shifting between hiding places, waiting out patrols, moving only when the soldiers' laughter faded or their backs turned. Every second stretched unbearably long, each moment a careful, measured step through the shattered remains of a fallen kingdom.

ㅤㅤThe weight of the boy against him grew heavier with each passing hour. His small frame sagged against Iason's side, his legs barely carrying him forward. More than once, Iason thought he might collapse entirely. Each time, he tightened his grip, murmuring quiet reassurances neither of them truly believed. He didn't know if the boy even heard him anymore—his breath had grown shallow, his body weak with hunger and exhaustion—but he still clung to Iason, his fingers curled into the fabric of his tunic like a lifeline.

ㅤㅤThey moved through a city that no longer lived. The palace, once resplendent with towering columns and golden halls, had become a graveyard of ember and shadow. The air reeked of charred wood, of burnt flesh and ruin. The streets they passed through were barely streets anymore—just blackened pathways lined with the corpses of those who had tried to flee. The silence was thick, suffocating, broken only by the distant crackle of dying fires and the occasional murmurs of Greek soldiers still lingering, picking at what was left. Troy was theirs. What was left of it, at least. The victors had taken their spoils, set their fires, and left the rest to rot.

ㅤㅤThe outskirts loomed ahead. Just a little further. Just beyond these final ruins, beyond the walls—freedom. If there was anything left beyond Troy that could be called that. Iason guided them forward, his arm tight around the boy, half-carrying him when his steps faltered. He could feel the boy trembling, his breaths coming too fast, too shallow. The fear was eating him alive. Iason knew it well. The feeling of being hunted. Of knowing death was never far behind. But there was no time to dwell on it. They had to keep moving.

ㅤㅤThen—a sound. A voice. Sharp, cutting through the dark.

ㅤㅤ"Who's there?!"

ㅤㅤIason's body tensed before his mind even caught up. A Greek soldier stood just ahead, partially concealed by an overturned column. The firelight from a nearby ruin flickered across his form, gleaming off his armor, casting his shadow long and jagged against the broken walls. In his hand, a half-eaten ration, forgotten now as his gaze flickered from Iason to the boy.

ㅤㅤIason saw it—the shift. Recognition. Realization. The soldier's fingers twitched toward his sword.

ㅤㅤIason didn't bother to think—his body was already moving on its own.

ㅤㅤHe grabbed the boy's wrist and ran. Shouts erupted behind them, boots scraping against stone.

ㅤㅤ"Run," Iason hissed, his voice barely more than breath. He didn't know if the boy had the strength, but it didn't matter. They had no choice.

ㅤㅤThe debris and broken columns from the buildings twisted around them, a labyrinth of collapsed structures and shattered archways. They wove through them as fast as they could, Iason half-dragging the boy as they darted past charred beams and skeletal remains of once-grand buildings. The pursuit was close. Too close. Not just one soldier anymore. A second voice had joined the first, both of them gaining ground.

ㅤㅤIason's mind raced. He was moving on instinct, his breath ragged, his pulse hammering. His grip on the boy tightened as he pulled him forward, his own body aching with exhaustion, but he didn't let himself slow. He couldn't. Then—there. An alley. Barely more than a gap between crumbling walls, narrow and dark. They could lose them there.

ㅤㅤHe yanked the boy toward it. The child stumbled, nearly collapsing, but Iason shoved him forward, through the opening first before ducking in after him. They pressed themselves against the wall, bodies rigid. Iason's hand splayed across the boy's chest, holding him still, willing him silent.

ㅤㅤThe footsteps thundered past. Iason held his breath. For a moment, he swore he could hear everything—the frantic beating of the boy's heart, the rush of blood in his own ears, the faint embers still smoldering in the distance. Again, it struck him—how clear it was. The rhythm of the boy's heart, sharp and stuttering. The soldier's too, steadier but strained, laced with quiet irritation. Even the rasp of breath, the shift of armor, the smoldering embers crackling somewhere beyond sight. Then—a pause that brought him from his thoughts.

ㅤㅤA voice—grumbling, cursing. A muttered exchange. The footsteps hesitated—then faded.

ㅤㅤA long moment passed before Iason finally exhaled. His muscles ached from how tightly wound they'd been, his chest burning from the effort of keeping still. The boy was staring up at him, wide-eyed, lips parted. He was shaking—whether from cold, fear, or exhaustion, Iason couldn't tell. Probably all three.

ㅤㅤIason forced himself to nod, silent. It wasn't over. They couldn't stop yet. But they were getting there.

ㅤㅤContinuing on, they kept moving. Step by step. Hour by hour. Until at last, as night fully took the sky, the broken gates loomed ahead. The massive wooden horse, the symbol of their downfall, remained standing amidst the ruins, its massive frame untouched, watching over the shattered remains of a city it had deceived. A grotesque monument to their defeat.

ㅤㅤThe final threshold. Beyond it, the land stretched into darkness—unknowing, uncertain. Behind them, Troy was little more than ash and bones. Only a few Greeks remained now—scavengers picking at the corpses of a kingdom that had once stood proud.

ㅤㅤIason turned to the boy. His face was pale still, his skin cool beneath the layers of dust and grime. His breaths came slow, controlled, but his eyes—those hollow, weary eyes—held something deeper. Not just exhaustion. Not just fear. But something else. A will to survive. Despite everything. Despite all they had lost. Despite the certainty that even beyond these gates, the world would not be kind to them.

ㅤㅤIason swallowed hard. "We're not safe yet," he murmured.

ㅤㅤThe boy didn't answer. Didn't even nod. But after a moment, his small fingers curled into the fabric of Iason's sleeve.

ㅤㅤThe silent gesture, although small it was undoubtedly a core of frightful trust—yet trust regardless.

ㅤㅤIason exhaled, steadying himself against the cold night air. His chest ached, not from exhaustion, but from the weight of everything that had led to this moment. The ruins of Troy lay behind them, a smoldering corpse of a city that had once been called great. The fires had begun to die, leaving behind only burnt and charred remains, blackened stone, and the distant, aimless shouts of scavengers picking through the bones.

ㅤㅤHe did not look back.

ㅤㅤHe had already failed once. Astyanax—Hector's son, Troy's last hope—had slipped through his fingers, lost to the slaughter. The memory clawed at him, a wound that refused to close, unlike the other gashes and wounds he had sustained. Regret and anguish curled in his gut like a living thing, but it was too late for sorrow. Too late for redemption.

ㅤㅤAnd yet, something had found him in the dark. A presence, slithering behind his eye, nesting in the hollow of his skull. It whispered of power beyond comprehension, of strength enough to tear apart the ones who had burned Troy to ash—he had witnessed and acted on it firsthand. But it came with a cost—a hunger, vast and insatiable, sinking its roots into him. A monster he has seen from the boy's eyes.

ㅤㅤThe Greeks could answer for what they had done. Their kings, their generals—every last hand that had torn Troy apart. If he embraced the parasite, the power would be his.

ㅤㅤAnd yet, when he looked at the boy, something twisted inside him. Not because they looked the same—Astyanax had been just a child, barely able to walk—but because the weight of failure felt the same. The boy stood before him, whole and breathing, but in his mind, Iason still saw small, grasping hands, felt weak fingers slipping from his own. He remembered the helpless cries, the silence that followed. The unbearable emptiness.

ㅤㅤThis was not Astyanax. And yet, the same promise pressed against his ribs, the same desperate need to hold on—to protect. This time, he would not fail.

ㅤㅤBut the parasite stirred.

ㅤㅤIt coiled behind his eye, thrumming with hunger, whispering of power. Power to tear apart the Greeks, to make them suffer. Their kings, their generals—every last hand that had torn Troy apart. He need only surrender—feed the thing inside him, let it take its due. The thought sent a shudder through him. He had failed once. Without power, he would fail again.

 ㅤㅤBut the boy...

ㅤㅤAstyanax had been small, fragile. This one stood, walked, breathed—but how long before that, too, was taken? How long before Iason's weakness cost him another life? Would this power protect him, or would it destroy him in the end? Would he wake one day and find himself no better than the Greeks he despised?

ㅤㅤHe adjusted his grip on the boy's wrist, feeling how thin it was, how fragile. With one last glance at the distant ruins, he turned, leading them into the dark. Away from the city. Away from the past.

ㅤㅤToward whatever waited ahead.

ㅤㅤThe night stretched long and silent, broken only by the occasional snap of branches beneath their feet and the distant howls of unseen creatures. The stars overhead were indifferent, scattered like shards of bone against the vast emptiness of the sky. The forest swallowed them whole, trees rising like sentinels, their gnarled limbs casting long, reaching shadows in the pale moonlight.

ㅤㅤNeither of them spoke.

ㅤㅤIn the days and nights ahead since then, the process of making camp had been an ordeal. Every movement felt wrong. Iason's hands—too strong, too unsteady—had crushed dry branches when he had only meant to snap them. His fingers had twitched when striking flint, his grip too tight when setting the fire. More than once, he had been forced to stop, breathe, remind himself that he was still himself. That he could still control this.

ㅤㅤAnd then there was the different type of hunger.

ㅤㅤThe scent of blood had long faded, washed away by the night air and distance, but it still lingered in his thoughts, a whisper at the back of his mind. He had done everything to ignore it—to push past the gnawing sensation, the aching void where something unnatural begged to be fed.

ㅤㅤThe boy sat across from him, hunched, his arms curled around his knees. He had barely looked at Iason since they had stopped for the night. Since they had escaped Troy. since he had seen what Iason had done.

ㅤㅤIason fed another branch to the fire. The flames flared briefly, crackling as they hungrily consumed the dry wood. Their glow flickered across the boy's face, highlighting sharp cheekbones, hollowed slightly by hunger. He was young. Too young for the horrors he had already seen.

ㅤㅤThe game he has caught, a hare he has already set on the campfire to cook, seems to be just ready.

ㅤㅤThe boy shifted, gaze darting toward Iason before snapping away just as quickly, his fingers curling against his knees.

ㅤㅤIason sighed, rubbing a hand across his face. He couldn't blame him. He had seen that look before—the way a person sat stiffly, muscles coiled as if at any moment they might have to run. It was the same wary tension that horses had before battle, flinching at every sudden movement, waiting for the chaos to begin.

ㅤㅤAnd yet, the boy had chosen to stay. Despite the fear lingering in his dark eyes, despite the unspoken weight between them, he had not fled into the night.

ㅤㅤThat meant something.

ㅤㅤIt meant Iason couldn't simply ignore him, couldn't let this uneasy silence stretch on forever. They would be traveling together, for however long the road would take them. The boy had made that choice.

ㅤㅤSo, Iason had to make one, too.

ㅤㅤHe adjusted his position, resting an arm over his knee as he glanced toward him. "Do you have a name?" His voice was low, careful. Non-threatening.

ㅤㅤA pause.

ㅤㅤThe boy hesitated, shoulders tensing as though the question itself was a risk. Then, finally, his lips parted, voice quiet but steady.

ㅤㅤ"...Ariston."

ㅤㅤIason nodded, repeating it in his mind. A name meant something, no matter how small. It was the first thread of something fragile, something real between them.

ㅤㅤHe could still feel the boy's unease, the way his body remained rigid despite the fire's warmth. But he hadn't closed off completely.

ㅤㅤIt was a start.

ㅤㅤAnd right now, a start was enough.

ㅤㅤThen, finally, the question Iason had been expecting.

ㅤㅤ"What are you?"

ㅤㅤIason stiffened. His jaw clenched, but he didn't look away.

ㅤㅤI don't know.

ㅤㅤIt wasn't a lie. It wasn't even an evasion. It was the simple, brutal truth. He didn't know what had happened to him—what he had become, what was now clawing beneath his skin, behind his eye, demanding to be fed.

ㅤㅤAcross from him, Ariston was watching. His dark eyes flickered with something unreadable. Disgust? Fear? Maybe both.

ㅤㅤ"You drank my blood."

ㅤㅤIason flinched.

ㅤㅤHe had tried not to think about it. Tried to push away the memory of the taste, the heat of it as it filled his veins, quenching his thirst. Even now, just hearing those words, something inside him stirred, twisting with sick anticipation.

ㅤㅤHis stomach turned.

ㅤㅤ"I didn't mean to."

ㅤㅤAriston's breath hitched, his voice barely above a whisper. "Didn't mean to?"

ㅤㅤHe didn't sound angry. He didn't even sound afraid—just disbelieving, like he couldn't understand how those words could possibly make sense.

ㅤㅤHe lowered his gaze. His fingers twitched where they rested against his knee, curling slightly, but he didn't clench them into fists. A soldier or anyone might have argued, might have scoffed or spat at Iason's words. But Ariston was no soldier. He was a servant boy—a palace attendant who had likely spent his life bowing his head, stepping carefully, knowing his place.

ㅤㅤHis voice was quieter when he spoke again, but there was something unshaken beneath it. "You pinned me down."

ㅤㅤIason said nothing.

ㅤㅤAriston swallowed hard. "I thought you were going to kill me."

ㅤㅤThe words struck like a blade.

ㅤㅤIason shut his eyes. The memory was fractured, distorted. He remembered hunger—not the kind that gnawed at an empty stomach, but something deeper, more insatiable. A hunger that drowned out thought and reason.

ㅤㅤHe remembered the boy's struggle, the weak desperate fight beneath him. Remembered his own grip tightening, muscles locking, a single instinct pressing forward in his mind: Take. Consume.

ㅤㅤThe blackness had swallowed him whole.

ㅤㅤ"I wasn't myself," he said finally.

ㅤㅤ"That's worse."

ㅤㅤSilence.

ㅤㅤIason had no answer for that.

ㅤㅤBecause it was worse.

ㅤㅤIf it had been a mistake, if it had been something conscious, something he could control—it would mean he was still human.

ㅤㅤBut this?

ㅤㅤThis meant there was something inside him now. Something that could take over, that could make him do things he wouldn't—shouldn't and couldn't—do.