Hektor son of Priam (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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milliways_bar2007-08-12 01:58 pm
hippodamio) wrote in milliways_bar2007-08-12 01:58 pm
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Hektor is prepared, this time, when the door opens from his home to the Bar. "I have had this near to hand for some time in case you called me here, Lady," he says, bowing with fist on brow. "It seemed a better gift than wine alone, and still appropriate."
He no longer needs to stand on tiptoe to place his offerings on the Bar's surface, which is just as well. A carved bull's-head rhyton is easiest balanced when one can see what one is doing. When the drinking vessel disappears Hektor smiles, and bows again. "Thank you, Lady," he says. "Now, if I may ask a favor of you. . . once, you gave me a book, so that I might learn what I needed to tame my horse Boukephalos. I had thought to ask you for another, or else for a name. The time will come when I will have need of knowing as much as I can about the ways of war, beyond only what I have learned from Father and my uncles. Will you tell me who I must meet, that I may learn as much as I can? If you cannot, then a book will do, if any have written upon the subject."
There is a long silence and stillness from the Bar, but in the end a slender grey volume materializes. Hektor bows deeply once more. "Thank you, Lady," he says. "There will be better offerings in it for you next time, if this goes well."
The adolescent then retreats to a convenient table so that he can look over his newly acquired reading.
He no longer needs to stand on tiptoe to place his offerings on the Bar's surface, which is just as well. A carved bull's-head rhyton is easiest balanced when one can see what one is doing. When the drinking vessel disappears Hektor smiles, and bows again. "Thank you, Lady," he says. "Now, if I may ask a favor of you. . . once, you gave me a book, so that I might learn what I needed to tame my horse Boukephalos. I had thought to ask you for another, or else for a name. The time will come when I will have need of knowing as much as I can about the ways of war, beyond only what I have learned from Father and my uncles. Will you tell me who I must meet, that I may learn as much as I can? If you cannot, then a book will do, if any have written upon the subject."
There is a long silence and stillness from the Bar, but in the end a slender grey volume materializes. Hektor bows deeply once more. "Thank you, Lady," he says. "There will be better offerings in it for you next time, if this goes well."
The adolescent then retreats to a convenient table so that he can look over his newly acquired reading.