Tuesday, 13 April 2021

INSIDE A KING'S MIND

 


Hi everyone. I’m Francesco G. and today I  have a new introspective story to share with you, again I imagined and wrote the inner struggle of a mythological / historical figure. Writing these stories, I like to think of  the people behind the deeds, especially in the moments which build literature and history. I’d like to know what you think and, if you feel like doing it, please share your thoughts in the comments below.

A horse. Ten years of  endless war and everything may be soon solved  thanks to  a wooden horse. It is giant and it can contain tens of warriors. We’ll be thirty-six. After we’ll open the Skaian Gates, I will look for the man who sleeps with my Helen, with my wife, with the reason of this war.

                Paris was killed by Philoctetes; I would have liked to do it for myself, but I can still kill Deiphobus, his brother, who married her after Paris died. This night will be forever remembered as the night Menelaus, king of Sparta, got his wife back.

 

The warriors get into the horse, the Trojans bring it into the city walls.

 

I’m inside the horse. We must stay still. Our armours can’t make the slightest  clangour; our breath cannot make the slightest noise. If someone makes a mistake, we’ll all be killed.

 

A few hours later

 

They’re drunk. They are  celebrating  their victory. It’s our moment.  We must open the gates and then, after looting, we’ll return to our homes; I will be united to my wife again, to the most beautiful and graceful woman in the world.

 

The warriors open the gates,  the army gets into Troy.

 

Fire and ruin: that’s all I can see. The city burns, every Trojan is slaughtered. Ulysses throws a child into the fire; the same hero considered the smartest of us is able to do horrible things . The men who left their wives and their little children in their motherlands commit unspeakable murders.

                But now I myself must be the most evil, the most vindicative and the most passionate man on Earth. I must take my wife back. I enter Deiphobus’s  house. He and Helen are sleeping. Anger gets me, I unsheathe my sword.

 

Menelaus kills Deiphobus and takes his wife back with him.

 

My wife lies on my shoulders, tied and terrified. I’m bringing her to my ship. I watch the city burn: that’s at the same time the most fascinating and the most terrible show I’ve ever seen.

                Thousands of people died because of the woman I carry with me. Is she worth all that? Can a woman be the cause of so much pain and death? Can beauty and love bring to such a great suffering?  

                That’s only one thing I can say: we have won.

  Francesco G. , 4sc.

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