Episode 3.2.c
>In the TSTT, Troy, Bronze Age<
Hercules reaches into his sack and draws out a small stone.
It is glowing.
Eadem lūx. īdem Lapis.
The same light. The same stone. This is a fragment of the Lapis itself, carried in the sack of Hercules like a piece of gravel.
He fits the stone into the head of his club. When he turns toward the creature and swings, the light comes off the weapon in a long pulse, and the creature makes a sound you feel more than hear: a deep, retreating sound, something between a cry and the closing of a very large door. The arms pull back. The sea closes over it, and the water settles, and the shore is quiet.
Laomedon comes down to the water's edge. The danger is gone, and his relief is visible, but there is something else in his face too, something careful and calculating, moving in just behind the relief.
"You have our deepest gratitude," he says. "Hercules, and your companions." He pauses, and the pause is slightly too long. "There is, however, a small difficulty. The agreement was that the monster would be killed. And it was not, precisely, killed. It was, as it were, persuaded to leave."
Hercules looks at him.
"Which means," Laomedon continues, with the tone of a man reading from a contract he did not write, "that the terms of payment may not strictly apply."
There is a long silence. Then Hercules understands. He picks up his club. His face does something simple and final.
What happens next is fast. Laomedon's court does not fare well. One by one they fall, until only one figure remains near the gate: a boy, thin and serious, clutching a folded golden robe to his chest and watching Hercules with wide, steady eyes. His name is Priamus, and he is the last of Laomedon's sons.
Hercules raises the club.
Prompt: Hercules must not kill Priamus. Find a way to convince him to spare the boy and to entrust the Lapis to him.
