Athena's Child (The Grecian Women Trilogy)

by Hannah M. Lynn

For those whose truth has been lost, may it one day be found.

Perhaps all monsters are born. Then again, perhaps it is just a way of hiding the darkness we all carry within us. A darkness we force ourselves to keep hidden from the world for we can barely imagine what terrible misdoings would occur if we were to let that darkness grow. Because the truth that we all know is this. Darkness grows.

Medusa grew from monsters, but she was not born of them.

These are not men. They are snakes, serpents trying to find the freshest eggs. And when they do find them, they crack them open, devour their insides, and leave nothing more than hollow shells.

I do not know wars, but I know of battles. Battles waged in my family’s name when my first suitor came calling when I was just eight. Battles I waged when I refused to let men’s hands wander where they felt they had a right to, or when I refused to follow them on a walk, down a path or into an olive grove. I know of the battles I have waged as I stood in a marketplace and demanded that men look not at my breasts, or my eyes, or my legs but at the fruit which I was selling. These were not battles of blood, it is true, but they are battles. Battles that I have fought and won.’

Her lips turned upwards, the smile rising to her cheeks. But the glimmer that came from her eyes was not one of joy. It was dark and hollow and not earned in her lifetime but in all the thousands of lifetimes that had gone before her. By her aunt, by her aunt’s aunt, and by generations too far back to recall. ‘Those battles,’ she said. ‘They don’t ever end.’

Men didn’t need gods, Medusa mused, they just needed somebody, anybody, to guide them in their lives.

Medusa had become accustomed to the way these events would play out, and every one caused the rock in her chest to harden further.

Women hold knives more often in the day than men ever do, yet it is not women who stab their husbands to death when they fear adultery.

Women gather in clusters with friendships stronger than steel, yet it is not women who beat their husbands to the ground in gangs when a hint of wrong-doing echoes in the air.

It is not women who require lover after lover, then make promises of love which they recant when darker hair and deep...

Women use words and reason where men use fists and force. So why are we always second? Why is that my goddess? Why are we always second?’

At that moment, Medusa naively thought and believed this would be the worst that would befall her in this lifetime. She had no idea how wrong she was.

Medusa’s heart fell like a stone statue and shattered into a thousand pieces.

‘I did not want his gaze,’ she said. ‘I do not want any man’s gaze.’

When faced with a monster, who ever looked to see beyond the teeth and talons?

‘You wish me to question those who never questioned me. Or you. Trust does not require answers, Perseus. Trust requires acceptance.’

‘Perseus, we could give you every item in our possession, and it would still not be enough to repay you for the years you have allowed me the gift of having you as a child.

‘Gods do not pay the price for their wrongdoings, Perseus. Mortals do. The gods, like the rich of the world, push their agendas onto those whose voices are not loud enough to speak for themselves. The women. The weak. The unwanted. And no one shouts for those who need it the most. Why would they? To shout for another is to risk losing something yourself. And man cannot see beyond the depth of his own reflection.’

Meanwhile, Medusa’s truth was lost, and all that remained was the story of monsters and heroes, though the world would never truly know which was which.