Southern India, 345 AD

There had been chains. Chanting. A cage, inlaid and veiled with red, red, scarlet red. There had been a girl, beaten and strong. There had been begging, her own, screams and ramblings and whisper, whisper, whisper and cry for the sky and there had been blood, blood, blood all poured out into bowls.

And there had been a fire.

She remembers the fire.

If there hadn't have been a fire, her clothes wouldn't be burnt, would they? Once a sari, costly and beautiful and fit for a goddess, now rags and charcoal showing ash-covered and still-perfect limbs.

She'd been worshiped before, but not like that and Medusa, gold nose-ring still there (give her a mirror and a century to calm down, and she might concede it actually suits her), gold manacles still on her wrists and ankles, gold bangles still jingling, is pacing in the ruins of a temple. She's chewing her bottom lip and fuming, the snakes hissing angry, angry, angry.

(like the sky above her, dark and rumbling with energy and pressure always rising)

If she wasn't certain that the men responsible had been killed, then Medusa, thinking in the clarity that only resurrection can bring, would be making sure that they were begging for it.

in the library, 2003

Medusa had spent the morning sparring with Stheno (Euryale had run off to town). Hard and fast and nasty and, in the end, Medusa had snapped her sister's wrist. Stheno had kicked her into a wall; the Gorgon girls had always played rough.

Which is why it's a good thing that they can fix each other.

So, when Medusa walks into the library (a large cavern under the earth, floor to nearly ceiling bookcases with laders with wheels that roll across the shelves, and there are tall, narrow windows to catch the breeze and light), her curls are damp from a shower and she's rolling her shoulder back. Magical healing or no, you do feel sore.

"Lucifer?"

Today her nosering (India left a lasting impression, and it's a look that suits her) is a nosestud, a little golden spider with a ruby on its back , and her walk is marked by the chiming of the tiny bells around her right ankle. Not that it's easy to see said bells, given that Medusa's taste in skirts tends towards flowing things long enough to reach the tops of her feet.