ira furor brevis est
Jan. 1st, 2008 08:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mycursedfaceIf Medusa would be the first to admit that what she is doing isn’t entirely sensible, she would also be the first to point out that she does, in fact, know what she is doing. Yes, she is still weak and shaking from her murder and subsequent resurrection. Yes, her curse has been utterly fucked up until she can taste the air and see the world around her in shades of heat ( literally around her, given her profusion of snakes). Yes, she is still covered in blood (both hers and her sisters’), and maybe another woman would stop and think before doing this.
But Medusa knows herself, and she knows that if she stops and thinks, she will have a fit of screaming hysteria. Indeed, she is relying on her current wave of pure, righteous anger to stop her from thinking, as well as make sure she can actually do this. She is a guardian; her nature is to guard, protect, nurture, and under any other circumstances but this, she would have made a good mother. A mother lioness, perhaps, all fierce love and sheathed claws, but still a mother with all that implies.
But not like this.
Not the way her sons were born. Not the way her sons were conceived. As a ghost, she could not look at them without remembering. She remembered his voice, she remembered his hands, she remembered the way he threw her into that wall and she remembered the way he said that she was beautiful, so beautiful, such a beautiful girl, even as he left her broken and bloody on the floor.
It is the memory of that which is what has her out here, standing on the shore with the waves lapping hungrily at her feet with her baby son in her arms, although one could be forgiven for missing the logic. Her sisters certainly are, even though they are with her. They won’t leave here, especially not for this. And if it means that Euryale curls her fingers around the winged foal’s mane to keep him from getting in the way, and if it means that Stheno stands there with her arms crossed and jaw clenched with disapproval, so be it; Medusa knows exactly what she is doing.
He hurt her. He broke her. He started this, all of this. The rape, the curse, the murder; all the pain and grief that her sisters have had to deal with; all of this is his responsibility.
And it’s time that he started to realize that.
So Medusa, the baby in her arms, tilts her head back and calls out in a high, clear voice that no human would ever hope to match;
“Hear, Poseidon, ruler of the sea profound; whose liquid grasp begirds the solid ground; who, at the bottom of the stormy main, dark and deep-bosomed holdest thy watery reign. Thy awful hand the brazen trident bears, and sea’s utmost bound thy will reveres. Thee I summon.
Poseidon Pelagios, thee I summon. Poseidon Ennosigiaos, thee I summon. Poseidon Hippios, thee I summon.
Poseidon, I summon thee!”
If nothing else, she is hoping that the curiosity about what she wants will be enough.
And she, they, do not have to wait long. A wave that doesn’t entirely break, and the part that doesn’t shifts into a human’s shape. Still water, but also a tall, strong man with curly hair and a beard, holding a trident in his hand. He takes a step forward, and Medusa doesn’t step back. Another step forward, and as he strides the water darkens to olive skin, black hair.
She lifts her chin, but nothing can make her unclench her toes.. She can taste him; brine and power and it’s all that she can do to keep from gagging.
“Poseidon, king of the sea, I-”
“-‘am a rather proud, foolish girl’?” Poseidon finishes for her, raising an eyebrow. She flushes, and then goes pale. Somewhere, she can feel the beginnings of a shudder. His voice, his face, his hands-
Her claws dig into her right palm, and it’s easier to meet his eye. ( A proper Greek woman keeps her eyes down, never ever looks a man in the eye, no, not even her husband of twenty years. )
“Cousin,” Medusa continues, “I have some things that belong to you. I am seeking to return them.”
He raises the other eyebrow. She stares back, and her blood stains her son’s cloth.
“Who sliced your throat, Medusa?”
“Perseus, son of Danaë and your brother-king. A dare, I do believe.”
“To be expected; you are a monster.”
“Is it my lineage that is under question, or my appearance?”
Poseidon waves it off. Before he can open his mouth, there comes a scream. A weak, mewling scream from the baby in her arms. Personally, Medusa is surprised that he’d been silent for so long. Poseidon’s dark eyes move ( at last! ) from her to the baby, and then the foal shifting nervously on his thin, wobbly legs. His eyes narrow, and then they glance back at Medusa.
“Are not our sons beautiful, Poseidon?” The curve of her lips could never be described as a smile.
“Sons.”
“Twins. Born from the mingling of my blood with the sea. They are yours.”
“Medusa-”
“From this moment,” she says, loud and clear and overriding him, “they are dead to me. I will not deny their existence, but they are dead to my mind and my heart. But they are yours, and so it is only fitting as their father that you decide their fate.”
Carefully, looking back at the baby and the winged foal, Poseidon asks, “And if I choose to expose them?”
“Then it is on your head.”
He reaches out and takes her chin in his hand and it’s all she can do to keep still. Mustn’t anger, mustn’t anger, mustn’t-
Stheno, Euryale, don’t don’t don’t just stay there please just. stay. there.
“A shame,” he comments, brushing a thumb over her jaw bone, “about those snakes. Without them you’d be quite, quite lovely. And all your suitors would come flooding back, all wanting to posses your beauty.” She can’t stop herself from shuddering. The baby wails, rubbing his face with his tiny fists and kicking his little legs.
“But you are spoiled goods, even if you do produce sons.”
Spoiled goods, nothing more than a whore, and at the glint in his eye Medusa suddenly wrenches her head away. She nearly throws the baby at him and stumbles back, all pretence at dignity gone. Stheno moves forward, but Euryale releases her grip on the foal’s mane. He runs forward and presses himself against his mother’s legs.
Medusa for her part is just shaking, but if from fear or fury it is impossible to tell.
“Touch me again, Poseidon, and I swear….I swear by the River Styx herself that you will be in agony for the rest of eternity.”
Poseidon’s face darkens and she tries to back away further. But the foal is there, trembling and confused, and she ends up slashing him with her claws. He shies back with the sudden pain, and Poseidon calls out to him.
It’d be surprising how gentle the god’s voice is, if it weren’t making her skin crawl. Poseidon Hippios, Poseidon who invented horsemanship, Poseidon who runs a soothing hand down his winged son’s neck.
If Stheno and Euryale weren’t there, now holding her hands tightly in support, Medusa thinks that she might just have hysterics here and now.
“I will not forget your oath, Medusa Gorgos,” he says without looking at her, “but I will let it pass this once. Our sons are, after all, quite beautiful.”
Glad they meet with your approval, but she isn’t reckless enough to say it. The snakes do, though, and the tone is so much like hers that she has a very, very horrible idea about what they are.
“Our sons are dead to me,” she repeats in a flat voice. Poseidon inclines his head, almost mocking. Absently, she notices that the baby has stopped crying.
He’s stopped crying.
He’s stopped crying, and that is more than she can bear. Pulling her hands from of her sisters’ grasp, Medusa spins around and runs back up the beach before leaping into the air. Stheno and Euryale follow not a moment behind, but even though they are powerful fliers, she reaches their cave long before they do.
And by the time they land, she’s in a huddle and shaking.
But Medusa knows herself, and she knows that if she stops and thinks, she will have a fit of screaming hysteria. Indeed, she is relying on her current wave of pure, righteous anger to stop her from thinking, as well as make sure she can actually do this. She is a guardian; her nature is to guard, protect, nurture, and under any other circumstances but this, she would have made a good mother. A mother lioness, perhaps, all fierce love and sheathed claws, but still a mother with all that implies.
But not like this.
Not the way her sons were born. Not the way her sons were conceived. As a ghost, she could not look at them without remembering. She remembered his voice, she remembered his hands, she remembered the way he threw her into that wall and she remembered the way he said that she was beautiful, so beautiful, such a beautiful girl, even as he left her broken and bloody on the floor.
It is the memory of that which is what has her out here, standing on the shore with the waves lapping hungrily at her feet with her baby son in her arms, although one could be forgiven for missing the logic. Her sisters certainly are, even though they are with her. They won’t leave here, especially not for this. And if it means that Euryale curls her fingers around the winged foal’s mane to keep him from getting in the way, and if it means that Stheno stands there with her arms crossed and jaw clenched with disapproval, so be it; Medusa knows exactly what she is doing.
He hurt her. He broke her. He started this, all of this. The rape, the curse, the murder; all the pain and grief that her sisters have had to deal with; all of this is his responsibility.
And it’s time that he started to realize that.
So Medusa, the baby in her arms, tilts her head back and calls out in a high, clear voice that no human would ever hope to match;
“Hear, Poseidon, ruler of the sea profound; whose liquid grasp begirds the solid ground; who, at the bottom of the stormy main, dark and deep-bosomed holdest thy watery reign. Thy awful hand the brazen trident bears, and sea’s utmost bound thy will reveres. Thee I summon.
Poseidon Pelagios, thee I summon. Poseidon Ennosigiaos, thee I summon. Poseidon Hippios, thee I summon.
Poseidon, I summon thee!”
If nothing else, she is hoping that the curiosity about what she wants will be enough.
And she, they, do not have to wait long. A wave that doesn’t entirely break, and the part that doesn’t shifts into a human’s shape. Still water, but also a tall, strong man with curly hair and a beard, holding a trident in his hand. He takes a step forward, and Medusa doesn’t step back. Another step forward, and as he strides the water darkens to olive skin, black hair.
She lifts her chin, but nothing can make her unclench her toes.. She can taste him; brine and power and it’s all that she can do to keep from gagging.
“Poseidon, king of the sea, I-”
“-‘am a rather proud, foolish girl’?” Poseidon finishes for her, raising an eyebrow. She flushes, and then goes pale. Somewhere, she can feel the beginnings of a shudder. His voice, his face, his hands-
Her claws dig into her right palm, and it’s easier to meet his eye. ( A proper Greek woman keeps her eyes down, never ever looks a man in the eye, no, not even her husband of twenty years. )
“Cousin,” Medusa continues, “I have some things that belong to you. I am seeking to return them.”
He raises the other eyebrow. She stares back, and her blood stains her son’s cloth.
“Who sliced your throat, Medusa?”
“Perseus, son of Danaë and your brother-king. A dare, I do believe.”
“To be expected; you are a monster.”
“Is it my lineage that is under question, or my appearance?”
Poseidon waves it off. Before he can open his mouth, there comes a scream. A weak, mewling scream from the baby in her arms. Personally, Medusa is surprised that he’d been silent for so long. Poseidon’s dark eyes move ( at last! ) from her to the baby, and then the foal shifting nervously on his thin, wobbly legs. His eyes narrow, and then they glance back at Medusa.
“Are not our sons beautiful, Poseidon?” The curve of her lips could never be described as a smile.
“Sons.”
“Twins. Born from the mingling of my blood with the sea. They are yours.”
“Medusa-”
“From this moment,” she says, loud and clear and overriding him, “they are dead to me. I will not deny their existence, but they are dead to my mind and my heart. But they are yours, and so it is only fitting as their father that you decide their fate.”
Carefully, looking back at the baby and the winged foal, Poseidon asks, “And if I choose to expose them?”
“Then it is on your head.”
He reaches out and takes her chin in his hand and it’s all she can do to keep still. Mustn’t anger, mustn’t anger, mustn’t-
Stheno, Euryale, don’t don’t don’t just stay there please just. stay. there.
“A shame,” he comments, brushing a thumb over her jaw bone, “about those snakes. Without them you’d be quite, quite lovely. And all your suitors would come flooding back, all wanting to posses your beauty.” She can’t stop herself from shuddering. The baby wails, rubbing his face with his tiny fists and kicking his little legs.
“But you are spoiled goods, even if you do produce sons.”
Spoiled goods, nothing more than a whore, and at the glint in his eye Medusa suddenly wrenches her head away. She nearly throws the baby at him and stumbles back, all pretence at dignity gone. Stheno moves forward, but Euryale releases her grip on the foal’s mane. He runs forward and presses himself against his mother’s legs.
Medusa for her part is just shaking, but if from fear or fury it is impossible to tell.
“Touch me again, Poseidon, and I swear….I swear by the River Styx herself that you will be in agony for the rest of eternity.”
Poseidon’s face darkens and she tries to back away further. But the foal is there, trembling and confused, and she ends up slashing him with her claws. He shies back with the sudden pain, and Poseidon calls out to him.
It’d be surprising how gentle the god’s voice is, if it weren’t making her skin crawl. Poseidon Hippios, Poseidon who invented horsemanship, Poseidon who runs a soothing hand down his winged son’s neck.
If Stheno and Euryale weren’t there, now holding her hands tightly in support, Medusa thinks that she might just have hysterics here and now.
“I will not forget your oath, Medusa Gorgos,” he says without looking at her, “but I will let it pass this once. Our sons are, after all, quite beautiful.”
Glad they meet with your approval, but she isn’t reckless enough to say it. The snakes do, though, and the tone is so much like hers that she has a very, very horrible idea about what they are.
“Our sons are dead to me,” she repeats in a flat voice. Poseidon inclines his head, almost mocking. Absently, she notices that the baby has stopped crying.
He’s stopped crying.
He’s stopped crying, and that is more than she can bear. Pulling her hands from of her sisters’ grasp, Medusa spins around and runs back up the beach before leaping into the air. Stheno and Euryale follow not a moment behind, but even though they are powerful fliers, she reaches their cave long before they do.
And by the time they land, she’s in a huddle and shaking.
