Perseus and the Monstrous Medusa

by Joan Holub

  A giant woman stood by him. She towered over the statues, wearing a green silk robe with a pattern of snakes stitched in black. Her back was to the Olympians as she faced Perseus. Though they couldn’t see her face, her hair was a tangle of nasty black and green hissing serpents. Medusa, of course!

  “That’s one big lady,” whispered Hades.

  “Shh!” the other three Olympians hissed at him.

  “Open your eyes, boy!” Medusa shrieked at Perseus. “We can do this the hard way or the easy way!”

  “Never!” Perseus yelled.

  Medusa grabbed a torch. “Maybe a little heat will convince you,” she said wickedly.

  “Perseus!” Athena wailed.

  “Athena? Don’t look into her eyes!” Perseus called out. “You’ll be turned to stone like these other poor fools!”

  Other poor fools? Fear gripped Zeus as he realized what Perseus meant. “Oh no! All these statues. They are real people Medusa turned into stone!”

  Athena gasped. “Which means she has the power to do in real life exactly what her image on the aegis can do!”

  At this, Hephaestus let out a terrified shriek. Medusa’s head spun until the Olympians were fully within her sight. She snarled at them, and her eyes glowed an eerie red. Her red eyes locked with Zeus’s gaze.

  Instantly Zeus went stiff. He couldn’t look away. He felt like he was . . . frozen!

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The Monster’s Weakness

  You’ll all make fine statues!” Medusa crowed at the Olympians.

  Are my three companions frozen too? wondered Zeus. He couldn’t move his head to check. It’s happening! he thought. She’s turning us to stone! We’ll never defeat King Cronus now. And I’ll never be the ruler of the Olympians!

  Then he noticed Medusa’s puzzled frown, and it suddenly hit him that he didn’t feel like stone. He broke away from Medusa’s gaze and looked down at his hands.

  They were flesh-and-blood hands. Not stone. Zeus slowly broke into a grin. He had only been scared stiff, not turned to stone after all.

  “I guess your power doesn’t work on gods,” he told Medusa.

  Hearing this, Athena, Hades, and Hephaestus opened their eyes. They all looked at Medusa.

  “Hooray! We’re not stone,” cheered Hephaestus.

  “Nooo faaaaiiiiir!” Medusa wailed. The snakes growing from her head all began to hiss.

  Zeus and the other Olympians huddled together. “Give up! Your powers can’t stop us, Medusa!” he called. “Free Perseus, and we’ll go away and leave you alone.”

  “My gaze is only one of my powers,” Medusa said darkly.

  The slithery snakes on her head all turned to look at the Olympians. Then they spoke as if they all shared one voice, just like the Gray Triplets shared an eye and a tooth! “Ussse thossse sssilly legsss of yours and come clossser,” they chorused, “if you want to sssave your friend.”

  “Don’t do it! Those snakes will eat us for dinner!” Hades warned in a loud whisper.

  “Ssscaredy-godssss! Ssscaredy-godssss!” the snakes mocked.

  Zeus thought quickly. A small part of him wanted to leave the thieving Perseus behind and run. But nobody deserved the fate that had befallen Medusa’s other victims. And besides, the Olympians still needed to get back their magical objects.

  Then it hit him. Duh. Bolt would come right to him if he called. “Bolt, come here!” Zeus yelled.

  Right away the zigzag daggerlike object started to glow. Then it jumped off the stage. But as it zipped through the air toward Zeus, one of the snakes on top of Medusa’s head stretched out and wrapped itself tightly around Bolt. Caught!

  “Nice try, lossser!” the snakes hissed at Zeus.

  “Come and get your little toy weapon, if you want it,” Medusa taunted them. Then she turned to Perseus, who kept his eyes shut tight.

  “Your friends cannot help you, and they cannot defeat me,” she said. “I can wait as long as you can, little mortal. Eventually you will be toast. Stone-cold toast!”

  “Medusa, don’t you dare put that helmet on Perseus before you turn him to stone,” Athena said, nodding toward Hades’s Helm of Darkness. “Even though he’d make a fine statue with it on.”

  Zeus knew what Athena was getting at. If Perseus wore the helmet, he would instantly become invisible—and then he could escape. Provided he could get free of the rope binding him, too. However, surely this green Gorgon lady wasn’t so dumb as to fall for Athena’s trick.

  Medusa’s eyes narrowed. “And why should you care if I make him a fine statue, little goddess. Are you trying to trick me?”

  Athena went on wrapping the thread around her finger. “How could I trick someone as smart as you?” she asked. “It’s just . . . I’m surprised you are more interested in Perseus than the magical objects at your feet.”

  “And why should I be interested in those?” Medusa asked.

  “Yessss, why?” echoed her head snakes.

  “Because they are works of art,” Athena said. “And I thought someone who makes magnificent sculptures like you do would appreciate them.”

  Medusa kicked the aegis, which was lying facedown on the ground. “What do I care for your gold? Stone is far more beautiful!”

  “Your stone sculptures are beautiful, in a grotesque kind of way,” agreed Athena. “But the aegis is engraved with your image, you know.”

  Huh? The image wasn’t exactly “engraved,” thought Zeus. It only sometimes appeared, as Athena knew, of course. She seemed to have given up on the helmet idea. What was she up to now?

  Medusa looked surprised . . . and flattered. “My image? Really?”

  Although he wasn’t quite sure where Athena was going with this, Zeus followed her lead. “Sure! People tell stories about you in every land. From the highest snowy mountaintops to the, um, bubbling hot springs.”

  “They do?” Medusa smiled and let out a pleased but horrible giggle. Her snakes wiggled and hissed happily, too.

  “Yes,” Athena said. “A great artist carved your image on that aegis. It doesn’t do justice to your real beauty, but it’s a very good likeness. Take a look.”

  Medusa seemed to forget her concern about being tricked. Eagerly she picked up the aegis. Its front side was turned away from her, but toward Zeus. He could see that her image had not appeared. But perhaps that didn’t matter?

  Medusa turned the gold aegis around. She looked directly into its shiny metal, and just like a mirror it reflected her face back to her. Only then did she realize the mistake she’d made. “Noooooo!” she screamed.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The Face in the Aegis

  The Olympians watched as Medusa slowly transformed before their eyes. Gray stone formed at the ground, starting at the bottom of her cloak. It crept up her robe to her shoulders, then her neck.

  “She’s turning into a statue!” Hades yelled.

  Zeus grinned at Athena. “You knew this would happen, didn’t you?”

  She nodded. “Medusa is a monster, not a goddess. So, I hoped if she saw her image reflected in the aegis, it might turn her to stone!”

  “Well, it’s working!” cheered Hephaestus.

  The Olympians watched as the gray took over her face and continued higher till it had stilled every wriggling snake on top of her head. She had completely turned to stone!

  Now that she could no longer hurt them, the Olympians ran to help Perseus. Zeus pulled Bolt out of the tangle of stone snakes on Medusa’s head and then sliced through Perseus’s ropes. He was free!

  Before they could stop him, the mortal grabbed Hades’s helmet and put it on. Instantly he went invisible.

  “Hey!” Hades protested. “Give that back!”

  Zeus looked around for Perseus, but couldn’t see him. “Where are you? And why do you keep stealing our magical objects?”

  “I’ll explain later,” the invisible Perseus began. “But first . . .”

  Hephaestus cried out. He had picked up his silver cane and
was swinging it about wildly.

  “Watch it!” Zeus yelled, ducking to avoid being hit.

  “It’s not me—my cane’s swinging itself. Whoa, look out!” Hephaestus yelled as he tried to control the cane.

  Suddenly it transformed into a silver sword! Hephaestus gave a yelp of surprise. “What’s happening?” he cried. The sword pulled his arm back—and then swung forward.

  Whack! The cane-sword sliced through the neck of the Medusa statue . . . and knocked her stone head off!

  THUMP! It fell to the ground and rolled across the stage. For a second her eyes seemed to be looking right at Zeus. Ick. He shivered.

  “How did I do that?” Hephaestus wondered in shock. As he gazed down at the sword in his hand it transformed back into a cane.

  Perseus materialized beside him. “Hey, don’t try to take credit, Hephaestus. While I was invisible I made your cane knock her block off. Who knew it would turn into a sword, though. That came in handy!”

  Perseus tossed the helmet he’d removed from his head to Hades, who caught it. “Thanks for the loan!”

  “You’re not welcome,” Hades replied, scowling.

  Ignoring everyone, Perseus bent down and tried to pick up Medusa’s stone head. When it proved too heavy, he broke off one of her stone hair snakes instead and pocketed it.

  The real snakes on the ground had quieted for a while, but now they began to move and writhe again.

  “Now you’ve done it! You woke them up!” Hephaestus accused. Perseus only shrugged.

  More and more snakes began to crawl all over Medusa’s stone head where it lay on the ground, slithering in and out of her stiff snaky hair. Zeus shuddered.

  “Something tells me we should get out of here—now,” said Athena. She grabbed the aegis.

  “Right. Let’s go,” urged Zeus. As he and his companions ran for their boat, hundreds more snakes streamed past them toward the stage. It seemed that all the island’s snakes were going there to mourn Medusa.

  “So, what’s the deal with you stealing our stuff?” he asked Perseus again as they ran.

  “I’m not normally a thief,” Perseus protested.

  Hades glared at him. “Really? You do a good impression of one.”

  “Well, I had a good reason for taking your stuff,” argued Perseus. “Medusa has been terrorizing my land. She would come and turn people to stone and then disappear, and nobody knew where she lived.”

  “That explains why you needed us to take you to the Gray Triplets to get her address,” Athena put in. “But why did you steal our objects?”

  “The king of my land is cruel,” Perseus said, and his voice grew sad. “He wants to marry my mom against her will!”

  Zeus felt a pang. His father, King Cronus, was cruel too. But his mom, Rhea, was nice. It made him sad to think that Perseus’s nice mom might have to marry a mean guy too.

  Finally the Olympians and Perseus reached the shore. There were so many boats that they spread out to find the one with their belongings still on it. Zeus, Athena, and Perseus searched along the shore together. Hades and Hephaestus went the other direction.

  “So, King Polydektes said that if I defeated Medusa, he wouldn’t make my mom marry him,” Perseus said. His eyes darkened. “He didn’t think I could do it. But when I met you Olympians, I knew you had the right tools. Like the Helm of Darkness and Bolt. I put on the helmet and sneaked up on that Gorgon before you got here. I was going to clobber her with Bolt. But I tripped on a snake and fell. The helmet slid off, and I was caught.”

  “So your mom won’t have to marry that cruel dorky king now, once you’re back home?” Zeus asked.

  Nodding, Perseus pulled something out of the pocket of his tunic and held it up. It was the stone snake that he’d broken off Medusa’s hair. “This is my proof. The king won’t go back on his word. At least I hope not.”

  “I get it,” said Athena. “You had to help your mom.” She looked over at Zeus. “We understand. Right, Zeus?”

  Yes, thought Zeus. He did understand. And that meant that he couldn’t stay mad at Perseus—well, not too mad. Looking at the boy, he nodded. “Just don’t steal from us again, okay?” he said gruffly.

  “I won’t,” Perseus said. Smiling now, he bent to take off his winged sandals. “To prove it, I want to give you these sandals. You can return them to the guy I, uh, borrowed them from.”

  Athena watched curiously as Perseus handed the sandals to Zeus.

  Suddenly they heard a shout. Hades and Hephaestus had found their boat. Zeus, Athena, and Perseus turned and ran in their direction and hopped aboard. Hades untied their boat and they shoved off.

  Zeus had never been happier to leave an island in his entire life. Snakes were for the birds!

  “Hey, where’s Perseus?” Hephaestus asked, looking around.

  “Over there!” Athena said, pointing across the sea. The mortal boy was busily rowing it away from the shore in a different direction. “He stayed behind without us noticing. And then jumped into one of the other deserted boats.”

  “Good riddance,” muttered Hades.

  Looking down at the winged sandals, Zeus suddenly remembered something. “Wait, I thought you said you traded for the sandals!” he called to Perseus. “Now you say you borrowed them?”

  “Oh, well, maybe I sort of stole them actually,” Perseus called back. “For a good cause. To defeat Medusa. Only I never could get the sandals to fly. Anyway, just return them to the thirteenth Olympian for me, okay?”

  Zeus, Athena, Hades, and Hephaestus looked at one another in surprise. As far as they knew, there were only twelve Olympians.

  “What thirteenth Olympian?” Athena yelled.

  Perseus was busy with his boat and didn’t reply right away. Finally he called back over his shoulder, “Sorry, didn’t get his name! Thanks for helping me. I hope you can find your friends again!”

  “But where can we find this new Olympian?” Zeus called after him. Unfortunately Perseus was too far away to hear by now.

  Zeus turned back to the others. “So I guess we’re not done looking for Olympians!”

  “Guess not,” said Athena. She loosened the ties on her cloak so she could slip the aegis back over her neck. Suddenly she gasped. “Medusa’s face! It’s back on the aegis!”

  CHAPTER NINE

  The Mysterious Horse

  It’s different from how it looked before, though,” Athena said, gazing into the shield she wore. “It’s like she’s . . . alive somehow. The snakes on her head are wriggling. See?”

  She turned the shield around to show the boys. Zeus saw Medusa’s head all right—but her snakes looked perfectly still to him.

  “It’s wicked-looking, but nothing’s moving,” said Hades.

  That confirmed what Zeus had seen—or rather, not seen. Was it possible Athena had only imagined the shield snakes wriggling?

  “I don’t see why everybody is so gaga over that dumb shield. Let’s talk about how my cane turned into a sword,” Hephaestus interjected. He thumped his cane against the boat deck for emphasis. “You all saw it slice through stone! Wasn’t it cool?”

  Athena nodded, going over to it and running her fingers over the carvings on the cane. “Yes, that whole thing was weird. It was like your cane had a mind of its own.”

  After Hephaestus took his cane back to lean on again, she turned the aegis to face her. “I wonder if, now that she’s dead, her image on my shield will still turn things to stone?”

  As she was speaking Zeus noticed what appeared to be a small rock sitting on the edge of the boat. He picked it up and looked at it closely. It wasn’t a rock, after all. It was a beetle—made of stone!

  “Here’s your answer,” Zeus said, handing the bug to her. “It must have looked into the shield when you showed it to us.”

  Athena frowned. “Sorry, beetle,” she said sadly. “I wish I knew how to change you back.”

  She gazed around at the island. “If we see Pythia again, we should ask her if there’s
some way to turn return Medusa’s victims back to flesh and blood,” she said. “I feel sorry for all those people.”

  Zeus went over and grabbed an oar to begin paddling. “We’ll ask her. I guess we should just feel lucky that Medusa’s powers didn’t work on us, or we could be statues now too.” He shuddered. “Come on. There’s not much wind for the sails, so let’s paddle and get out of this creepy place.”

  “I’m a fan of creepy, but this place is too creepy even for me,” Hades declared. He grabbed an oar too.

  As they rowed away from the island, Athena put the aegis back on and covered it with her cloak. “I’d better be extra careful with this thing from now on,” she said. “Especially when we’re around mortals.”

  “You and me both,” Hephaestus said, staring at the cane in his lap. “What if my cane starts cutting off heads left and right?” He sounded more admiring than appalled as he said this idea, however.

  “Pythia will probably know how to handle that,” Hades told him. “She usually has answers.”

  “Hope she pops up soon,” Hephaestus said, still gazing at his cane.

  Suddenly a rumbling sound came from the island they’d just left. The Olympians looked back toward it. Medusa’s stone stage had broken free of the ground and was rising up into the air. Even now it was visible above all the tall stone statues.

  “What’s happening?” Athena wondered.

  The stage started to shake. Then . . . boom! It, and everything on it, which must have included Medusa’s stone body, exploded, splintering into a thousand small rocks! The Olympians gasped.

  Once the dust cleared, they could see some kind of figure emerge from the rubble to hover in the air. It was a winged creature of some sort.

  “What is THAT?” Hades asked nervously.

  As the Olympians stared at it, the figure flew high into the sky. “It’s a white, winged horse!” Athena exclaimed.

  “And it’s diving straight at us!” yelled Hades. “Hit the deck!”