He bowed to her, then turned again to Hermes, the winged sandals already picking him up from the ground. His balance wavered, and he smiled, eyes crinkling. “Thank you both,” he said. “I will honor your gifts by bringing back Medusa's head.”
They watched him fly away, and Athena offered Hermes a ride in her chariot so they might watch Perseus’ quest from Mount Olympus. With a worried knot forming in his stomach, Hermes hastily agreed, and he jumped into the chariot, his feet feeling vulnerable without his sandals.
In a few minutes, they were watching from the mountaintop, the clouds parting so they could better see. Hermes summoned Heracles to his side and ordered him to keep his goblet of wine full. He had never been so anxious to discover a hero’s fate.
This is what he saw, with half his face obscured by his goblet as he drank deeply, trying to soothe his nerves:
Perseus positioned his shield and sickle, snuck to the mouth of the cave wherein the gorgon Medusa dwelled, and then he slipped onto his head the Helmet of Invisibility. Which meant Athena and Hermes could no longer see him. They exchanged grimaces at their lack of foresight and continued to watch regardless. Only being able to see Medusa slithering about her den made it all the more excruciating. Perseus had taken Hermes’ advice and was being so quiet, neither Hermes nor the gorgon could pinpoint his location in the cave. Still, she must have smelled him, because she kept banging her rattling tail against rocks and sliding around, her head of snakes turning one way, then another, searching.
“She will find him,” Athena murmured.
“Be quiet,” Hermes snapped.
When Medusa abruptly froze and turned to stone, it was a shock of relief. Perseus removed the helmet, and they could see him smiling triumphantly as he lowered the reflective shield that had turned Medusa’s deadly gaze onto herself. Then he took up the adamantine sickle and chopped the head from her body. Hermes winced; Medusa really deserved none of this, but alas.
Perseus picked up her head, which crumbled from stone back into monstrous flesh, and hid her dangerous gaze within a sack. Blood dripped through the cave as he walked back into the sunlight, and, surprising everyone, a fully-grown Pegasus formed from the gorgon’s blood, bucking happily and flapping wings of pure white feathers.
“Hmm,” Hermes commented.
“Interesting,” Athena agreed.
While Perseus introduced himself to Pegasus, Athena and Hermes went to him. Their congratulations were well met by a slightly sweaty, mightily pleased, handsome hero. Perseus had already taken off the winged sandals and was mounted on Pegasus’ back. At the sight of Hermes, he handed them back, along with the helmet and shield. He tried to return the sickle, as well, but Hermes, feeling sentimental, told him he should keep it.
“One never knows when a beheading will be required,” he said.
Perseus laughed and Hermes puffed up his chest with pride as he slipped back into his sandals. He was so pleased to have them back on his feet, he fluttered up into the sky a bit, just high enough to hover mischievously over Perseus’ head.
“You have done well,” Athena said. “You may now return to King Polydectes and free your mother from his grasp. But be warned, brave Perseus. Medusa’s eyes remain lethal to behold. Keep her head in that bag or risk turning innocents to stone.”
“It will soon be King Polydectes’ to use as he would like, but I will warn him of its dangers,” Perseus promised.
“Then there is nothing left for you to do but return to Seriphos,” said Athena.
“Yes.” Perseus glanced at Hermes. “I will fly there on Pegasus.”
Hermes, still fluttering above him, eyed the gorgon bag doubtfully. “That looks awfully heavy,” he said.
Perseus shrugged. “It is not light, to be sure. It still has the weight of stone.”
An idea sprung to Hermes’ mind, one that suited him rather well. “I shall accompany you to Seriphos, and help you carry the weight,” he declared.
Athena made another disapproving sound and excused herself from “all this nonsense,” riding off on her chariot.
Finally alone with his hero, Hermes gave his hair a flip and looked at Perseus with a playful smirk. “What say you? Shall we share the load?”
Perseus was delightfully easy to convince. He heartily agreed to Hermes’ assistance, and even let him take first shift in holding the sack.
It was not only heavy, but disgusting, Hermes trying to keep the head held as far away from himself as possible as they flew, blood dripping down all over Greece. He feared that may prove to be an issue later, but was in too good a mood to be concerned with it at present. Perseus was wonderful company, funny and clever, only cocky enough to be confident, not enough to make Hermes want to knock him from his mount.
They traveled across the sky, having a simply marvelous time, and Hermes was just beginning to realize his shift in luck, when—of course—they passed by a naked woman chained to a cliff overlooking the sea. And—of course—Perseus had to stop to see what was going on.
He landed Pegasus in the town beside the cliff, and Hermes landed next to him.
As they asked around the crowd of terrified townspeople, Hermes’ heart began to sink. He was very soon the picture of despair.
“She is Andromeda, the princess!” they reported. “Her mother claimed she was prettier than even the Nereids!”
Hermes shook his head at the sheer idiocy of some mortals. Would they never learn? “I imagine Poseidon took issue with this claim,” he said.
The townspeople nodded. “He is sending a giant monster to devour us all, unless we sacrifice Andromeda!”
“So you have chained a faultless young woman to a cliff?” asked Perseus, and he looked just as handsome with a scowl as he did a smile. “There must be another way to vanquish this sea monster than to put an innocent girl to death.”
If his zealotry to save the pretty, naked princess was not enough to crush Hermes’ hopes, the king arrived soon after and offered Perseus his daughter’s hand in marriage, if he could only slay the monster and save them all.
It was as if Perseus had winged sandals of his own, he moved so quickly after hearing this offer. Hermes watched him fly off on Pegasus’ back and zoom towards Andromeda. Naked, annoying Andromeda, ruining all of Hermes’ plans of seduction. But he followed after in concern. If Perseus must be lost to him, he would rather it be to marriage than to the maw or claws of one of Poseidon’s creatures.
It seemed they were just in time for the sacrificial feast, for as soon as Perseus flew Pegasus over the sea, the monster breached the water, and the behemoth Kraken lifted its toothy head into the air. It snapped its jaws at a screaming Andromeda, and Hermes felt a bit like screaming, too, as he flew over the Kraken’s head to reach Perseus.
“Hermes, be careful!” Perseus shouted, for Hermes had almost been chomped. “I can handle this!”
“I’m a god, if you recall!” Hermes shouted back. He tossed the sack with Medusa’s head at him. “Use this!”
Perseus’ eyes lit up as he caught the bloody bag. “Brilliant, Hermes!” he praised, and Hermes might have blushed, but that was no one’s business but his own.
He fluttered off, narrowly escaping another chomp, and watched anxiously with the rest of the townspeople—and poor, screaming Andromeda—as Perseus flew circles around the Kraken before finally revealing the gorgon head and thrusting it into the Kraken’s face.
The horrid creature became at once a horrid statue, and Perseus became at once a magnificent hero. The townspeople clapped and cheered, and Hermes wiped away an annoying tear as Perseus unchained Andromeda from the cliff, wrapped his cloak around her, and flew her to the safety of her father.
He lifted her chivalrously from Pegasus’ back, then kissed her hand.
Hermes had to turn away. Not again, he thought. Another love lost to the doom of marriage. He’d had such high hopes for Perseus. He could not deny that he was emotionally distraught by the idea
of losing him, and briefly considered turning him into a shrub, just so Andromeda could not have him. But he would never do such a thing to Perseus. Not sweet, handsome, brave Perseus. He could not bear to turn those muscles into branches. It would be a crime to do so.
Despite trying not to overhear, he heard anyway, perhaps because he was standing right beside Perseus with a possessive hand resting on his shoulder.
The king did not forget his promise. “Perseus, you’ve saved our city and my daughter. I will stand true to my word. You may take Andromeda as your wife.”
Hermes wanted to sob, right then and there. But he remained steadfast and nonchalant in the face of his agony.
Andromeda was looking at Perseus, her eyebrows lifted in surprise. Perseus was looking at Andromeda, his eyebrows doing nothing but being perfect. The king was looking at both of them, and if his eyebrows could have done it, they might have formed a question mark.
Hermes decided it would be in his best interest to remove himself from all the eyebrows, and all the suspense, and all the inevitable talk of marriage. He squeezed Perseus’ shoulder and muttered, “I must be going.”
He turned away, his winged heels beginning to flutter. He’d just reached the edge of the cliff and was several feet off the ground already, when a hand wrapped around his ankle and tugged him back down to earth. He went with a cry, angry until he saw whose hand had caught him. His feet touched the ground and his hands touched Perseus’ chest.
“Where are you going?” Perseus asked.
Hermes squinted at him in confusion. He could see Andromeda yelling at her father in the distance. “Back to Olympus,” he answered. “Go and be with your betrothed.”
“Hermes,” said Perseus, his hands gripping Hermes at the elbows. His hands were warm and solid and alive. “I never said I would marry Andromeda. Nor did she ever agree to marry me. Do you not see her berating her father for his behavior?”
Hermes looked again at Andromeda, who was now shaking her finger in the king’s face. “I assumed—”
“You assumed I would be interested in marrying a girl I have only just met, just because I had the decency to save her from being eaten?”
“Well,” Hermes muttered, studying his sandals, “that is usually the way of it.”
“That is not my way,” Perseus said.
Hermes glanced up at him and his crinkly eyes.
“I am not interested in Andromeda beyond saving her life, which I’ve already done.”
“Yes, you’re very heroic,” Hermes agreed. The sadness he’d felt before had disappeared when Perseus grabbed his ankle, and now he was positively swelling with jubilance. “What are your other interests?”
“Impressing handsome gods,” Perseus replied smartly, boldly moving his hands from Hermes’ elbows to his hips, which he gripped tight. “Are you impressed?”
Hermes was impressed. “Perhaps.”
“May I endeavor to impress you further?”
Thrilled, Hermes nodded, afraid that if he spoke, he might scream his pleasure instead, and it was a bit too soon for that. “I suppose you can try,” he said, trying to keep the heart-pumping LOVE from his voice. But it was there; he felt it keenly. And then he keenly felt Perseus drag him close and crush their mouths together in a kiss Hermes could only describe as impressive.
When Perseus pulled away, he looked as smug as Hermes felt. But there was something else there, in his eyes. A look Hermes knew well, for he’d been searching for it all his life. It was relief. Pure relief.
“You’re impressed, too, aren’t you? By me?” Hermes asked, and Perseus only laughed before wrapping him up in his arms and kissing him soundly. It was a kiss with many answers, all of them good. Finally, finally, something good. Later, he would put it in the stars as proof. Perseus, his hero.
And that is how Hermes got lucky.
Ω
Citations
The cover image is a reproduction of The Abduction of Ganymède (1886) by French artist Gustave Moreau.
The constellations contained in this book were obtained at Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
T.S. Cleveland is a writer, artist, and illustrator.
She lives in Atlanta, GA.
http://tscleveland.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/artbyvictoriaskye/
www.Etsy.com/Shop/ArtbyVictoriaSkye
Ganymede and Other Romantic Short Stories from Greek Mythology Page 19
