Even when he expects it, being summoned this way is startling. For all his lasting legend, few have had the power or nerve to summon Achilles. The last was Odysseus so many years ago.
He hears Medea’s words as clearly as if she were speaking inches from his ear, he feels the transportive pull of the summons, like being sieved through layer upon layer of the clinging fabric that separates the living and the dead. By the time he appears before Medea, he feels thinned. Like a true shadow.
Achilles knows she visited his father, but he barely remembers this woman. The shape of her has since been filled in by reputation. She’s become her own legend colored by dark stories and misfortune. What he sees, though, is an older, mortal woman. Not a monster, not a seductress, not someone twisted by evil. If he didn’t see her among the accoutrements of this macabre ceremony, he might assume she was a severe, but harmless grandmother.
Even so, it’s still Achilles’ instinct to recoil from magic and witchcraft as an unnatural thing—a desperate attempt by mortals to grasp at the power of gods. But he resolves to lay aside the stories he’s been told, to quash that revulsion. Rumor and ignorance. He’ll judge for himself.
Witchcraft may be what keeps his daughter safe.
“Medea of Colchis, wife of King Aegeus,” Achilles says in greeting. “You have done well to honor Lord Hermes’ request.”
His eyes sweep over the surroundings—the hospitality on offer pleases him, even if the ghoulish display of the dying goat disrupts the tranquility of the room. “I have come to judge your worthiness for an even greater task.”
no subject
He hears Medea’s words as clearly as if she were speaking inches from his ear, he feels the transportive pull of the summons, like being sieved through layer upon layer of the clinging fabric that separates the living and the dead. By the time he appears before Medea, he feels thinned. Like a true shadow.
Achilles knows she visited his father, but he barely remembers this woman. The shape of her has since been filled in by reputation. She’s become her own legend colored by dark stories and misfortune. What he sees, though, is an older, mortal woman. Not a monster, not a seductress, not someone twisted by evil. If he didn’t see her among the accoutrements of this macabre ceremony, he might assume she was a severe, but harmless grandmother.
Even so, it’s still Achilles’ instinct to recoil from magic and witchcraft as an unnatural thing—a desperate attempt by mortals to grasp at the power of gods. But he resolves to lay aside the stories he’s been told, to quash that revulsion. Rumor and ignorance. He’ll judge for himself.
Witchcraft may be what keeps his daughter safe.
“Medea of Colchis, wife of King Aegeus,” Achilles says in greeting. “You have done well to honor Lord Hermes’ request.”
His eyes sweep over the surroundings—the hospitality on offer pleases him, even if the ghoulish display of the dying goat disrupts the tranquility of the room. “I have come to judge your worthiness for an even greater task.”