Medusa and Men and Monsters

By Mattie Fitzpatrick | December 8, 2025 

Photo Credit: Mattie Fitzpatrick | The ASP

Medusa

I scream up to the sky, but it has only ever been empty for me. They’ve done it again. There’s a broken child at my feet, blood where bravado once bloomed. His mask has become sticky with sweat against his face, his skin pale, and his breath coming fast. I drop to my knees next to him, cradling his head on my lap. I focused on his face as the sword and mirror hit the sand next to his body. He can’t be more than fifteen with a spattering of freckles across his face and bumps across his forehead.

His breathing gets heavier as he lies stretched out on the ground, the rubble of statues underneath him. I see his hand flexing out of the corner of my eye, and I begin to stroke his hair back. “I’ll be okay,” I promise. We both know it’s a lie. He’s bloody, but I don’t know where it’s coming from, and I don’t remember how it happened.

“It was cruel of them to make you fight me  - you could never have won. It’s not your fault,” I continue to soothe him. I wish I could take his pain away. It was not his fault, he put his faith in an empty sky and Gods who never care. It only took the loss of my virtue and beauty to learn such a lesson, but this boy is paying with his life. A fruitless quest gone wrong like all the others, a story that never ends any differently.

He tries to say something, but chokes before he can get it out, and I nod like I understand everything he wants me to understand. I nod because it is all I can do to make things better. I wonder if my face scares him more than death. By the time this young boy in my arms stops breathing, my tears have begun to hit his face, and I begin to hyperventilate without realizing it. 

This is not the first child sent to their death at my hands. They made me a monster first before they made me a murderer. I don’t know how long I’m sitting there with his head in my lap and my hands caressing his hair like the mother I will never be, and by the time my sisters walk in and find me, the cave is covered in the shadows of the setting sun.

I jump when Stheno’s hand lands on my shoulder, and Euryale, ever the middle sister, begins to clean up. It has not been long since we had to clean the blood out of the sand, and now here we are doing it again. I bow my head further into the chest of this boy. Someone out there, a woman has become a mother without a son. My heart aches, and my sisters begin to move around me with practiced efficiency. Stheno begins to pull me up and away from the almost hero, and I wish I knew his name. I almost collapsed into her shoulder, my tears coming harder and faster than before. 

My pregnant belly brushes Stheno’s wings, and it becomes hard not to cry for myself as well as this boy. The child who will never grow old and the child who will never be born. She brings me to my cot and sets me down slowly like I’m something precious. She caresses my forehead like she did when we were kids and begins to sing. My eyes feel heavy, and my tears begin to dry on my face, right there, wrapped up in my own arms with Stheno holding me together. 

Eurayle

A flame begins in my chest as the familiar refrain picks up steam. It’s not her fault, it’s not her fault, IT’S NOT HER FAULT. Because it’s true. It’s not Medusa’s fault that some man decided to take her body when he didn’t have the right, and it’s not her fault a goddess decided she needed to be punished for her victimization, and it’s not her fault boys keep coming to try and kill her. I know she feels guilt over the boys who have died; her anguish is as familiar to me as my anger, but their circumstances are their own doing. They were not forced to make the trek to kill the fabled Medusa. They had choices every second and every day, and this series of choices led to their burial in the sea or their bodies as stone in the sand.

I hope our little Icarus enjoyed his chance to feel the sun on his face because his body is getting thrown out of this cave into the water. One last flight. Stheno has Medusa lying down and subdued somewhere in the back, the sounds of cries becoming quieter. It’s not abnormal for Medusa to cry herself to sleep, but every time she does, it makes me want to yell at the world. She doesn’t deserve any of this. She doesn’t deserve the baby stuck in her body or the stone reminders of how her life is ruined or even that her sisters, her caretakers, were always going to outlive her because she was a rarity; a mortal monster. How could life be so cruel? 

When his body hits the water with a splash, I stare at the bubbles. I hope Poseidon enjoys rotting corpses in his domain. The least I can do for the God of the Sea and perpetrator of rape. I hope he’s haunted by the men my sister has had to kill just to survive, around every corner and piece of coral, I hope he’s reminded. I dust my hands and turn around, good riddance. I remember the first boy who ever came to our little cave. Medusa didn’t know she had the power of stone as well as snakes, and that boy’s face was forever immortalized in fear, a tear running down his cheek. We thought he would be the only one, that the story would spread, and perhaps Medusa would gain peace in her hell. The Gods could not allow it. 

His statue remains in our cave, and it is his own fault. He doesn’t deserve her anguish, and he certainly didn’t deserve the life he enjoyed while my sister lives in an hourglass, waiting for her time to run out and her head to be taken as a prize. This is not living, this is barely surviving. I took off from the mouth of the cave, flying. After all these years, it still feels strange having the sky as our domain rather than the sea where we lived as babes. The smooth mist of the clouds feels a cousin to the bubbles under the water, and I remember when we were happy. 

Stheno, Medusa, and I were content under the sea with no burdens to bear or woes to worry about. Medusa had always been the most naive out of the three of us; she used to ride on shark fins and pet jellyfish. They never stung her, and I never figured out how she managed to do that. She was our angel and Stheno, and I would pluck the salt from the sea if we thought it would make her happy until the day she started to gasp for breath. Medusa had never had a problem breathing underwater before, none of us had, but the swim up to the surface for our mortal sister to fill her lungs with air was the longest of my life. We did not yet have wings, so we relied on the kindness of man. Ironic now. As long as we were together, though, the three of us had a home in each other. Stheno was the mother we never had, and I can’t remember my life without Medusa and her once blinding smile. What I wouldn’t give to see it again. 

As night fell and the stars rose, I returned to the cave. Our lives had become a shadow of their former glory, and our accommodations reflected that. Stheno and I thought that a cave, high above the water, would make us difficult to reach by the false heroes of society, and yet I had a feeling that even at the top of the sky, these dogs would come sniffing for glory with their swords and audacity. My immortal life has three time periods: the birth of our little family under the waves, our time on land where the beautiful Medusa made a life for us on land, and finally, the quarter moon of the life we once had, where Medusa’s world has shrunk to the three walls of this cave while Stheno and I have been granted wings. A mocking gesture to be sure; the gods' way of saying you can get away from her fate if you abandon your family, but who is Euryale without Stheno and Medusa? 

The cave was quiet and dark as it always was at this time of night. Medusa’s even breaths came periodically, and Stheno was muttering in her sleep, some old song we learned as children. Sleep has always come more easily to them than to me; their exhaustion is constantly clear on their shoulders, and sometimes Medusa didn’t even want to rise out of bed.

I begin the prayer I do every night, not to the Gods, but to whatever else is out there. To the trees, and the streams, and the air, perhaps. Please, let me be strong enough to protect my sisters. Please let her survive another night. On and on my prayers go into the universe as if some grand deity will take pity on me. I wonder if monsters get pity at all. My lips continue to move deep in the night as my eyes become heavier and my wings curl around myself. Please, why could you not let it happen to me instead of sweet Medusa? 

The Boy in the Water

A boy stood in front of three Underworld judges. Small compared to the towering height of their bench, he began to plead his case as his mother had once taught him. His deeds surely would be considered heroic; he almost slew Medusa. If she had not woken up during his approach to her cot, he would be the hero he always knew he would be, the hero his people always believed he would be.

Their wide, unblinking eyes stayed as the middle judge tilted his head for the boy to begin. “I was trying to kill a monster. I am a hero, and if I hadn’t died, a killer would be dead, and the world would be better.”

“I was trying to kill a monster,” He felt small in front of the three masked judges, but if he explained, he knew they’d understand. With shoulders squared, he continued, “Everybody says she’s a monster. She’s killed before, and she’s hideous to look at. She has to die!”

A boy, the first judge mused without opening his mouth. A child, the second continued. Foolhardy and young, the third leaned back. Their eyes gazed into the child in front of them as he defended himself.

He blanched at their blatant disrespect. He was the pride of his kingdom, and he did not deserve their scrutiny for trying to vanquish a monster. “I am a man,” he said. “Not some child-” 

Too young, the first judge tutted. Too naive, the second judge shook his head. A product of his environment, the third sympathized. The boy went to open his mouth again, but the judges waved their palms, and only empty space was left where he had stood. 

Medusa, the first judge, recited like a practiced prayer.

Medusa, the second judge, sighed with a shrug.

Medusa, the third judge, ruminated on what could have been. 

Stheno

For a moment, I thought I was back underneath the water. I felt the warmth of the sea on my hand, and the bubbles as sharks raced past me, the force of the water as my Eurayle and I giggled with delight. She used to blow the best bubble kisses out of the two of us, and then the Gods granted us a gift. Her name was Ariana, and her first language was first love. She was our holy one, as her name suggested, the reason we believed in the Gods. Her giggles could attract the most stubborn animal to her grasp for love, and her smile was the sweetest sight underneath the sea. I seldom wanted her to leave my arms, as was the norm when it came to baby Ari. Keto handed her off to me the second she was born, and from there, I became more than a sister; I became a mother. Phoryc never bothered to see the result of his union, and just like that, we went from two to three. She was the piece we never realized was missing.

I felt the corners of my mouth turn up in my sleep. We used to do anything to see her giggle. Now I would do anything just to see her smile. She renamed herself Medusa after she lost her holiness, donning the name guardian like a shield that could protect her. I opened my eyes slowly, staring at the ceiling of the cave. Our lives could be divided so neatly as the world took its frustration out on us, the pathetic daughters of two sea gods. The beginning in the sea, the middle on land, the present trapped in a cave like a crypt because of boys and men who believe they’re entitled.

When I pulled my hand away from my face, something wet was left on my cheeks, and I moved my nose. Opening my eyes slowly, I saw my hand was covered in red, and I shot up from bed. My eyes began to gather tears, and I could feel my breath coming shorter and faster as my brain tried to comprehend what I was seeing. My sweet little sister was missing her head. In its place, all that was left was a crimson puddle. The inside of her neck was something that I will never get out of my mind, nor the sound of footsteps rushing toward the entrance of the cave. I lunged as Euryale began to rise from her bed with a sharp gasp. He was invisible, but his footsteps were memorialized in my sister’s blood as if taking her head wasn’t enough. Her blood got farther and farther from her body as my talons extended. 

This monster who beheaded my sister and took a spoil of war from her broken body was not going to escape. Eurayle joined the chase behind me. We reached the sunlight of the cave in quick order, and the sound of feathers flapping began. Of course, Godcraft was involved, those bastards. Their spawn would not escape me. This demon has already taken my sister away from me; he will not have her head as well. I reached forward as fast as I could in the blank air and ripped the cap off the boy murderer. 

His eyes were wide when they met mine, and he flinched like he believed that I, too, would turn him to stone. If I were Medusa, I would recognize how young he was, but all I could see was the blood that covered him and the sack in my hand. Euryale came up behind me, the flapping of her wings pushing the murderer’s hair back, and suddenly he looked very lost. He began to stutter something out, “m-m-monster.” 

I bared my teeth at him as tears continued, hot and angry down my face. I grabbed the sack from his hand while Eurayle grabbed his other wrist and held him in place. I choked on the air as I opened the bag. Her eyes were closed, but her snakes continued to move slowly, and I remembered holding her in my arms as a baby. Ariana to Medusa, my sister throughout. 

I didn’t give him any time to protect himself. Medusa’s head was out of the bag before I could think about it. His face began to turn to stone immediately, and his expression, forever fearful, froze. He dropped like a stone into the water below, not even his feathered shoes could keep him afloat, and the only thing keeping me from collapsing was Medusa in my hands. We watched the bubbles of water disappear as the world’s newest statue sank into Poseidon’s embrace. We flew back to the cave slowly, and I couldn’t seem to stop the shaking of my body. We collapsed in a heap together in the sun with our sister’s head between us and her body left behind us. Our arms found each other. We had become two from three. 

It took days for Euryale and me to rise fully. We burned what was left of Medusa and spread her ashes in the sea from which she was born. She had loved, lived, and lost more than she ever deserved, and now she was to rest too soon. Without our sister, Eurayle, we found it difficult to survive. My heart throbbed painfully, and not for the first time in my life, I wished I weren’t immortal. I wanted to die and spend my death as I had my life, walking beside my sisters. 

Medusa

I met them all again. The children, convinced of my monstrosity with knives in their hands, were the humans I had met while my life was still dedicated to the Gods. My children. The children born out of my death, the immortal remnants of my divine violation.

In the beyond, there are no monsters. Only people. I never saw a god in the great beyond, and I never saw my sisters again. That was perhaps the cruelest fate, worse than the image of my head placed on the shield of the goddess who condemned me to monsterhood. Worse than my children bearing the patronage of the Gods.

I see them all. They do not recognize me, my mortal look restored, but I have the sight of them memorized. I have spent my demise walking the Underworld, exploring in a way I have never been able to. I have seen decrypted mothers, and grief-stricken fathers, and babies not yet out of the cradle, and yet they all continue to pray to the Gods. I pray to Stheno and Eurayle.

I have seen the boys who fell at my hand and the people who told them I was a monster. When they look at me now, I wonder what they see. Their foe finally vanquished, a monster snuffed out, and yet she looks the same as them now. Do they look at my face now and see the shield of Athena, my slain head displayed proudly, or do they see a young woman? A girl barely twenty? 

I saw the boy who killed me finally. I am struck by the loss of life, his and mine. I wonder if the world will ever change, ever stop sending boys to their deaths at the hands of monsters that don’t exist. More than anything, I struck at the love I have been afforded in my lifetime and the women who raised me. There is no lesson in my story, only pain and sorrow.