Forty

Ava, Fia, and Layla raced past the rusty bedframes and crumbling plaster into the hallway of the insane asylum. The old ruin wasn’t so frightening by daylight. Shafts of sun shone through the holes in the ceiling, and a fresh breeze stirred the dust.

“Medusa!” Ava called out. “It’s us! We’re back!”

The rush of her footsteps was a welcome sound. Medusa rounded the corner, her sallow face pinched with worry, the black adders writhing frantically atop her head.

“Child, are you okay?”

She pulled Ava into her arms, where the snakes happily swarmed her with their forked tongues.

“Yes,” Ava reassured her. “Or at least no worse off than when we left.”

Fia silently waved, and Medusa reached out and touched her cheek. “And the boys?”

“They’re waiting outside,” Ava said.

“Safe and sound,” Layla added.

Medusa’s face softened.

“We have so much to tell you!” Layla said.

“My story?” Medusa asked.

“Your entire story!” Ava said. “Even the part you don’t know! It’s pretty incredible. You might want to sit.”

Medusa led them to the bottom of the curving staircase, where they sat down around her. “Tell me everything,” she said.

Ava wove together the accounts of Hecate, Hestia, and Metis into a single story—the story of a mother determined to protect her daughter from harm, of a prophecy the gods misinterpreted because of their own sexism and hubris, of the goddesses mistreated and silenced but not defeated, who hid the girl’s true history inside their memories and hearts. Medusa closed her eyes, but Ava knew she was listening from the way her eyelids fluttered. Even the snakes atop her head grew still, as if they were charmed by the tale. Ava’s voice echoed through the asylum, which was as quiet as if the walls and floor were listening too.

“You’re the daughter of Metis and Zeus, that’s who you are,” Ava concluded. “A goddess destined to change the world!”

“I always knew I was special,” Medusa said softly. “But knowing who my mother is, knowing that she loved me . . .”

She opened her eyes. They were no longer dull and mud colored. They were the color of amber and sparkled with flashes of light. Her eyelashes grew longer and darker. Her skin changed from sallow yellow to golden brown. Her chin softened, and her nose straightened. The snakes on her head twisted themselves into corkscrews, their scales and mouths darkening as they transformed into wild black curls.

“You’re beautiful!” Ava exclaimed.

Medusa smiled. “I told you, you look like me.”

Fia nodded in agreement. This, Ava realized, was what the other goddesses had meant when they said she looked like Medusa. She was beautiful, too, and always had been.

“Do you think your powers are back?” Ava asked.

Medusa stood up, then pulled Fia to her feet. “There’s only one way to find out.”

Ava and Layla jumped up and crowded around them. Ava’s fingers tingled, and her heart thumped. This was it. The moment she’d fought for.

Medusa touched the tip of her finger to Fia’s lips and chanted:

“When men silence women,

It’s men who are weak,

Open your mouth, girl,

And let yourself speak!”

Fia blinked, then cleared her throat and turned to Medusa.

“I liked you better with snake hair.”

“Fia!” Ava shouted and threw her arms around her friend. Layla joined in, and they jumped around in a big, happy bear hug.

Medusa grinned, pulled one of her curls. “It certainly has less personality.”

“Thank you!” Ava said to Medusa.

“It took a little longer than I’d like, but yeah, thanks,” Fia said.

“Fia!” Layla said, playfully jostling her shoulder.

Medusa winked at Fia. “I like this one.”

“Me too,” Ava said.

“It’s you, girls, I should thank,” Medusa said. “I always knew I was powerful, even when I couldn’t tell you how. But now, according to the prophecy, I’m even more powerful than my father. He can’t keep me here.”

She raised her palm and looked up at the ceiling. The plaster fell, crashing loudly to the floor in front of them and leaving a series of gaping holes through which Ava could see up two floors to the blue morning sky.

“Are you okay?!” shouted Jax and Arnold from down the hall.

“Let them join us,” Medusa said. “They’ll be safe now.”

“We’re fine!” Ava shouted. “You can come now! The curse has been lifted.”

Jax’s face cautiously appeared around the bend in the hall, followed by Arnold’s.

“Is that Medusa?” Arnold asked.

“You bet, and she looks just like me!” Ava shouted back.

“Don’t forget, she’s my great-great-great-great-great grandma too,” Jax said, coming toward them.

“So now you want to be a Gorgon,” Fia teased.

Jax bowed down in front of Medusa. “Thank you, goddess, for helping me find Ava.”

Medusa waved him back to his feet. “Please, I don’t need bows. I’m glad you inherited my healing power. Brave girls like these need allies.”

“Or at least good health care,” added Fia.

Ava grinned. It was so good to hear her voice. “I’m sorry about the way Orion treated you,” she said to Medusa.

Medusa winced at the mention of his name, and Ava could tell she’d been hurt by his rejection.

“And how about the way he treated me?” Fia asked.

“I’m sorry for the way he treated both of you,” Ava said. “He did help us in the end, though.”

Medusa nodded in approval of Orion’s fatherly turn. “One thing the myths get right is that families are always complicated.”

“I might go with ‘crazy,’” Fia said. “But then again, that’s why I love the myths. It’s boring to be anything else.”

“I could use a little boring after all that,” Jax said.

Medusa laughed. “Ava,” she said, holding out her hand. “I need to test my powers. Come with me.”

Ava hesitated, not wanting to leave her friends, especially Fia. But Medusa seemed to understand. “This won’t take long.”

“Go,” Fia said. “You deserve a victory lap. You never gave up on me.”

“She’s right,” Layla said. “You were our brave leader.”

“Sometimes stupid,” Jax said. “But mostly brave.”

Ava gave him a playful shove.

Arnold saluted her. “I’ll fly them out of here if anyone comes.”

“Okay,” Ava managed to say. She was afraid to say more in case she started to cry. She was a heroine not just to the most powerful goddess of all, but to her friends.

“Let’s go!” Medusa shouted.

With a joyous whoop, she leaped into the air, pulling Ava up through the hole she had made in the ceiling.

“Don’t worry,” Medusa shouted down at them. “I’ll bring her back soon.”

“Where are we going?” Ava asked. Poveglia was shrinking beneath them as they sailed higher and higher. Ava was glad she’d done some flying with Arnold and was used to the whistling of wind through her hair and the dizzying view.

But Medusa didn’t seem to hear her question. She was looking out past the islands of the Venice lagoon toward the horizon.

“What’s next? Are you going to take over Olympus?” Ava asked hopefully. She imagined Zeus cowering before his mighty daughter and Hestia finally getting back her throne and the dumbstruck look on Athena’s face when she realized her sister was the most powerful goddess of all.

Medusa slowed down and steered them into the misty insides of a cloud.

“No,” she said.

“Maybe not right now,” Ava said. “Maybe you need to prepare a little. But in a few days or weeks—”

But Medusa was shaking her head. “Taking over Olympus by force won’t change the old order,” she explained. “It would just continue it.”

“But you would rule differently!” Ava argued. “With kindness! You would let women have voices, let them speak.”

Medusa’s eyes softened. “I know you’re disappointed. My father gave me power, and you want me to use it. But my mother, Metis, gave me the wisdom to know you can’t change the world by force.”

Ava didn’t even bother to hide her frustration. “Then what can you change it by?!”

“Stories.” Medusa’s amber eyes flashed. “You want to change the world? Find and tell the stories of the silenced and the powerless that haven’t been told. Just like you did for me.”

“I can’t do any of that! The gods are going to kill me for helping you! Mr. Orion is probably already stomping all over the sea looking for me.”

“He won’t kill you,” Medusa said. “He loves you in his own way.”

“But the rest of the gods . . .” Ava said. “Can you at least stay and protect me?”

Medusa shook her head. “You don’t need protecting.”

“How do you know? Now that you’ve got your powers back, you know everything?”

Ava realized she was being rude—Zeus would probably have fried her with a thunderbolt for her tone. But his daughter just laughed.

“No, I don’t know everything. But I’ve always known this. My name, ‘Medusa,’ never meant monster. It means ‘guardian’ or ‘protector.’ As my descendant, you’re a guardian and a protector too. Your destiny is to return to the Accademia and help other so-called monsters find out their true stories and who they really are.”

“I can’t go back to the Accademia! Even if Mr. Orion wanted me there, the Olympian council won’t let me return. They’ll silence me too.”

“You have allies . . . and friends,” Medusa said. She swept away a wisp of cloud so they could peer below. “It’s time to take you down.”

And for us to say goodbye. Medusa didn’t say it, but Ava knew. Ava clutched her hand tighter. “Where will you go?”

“To find my mother, Metis.”

Ava’s chest tightened with longing. She missed her mom too.

Medusa dove down through the clouds. “You have one other task, Ava. You need to free your mother.”

“Did the gods imprison her when I ran away?” Ava asked anxiously.

“She was imprisoned long ago. But not by magic,” Medusa said. “By fear.”

Ava understood. “When you’re afraid to speak out and be yourself, it’s almost as lonely as being stuck on an island.”

Poveglia was growing larger beneath them; Ava could see the ruins of the insane asylum and her friends and Jax clustered inside.

“One day, the world will change,” Medusa said. “And you, and those who love you, will help change it.”

Ava could hear them now calling her name, waving her down. Medusa glided over to them.

“In the meantime, remember,” she whispered. “You’re not alone.”

Then she dropped Ava gently into their outstretched arms.