Stone Blind(46)

By the time Sthenno reached her, she was completely in darkness again. But the sun shone on the snakes, and it shone on her.





Cornix


Kra kra! You’ll never guess what I just saw. Never, ever, not if I let you try all day. Go on, try. You see? I knew you wouldn’t get it. Do you want another go? You can have as many as you want, but it won’t help. This crow knows and you don’t.

Alright, I’ll tell you: Athene has a child. He isn’t exactly hers, obviously: she is a virgin goddess, just like you thought. But Gaia gave the child to her and said she must take responsibility for it. Because she – Gaia – didn’t want to raise another child, after losing all her beautiful giants in the war against the gods. That’s her word, beautiful, not mine. I didn’t think the giants were beautiful, to be honest. But that’s not something I would say to Gaia because there’s never any real need to say something hurtful unless you can’t help it, which sometimes I can’t but on this occasion I could.

The boy is the son of Hephaestus: you remember that time he tried to persuade Athene to marry him? And she said no and he grabbed her and held her until he ejaculated on her thigh? (Sorry – is that too much for you? Crows don’t always know what is appropriate.) She took a piece of wool and wiped herself clean, but she threw the wool onto the ground so Gaia took it. Gaia can make life out of nothing, so of course she could make a child out of that. And she did, and then gave it to Athene.

And Athene didn’t know what to do, at first. You can imagine it, can’t you? What does she know about raising a child? What does she even want to know about it? I thought she might give the boy to Hephaestus and tell him to deal with it. Because why shouldn’t she, really? But she didn’t, she did something else.

She’s very good at weaving, did you know that about her? She tells everyone, so you probably did. So she took the child to a river, and wove a basket out of willow branches. She hid the child inside: can you imagine that? Kept weaving until the basket was sealed shut. And then she took reeds from the water and used those to fill in every gap so that no one, not even a sharp-eyed crow, could have seen what was within. And then she gave the basket to the daughters of Cecrops: do you know about them?

I suppose you don’t really need to know about them, beyond that they were who Athene chose to protect the basket. Cecrops was a king of Athens (with three daughters) and Athene likes Athens, which is probably why she went there and gave them the child. But if I’m honest I’m only giving you these details because I like you to know I know them. It doesn’t make much difference to what happened next, except it does now I think about it.

Because the daughters of Cecrops are named Herse, Pandrosus and Aglaurus. Three daughters chosen by one goddess to guard one basket. She gave them an order before she left, which was that they were on no account to open the basket and find out what was inside. In case you’re doubting my story and wondering how I know so much, I was hiding in an elm tree nearby and I saw the whole thing with my own eyes. And I heard every word too. Athene told them it was a secret and she trusted them to keep it safe.

And two of them did. You see, this is the part where I think maybe it does matter that she picked the daughters of Cecrops. If she’d picked someone with only two daughters, things might have turned out very differently. But she chose these, and Herse and Pandrosus did exactly as she’d asked. They hid the basket, ignored it and then forgot about it. Exactly what Athene was hoping for.

Wait – you look upset. Are you worried that the baby will die? Suffocate or starve or something? The offspring of the gods and the earth itself is not as fragile as a mortal child. Remember how difficult it was to kill the giants? Gaia’s offspring are not made lightly. So don’t concern yourself with the child’s wellbeing, because in a moment you’ll understand that you’re worrying about quite the wrong person in this story.

Aglaurus wanted to know what was inside the basket and she wouldn’t leave it alone. She went back, over and over, to look at it and turn it about and wonder what was inside. She couldn’t understand how her sisters were so accepting of Athene’s orders. She couldn’t bear not knowing everything. She peered at the basket and held it up to the light, tried to push the reeds aside so she could just make out something of the contents. She told herself as she did this that once she had slaked her curiosity she would leave it alone.

But Athene doesn’t weave in such a way that a woman can just peer through the gaps. She doesn’t leave gaps. Kra kra! So Aglaurus couldn’t see a thing. And you might think this would be enough to warn her of the danger she was in. If the goddess had meant for someone to see inside the basket, she would have allowed it. But – foolish girl – her curiosity only intensified. So she found the end of one of the reeds and she worked it loose. Just gently, pushing it and pulling until one little strand stood proud. She worked it a bit more, now she could grip it more easily. It was loose anyway, she told herself. She might as well undo it. But because she didn’t dampen it first, the reed snapped between her fingers. A crow could have told her how to do that better: she should have asked me for advice. But she could always replace it, she decided, so she kept going. She unwove one reed and then another and then another. But even that wasn’t enough for her to be able to see. Telling herself that she was the brave one and her sisters were cowards, she undid more and more of the basket, until the top looked like an abandoned bird’s nest. Now it was open and she could finally see what was inside.