And yet something must have made her scream. The mortals behind her are now advancing towards the water. There is the sound of men arguing and pleading. It is the priests, I think, trying to persuade their people not to attack. The water is stirred and something appears on its surface. If it was much smaller, it could be a dolphin. It is a quick dark body glistening in the light. An eel? But it is vast, whatever it is. A second creature appears far across the bay: there are no fins or gills, just a dark tentacle unfurling. And then a third, a fourth, a fifth: this is a huge shoal of fish or dolphins. There is a sudden plunging sound, as these giant fish all descend at once and another rises in their midst.
And then I understand why she screams. Because it is not a shoal of creatures, it is one immense creature. I have never seen anything like it and nor has Perseus because he gasps. Obviously, he is scared of everything so this isn’t a reliable indicator. But if I took breaths, I would gasp too.
Men will tell you that Gorgons are monsters, but men are fools. They cannot comprehend any beauty beyond what they can see. And what they see is a tiny part of what there is. So for Perseus the only difference between this great creature and Medusa and her sisters is one of scale. They terrified him because of their claws and teeth and wings, I terrify him with my gaze. The beast in the water terrifies him because of its size and its mighty jaws. But he has me to fight the creature so why is he still afraid? Because he is a coward, and even when he fights with the assistance of the gods, he never stops fearing for his life.
So why has he decided to come here and defend the woman who is tied between those tree stumps? There are several reasons I could give you, and each of them is part of the truth.
*
He did not know what he was getting himself into when he flew here. He heard a woman screaming and imagined himself a hero and then he arrived and saw a creature that terrorized all who laid eyes on it （all but one） and it was too late then to just flap his shoes and fly away. So now he is stuck with trying to attempt an audacious rescue.
He was frustrated by his many failures so far, and by his inability to complete his quest.
He is testing his father’s love for him, by fighting a creature that can obliterate him with a single bite.
He is getting a taste for adventure, rather late in the day. He is heavily armed and favoured by the gods and he wants to take advantage of this.
He has already destroyed a Titan and left a great stone monument to its destruction. What else could he achieve?
He sees a woman in danger and he tries to save her.
He is malevolent and he wants to kill.
*
The people armed with spears and arrows are letting them fly at the monster they fear as it towers above their sacrifice. Mortals are perplexing: why did they tie her up if they didn’t want her to be eaten? The creature shows no sign of feeling the few arrows that hit their mark. It shrugs them off. Spears hit the side of a huge tentacle, but they too bounce, useless, into the water. The beast drops back beneath the surface and the men pick up their second spears, nock more arrows. They jeer, thinking they have scared it away. Perhaps Perseus is not unusually stupid, by mortal standards.
The water churns and the creature rises up and drops immediately back. The resulting wave rushes inland and knocks its assailants off their feet. When the water retreats, their weapons are drawn back into the sea. The men are left lying on wet sand, little knowing that the beast has chosen not to create a larger wave and take them too. The girl bound in front of the rock is drenched: her tunic is ragged, her crown askew. She screams again, as the water begins to surge.
Perseus has no spear or bow and his curved sword is no good to him here unless he flies much closer, which he is unwilling to do. He manoeuvres himself to a place next to the rock and slightly behind it. He drops to just above the height of the water, and raises his hand. The hand that holds me.
I look out over the ocean, the expanse sparkling before me, and I feel no fear, not of Poseidon, or Athene or the creature. And then it rises again, dark limbs everywhere. I look to the centre, because that must be its head, but it is hard to tell as each part of it looks like the rest: a rippling mass of muscle. The light falling on it is so bright it is dazzling and I cannot tell if I am looking into its eyes or not.
But I am. Its gaze has met mine and it is frozen into stillness. I wonder, how will this one die? Will it turn into a statue like the birds and the shepherd? Or a mountain like the Titan? Will it be left here for ever, a tribute to my great power? Or will it be remembered as a marker of Perseus’s power? Will it sink beneath the waves? I don’t want Perseus to be remembered at all, but it is too late now because the creature is petrifying limb by limb, from the tip of each tentacle towards the core. Its glittering black flesh becomes dull grey stone and I know I have saved the life of the sacrifice even if Perseus claims the credit. The creature writhes as its extremities go numb and I see that the weight of each limb is dragging it beneath the waves. It has only moments left before it is solid rock.
And suddenly I see its eyes. And I recognize them.
Andromeda
The princess stood with her mouth agape. All thoughts of the discomfort of her tied wrists were gone. The salt water that had washed over her moments earlier had left her eyes stinging, but she didn’t think about that either. The proximity of death had pushed everything else from her mind, and then suddenly she was saved by a stranger. Or by whatever the stranger was holding. She looked at his back and tried to blink away the water that obscured her vision. But nothing changed what she thought she had seen: a flying man holding a handful of snakes which had apparently turned the monster to stone.
As her eyes focused, she still saw a man seeming to hover over the sea, as he pushed his snakes back into a golden bag slung over one shoulder. The monster was slipping beneath the surface and, now that the danger was past, the man turned back towards her. He was, she saw, very young. As young as her. Half the age of Phineus. His hair was a damp black mess, but she suspected he had curls. His short tunic revealed muscular arms and legs, in every way unlike those of her uncle. And he had rescued her from certain death.
He flew to her and untied her hands. Even if she had had the strength to stand, she would have fallen into his arms. Exhaustion, gratitude, and the absolute need to convey that she was no longer promised to a much older man: all these contributed to her collapse.
‘Thank you, sir,’ she said. And he smiled.
‘How did you end up in this position?’ he asked. She liked his dark, darting eyes and the way he seemed to have no other interest but her. He didn’t even know she was a princess. He had not even seen her mother.
‘The priests made me sacrifice,’ she said. His brow creased. ‘I mean, they made me into their sacrifice,’ she clarified. ‘They didn’t ask me to make a sacrifice and everything went wrong.’
He nodded. She assumed he was befuddled by her beauty, but she wasn’t sure until he reached up and straightened her diadem.
‘I am Andromeda,’ she said.
‘I’m Perseus,’ he replied. ‘Who is your father?’
‘Cepheus, king of the Ethiopians,’ she said.
‘I see.’ He brightened. ‘I will kill these priests for you, and then perhaps you would introduce me to your parents?’