Story [Harry Potter] Witches of the White Sea: The Age of Gods and Monsters | 2025 Kessel Run Challenge

All those Oenomagi with their wine names. Love it trying to get wine when they see those awful brews. And the amagi working to grow grapes and using enzymes. That's the solution for making wine with Dionysus not involved.

 

That and all the wine names had be laughing like crazy.

 

Thank you all for reading and reviewing! I expected that the found poem prompt would kick my butt again, but I actually figured it out faster than anticipated, and I threw in a diary entry for the substitute prompt for good measure. So I already have a new post, but first, a few replies.

@pronker Thank you!

Judging from the end of the last Thor movie, a brawl between Thor and Hercules is coming up soon in the MCU. Brace yourself!

Hahaha! I definitely agree with your choices of beverage here. You and I need to meet for drinks, ma'am!

@WarmNyota_SweetAyesha Thank you! Yes, it must be quite mortifying to cast a spell for wine and find youself with a cup of chamomile instead.

@earlybird-obi-wan Thank you! I always thought that the myth saying that humankind needed a god to teach them how to make wine was overkill. I mean, wine just brews itself once you crush the grapes, right? So even if your god went teetotal, it wouldn't take much to figure it out on your own.

@Vek Talis Thank you! I'm glad this story could make you laugh. As I said, I got the idea for the story from that Astérix panel, and once I was in Astérix mode the wine-y names just wrote themselves.

And now, for something completely different... I didn't get the chance to write about a proper magical mishap yet for this collection, but this week's prompt gave me the opportunity big time.

 

Prompts: 1) Write a found poem using these selected passages from the novelizations of Revenge of the Sith and Return of the Jedi as your source and 2) Write a story between 300 and 1,200 words in the form of a character’s journal/diary entry (the latter being the substitute prompt)
Genre: Drama
Characters: OCs
Word count: 220 words for the poem + 425 words for the diary entry (+ 82 words for the intro, which I’m not counting as a KR entry since both the poem and the diary entry can stand on their own)
Notes: Thera is the Greek name of the island of Santorini, which was destroyed in the Minoan eruption at some point towards the end of the Bronze Age.

Many thanks to @Vek Talis for looking over the poem for me.

The Fall of Thera

The stories say that the destruction of the island of Thera came about a result of the wrath of the gods. They speak of their war against the Titans who sought to maintain the dominion of Cronus and of mighty battles in which the earth itself boiled.

The truth, of course, is much simpler. Thera sits atop a volcano, and it was its eruption that caused the island to fall.

But why the volcano chose to erupt is a different matter altogether.

* * *​

Fire
Fire, explosions, death, pain
And a dark lord with a blazing helmet, his power as his only shield

A horror of dragon blood and venom festered
And brought forth a furnace
With lava running from the molten pit to slay all:
Father, son, wife, friend

It scorched nerves
It burned flesh
It killed with the black rage of hatred
It turned sand into glass and skin into flame

He who wanted to scream could not
His voice died in his throat
She who was crying could not
Her tears gone from her eyes

There would be no one to remember
There would be no one to regret
Not even a dark lord with a blazing helmet, his power as his only shield

The Lord of the Brotherhood of Shadow gazed upon the burning world

This was the end
This was his final dawn
But it was a good end

He felt no guilt, he felt no anguish, he felt no regret
For a lifetime of crimes, cruelty and horrors
For a taste of the power that comes from the dark

Because he knew:
Another would come
He would touch the shadow
He would understand the meaning of power
He would take this world as his own
Another dark lord with a blazing helmet, his power as his only shield

* * *​

My name is Acacus Agnostus. I carve these words in stone on the second day of the spring equinox, in the hope that, when humankind returns to the ashes of my island, it will heed my words and banish forever the dark art of the Erinyes’ Fire.

My master is Dracon Chimaerus Pyrocrates, and it is he who has brought this curse upon us.

My master is a powerful magus, and I a mere apprentice. I had heard whispers that he is the lord of the Brotherhood of Shadow, but I paid them no heed. Though I am young, I have seen it time and time again: power attracts envy, and envy brews rumour and falsehood, as often happens when the Amagi learn of our abilities. Alas! Would it that I had listened. My magical skills are limited, laughable even, compared to my master’s, but I might have been able to prevent this calamity.

I could see that my master vanished for hours and days at a time, dedicating himself to research so deep and dark that I should have known something was amiss. It was only today that I broke into his study and saw the fruit of his crime.

He steeped the scale of a dragon in its own blood and venom, in the hope of creating fire that can never be tamed.

The result is perhaps beyond his expectations. The foul concoction pierced through the crater, through the table, through the stone of the floor – and it sank deep into the bowels of the earth and awakened the fire mountain below.

This is the end of the island of Thera, the Most Beautiful, the Circular One. The mountain is belching flames and ashes and lava, and soon all that is not charred will be buried in dust.

My master is indeed the lord of the Brotherhood of Shadow, and I, his apprentice, am nothing but a fool. He now stands on the roof of his house, savouring the last of his power as the Fire of the Erinyes courses through the land, while I hide in the basement and write this account. I can only hope that, when Hermes Psychopomp guides our souls to Hades, I will not bear punishment for his crime.

This slab of marble will remain as the sole trace of my existence. May the chronicle I engraved be found and read, and may the name of Dracon Chimaerus Pyrocrates forever be cursed as that of a dark magus who meddled with powers that are only for the gods.

------------------------------------------

Endnotes

Scholarly research has suggested that Hesiod’s myth of the Titanomachy (i.e. the war of the gods and the Titans) was inspired by the eruption of Thera and the volcanic fallout. However, in myth the Titanomachy took place in Thessaly (central continental Greece) and has absolutely nothing to do with Santorini; that’s a bit that I just made up.

I created the name Acacus Agnostus from ἄκακος, ‘innocent, harmless’ and ἄγνωστος, ‘ignorant’.

I created the name Dracon Chimaerus Pyrocrates from δράκων, ‘dragon’, Χίμαιρα, ‘Chimaera’ and the combined roots πύρ, ‘fire’ and κράτος, ‘rule’ to mean ‘he who rules through fire’.

The ‘Erinyes’ Fire’ was the best I could come up with for a hellenised version of Fiendfyre from the Potterverse.

Lastly, among the many ancient name of Thera/Santorini, the island was known in Antiquity as Καλλίστη (kallistê), ‘the most beautiful one’ and Στρογγύλη (stroggylê), ‘the circular one’. The island was indeed circular before the Minoan eruption; most of it collapsed under the sea when the volcano exploded, leaving the crescent-shaped island with the tall cliffs that you’ve all seen pictures of.

 

A vivid poem and a super companion piece with the diary entry of an apprentice who regrets following his overly ambitious 'dark' master.

 

Great diary entry to go along with the evocative poem. Does it make me Greek that I knew Pyrocrates meant 'one who rules through fire'?

 

A poem about the wielding of power, destruction, killing, carved in stone by the diarist. And his master Pyrocrates, sure is a pyromaniac

 

Thank you all for reading and reviewing! I have the penultimate story of this thread ready, but first a few replies.

@WarmNyota_SweetAyesha Thank you! I was initially planning to write only the poem, but I realised that the diary entry would complement it well instead of writing a super-long introductory note about the eruption of Santorini volcano in the Bronze Age.

@Vek Talis Thank you! And I just realised that, in my fit of can't-wait-to-post-itis when I put up the story, I forgot to thank you for looking over the poem for me, so I'm doing it now and I fixed my opening notes.

You're well on your way to being Greek, but careful what you wish for. You know what they say, beware of Greeks bringing gifts!

@earlybird-obi-wan Thank you! I knew when I started out on this KR that I wanted the poem to be carved in stone – I mean, isn't that how many ancient texts reached us?

You're also well on your way to becoming a honorary Greek!

Thanks again to all readers, reviewers and lurkers! Next story coming right up.

 

Prompt: Write a story between 100 and 400 words, and include the words privilege, vault and cascade
Genre: Humour
Characters: Autolycus, the Olympian gods
Word count: 400 (+ 62 for the intro, which, once again, I’m not counting since the story stands on its own)
Notes: The idea for this story came to me after listening to the song Un chat qui miaule by the French singer Fréhel (1891–1951), in which a burglar who ends up committing murder blames it on a cat.

The Trial of Autolycus

The stories say that Autolycus, son of the god Hermes, inherited from his father the skills of theft and trickery. His divine parentage granted him the gift every thief dreams of: he would never be caught.

What the stories don’t say is that Autolycus’s talent stemmed from his being a magus – and there came a point when his magic displeased the gods.

* * *​

“I didn’t mean to!” Autolycus pleaded. “I didn’t mean to do it! I’m giving you my word!”

The tribunal of the gods was distinctly unimpressed. “What’s your word worth, thief?” Hera snapped.

“Not much, I understand that,” the man stammered. “But that’s precisely it. I’m a magus and a thief, not a murderer. I wouldn’t kill my own father!”

“Then explain it to us!” Zeus thundered. “Hermes was strangled, and you were in his room!”

Autolycus lowered his eyes. “It’s because of the raven, Almighty Zeus. It’s all because of the raven.”

Poseidon arched an ironic eyebrow. “Would you care to elaborate?”

The magus took a deep breath. “I… I wanted Father’s winged sandals. There, I said it. I wanted to steal from him. I waited until he fell asleep, I sneaked in through the window and I went to the vault by his bed. I was trying to figure out a clever spell to open the lock, when… when a raven croaked in the night.”

“And…?” Poseidon prompted.

“Don’t you understand? It was a raven. It’s a terribly bad omen! And it wouldn’t stop. Father was jolted awake and he looked straight at me like a madman, and I was scared, and…”

“And…?”

“I don’t know what took me! I leapt at him and I strangled him.” He lowered his eyes again. “I was scared, is all. And I did it.”

There was a heavy silence. Then the assembled gods suddenly erupted in boisterous laughter; coins fell on the table in a ringing cascade. “Cough up, everyone,” Aphrodite said between two fits of giggles. “Ten drachmas to Demeter for the Phantasmagory Charm, ten to Hades for the Mystification Jinx, twenty to Hermes for the idea… Oh, and a bonus to Hera for predicting his reaction.”

Autolycus gave them a perplexed look. “What happened?”

“Really, boy,” Zeus asked when he found his voice. “Did Hermes teach you nothing? Did you really think you could strangle a god?”

Autolycus looked up hopefully. “You mean… I didn’t kill him?”

“Of course you didn’t, you foolish child!”

“But I was there! I remember doing it and…” He caught his breath. “Wait a second! You people – gods – cast a Phantasmagory Charm on me?”

Zeus composed his face into a stern expression. “Take this as a warning, Autolycus. It’s your privilege to use magic. But don’t ever, ever use it to steal from the gods.”

 

Funny and clever way to teach a lesson

 

I could see Bruce Campbell's face gaping (he played Autolycus in Xena) when they sprang the joke on him, lol. I can see Xena slap him on the back of the head for being so foolish, too, lol.

 

Great piece of fun. Stealing from a god and telling how it happened not.

 

Thank you all for reading and reviewing!

@WarmNyota_SweetAyesha Thank you! The gods can be quite whimsical in mythology, so I thought I could have them play a trick on the ultimate trickster.

@Vek Talis Thanks! And wow, Autolycus is a character is Xena? I really need to have a look at that series. (Oh, and yes, someone needs to smack him up the head for falling for the idea that he could have strangled a god. They're made of tougher stuff than that!)

@earlybird-obi-wan Thank you! Well, ya know. Thinking that you could strangle a god with your bare hands is a pretty good indication that you're suffering from delusions of gradeur

Thanks again to all readers, reviewers and lurkers! And now (drumroll), the final story of this thread is coming right up.

 

Prompt: Write a 2000+ word story featuring an embedded narrative
Genre: Humour
Characters: Heracles and the Muses, mentions and brief appearances of others (you’ll find detailed references in the endnotes)
Word count: 4375 words

Many thanks to the always amazing @Findswoman for beta-reading this silly little story

The Death of Heracles

The stories claim that Heracles was the son of Zeus and Alcmene, a man of preternatural strength, courage and ingenuity whose Twelve Labours elevated him to stand amidst the immortals. Tales have been written and songs have been sung of his feats and exploits, and myth and history both recorded his achievements as the works of a hero and a god.

But was he?

* * * ​

It was a sunny morning on Mount Olympus and the Muses were gathering in their favourite spot of the northern foothills to find inspiration for their works. Clio settled comfortably in the shade of an olive tree with her books and scrolls; Urania set up her globe and compass to study the movement of the sun; Terpsichore was discussing with Euterpe the piece of music she required for her next dance; and Polyhymnia, Erato, Calliope and Melpomene were already ensconced in their never-ending debate about the superior form of poetry. As usual, Thalia found herself left to her own devices. There really wasn’t much inspiration to be found for comedy when you were surrounded by deities and heroes – unless you counted that lowlife Dionysus, but frankly his drunken schtick was getting old – and her father Zeus was reluctant to bring adequate material for her to study in the domain of the gods. She was considering for the umpteenth time the benefits of leaving the divine realm and wandering off on her own among the mortals when she spotted an unusual figure making its way in their direction.

“Well,” she said drily. “There’s something you don’t see every day.”

Her sisters glanced at the newcomer and gasped. He was small-bodied and skinny, with a balding head and a scraggly beard, and even from a distance they could see that he was huffing and puffing as he trekked up the hill with the help of a walking stick. Calliope wrinkled her nose in disgust. “I thought that the standard for men to be allowed in our realm was to be at least a fathom tall. How am I supposed to write epic poetry for… this?”

“Maybe this one’s for comedy,” Thalia said hopefully. “Maybe Papa finally agreed that –”

“As long as he isn’t about dancing, I’m fine,” Terpsichore interrupted. “I’d be rather concerned about my toes if I had to dance with one so uncouth.”

Thalia was tempted to do an imitation of her sister’s snotty manner but she thought better of it. Their improbable visitor didn’t need to know of the Muses’ squabbles, after all – and while Zeus wasn’t particularly demanding about his offspring’s manners, their mother the Titaness Mnemosyne had drilled into her daughters the importance of keeping their occasional spats in the family. Thalia waited for the ridiculous little man to arrive on the ridge where she stood with her sisters and gave him a polite bow.

“Hello!” he said cheerfully. “I was told I’d find the Muses here. Would that be you charming ladies?”

The nine women held out the symbols that identified them as such. “And you are…?” Thalia asked.

“I’m Heracles.”

Thalia suppressed a snort, Calliope rolled her eyes discreetly, Melpomene caught herself before she could shake her head in dismay and Terpsichore suddenly became very interested in her fingernails; but Erato had no qualms about expressing her disbelief. “Fat chance,” she muttered.

“I beg your pardon?” the man asked.

“Heracles is tall and handsome,” she retorted. “The ideal subject for love poetry. You, on the other hand…” Her voice trailed off as she gestured contemptuously to encompass his less-than-flattering silhouette.

The man didn’t appear to be offended in the least. “Ah. Yes. Of course. Here, let me show you.” He tapped the handle of his walking stick on his shoulder. His scrawny body began to shift and ripple, and, to Thalia’s great disappointment, he transfigured within seconds into a typical Olympian demigod. “That’s more like it, isn’t it?”

He was very good-looking with his well-defined muscles and roguish goatee; Thalia had to give it to him even as her dreams of comedic material evaporated. Erato, however, was not convinced. “What about your lion skin?” she asked suspiciously.

Heracles’s lips quirked into a smile. To the Muses’ astonishment, he transformed into a lion, then reverted to being a man, stopping just short of a full metamorphosis – and he stood before them in his comely form, but now with a lion pelt on his back. The mane was the exact colour of his hair.

Clio whistled appreciatively. “You’re a Zoomagus.”

“I am. It took me some time to perfect the half-transformation – if I overshoot, I’m left with a tail dangling from my… Well, you don’t need to know the details. At any rate, this is how my mythical aspect came to be – with a little help from the Anabolic Charm, of course. The lion skin wouldn’t do much for me if I wore it over my natural appearance, you know what I mean?”

He tapped his walking stick on his shoulder again and reverted to his runtish body. His furry cloak was suddenly far too big for him. Thalia grinned. He was turning out to be everything she’d been hoping for and more.

“Wait a second,” Calliope blurted. “You’re a magus? One of the chosen few who were touched by the gift of Uncle Prometheus? I was told you were a hero.”

“Actually, my sources are rather unclear on that particular point,” Clio said thoughtfully as she shuffled through her books. “You did perform the Twelve Labours, didn’t you?”

“I absolutely did! Not always in the manner they were reported, admittedly – magic was very helpful in that regard – but I’m enough of a hero that Zeus Almighty granted me immortality.”

The muse of history arched an eyebrow. “I don’t have any records of your mortal death to explain your presence here.”

“And that, my dear lady, is the very reason I came to you. I am in dire need of being thought dead, and Zeus Almighty was confident that you and your sisters could expound on my legend in such a way that it would end with my final, irrevocable, undisputable demise and thus justify my continued absence from the mortal realm.”

The nine women exchanged perplexed glances. “All right, colour us intrigued,” Melpomene said. “Why don’t we all have a seat, and you can explain your request.”

They settled comfortably on the lush grass and waited for Heracles to begin. “Well?” Calliope asked.

“This is so embarrassing,” the man muttered to himself. “Where to start? As you said, I am a magus – a rather powerful one at that, according to your uncle Prometheus himself, whom I had the pleasure of meeting not so long ago… but I digress. I am, indeed, a powerful magus, but I have one weakness.” He blushed. “I am highly susceptible to the charms of the fairer sex.”

Thalia chuckled. “The charms of the fairer sex?”

“Yes,” he said contritely. “And by ‘highly susceptible’, I mean highly. The mere sight of a beautiful woman causes me to act rather foolishly, and –”

“That explains a lot, actually,” Clio muttered as she leafed through her documents. “All those times you got married…”

“... were moments of such weakness,” Heracles completed. “First there was Megara, the daughter of King Creon of Thebes – a really messed-up family, if you ask me; just look at how her cousin Oedipus turned out. Then there was Queen Omphale of Lydia, and I have to tell you, that woman is quite something. I thought that I was the woman for a while. Then –”

Clio fished a scroll out of her pile. “I have the list right here. I take it that your fit of insanity when you killed Megara and your children was a sham?”

“I did most certainly not kill them!” Heracles exclaimed. “How could you believe such a thing? It just happened that, one day, I came to my senses and realised that this marriage wasn’t going anywhere. So I cast a Lethean Hex on Megara and the children and I relocated them to Macedonia. They’re very happy there.”

Erato’s eyes narrowed ominously. “A Lethean Hex?”

“Yes,” the scrawny magus said with a puzzled look. “You know, Lethe. As in, the river of the Underworld that causes one to experience complete forgetfulness –”

“I know my geography of the Underworld, thank you very much,” Erato retorted acidly. “You cast a Lethean Hex on your own children? To make them forget your existence?”

Heracles blinked. “Well, yes. Better than to let them grow up in an unhappy household, right? Not to mention that it kept them away from that spot of trouble with Oedipus – you know, having your cousin involved in that sort of unsavoury business can do quite a number on sensitive young souls.”

“Certainly better than to let them know they have a deadbeat dad,” the muse of love muttered.

“Now I resent that,” Heracles protested. “I’ve been very generous with alimony. I even made arrangements for my nephew Iolaus to keep up the payments after I’m… you know, gone.”

Meanwhile, Clio was scribbling away furiously, apparently determined to record every detail of the magus’s life for posterity. “I assume that the Lethean Hex came in useful for your other failed relationships too?”

At this the man grinned. “Oh, yes. I’m quite good at it. It’s one of my specialities, as a matter of fact.”

Thalia sneaked a peek at the long list of wives and lovers on Clio’s scroll. “I can imagine that.”

“Anyway, this is where you come in,” he continued, oblivious to the distinctly awkward atmosphere that had taken hold of his audience. “Right now I’m married to Deianira, the daughter of King Oeneus of Calydon. He brews the best wines, by the way – I hope I’ll be able to import some once I’m settled here; I’m told that we have open trade routes with the mortal realm… but I digress again. The bottom line is that this Centaur-and-Cerberus show has run its course, in my humble opinion. Having consulted with Zeus Almighty, we agreed that it was best for me to die a spectacular death – or, at least, for the masses to believe that I died, while I retire to Mount Olympus. So here I am, counting on you to write a suitably grandiose story.”

The silence that followed was deafening. “That’s… very interesting,” Thalia said when it became clear that her sisters could not overcome their disappointment to answer within the boundaries of civility. “Will you allow us some time to think of it? As you said, it should be suitably grandiose, and we can’t come up with something like that at the drop of a laurel wreath.”

“Of course, of course!” Heracles stood up. “I’ll leave you to it; I’m sure you don’t like to be interrupted. Should you require any details, I’ll be over there with Zeus Almighty. He said there’s ambrosia for dinner, you know. You should join us when you’re done!” And with that, he spun on his heel and disappeared with a pop.

The nine Muses looked at each other in dismay. “Can you believe that this miscreant is our half-brother?” Terpsichore asked. “Papa must be so disappointed to have such a lout for a son.”

“Actually, I don’t think he’s really our brother,” Clio piped up from amidst her books and scrolls. “The origins of that story are fuzzy at best. My guess is that it’s a rumour Papa started to explain away the fact that he’s such a powerful magus. You know how Papa can be about magic – he doesn’t want the Amagi to know about it, or they start making sacrifices to him to be granted the gift, and things get messy real fast.”

“Besides, can you imagine Auntie Hera if Papa brought one of his bastard children to Mount Olympus?” Melpomene asked. “She’s fine with us being here because we were born before she and Papa were married, but an actual bastard? We’d never hear the end of it.”

“But if Heracles isn’t Papa’s son, how did he stop those serpents in his crib?” Polyhymnia began. “Ooooooh,” she exclaimed as it dawned on her. “He must be an Ophidian Whisperer.”

Calliope sighed. “A Zoomagus, an Ophidian Whisperer and a practitioner of the Lethean Hex. That’s not legend material at all.”

“Not to mention a cad and a bounder,” Erato added scornfully. “Does anyone seriously expect me to put his so-called love stories in iambic pentameter? I’m not doing it.”

“Oh, lighten up,” Thalia said. Unlike her sisters, she found this little project very entertaining. “How about something like this?

“The great Heracles was so feckless
That his love life was totally hopeless.

He was such a fraud
His tales so tall and broad​

That the Muse thought his legend was worthless.”​

The nine women burst out laughing. “Papa bestow his blessings upon you, sister,” Terpsichore hiccoughed. “I needed that laugh.”

“We’re nowhere closer to figuring out a legend, though,” Calliope said. “Any other ideas?” She let her eyes wander among her sisters, finally fixing her gaze on Urania.

“What, me? I don’t think so,” the muse of astronomy said. She checked her records. “Nope, no stars in any of Heracles’s stories – except that business with the Golden Apples of the Hesperides. Oh, surely you’ve heard about it!” she added a little impatiently when the others gave her a questioning look. “The Hesperides wouldn’t let him into their garden, so he offered to hold the Heavens up while Uncle Atlas fetched the apples for him.” She rolled her eyes. “I never understood why Uncle Atlas took back the Heavens afterwards. He’s always complaining about how heavy they are; this was his chance to escape, wasn’t it? Not to mention that he would’ve saved us the trouble of making up a story for this despicable buffoon.”

“Maybe we can elaborate on that tale,” Thalia offered. “Spruce it up a bit. Something along these lines:

“The old Titan Atlas thought himself cunning,
For the sad truth was that his strength was waning.
The weight of the Heavens lay heavy on his arm
But Heracles could hold the skies up with a charm.
He claimed to agree to the quest in a heartbeat
Thinking the magus would not see through his deceit.
Upon returning with a basket of the coveted prize,
He revealed that his pledge was nothing but lies.
Yet with the Golden Apples finally in his grasp
Heracles would not be bested by a treacherous asp.
Looking straight at the Titan he intoned: “Mystify!”
And the jinx-jostled Atlas could only comply –”​

“Stop right there,” Urania interrupted. “A Mystification Jinx to trick Uncle Atlas into taking back the Heavens? No one would believe it. Let’s face it, Uncle Atlas was never the sharpest spear in the armoury. You wouldn’t need magic to fool him; everybody knows that.”

Thalia grinned. “Fair point. Besides, as much as I’m enjoying this, I agree that it’s still not legend material at all.”

The other muses nodded glumly. “Let’s try a more systematic approach,” Clio suggested. “If we can figure out how he achieved success with each labour… We have a few sorted out already.” She started ticking items off her fingers. “The Nemean Lion: his Zoomagus skill – it’s fairly obvious that the lion never existed at all. The Lernaean Hydra: he’s an Ophidian Whisperer. The Hydra’s a sort of snake, isn’t it? The Golden Apples of the Hesperides: an Aerostasis Charm –”

“– and the fact that Uncle Atlas is really dumb,” Thalia interjected to a round of laughter.

“The Ceryneian Hind: I’ll bet he simply Tachykineticked to catch it,” Urania said. “No matter how fast the hind could run…”

“The Erymanthian Boar… hmmm,” Polyhymnia wondered. “Isn’t the official version that he led it into thick snow to capture it?”

Clio looked at her notes. “It was the middle of summer.”

“A Cryogenesis Hex, then. He may be powerful, but he comes across as someone who values efficiency over elegance.”

“That would work. The Augean Stables?”

“Pff. A Hygiene Charm. Even I could do that in my sleep.”

“You know,” Thalia said suddenly, “I think we got it backwards. The magic stuff is actually the problem if we want this to be a legend. What we need instead is feats of strength, and tales of love, and the protection of the gods… Plus a few obscure pronouncements from oracles, and possibly a curse from the Fates – all of it in dactylic hexameter, of course.”

“But he didn’t do any of that,” Erato objected.

Thalia grinned. “The secret to a good legend is that it holds a kernel of truth, yet blows the heroic aspects out of proportion. We can keep the basic outline of his story, but for the rest… We’re the Muses. We can make it up. For instance:

“Tell me, Muse, of the mighty Heracles,
The child born under the curse of Hera,
Whose life was spent in torment and pain.
Tell me of his adventures as he fought for redemption
Until he gained his place among the gods.
Tell me of his many loves and losses,
Of the women and children he left dead in his path –”​

“But why would we immortalise such a loser in poetic glory?” Erato insisted. “Besides, won’t Auntie Hera mind that we brought her into this?”

By now Thalia’s smile was outright mischievous. “Not when we tell her what a deadbeat dad and husband he is. I mean, she’s the goddess of marriage, women and family, isn’t she? With a bit of prodding in the right direction…”

“... she may even choose to make his suffering real,” Melpomene completed.

Erato pondered this for a moment. “Actually, drawing Auntie Hera’s ire to him may be a reason to make this the most epic of all epics,” she said with an ominous undertone. “I don’t know about you sisters, but I feel that there should be a price to his comfortable retirement among the gods.”

The other eight muses nodded enthusiastically. “An epic, eh? I’ve got this,” Calliope said. “Thalia, you come and help me – you’re in a creative mood today. Melpo, I’ll need a solid ending.”

The muse of tragedy was already skimming through Clio’s collection of scrolls for inspiration. “I’m on it, sister. Don’t worry. I’ll figure out something grand.”

The rest of the day went by in a blur. Clio supplied information about real and fantasised events of Heracles’s life as they were described in her books; Thalia, Terpsichore and Urania embellished them to build a story for a hero; Calliope put them in verse with help from Polyhymnia and Erato; Euterpe composed a piece of music to accompany the reading; and Melpomene focused on the all-important ending. The sun was setting over Mount Olympus by the time they were done; and they collected their scrolls and tablets and made their way to the banquet of the gods.

From a distance, Thalia could see that the entire extended family was assembled there, as was custom when a new member was added to their ranks. As the guest of honour, Heracles was seated at Zeus’s right-hand side while Auntie Hera sat to his left. She smiled inwardly. This was precisely what she had been counting on.

“Ah, my little girls!” Zeus exclaimed when they arrived. “I take it that you are here to entertain us with the story you came up with for this rascal?” He gave Heracles a jovial slap on the back; the scrawny man coughed and spluttered in a most undignified way as the air fled his lungs.

“We did, Papa,” Thalia said in her usual chipper manner. “But I must preface our performance with a warning that we had to take some liberties with the facts. We deemed it prudent to avoid any mentions of magic, you see.”

“Rightly so,” Hera said approvingly. “No need to spread the word of the treachery of Prometheus.”

Thalia allowed herself a sly smile. “There’s that, obviously. There’s also the fact that it’s difficult to emphasise the heroic character of our new family member when his deeds are nothing but cheap tricks.”

Heracles did a double-take. “They’re not cheap –”

“At any rate, here is our epic poem for your enjoyment,” Thalia interrupted before he could protest any further. “I will now cede the floor to Callie, who will declaim it far better than I ever could.”

She stepped aside to let the muse of epic poetry take the stage and sat among her sisters as the reading began. The tale they had concocted wasn’t half bad, if she said so herself. They had taken the rumour that Heracles was the son of Zeus and the mortal woman Alcmene and run with it. The child found himself the target of Hera’s ire, who wished him undone as punishment for her husband’s infidelity; he was driven to madness and killed his wife and children, and he had to perform the Twelve Labours to redeem himself in the eyes of the gods. Her sisters had gone a little over the top with his superhuman strength and prowess, in Thalia’s opinion, and she had remedied that by insisting that the tips of his arrows be dipped in the venom of the Lernaean Hydra, making them deadly to anything they touched. But in the end, everyone liked a story about a dazzling hero, and the oohs and aahs of their godly audience at the narration of Heracles’s purported exploits were proof enough that their gambit was paying off. Calliope completed her account of the newly-minted demigod’s adventures with a flourish and gestured for Melpomene to step forth.

Thalia leaned forward in her chair. This was the climax they had devised, and she needed her sister to make an impression if their little scheme was to pan out. Melpomene plucked a mournful tune on the strings of her lyre and began:

“Alas! His death came at the hand of his wife Deianira
When he returned from the war in Oechalia
With the maiden Iole, of beauty divine,
And elected to take her as his concubine.
Deianira had been deceived by the Centaur Nessus
To believe that his blood was a potion most precious
To rekindle one’s love to blaze like bright fire
If spread on the skin or absorbed in attire.
Yet what Nessus well knew and Deianira did not
Was that venom lingered in the arrow that was shot
By Heracles himself when he’d rescued his bride
And killed the wily Centaur on the Euenos riverside.
But the fear of loss left Deianira so distraught
That she did not give the matter adequate thought;
She prepared a tunic soaked in the poisonous blood
And thus sealed the fate of the man she so loved.
When he wore it the venom smote the flesh off his bones
And Heracles was reduced to pain, cries and moans.
In his agony he built a funeral pyre
And took his own life leaping into the fire.

“Thus perished Heracles, demigod among men,
Champion, husband, father, protector and friend,
Averter of evil, ancestor of kings,
Bringer of victory on Athena’s wings.
His last step took him to the end of the path
That had been laid before him by the stern Hera’s wrath.
Yet his deeds were so mighty, his legend so strong,
That they soon were recorded and written in song;
And Zeus the Almighty, in his godly abode,
Granted him the glory his scion was owed.
He brought him to Olympus to stand amidst the gods
Where Heracles was honoured with perpetual lauds.”​

The divine realm erupted into cheers and applause when the muse of tragedy finally lowered her instrument. Apollo nodded enthusiastically at his half-sisters’ creation; Poseidon stood up to hug his nieces; Aphrodite, ever the romantic, wiped away a tear; and Heracles himself was clapping happily, his indignation at Thalia’s earlier barb all but forgotten.

“Excellent, excellent!” he exclaimed. “I wouldn’t have done better myself!” He leaned back in his chair. “Ah! It’s such a relief to be dead!”

Thalia stole a glance at Hera. Alone among the extended family, the queen of the gods was dejected and forlorn. “Well, I’m glad that this is a work of fiction,” she said despondently once the ruckus subsided. “Why is it that I always have to be the villain in these stories?”

“We felt that the divine parentage-and-curse approach was the way to go, Auntie,” Thalia answered apologetically. “We couldn’t figure out a way to explain Heracles’s moments of insanity without it. Otherwise, we would have to mention his use of the Lethean Hex, and –”

Hera arched an elegant eyebrow. “The Lethean Hex?”

Thalia gave her stepmother her most innocent look. “Well, yes. Heracles never killed his wife and children, did he? He simply cast a Lethean Hex on them and moved on with his life.”

The goddess’s eyes narrowed ominously. “Did he, now.”

At this the makebelieve hero paled and slumped in his seat. All he could voice in answer was a small, unintelligible squeal.

There was an awkward silence. The assembled immortals were suddenly very interested in the plates of ambrosia before them; Thalia had no doubt that they understood precisely what was coming – after all, Auntie Hera was nothing if not predictable when it came to the sanctity of marriage and family. “Very well,” the goddess enunciated through gritted teeth. “Our girls’ story is indeed excellent, and I have nothing to add to it. My only comment would be that the mortals ought to see the ending play out – you know, for reasons of plausibility.”

Like everyone else, Zeus could see where this was going. “Come now, darling – creating a poisoned shirt would be such a tedious process. Perhaps Heracles could simply go back and cast a Phantasmagory Charm –”

“Certainly not,” Hera snapped. “We will not encourage the use of magic in this household.” She leaned forward to look at Heracles on her husband’s other side and gave him her sweetest smile. Thalia noted with great satisfaction that the magus had shrunk even further into his throne-like chair. “I will be expecting you tomorrow morning for a fitting, my boy. I have the most talented seamstress; you would not believe the enchanted clothing she can create. We will make this look absolutely real.”

------------------------------------------------

Endnotes and Wikipedia links

Spoiler

The Wikipedia page for Heracles lists the twelve labours; the Wikipedia page for the Muses lists their names and areas of expertise.

Several spells that appear in this vignette were introduced in previous stories of this thread (the Zoomagus i.e. Animagus; the Lethean Hex i.e. the Memory Charm; the Mystification Jinx i.e. the Confundus Charm; the Ophidian Whisperer i.e. Parselmouth; the Aerostasis Charm i.e. the Levitation Charm; Tachykinesis i.e. Apparition/Disapparition; the Phantasmagory Charm); to those I added a few new, rather transparent ones (the Anabolic Charm, the Cryogenesis Hex and the Hygiene Charm).

In some versions of the myth, the father of Megara, Heracles’s first wife, was the same king Creon of Thebes who was the brother of Jocasta and thus the uncle of Oedipus.

Queen Omphale of Lydia

The Titan Atlas, brother of Prometheus, was condemned to hold up the heavens as punishment after his defeat in the Titanomachy. In some versions of the myth, he is the father of the Hesperides and thus has access to their garden where he collects the golden apples for Heracles. In the myth, Heracles agrees to hold up the heavens while Atlas fetches the apples, but then Atlas doesn’t want to take back the heavens. Heracles tricks him into taking them back by arguing that he needs to adjust his cloak (so the idea that Atlas wasn’t the sharpest knife isn’t something I made up )

Many epic poems begin with an invocation to the muses; the opening “Tell me, muse, of…” is borrowed from the Odyssey, which begins with “Tell me, muse, of the man of many ways”. The story that the muses come up with for Heracles at the end of this vignette is a condensed version of the “real” myth.

Deianira, daughter of Oeneus of Calydon, was Heracles’s last mortal wife and caused his death by giving him the shirt of Nessus when she suspected that he was falling in love with the younger and more beautiful Iole. Incidentally, Oeneus literally translates to ‘wine-man’, hence the reference to the fact that he brews the best wines.

 

Very nice story within a story as Heracles is rescued from his own susceptibility. I enjoyed the banter amongst the Muses.

Congratulations on finishing all KR prompts.

 

Heracles has been a naughty, deceptive boy, hasn't he?

Running out on his wife and kids and erasing their memories? Now why didn't I think of that?

He thought he got away with it all, too. The Muses, however, got the next to last laugh with that 'story' of his legend. And Hera will certainly get the very last laugh with her creative idea on making it all real.

Delicious idea turned into a fantastic tale of reaping what you sew. Magnificent, Chyn!

 

Heracles and his many disguises surely has the muzes bickering and wanting to make poems about the legendary works. Hera sure has the last laugh when she sees him sitting next to Zeus
Congrats on completing your magnificent KR

 

I came around here to change the tag from WIP to complete, and in doing so I realised that I hadn't done my last round of thanks and replies So here it is: thank you for the reviews, and thanks to everyone who stopped by to read this thread!

@WarmNyota_SweetAyesha Thank you! I had to laugh at "Heracles is rescued from his own susceptibility" That would be one way of putting it! Thanks so much for keeping up with this thread throughout the KR!

@Vek Talis Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed the twists and turns of this story. The final vignette was actually the reason I chose to go with this thread concept for this year's KR; the idea popped into my head the moment I saw the prompt and thought "story within a story" means "muses". It took me literally minutes to figure out the general idea, and I had a good laugh coming up with the details. I'm happy I could make you laugh too. Thank you for being such a consistent reader during the KR!

@earlybird-obi-wan Thank you! Hera definitely had the last laugh, although, in proper Greek myth fashion, it's pretty painful for others when she does. Thank you for being here week after week throughout the KR!

And with that, this thread is officially complete, but Witches of the White Sea will be back at some point in the future with a look at magic during the classical and Hellenistic periods!

 

This struck home in its bitter truth

Zeus, you hypocrite, when you go all Magisterial, I can't even ...

Deities major and minor are either creating or quarreling.

I sincerely enjoyed all the facets of your Run, congrats!

 

This is amazing!! I've only read the first two so far but they are perfect. I've never been I big fan of the Harry Potter stories, but I do admire the world building. And combining with ancient myth is something I would never have thought of, but is done seamlessly here. So glad you shared this, can't wait to keep reading!