Percy Jackson's Greek Gods (30 page)

Marsyas backed up. His mouth tasted like python slime. “Lord Apollo, let me apologize for—”

“I’m going to flay you alive!” Apollo said cheerfully. “I’m going remove your skin, so we can all see what’s underneath!”

Grossed out yet?

Yeah. It was pretty horrible.

Marsyas suffered a grisly death just because he dared to make music as good as Apollo’s. The satyr’s body was buried in a cave near the site of the music contest, and his blood became a river that gushed down the side of the hill.

Apollo made the cover of
Rolling Stone.
From his smiling face, you’d never guess the guy sewed curtains out of satyr skin.

Final thing about Apollo: he was a confirmed bachelor and a real ladies’ man. Hey, a mass-murdering psychopath who plays the lyre? It doesn’t get much more charming than that!

According to some stories, he dated each of the Nine Muses—the goddesses who oversaw different kinds of art, like tragedy, comedy, docudrama, and whatever. Apollo couldn’t decide between them. They were all too lovely; so he vowed never to marry, just date around.

Only once was he tempted to break that promise. He fell in love and got his heart broken—and it was his own fault.

One afternoon Apollo happened to be walking through the palace at Mount Olympus when he ran across Eros, Aphrodite’s son. The hit man of love was sitting on a window ledge restringing his bow. The kid looked so young, his bow so tiny, that Apollo burst out laughing.

“Oh my gods!” Apollo wiped a tear from his eye. “You call that a
bow
?
Those arrows look like darts. How can you
hit
anything?”

Eros was seething inside, but he managed a smile. “I do all right.”

“
This
is a bow, kid!” Apollo pulled out his own golden longbow, made by Hephaestus. “My enemies tremble when they see me coming. I can destroy anyone with a single arrow from any distance! You…well, I suppose you’d be a fearsome gerbil hunter.”

Apollo strode off, still laughing.

Eros gritted his teeth. He muttered to himself, “We’ll see about that, Mr. Big Shot. Maybe you can bring down your enemies, but I can bring down
you
.”

The next morning Apollo was walking by the riverside in Thessaly, just playing his lyre and enjoying the sunshine, when Eros shot an arrow straight into Apollo’s heart.

By chance, a naiad was bathing nearby—one of the daughters of the local river spirit. Her name was Daphne. By anybody’s standards, Daphne was beautiful. Most naiads were. But the moment Apollo saw her, he thought she was even hotter than Aphrodite. All the other women he’d dated suddenly seemed like complete losers. Apollo decided he
had
to marry Daphne.

Sadly, like a lot of smart nymphs, Daphne had long ago sworn off dating gods, because bad things happened to their girlfriends. Not all the time, maybe. Just, like, 99.9 percent of the time.

“Hey!” Apollo called out. “What’s your name?”

Daphne leaped out of the water and wrapped herself in her robe. “I’m—I’m Daphne. Please, go away.”

“Oh, Daphne Please-Go-Away,” Apollo said, “I love you! Marry me, and I will make you the happiest naiad in the universe.”

“No.”

“I insist! Come; let me kiss you. I will prove my affection and…Hey, where are you going?”

Daphne ran.

Apollo was fast, but Daphne was faster. Apollo was burdened with his bow and his lyre and he was dazed with love, so he kept stopping to compose new haiku in her honor.

Eventually, though, Daphne began to tire. She reached a cliff that looked out over a canyon. Apollo climbed the slope behind her. There was no way Daphne could double back.

That left her with two options: leap to her death, or agree to marry Apollo. Hearing him spout love poetry, she thought leaping off the cliff sounded pretty good.

In desperation, she tried one last thing: “Oh, Gaea, protector of all nature spirits, hear me! Save me from becoming this god’s girlfriend!”

Gaea took pity on Daphne. Just as Apollo reached the cliff and threw his arms around the naiad, Daphne changed into a laurel tree. Apollo found himself hugging a tree trunk, caressing arms that had turned into branches, running his hands through hair that had become leaves.

Apollo sobbed in despair. “Oh, beautiful naiad! I will never forget you. You were my one true love. You should have been my wife! I failed to win your love, but from now until the end of time, you will be a symbol of victory. Your leaves shall adorn my head, and I will totally start a new fashion trend!”

That’s why you’ll often see pictures of Greeks and Romans wearing laurel wreaths on their heads. Apollo made it stylish. Laurels became a sign of honor. If you won a contest or a sporting event, you got to wear laurels. If you conquered an enemy nation, more laurels! If you got tired of doing amazing deeds and you had enough wreaths to stuff a mattress, you could retire and rest on your laurels!

All because Apollo bragged about his big fancy golden bow.

Eros had the last laugh, but generally speaking, Apollo was right to brag. He
was
the best archer in the world. Only one person was as good as he was, maybe even better.

That would be his sister Artemis. If you want to read about her, fine. But, guys—be on your best behavior. I’m warning you now: Artemis doesn’t have a sense of humor.

ARTEMIS UNLEASHES
THE
DEATH PIG

I
T’S NOT THAT
A
RTEMIS HATED ALL MEN
,
just most of them. From the moment she was born, she knew one critical fact:
Guys are kinda gross.

Of course, she’d spent those seven months in the womb with her twin brother, Apollo, waiting to be born. That much time alone with Apollo would give anyone a bad impression of the male gender.

Artemis was born first, probably because she was anxious to get out. She immediately grew to the size of a six-year-old girl and looked around at the other goddesses who had assembled to help Leto.

“Right,” Artemis said. “I’ll assist with my brother’s delivery. He’s going to be a pain. Boil some water! Get some extra sheets! I’ll scrub up.”

Sure enough, Artemis helped deliver her own twin brother. From that point on, she became a goddess of childbirth, the protector of newborn babies and young children. (Along with the other childbirth goddess, Eileithyia; they shared the duties.) Once Apollo was born and started dancing and singing about how great he was, Artemis just stepped back and rolled her eyes.

“He’s always like this,” she confided to Hestia. “Seven months in the womb, he wouldn’t shut up.”

Hestia smiled kindly. “And you, dear? Do you sing and dance?”

“Ugh, no. But I do have plans. Could you take me to see my dad?”

Hestia whisked young Artemis off to Mount Olympus, where her father, Zeus, was sitting on his throne, listening to the wind gods give their weekly report on cloud formations. It was
so
freaking boring, Zeus was delighted to have a distraction.

“Hey, look!” Zeus said, interrupting the South Wind’s PowerPoint presentation about low-pressure zones. “It’s Hestia and…and some kid. Come in!”

Hestia stepped into the throne room, leading Artemis by the hand. “Lord Zeus, this is your new daughter, Artemis. We can come back later if you’re busy.”

“Busy?” Zeus cleared his throat. “No, no! They’re important stuff, weather reports, but darn it, they’ll have to wait!”

He shooed away the wind gods and held out his arms to Artemis. “Come to Papa, little one! Let’s take a look at you!”

Artemis wore a simple knee-length
chiton
—a sort of T-shirt dress tied with a cord at the waist. She had shoulder-length raven-black hair and strikingly beautiful silver-gray eyes. I use the word
strikingly
because you got the feeling those eyes could strike you dead if Artemis got angry.

She was less than a day old, but she already looked like she was in elementary school. Even for a nine- or ten-year-old, she would have been tall. She could’ve totally dominated the fourth-grade basketball team. As she approached the throne, she gave Zeus a brilliant smile that melted his heart.

“Daddy!” She threw herself into his arms. “I love you, I love you! You’re the best daddy ever!”

Maybe she didn’t like guys that much, but she knew
exactly
how to wrap her father around her little finger.

Zeus chuckled. “Well, shock me silly. You are the cutest little goddess I’ve ever seen. Tell Daddy Zeus what you want for your birthday present, honeycakes, and it’s yours.”

Artemis batted her eyelashes. “Anything?”

“Anything! I promise on the River Styx!”

Boom. Magic words. You’d think the gods would’ve been smarter about not making rash promises on the River Styx, but Zeus never seemed to learn. Now he would have to give Artemis whatever she wanted.

Some girls might’ve asked for a pony or a new phone or a shopping spree with their friends at the mall. Some might’ve asked for front-row tickets to the hottest boy band concert, or a date with somebody really awesome—like, I don’t know, Percy Jackson, or somebody. (
What
—
It could happen.)

Artemis didn’t care about any of that. She knew
exactly
what she wanted. Maybe it was because her mom, Leto, had been on the move so much while she tried to give birth, wandering from island to island. Maybe it was because the snake Python had almost devoured Leto before the twins could be born. Whatever the case, Artemis had a restless spirit. She wanted to roam the world and hunt dangerous creatures, and she
definitely
never wanted to get pregnant. She’d seen how much trouble that had brought her mom. Artemis was happy assisting with deliveries, but she never wanted to go through that herself.

“Let me be a maiden forever, Father,” Artemis said, twirling her finger in Zeus’s beard. “I never want to get married. I want a bow and arrows—Wait. You know what? Forget that. If
you
gave me the bow and arrows, they might not be the best quality. I’ll go see the Cyclopes and get them to custom-make my weapons. But you can grant me a bunch of followers: ocean nymphs, river nymphs, wood nymphs—what the heck, how about mortal girls, too? Any girls who want to join me can become my followers, as long as they remain maidens like me. They should probably make the decision when they’re about nine years old, before they get interested in boys, because after that, they’ll be all distracted and of no use to me. I think we can start with about eighty followers, okay? We’ll see how it goes. They can hunt with me, clean my kills, take care of my hunting dogs. Oh, that reminds me! I want hunting dogs.”

She took a deep breath. “I also want the right to hunt any dangerous animals anywhere in the world. I want all mountains to be sacred to me, because that’s where I’ll spend most of my time, out in the wilderness. As far as cities…I don’t know. Just pick any old city to be my special place. I’ll only visit towns when the women need my help with childbirth, or when the little kids need a protector.” She smiled up at Zeus with her big silvery eyes. “And…yeah, I think that’s it.”

Zeus blinked, momentarily stunned.

Then he burst out laughing. “You’re my daughter, all right! You think
big
!”
He kissed Artemis’s forehead and set her on her feet. “You know, when I have children like you, it’s totally worth dealing with Hera’s wrath. I’ll give you everything you asked for, my sweet. Not only that, I’ll give you
lots
of cities. I have a feeling you’re going to be very popular!”

Zeus was right. Artemis was worshipped by all kinds of people: pregnant women, little kids, parents, young maidens who wanted protection from gross guys, and of course anyone who hunted, which back then were a
lot
of folks. Guy or girl, if you hunted, Artemis was on your side—as long as you didn’t trash up the wilderness, and you actually
used
what you killed.
But she was also the goddess of wild animals, so if you went crazy and killed too many animals for no good reason, Artemis would have a few things to say to you.

After talking with Zeus, Artemis went to see the Cyclopes, who were working at one of Hephaestus’s forges on the island of Lipara. She got them to make her a special silver hunting bow and a quiver full of enchanted gold and silver arrows.

Then she went to visit Pan, the satyr god of the wild. She adopted his best wild dogs for her hunting pack. Some were black and white, some were reddish, some had spots like Dalmatians; but they were all fierce. They ran faster than the wind, and each one was strong enough to pull down a full-grown lion. Imagine what they could do as a pack.

Next, Artemis assembled her group of followers. It wasn’t hard. A lot of nymphs and mortal girls liked the idea of living free in the wilderness, never having to worry about getting married. Maybe you’re thinking:
Oh, but I want to get married someday!
Yeah, but back then, most girls didn’t get to pick who they married. Your dad just said,
Hey, go marry that guy. He offered me the biggest dowry.
It didn’t matter if the dude was fat, old, ugly, and smelled like month-old cheese. You had no choice but to marry him.

Artemis’s followers never had to deal with that. They also never had to look over their shoulders, wondering if some lovesick god was going to ambush them. Artemis’s hunters were off-limits. Anybody who tried to kidnap them, or even flirt with them, would find himself on the wrong side of Artemis’s silver bow.

Usually Artemis only took about twenty followers hunting with her at a time. You can’t exactly sneak up on your prey with eighty girls. The rest of her followers would either hunt in different groups or stay back at camp and butcher the kills, or cure the leather, or make campfires…or whatever nature-type people do when they’re camping. I’m from Manhattan. I don’t know these things.

Early on, Artemis realized she would be traveling long distances and moving quickly—sometimes more quickly than even a goddess could move on foot. She decided it would be a good idea to get a chariot. She just wasn’t sure what type of animals should pull it. Horses were Poseidon’s thing. Besides, they were domesticated. Artemis wanted something wild and fast.

Then one day she spotted a herd of deer.

You’re thinking,
Wow, deer. That fills me with excitement.

But this herd of deer included five huge hinds—adult females the size of bulls, with hooves and antlers made of solid gold. How did Artemis know it was real gold and not spray-paint? She’s the goddess of wild animals. She could just tell.

She turned to her followers and whispered, “Those noble deer would be
awesome
pulling my chariot. This will be our first big capture, ladies!”

Now, Artemis preferred not to kill harmless animals like deer. Mostly she just killed animals that hurt humans, like bears or lions or enraged badgers. But she had lots of clever ways to catch animals without hurting them. Among her followers was a nymph named Britomartis, who was so good at making nets that Artemis would eventually make her a minor goddess—the Lady of Nets. (Did she play basketball? I don’t know.)

Britomartis set some snares and concealed nets. Then the followers of Artemis started making noise. Just as they hoped, most of the regular-sized deer ran away, but the giant hinds with the golden horns turned to face the enemy and protect their herd.

Four of them charged straight into the nets and were caught, but the smartest of the five turned at the last second and dashed to safety.

“My lady,” said Britomartis, “should we go after that one?”

Artemis smiled. “No. Four deer are enough to pull my chariot. That fifth one has earned her freedom. She’s a smart hind! From now on, she will have my blessing. I forbid any hunter to harm her.”

That lucky deer lived a long time. She became famous for hanging out in an area of Greece called Ceryneia, so she was known as the Ceryneian Hind. Later on, Hercules would be ordered to capture her, but that’s another story.

Artemis now had everything she needed: her weapons, her followers, her hunting dogs, and her chariot pulled by magical hinds with fourteen-karat horns. The goddess spent her time roaming the mountains, hunting monsters, punishing anyone who was needlessly cruel to animals or didn’t respect the wilderness. Occasionally she would pop into town to check on the children, help mothers give birth, and maybe do a little recruiting among the young girls who might want to join the Hunt.

In some ways, she and her brother Apollo were very much alike. They were both freakishly good archers. While Artemis was the protector of young maidens, Apollo was the protector of young men. Both had healing powers. Both could punish disrespectful mortals with a sudden death-arrow or a horrible plague. Later on, Artemis became known as the goddess of the moon, taking over from the Titan Selene, the same way Apollo took over from Helios, the sun Titan. Sometimes you’ll see Artemis with a silvery crescent-shape emblem on her headband, which either means she’s the moon goddess or that she has a boomerang duct-taped to her forehead. Let’s go with the first option.

In other ways, Artemis was totally different from her brother. Apollo dated
everybody.
Artemis had no time for that nonsense. She was absolutely immune to love magic.

Her brother Apollo liked to make music. Artemis preferred the sounds of the crickets at night, the crackle of the campfire, the hooting of owls, and the gurgling of rivers. Apollo liked to draw attention to himself. Artemis preferred to slip away into the wilderness and be left alone with just her followers.

Her symbols? No surprise: the bow, the deer, and sometimes the crescent moon.

You might think only women worshipped her, but guys respected her as well. The Spartans used to pray to her for good hunting and success with archery and whatnot. Gross-out alert: to honor her, they used to tie a young guy to Artemis’s altar and whip him until he bled all over the place. Why they thought that would make Artemis happy, I’m not sure. Did I mention the Spartans were complete freakazoids?

Other Greeks sacrificed goats to her, or even dogs.

I know.
Dogs?
Artemis loved dogs. Why anyone would sacrifice them to her, I don’t know. Hopefully Artemis made her displeasure known by sending a plague down on those idiots.

She was popular all over Greece, but her biggest temple was in the city of Ephesus in Asia Minor. The Amazons founded the place, which makes sense. A nation of women warriors? They totally got what Artemis was about.