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- Herausgeber: Dragonfire Press
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Serie: Fated & Cursed
- Sprache: Englisch
A woman destined for glory and the goddess determined to see her fall from grace.
Arachne of Hypaepa was born to be a weaver. Known as the best in all of Lydia, she leads a charmed life, full of fame and fortune. But her circumstances soon take a turn for the worse when she offends the goddess of craft with her hubris.
Confident in her abilities, Arachne brazenly challenges Athena to a contest: Whoever impresses the townsfolk of Hypaepa will hold the title of best weaver among mortals and the divine. Athena agrees to the competition, and the two women go head-to-head, putting their talents to the test. When Arachne catches a glimpse of Athena’s otherworldly design—a reminder to mortals of their place—her sure-fire victory turns to crumbling ash.
Angered by the slight and desperate to prove herself, Arachne devises a new plan: Defeat the goddess by weaving a scene depicting the hypocrisy of the gods in jaw-dropping detail. When the tapestries are finally revealed, it’s clear Arachne has prevailed over Athena, using not only her skill but her cunning, another attribute Athena credits to herself.
Enraged by her audacity, Athena unleashes her fury on Arachne, tearing apart not only her greatest work but her unshakeable spirit. Humiliated and broken, Arachne must find a way to save all that her act of defiance has cost both her and her family.
The Weaver and the Web is a retelling of the myth of Arachne, the tragic tale of a woman ensnared by pride and caught in the tangled web of a jealous goddess.
This retelling contains themes that some may find distressing, including physical assault and suicidal ideation.
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Seitenzahl: 106
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024
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The Weaver and the Web
An Arachne Retelling
Kerri Keberly
Copyright © 2024 by Kerri Keberly
All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the express written consent of the copyright holder, except in the case of brief quotations for the purpose of reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. All events portrayed in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to real people or events is purely coincidental. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form without the express permission of the publisher.
Cover design by Keith Robinson
Contents
Little Arachne shivered when she slipped from the warmth of her bed and into the chill of night. There was no slumber to rub from her eyes, for she had not been sleeping. She had been lying awake for hours, thinking of how she would arrange the colored threads on her mother’s loom.
She crept silently to the door that separated her family’s home from the shop where they sold their wares. Her heart pounded in her chest, but it was not from fear of the dark like other children. She knew these rooms and short halls like the back of her hand. No, her pulse jumped in anticipation from what she was about to do.
They sold yarn dyed by her father and bolts of fine cloth weaved by her mother, the edges stitched and embroidered with silk thread by her older siblings. But of all the things sold in their shop, the intricate and colorful tapestries were Arachne’s favorite.
From the time she could walk on her own, Arachne was eager to learn her mother’s craft. She would stare transfixed as her older siblings would comb and spin wool or wind silk threads, annoying them with her endless questions. When would she be a weaver like Mama? was the one she asked most often.
Her heart would sink every time her sister would laugh at her, telling her she wasn’t old enough to sit at the loom. Why, her feet didn’t even reach the floor when she sat on the stool! Once her brother would join in the ribbing, Arachne would run crying to their mama, who would always stop what she was doing. She would take Arachne in her arms and pet her long dark hair, wiping away her tears as she gently reiterated what Arachne had already been told countless times; she was too small, too antsy, too this, and too that.
Perhaps it was being told no, or that Arachne was forbidden from doing something, but the denials only ignited a burning passion within her. She continued her relentless pursuit to become a weaver like her mother until she was finally given the task of grinding the dried plants and insects to make the dyes her father used. She would help him hang the colorful yarns and silk threads, and once they were dry, she would wind them onto the bobbins. She did this happily, watching her mother carefully as she did her work and learning what went where while she created wondrous scenes out of the threads Arachne and her father had prepared for her.
When Arachne had finally mastered spinning, dying, and winding, she was allowed to sit next to her mother and push the weft down with a wooden comb while her mother inserted the shuttle into the warp near the heddles. Arachne was quick, and it wasn’t long before they fell into a rhythm, working as though they were one person with two pairs of hands.
Arachne knew she only slowed her mother down working this way, but with so many patrons coming into the shop, there was no time for her mother to oversee Arachne’s work if she attempted a tapestry on her own.
She was not yet tall enough to reach the top of the loom. What if she made an error? What if the warp was too tight, or worse, too loose? They could not afford to waste the expensive wool! Those were the excuses her parents gave, even though she presented her case each morning.
“Mama, imagine having two weavers in the family!” she would say to her mother before rounding on her father, tugging on the back of his tunic as he worked. “Papa, think of how much more we could earn!”
Despite her insistence, they remained firm. “A few more years, daughter,” her father would say, patting her on the head with a dye-stained hand. “Now run along. There is wool to be combed, and I must get back to my work.”
Arachne would sigh, always careful to hide the sullen look on her face as she completed the day’s chores, which included leaving the small town in which they lived each evening and going up into the grassy mountainside to help corral her grandfather’s sheep for the night. It was a rite of passage; all her siblings had taken their turn at helping the old man.
On her way there, she would let her mind wander, smiling at the vibrant scenes she saw herself weaving inside her head. She supposed she couldn’t blame her parents for their trepidation. They had the shop to run. In her opinion, that was even more reason to let her weave. After all, she was twelve now, and, besides that, she had waited long enough. She knew she could do it.
An adolescent bird simply knows when it’s time to leave the nest, does it not?
Her innate sense of knowing wasn’t the problem. It was convincing her mother and father to trust her. There was no other way to prove to them she could earn her keep than to take matters into her own hands. Like a bird ready to venture out into the open sky, she had waited until her parents were not around to test her wings for the first time.
A small flickering light filled the room when Arachne lit the oil lamp and then tip-toed over to the corner where her mother weaved each day. She sat the lamp on a wooden table before inhaling deeply. Tonight, Arachne would finish the tapestry her mother had begun. In the morning, her mother and father would praise her work, and she would finally be allowed to weave on her own.
Her gaze traveled over the half-finished tapestry, darting to the places where her mother had made small errors. No matter, they would be unnoticeable soon enough. Arachne bent to pick up the shuttle, grinning at the weight of it in her hand, and as she climbed onto the stool and began to weave, her lips widened into a grin.
Arachne yawned, the rosy fingers of dawn gently caressing her back. She’d worked through the night, her fingers moving so deftly, it had surprised even her. Both exhausted and exhilarated, she slipped off the stool to survey her work.
She couldn’t wait for her mother to see how perfectly the threads had fallen into place. The patron who’d commissioned it was sure to be delighted. The tail feathers of the owl sitting atop Athena’s shoulder were so intricate in their detail and wonderful in their dimension, they looked as though she could reach out and pluck one. The goddess’s face and form so life-like it seemed she’d come down from Olympus to grace the shop with her presence.
Arachne whirled around when she heard the gasp.
Her mother stood in the doorway, hand over her mouth and eyes brimming with tears before dropping her hand and hurrying over to inspect the tapestry.
“The gods...” she murmured, running her fingertips over the threads lightly. “It must be the work of the gods.”
“No, Mama,” Arachne shook her head, stepping closer. “It was me.”
“Do not tell such tall tales, Arachne,” replied her mother, sounding more fearful than unkind. “It is offensive to the gods.”
“I’m not lying,” insisted Arachne. “I worked all night so that you could see for yourself that what I say is true.” She smiled triumphantly, wiggling her fingers playfully. “I am a weaver, just like you.”
Her mother glanced at the oil lamp, smoke still curling up from the wick that had recently been extinguished. She fixed her eyes on Arachne once more. “You’ve been blessed by the gods with this talent.”
Arachne beamed up at her, even though something heavy threatened to weigh the corners of her lips down. The gods had nothing to do with it. It had been her own two hands that had done the work. Her mind that had arranged the threads in both her dreams and in her waking hours. It was she who had learned how to weave, by carefully watching and patiently waiting, not the gods.
“What is all this commotion about?” came her father’s voice. Before either of them could answer, he too gasped. “By the gods, Derya.” He approached with wide eyes. “This is your finest work yet.”
Arachne opened her mouth to set her father straight, but her mother spoke first.
“Idmon,” she began, “Arachne has done this, not I.”
His mouth dropped open, his gaze cutting to Arachne. “Is this true, child?”
Arachne nodded, heart thumping in her chest. Her head spun, and she thought it might explode from the few moments of stunned silence that followed, but she blew out a relieved breath from her lungs when her father began to laugh. It rang in the air with incredulity, his laughter, but the way he took her face in his hands and kissed each of her cheeks, it was clear he had chosen to celebrate the good fortune he’d woken up to and not scold his child for scandalous claims.
Before the end of that year, Arachne had her own loom. Her father was a smart businessman, wasting no time capitalizing on the opportunity to have two weavers in his shop. This had not bothered Arachne or her mother. They both admired his gumption, for he was where Arachne got her resourceful and determined nature, and her mother had married a man who had always provided a good life for her, never raising a hand to her or their children. And so, Arachne and her mother worked side by side for the next six years, dutifully weaving the rugs and tapestries the townsfolk commissioned.
Arachne had never cared about the profits like her father, and still didn’t. It was her work in which she cared most, and with each exclamation of joy and delight from another satisfied customer, she grew more certain she was doing what she was meant to do. The elation she felt whenever she began a new tapestry was only rivaled by the pride she felt when their mouths dropped open after seeing the end results.
Her attention to detail and eye for color was so keen, it wasn’t long before the surrounding cities heard of the masterful young woman who wove even better than the best weavers far and wide, that wealthy patrons from all over Lydia came to commission larger and more elaborate scenes.
The years had passed, as they do, and her mother had begun to grumble about stiff fingers and aching joints. As she had slowed, it seemed Arachne had only gotten faster, completing her work in mere weeks instead of the months it normally took. It had been a blessing in disguise, really. A way for her mother to retire from her life-long craft with dignity, for no one was commissioning work from her any longer.
The crowds that normally gathered to watch Arachne weave were no exception on this morning. They murmured as they milled in and out of the shop, perusing the skeins of wool and bolts of fabric on display. Arachne paid them no mind. The din of busy city streets had become background noise to her. Instead, she focused her attention on the pretty trio of nymphs posing in front of her, just beyond her loom.
