Disclaimer: The mythological figures own themselves, but i own this particular myth.
Summary: The tale of how the Oleander flower came into being.
Author's Note: This was written for my Greek and Roman Mythology class, and uses only Greek names for the deities. This is also the first thing i've written in a long, long time, so please forgive me if i am a tad rusty. Beta'd by my fabulous roommate.
Thales was a young Athenian shepherd, with skin of lily-white and golden hair; a physical beauty to rival that of Adonis and Hippolytus. Given this, he naturally attracted the dubious attentions of the goddess of love, Aphrodite. She made ready to visit the youth as he tended his flock, dressing herself in the garb of a shepherdess so as not to frighten the lad.
She descended from her Olympia home and made her way to the handsome young man, but as she did so she failed to notice the narrowed eyes that watched her go. They belonged to her lover, the war god Ares, whose jealousy had grown with each mortal lover the Goddess had taken. This one, he decided, would turn out differently. Eyes dark and brooding, Ares departed to plot his subterfuge.
Meanwhile, Aphrodite was having enough trouble just as it was. Thales had turned out to be a more decorous youth than the goddess was used to. She had had the proper affect; the young man had been struck dumb by her beauty and proclaimed her to be a goddess, though Aphrodite kept up her charade and denied it repeatedly. He begged for her name, but she would not give it. Finally, Thales confessed a devotion he swore was undying and asked the goddess to marry him. This was not going the way she had planned and tried to steer it back in the direction of her intentions, but Thales would have none. Aphrodite was quite annoyed at this turn, though she did find herself oddly touched by the youth's propriety. He wished her to go back with him at once to Athens so things could be arranged, but it had grown late and the sun was low in the sky. Aphrodite was willing to play along, and the two lay down on opposite sides of a nearby tree to sleep.
Back on Olympus, Ares had set in motion his machinations. He stole into the house of Eros, intending to make good use of the young god's arrows. He remembered a trick that Eros had once played on Apollo, causing the god to fall in love with a nymph that he had similarly used an arrow upon, only instead of a gold-tipped arrow for inspiring love, for the nymph, Eros used a lead-tipped one that made the girl flee in terror from Apollo's advances. Smirking slightly at the memory, the war god selected one lead-tipped arrow from the quiver of Eros, and left swiftly - he did not wish to be discovered.
He too, as Aphrodite before him, descended from Olympia and made his way to the field where the shepherd tended his flock. He hid himself among the branches of the tree underneath which the goddess and shepherd slept, and waited for them to awake. He did not have to wait long. The sun soon rose, sending golden rays to wake the sleeping pair. As Thales opened his eyes and drank in with a blissful smile the sight of the sleeping goddess, Ares struck the youth straight through the heart. Thales gave a cry of horror, startling Aphrodite awake. She reached out to embrace the young man, but he recoiled in terror. Aphrodite was outraged. "False!" she shrieked, "False! How dare you lay such promises of marriage before me, calling me a goddess of beauty, and then shrink in fear at my touch!" And in her righteous anger she struck him with all her might, causing the youth to crumple to the ground. She stood over him, eyes blazing with fury. "As you have been, you shall now always be: You are the Oleander, appearing first as beautiful and pure but proving only to be poisonous and common. All shall know of your falsities." With this final sentence spat at the boy, Aphrodite left in a whirl of light.
The parents of Thales searched for their son all through the woods and hills surrounding Athens. They finally found the field in which his flock still roamed, sheperdless, but instead of Thales they only found a single white flower beneath a tree.
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