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Zagreus was an ill-behaved child. Often, he took pride in this, especially once it seemed he had all of Olympus on his side. Defying his father felt right- it always had, really, but now he felt less like he was struggling against nothing and more like he was fighting a fight he could actually win. The Olympians helped, yes, but weapons of his own helped too. Weapons of his own helped immensely.
He only wished he had a whip.
Not like he’d be particularly proficient with a whip-surely he’d pick it up eventually as he had with his other arms, but it only seemed fair. He deserved to wield a whip in this fight, given who he was up against.
Zagreus had never really blamed Megaera for the punishments he’d endured as a child. Sure, she’d been the one to actually deliver them, but even then he’d only held true contempt for his father. Still, it would be satisfying to ensure Megaera knew exactly what pain she’d been inflicting upon him all those years.
He’d merely been a boy the first time, swiping food from the kitchen as young boys are bound to do, only to be caught by his father. The whipping he’d received for that seemed tame now, in that he’d been permitted to keep his clothes on and that he could actually remember how many lashes he’d received: thirteen, one for each grape his father had pried from his hands as he attempted to swipe them from the kitchen. Zagreus had still cried afterwards. He was only a boy after all, and hadn’t had the chance to grow accustomed to the sting of the whip. In time, he’d learn to take far worse lashings without shedding a tear.
His father never punished him for crying. This was partly why Zagreus forced his tears back as he left Meg’s chambers with his back stinging-he suspected his father enjoyed the sight of him, limping and tear-stained and feeling awful for whatever infraction he’d committed. He didn’t want to give his father the pleasure of knowing just how much his punishments hurt.
Until his escape attempts, Zagreus’s infractions were minor but frequent. Tardiness was a common one-he overslept frequently, and his father disliked when he arrived late for his household duties. Of course, the oversleeping was more often than not preceded by a night of tossing and turning as he attempted to fall asleep while his back still throbbed from the previous day’s whippings, but his father was unconcerned with this. The household duties themselves were another excuse for lashings, as Zagreus could never properly fulfill them, and his refusal to sit still at any point often earned him even more punishments. Most of Zagreus’s free time was spent in Meg’s chambers, on his hands and knees (or when his strength failed him, on his stomach), receiving an endless string of lashings for the growing list of that day’s infractions.
He didn’t dare protest the first time he was asked to remove his clothes before the whipping. Back then, he could still count the number of lashes; the punishment still had a foreseeable end, and he had no desire to prolong it. So he removed his clothes and knelt, closing his eyes and remaining still for the only time that day, awaiting the first lashing.
It was so painful he nearly burst into tears on the spot, only preventing it by biting down hard on his tongue. The whippings had still been horrid through his clothing, yes, but once the whip made contact with his bare skin he instantly longed for that meagre barrier. His flesh felt seared, torn open and raw, and if he wasn’t immortal he would’ve thought he was going to die right there. By the time the lashings had finished, the idea of his immortality had almost slipped his mind and he figured this might be the end of him anyway. He couldn’t remember how many lashings he’d received that day. The pain was so horrid it clouded all other memories.
Somehow, Zagreus never learned. He remained as defiant as ever, and the whipping grew more horrible and more frequent. A casual observer may have even guessed that he liked them, given every sight and trivial way he chose to act out, earning him more and more lashes. This wasn’t the case, of course-he loved defying his father in any way he could, yes, but he always despised the whippings.
Eventually he was earning himself so many lashings that counting them would be impossible, and his father agreed. He’d instructed Meg to whip him for as long as she saw fit, and Meg saw fit to whip him for what felt like hours. Zagreus had tried to count the lashings, but after the first hundred or so his head was swimming with pain and he simply couldn’t anymore. When Meg had finally finished with him, he could barely move. He lay on the floor, naked and shuddering, the pain of his abused back coursing through his whole body.
When Zagreus had finally managed to pull himself to his feet after that particular punishment, he made the mistake of looking in a mirror. Searing red lines cut through his flesh, covering him from his shoulders down to the backs of his thighs. And they bled-blood and darkness, how they bled-he was certain he’d leave quite the stain on his bedsheets that night. He didn’t bother trying to put his clothes back on. The touch of fabric on those fresh, weeping wounds would have been too much.
There was one mercy from the whippings, and that was that they didn’t scar. Zagreus had seen the scars a whipping could leave, he’d seen shades roaming the underworld with thick ridges of flesh on their backs left by such an instrument, and he had no desire to take on that feature himself. As much as the wounds stung, they healed quickly, closing after only a couple days and all but disappearing after a couple more. Of course, his father was quick to order more lashings and leave more horrid welts in their place, but at least they healed. At least Zagreus knew that if he ever managed to leave the underworld, he wouldn’t have to carry a trace of that whip with him.