The story goes, the war was fought because of Helen’s beauty. Because they prefer us as stories in which we cannot refute, cannot protest, cannot raise our voices. They like to say the girl was raped because of her beauty. They like to say the woman was queened because of hers. It’s all just a game of chance, which one of them finds you, which one of them kills you, for even if you do not die, you no longer exist beyond your body. Our beauty drives them to madness, and madness drives them to cruelty. But. One woman used her voice to save as many as she could. Helen did not ask for war. Eve did not ask for paradise. Lilith asked only for freedom. But they survived in myth, in story, in our words. Scheherazade smiled, and asked if they wanted more, and their greed bought her time. Our haunted eyes and trembling lips, they’re cursed. They see our sadness, and know that they must be the cure. They see our beauty, and know what their next prize shall be. The beautiful no longer exist as human. We are symbols and rallying points. And alas, for we are all stunning and godlike and desired and so none of us are human, not like them— they who hunt, they whose wants have never bent to the word no. But Scheherazade, she keeps them alive. She uses her voice, and she keeps us alive, because she knows none of these stories are over, and she knows they’re desperate for the end, (at the end, they can change the narrative) and she know that her voice is more powerful than their dead, abridged versions of the women who came before. Remember Eve, she says, remember the woman who gave you life. Remember the woman who chose knowledge. Remember the woman who said yes. Recall Lilith, she says, recall the woman who gave you freedom. Recall the woman who chose independence. Recall the woman who said no. Scheherazade says, Oh you foolish one, my beauty is a weapon and I will use it to drive you to listen. And then— Wait. Don’t you want to hear how the story ends?
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