“I explained—”
“I’m your captain, you swore loyalty to me. Don’t make me regret what I offered you.”
“Yes, Captain.” She inclined her head and rose to her feet. As she walked away, a smile spread across her lips. Phineus said most seers were liars or fools. She was about to prove him right.
She would make sure the omens were in Heracles’s favor.
They gave Tiphys a sea burial. It was what he would have wanted. Danae spoke the funeral rights as the navigator’s body bobbed away across the waves, two obols tucked into his wrappings for the ferryman.
Then Jason instructed the Argonauts to build an altar.
In the early hours before dawn, they combed the beach for driftwood and piled it high on the shore. They’d saved the Stymphalian birds’ thighs to roast on the pyre as an offering to Poseidon. It was a strange but welcome discovery that underneath their knife-like feathers, the birds were flesh and bone like any other. For the first time in a long while, everyone had gone to bed with a full stomach.
Danae made sure she looked the part. She brought out her midnight cloak for the occasion and finished the effect by smudging charcoal from the ashes of the fire around her eyes.
“Just like the first time I saw you,” Heracles whispered as she walked past.
A thrill rippled through her.
Castor and Pollux stood at either side of the altar. At her nod, they threw burning torches on the pyre and stepped back to join the others.
Danae fell to her knees and lifted her arms into the air.
“Father Poseidon, hear my prayer. Bless theArgoand all who sail in her. Keep us safe on your waters, protect the crew from harm. As your daughter, I ask this of you.”
She sang an old tune of Naxos that told of Poseidon’s love for a mortal girl he’d seen dancing barefoot on the island’s shore. Orpheus wove a lilting harmony with her melody, but as they serenaded the dawn, sadness sank into her bones. She would have given anything to be singing with her father.
As the song ended, Jason stepped forward and placed the body of a Stymphalian bird in front of her, then handed her a knife. She plunged the blade down and with a mixture of repulsion and fascination, pulled the entrails through her fingers, making a display of examining the folds of blood and gristle.
Silently she said her own prayer. She didn’t know if anyone could hear her. But something had given her these powers. Perhaps they were listening, whoever they were.
Please keep my family safe. Help me get back to them one day.
She straightened up, blood dripping from her hands, and turned to face the crew. “The omens are clear. The gods are satisfied with the penance Heracles has paid for his crimes. If our mission is to succeed, he must rejoin the Argonauts.”
Silence rolled over the beach. The Argonauts glanced at one another. Jason looked furious.
“I’m not sharing a ship with a child murderer,” growled Castor.
There was a collective intake of breath. Castor was either very brave or incredibly foolish. Heracles could crush him as easily as breathing.
The crew muttered amongst themselves. She’d hoped their faith would be enough to convince them, but clearly these warriors needed to be spoken to in the only language they really understood: power.
The sand trembled. Then the sea nearest the altar began to churn, foam flecking the boiling waves.
“You dare question the omens?” Danae threw the full force of divine anger behind her words.
Castor paled and shook his head.
You are like a god to them, said the voice.
I know, she thought.
She let the sea go calm. “Captain.”
Jason glanced around at the now quivering Argonauts, then back at her. Angry as he was, he couldn’t contradict her without denying the gods. She’d trapped him.
Through gritted teeth, he said, “We will obey the omens. Heracles and Dolos will rejoin the Argonauts.”
