A few days after my conversation with Chalciope, I was walking alone along the same stretch of shore when I came upon a great ship.
It was magnificent, only a little smaller than the great war vessels of my father’s fleet, with sails like a palace ceiling and a bristling array of oars. Despite its size, it was light enough to be dragged halfway up the sand and tilted on its side like a beached whale. People milled around the ship; even from a distance, I could see these were men of fighting age.
Tempering my intense curiosity with caution, I went up behind the dunes, then down on my hands and knees, creeping forward until I could get a better look at the new arrivals.
They were setting up tents and kindling cookfires. I could hear them speaking Greek to one another and counted about fifty in total, all men. Not an army, but certainly a large expeditionary force. My eyes raked over the scene on the beach until they fell on a figure standing at the prow of the beached ship.
Long tawny hair whipped in the wind. A woman, I was shocked to realize, though she was clad in the clothes of a man. I pressed forward, intrigued. Who was she, a prisoner of war? No, the set of her shoulders was too proud. Nor did she wear the demure clothing of a Greek wife. Perhaps she was one of the Amazons, who rodetheir horses across the steppes like dolphins dancing on the surface of the sea.
My fascination was flavored with the bitter tinge of envy—here was a woman who had never felt the opprobrium of a domineering father, and was clearly allowed to do whatever she liked. I felt smaller just looking at her.
Tearing my gaze away from the woman, I scanned the camp and took in its inhabitants: a dark-haired man tuning a lyre; a pair of twins arguing about something I could not hear; an enormous man hauling jars of water from the hills.
Then I saw them.
Four boys, significantly younger than the men around them. Vague recognition turned to absolute astonishment when I realized that the tallest was my nephew Argus, Chalciope’s eldest son. And the other three were his brothers, who had been sent out on a little boat with no oars many moons ago. Here they were, alive.
I slapped a hand over my mouth to stifle my yelp of shock. Yes—they were a little older than they had been at the last ancestral festival, but unmistakable. As I watched, the enormous, muscled man reached down and ruffled Melas’s hair affectionately.
They were here. They were alive. My magic had been vindicated and my auguries proven correct. I couldn’t wait to tell Chalciope.
Just as I was about to run back to the palace, a cry of greeting below caught my attention. My eyes fell on a young man loping along the beach; he was slender, almost as delicately built as a girl. The others greeted him with cheers.
He must be the leader of the crew. Certainly he moved with calm authority, standing at the nexus of the camp, listening thoughtfully to the people who ran over to him. So very unlike Aeetes, who ruled with edicts and fear.
There was kindness in the young man’s face, and that intriguedme. He smiled at everyone and spoke to them in turn, even my little nephews. I crept forward, still hidden among the dunes, my heart in my throat. This man was not outrageously handsome, but he was good-looking in a way that snuck up on you.
“Jason!” someone called, and the stranger’s head whipped around. Jason, that must be his name.
My mind turned as I crouched amid the dunes. The magic I’d worked to bring Chalciope’s children home had brought me something as well, a precious treasure. This man Jason and his ship represented a possibility.
An unfamiliar feeling unfurled inside me like a flower blooming. Gradually, I recognized it as hope.
In that moment I chose Jason, though it did not seem like a choice at the time, only the natural order of things, like water running downhill. I took all my hopes for the future and pinned them on him. Whatever this man had come to Qulha to do, I would help him. And in return, he would set me free.
Jason was the most beautiful man I had ever seen, because he was my way out.
17
Jason
It will be different this time,Jason assures himself as he sets off for the Colchian city of Aea the morning after their arrival. There will be no more unhappy accidents with local kings or any deaths among his men. The Argonauts have instructions to stay put for now, though Zetes and Calais are monitoring the situation from the air. Jason does not want to risk any more violence.
It will be different this time because Jason has the four sons of Phrixus in tow. King Aeetes’s grandsons, healthy and hale, their appearance a gift from the goddess. Surely the king will be so overjoyed at their return that he’ll offer Jason whatever he desires.
The path to the city of Aea unspools before them. Jason tilts his head back to enjoy the cool whisper of a Colchian breeze, so much more refreshing than the hot climate of Greece, and for the first time on this journey he feels almost hopeful.
Until he sees the bodies.
At first, Jason assumes the wooden platform is a lookout post. Then he sees the decaying human corpse lying upon it. And then another and another. His eyes bounce from tree to tree along the path, each adorned with these gruesome altars to rotted death. He gives a little cry of shock, and the sons of Phrixus stop to look at him.
“This is just what we do for the dead here in Qulha,” Argus says when he ascertains the source of Jason’s horror, pronouncing thename of this land in its own people’s tongue, so different from the Greek. “We bury the bodies of the men like this, so the birds eat them and bring their souls back up to the sky, Tengri. It is called ‘sky burial,’ and we borrowed it from the steppe people. We used to bury our dead in the Egyptian way with beautiful tombs, but Grandfather changed all that. Now, women go into the earth so that they might nurture the soil, and men go into the sky. And criminals go into the sea, but we don’t speak of that.”
“I... see,” Jason says, though he doesn’t. The edge of the world is a strange, barbarian place.
He wonders what exactly he is walking into.
They soon arrive at the palace, a magnificent building held up by great pillars as wide around as trees. A commotion ensues when the palace guards recognize the sons of Phrixus. A messenger is dispatched, and soon the atrium of the palace is teeming with people as the royal family welcomes back their own.
