“I have a proposal for you,” Hypsipyle says. “Stay here. Let your men become husbands to my women—see how they enjoy each other’s company already. And let me take you as my own husband.”
Jason blinks. At first, he is sure he must have misunderstood. He puts down his wine cup, hard, and fumblingly asks Hypsipyle to repeat herself. She does, murmuring the marriage proposal in a husky voice, her eyes half lidded. She is so close that he can smell the jasmine perfume rising from her skin.
The offer is shocking, and it is a measure of Jason’s exhaustion that he briefly considers it. The journey of theArgohas drained him; he is tired of bloodshed and craves a respite. There is his promise to return his men safely to Greece, but as he watches both Castor and Polydeuces flirt with a buxom woman who seems all too delighted by their attentions, Jason reflects that his Argonauts do not seem in such a hurry to get back.
But then Jason thinks of the Golden Fleece, safe on theArgounder the watchful eyes of Heracles and Hylas, who have stayed behind. He imagines it slowly rotting, left to decay in the dark. He thinks of his mother, Alcimede, whiling away her days in a shack at the foot of Mount Pelion. He remembers his father sitting in the garden so long ago. If Jason does not honor his father’s memory, no one will.
He thinks of Medea too, not with axe in hand, but as she appeared to him the night before the trial of the bulls, all mingled fear and hope. A barbarian princess offering herself to him body and soul, an act of trust he will not squander.
“I fear I cannot accept your offer, honored Queen, generous though it is,” Jason says to Hypsipyle. “I am already betrothed. I must return home and take my rightful place as king.”
“You would be a kinghere,” Hypsipyle says, indicating the feasting hall and the island of Lemnos beyond. “I bring you akingdom, a patch of paradise in the setting sun. I would be your queen.”
Jason smiles, apologetic. “But not the right kingdom.”And not the right queen,he adds silently.
The smile fades from Hypsipyle’s face. There is the sense of a curtain falling away, of pretenses dropped. It is as though Hypsipyle has put on her armor again, becoming remote and cold.
“If that is your answer,” she snaps, “then we are finished here. I have other business to attend to.” And with that, Hypsipyle leaves. Jason is left with the cup of wine in his hand and the half-finished dinner before him, alone amid the revels. Belatedly, Jason worries that he may have inadvertently jeopardized their welcome through his refusal.
Hypsipyle disappears, though she soon resurfaces in animated conversation with Ancaeus, the strongest man among the Argonauts after Heracles. Her hands are wrapped around Ancaeus’s flexed biceps, and her face is turned up toward his like a flower as she murmurs appreciatively into his ear. Jason feels a bit nauseated. Hypsipyle is certainly wasting no time in her quest for a husband, and it dismays Jason to see how easily he has been replaced.
Then Jason catches sight of Medea and Atalanta at the edge of the feasting hall and feels a surge of alarm. He springs up from the couch and approaches them. Atalanta says something, and for a moment Jason is so startled by the fact that Atalanta is willingly speaking to him that he cannot parse her words.
“We must leave,” she repeats. “Now.”
“The women here killed the men,” Medea says, pushing past Atalanta. Her face is pale with fear. “And the Thracian slave women too, most of them. If Hypsipyle and her women did this to their own people, there’s no telling what they’ll do to us. We have to leavenow.”
Jason stares at her blankly. An ugly thought crosses his mind:Perhaps Medea somehow got wind of Hypsipyle’s offer of marriage and, in a jealous rage, made up this horrible story to frighten him away from her cousin. But Jason has already made his choice. Besides, this preposterous tale explains the numerous oddities he has noticed since setting foot on Lemnos.
So that is why there are no men here, why the women met them like warriors on the shore, why Hypsipyle laughed prettily when Jason remarked that their husbands might not approve of what the women of Lemnos were currently doing with the men of theArgo.TheLemnianmen are away in Thrace,Hypsipyle told him at the beginning of the feast. The kind of lie you might tell a child.
Jason dithers, unsure of the right course. He is afraid, but departing so swiftly would be an unforgivable snub, and he has already insulted Hypsipyle’s hospitality by turning down her proposal.
“Do you believe me?” Medea bites her lip. “Do you trust me?”
Does he? For all that Jason used his betrothal to Medea to escape the promise of marriage with Hypsipyle, the reality is not so simple. It is so much easier to love the idea of her than it is to love the flesh-and-blood woman.
Hypsipyle is not the right queen, but does that necessarily mean Medea is?
“Do you trust me?” Medea repeats.
Jason realizes with some surprise that, yes, despite certain recent events, hedoestrust Medea. She simply has no reason to lie; her fate is bound up with his. She saved him from the bronze bulls and gave him the Golden Fleece. She is alone in the world, without friends or family, and she needs him.
That settles it. “Argonauts!” Jason calls out over the clatter of the feasting hall. Conversation stills and heads whip toward him. “An urgent message from Heracles, back at the ship. We must return to theArgoat once.”
A chorus of groans and curses, followed by the creaking of couches as the men stand up.
“When did we receive a message from Heracles?” Atalanta asks him, perplexed.
Jason chuckles as if she made a very good joke and pats her on the shoulder. How naive Atalanta is, not to know the utility of a good lie.
Hypsipyle is waiting for them outside the palace. She still wears her lovely gown, but the royal guard around her is clad in armor, with spears at the ready.
Jason is profuse with apologies, but Hypsipyle absorbs his words as impassively as stone. “By all means, go,” she says, voice dripping with disdain. “You’ve done enough.”
It takes Jason some time to comprehend her meaning. It is not until they push theArgointo the dark waters of the sea under a bridge of stars that he truly understands.
An island with no men has no means of making children. That must be why Hypsipyle wanted his Argonauts, and him. Jason has a vision of bees pollinating flowers, drones dutifully laying down their lives for the hive queen. He shudders at the near miss, sick with horror at what might have been.
