Aeëtes cleared his throat, pulling away from her as he misread her sudden silence for disgust.
“Right up towards the deck, there you go,” he said encouragingly enough, but Hecate felt her mood sour. She had never liked taking instruction.
“I know how to walk, Aeëtes,” she snapped, turning around and storming up the rest of the way until she disappeared. She walked past Pelias, who took a few steps down the gangplank and looked at Aeëtes.
“What have you gotten yourself into?”
Aeëtes only smiled, licking his teeth as he watched Hecate walk away. “An adventure, Pelias…an adventure.”
Part II
13
Hecate waited at the edge of the ship, keeping her eyes on the coast of Heraklion as the ship bustled with activity around her. She had been on a boat before, but it had been a long time ago…long before boats were ever this large, before they had fit so many people.
There was only the slightest bit of sunlight left. She watched Helios begin to drive his horses over the horizon, shaking her head at him and wondering if he knew anything about the mess that Hera had put his son in. He had never mentioned a son at all, now that she thought about it.
To be fair, I haven’t exactly kept up with my correspondence to the Olympus squabbles.She rolled her eyes even if no one was there to see it. Hecate was the first to admit that she had no patience for the newly formed pantheon; she thought they had been annoying before the uprising against Kronos, and she thought they were annoying now. Still, she knew most everyone. Aeëtes had been a…surprise.
Yes, that’s what we’re calling it.Hecate was almost annoyed with herself as she mused over their first meeting.
There was a massive heave, and the ship tipped to one side, causing Hecate to grab onto the rail and dig her fingers into the wood with a hiss. She looked over the edge until she saw the anchor being hauled up from the sea floor, signaling that they were getting ready to depart. It was going to take awhile until she found her sea legs, if she did at all. She was comfortable in the Underworld, and there was nothing more solid than earth to her; spending this much time on water was going to make her uneasy for the entire voyage.
Aeëtes watched her from the opposite side of the deck, his arms crossed over his chest as he leaned against the railing in nonchalance. Pelias stood next to him, shaking his head in utter disbelief. The chaos around them picked up as soon the gangplank was pulled away from the edge, the boat pushing off. Once they were out of hearing range from anyone on the deck, Pelias turned to Aeëtes.
“You want to tell me how you disappeared from my roof and a day later, you ask to go to Colchis for the first time in your life…traveling with agoddess?”He said the last word in a whisper, pressing in closer to his friend and jamming a finger into his chest. “And half naked, for the god’s sake!”
“She’s not half naked,” Aeëtes murmured, sounding almost disappointed, while Pelias looked ready to smack him.
“I’m aware. I’m also disturbingly aware of the fact thatyou’rethe one half-naked.”
“Oh, that.” Aeëtes adjusted the chlamys slightly. “I’ll grab some clothes from my cabin.”
“That would be lovely.” Pelias rolled his eyes. “You also ignored my other question.”
Aeëtes nodded, not paying attention to a single thing that his friend said, still staring at Hecate as she absentmindedly braided her hair in the rising moonlight. “Yes, I’ll get the clothes—ow!”
Pelias smacked him upside the head and rolled his eyes. Aeëtes shook to attention and turned to him, a petulant look on his face like a child who had just stolen sweets.
“How did you end up bringingHecateonto my ship?” Pelias asked again, his voice a little louder this time.
“It is probably more appropriate to say that I brought Aeëtes to you,” Hecate’s smooth voice cut in between the two men as they both turned to look at her.
Now that she had Aeëtes’s promise that he trusted his crew and they were safely away from Heraklion, she had let her glamour begin to slip. She looked like she was floating as she crossed the deck of the ship, her eyes glittering with moonlight as it played off her skin and hair. Aeëtes could swear that when she moved, he could see the spells written into her skin by flakes of the moon itself. Even her diadem, in the shape of the triple crown, appeared when she turned her head a certain way. She was transforming by the second into the Goddess of the Moon, and Aeëtes stared at her with the look of a starving man.
Pelias gave him a sharp elbow to the side, causing him to straighten up. “You’ve got your heart written across your face, friend.”
Aeëtes only shrugged as Hecate stepped closer to them, “Might as well. There’s no point keeping anything from a goddess anyway.”
“That’s true,” Hecate agreed with him, although he could tell by her attitude that she hadn’t heard Pelias’s remark.
“So what brings you aboard and on your way to Colchis? I’m sure the royal family will lay out all the tribute you’d desire for bringing their son back to them so soon,” Pelias chuckled at the mention of the royal family, but Aeëtes remarkably didn’t.
“Isn’t it obvious?” Aeëtes looked from Hecate to Pelias. “She fell in love with me as soon as she saw me.” Both Hecate and Pelias made a groan, stopping and giving each other a nod of camaraderie when they realized they both had the same low tolerance for Aeëtes at times.
“Wrong place, wrong time,” Hecate quipped. “That’s probably a better way to put it. In short, you need to know that I’ve taken on a life debt for Aeëtes, and he’s been cursed by Hera. We need to go to Colchis to try and break the spell, but we’ll need you to change course and take us to Aeaea first. Can you do that?” Hecate said everything to Pelias in a rather mundane tone, as if she was letting him know what the weather had been like on their journey. Aeëtes couldn’t help but let out a squawk of laughter at the look on Pelias’s face as he processed it.
“So…life debt, Hera, curse, Aeaea. Yeah. That’s…normal.” Pelias choked out the words before he looked over at Aeëtes, waiting a minute before bursting out into laughter. Hecate recoiled slightly, confused at his merriment, but watched as both men nearly sunk to their knees in mirth.
