She was staring at me, but I did not stop. My words were tumbling out, catching fire as they went. “You will find no safety there, no peace. Yet still you may be free from your father. I cannot undo his cruelties, but I can ensure that they follow you no further. He said once that witchcraft cannot be taught. He was wrong. He kept his knowledge from you, but I will give you all I know. When he comes, we will turn him away together.”
She was silent a long moment. “What of Jason?”
“Let him be a hero. You are something else.”
“And what is that?”
In my mind I saw us already, our heads bent together over the purple flowers of aconite, the black roots of moly. I would rescue her from her tainted past.
“A witch,” I said. “With unbound power. Who need answer to none but herself.”
“I see,” she said. “Like you? A pathetic exile, who stinks of her loneliness?” She saw the shock on my face. “What, do you think because you surround yourself with cats and pigs, you are deceiving anyone? You do not know me for an afternoon, yet you are scrabbling to keep me. You claim you want to help me, but whom do you really help? ‘Oh, niece, dearest niece! We will be the best of friends and do our magics side by side. I will keep you close, and so fill up my childless days.’” She curled her lip. “I will not sentence myself to such a living death.”
Restless, I had thought. I was only restless in those days, and a little sad. But she had stripped me to my skin, and now I saw myself in her eyes: a bitter, abandoned crone, a spider, scheming to suck out her life.
Face stinging, I rose to meet her. “It is better than being married to Jason. You are blind not to see what a weak reed he is. He flinches from you already. And you are what, three days married? What will he do in a year? He is led by his love for himself—you were only expedient. In Iolcos your position will rest on his goodwill. How long do you think that will last, when his countrymen come crying that the murder of your brother brings a curse to their land?”
Her fists were clenched. “None will learn of my brother’s death. I have sworn the crew to silence.”
“Such a secret cannot be kept. If you were not a child you would know it. The moment those men are out of earshot they will start their gossip. In a day, the whole kingdom will know, and they will shake your trembling Jason till he falls. ‘Great king, it was not your fault the boy died. It was that villainess, that foreign witch. She carved her own kin, what worse evils does she work even now? Cast her out, cleanse the land, and take a better in her place.’”
“Jason would never listen to such slander! I delivered him the fleece! He loves me!” She stood fixed in her outrage, bright and defiant. All my hammering had only made her harder. Just so must I have seemed to my grandmother when she said to me: Those are two different things.
“Medea,” I said. “Listen to me. You are young, and Iolcos will make you old. There is no safety for you there.”
“Every day makes me old,” she said. “I do not have your years to waste. As for that safety, I do not want it. It is only more chains. Let them come at me if they dare. They will never take Jason from me. I have my powers, and I will use them.”
Every time she said his name, a fierce eagle love flashed in her eyes. She had him in her grip and would clench him till he died.
“And if you try to keep me,” she said, “I will fight you too.”
She would, I thought. Though I was a god, and she a mortal. She would fight the whole world.
Jason stirred. The spell was fading.
“Niece,” I said, “I will not keep you against your will. But if you ever—”
“No,” she said. “I want nothing more from you.”
She led Jason to the shore. They did not pause to rest or eat, they did not wait for dawn. They drew up the anchor and sailed into the darkness, their path lit only by the veiled moon and the unwavering gold of Medea’s eyes. I kept among the trees, so she would not see me watching and scorn me for that too. But I need not have bothered. She did not look back.
Out on the beach, the sand was cool, and the starlight dappled my skin. The waves were busy washing away their footprints. I closed my eyes and let the breeze move over me, carrying its scents of brine and ocean-weed. Overhead I felt the constellations turning on their distant tracks. I waited there a long time, listening, sending my mind out into the waves. I heard nothing, no sound of oars, no snap of sail, no voices on the wind. But I knew when he came. I opened my eyes.
The curve-beaked hull was splitting the waves of my harbor. He stood on its prow, his golden face outlined against the dawning sky. A pleasure rose in me so old and sharp it felt like pain. My brother.
He lifted his hand and the ship stopped, hanging perfectly still in the waves.
“Circe,” he cried over the water between us. His voice rang the air like struck bronze. “My daughter came here.”
“Yes,” I said. “She did.”
The satisfaction shone on his face. When he was an infant, his head had seemed to me delicate as glass. I used to trace its bones with my finger while he slept.
“I knew she would. She is desperate. She sought to bind me, but she has bound herself. Her fratricide will hang upon her all her days.”
“I grieve for your son’s death,” I said.
“She will pay for it,” he said. “Send her out.”
My woods had gone quiet behind me. All the animals were still, crouching to the ground. As a child, he had liked to lean his head upon my shoulder and watch the seagulls dip to catch their fish. His laugh had been bright as morning sun.
“I met Daedalus,” I said.
He frowned. “Daedalus? He has been dead for years. Where is Medea? Give her to me.”
“She is not here,” I said.
If I had turned the sea to stone I do not think he could have been more shocked. His face bloomed with incredulity and rage.
“You let her go?”
“She did not want to stay.”
“Did not want to? She is a criminal and a traitor! It was your duty to keep her for me!”
I had never seen him so angry before. I had never seen him angry at all. Even so, his face was beautiful, like the waves when they lift their storm-heads. I could still ask for his forgiveness, it was not too late. I could say she tricked me. I was his foolish sister, who trusted too easily and could not see into the cracks of the world. Then he would come ashore and we might—but my imagination would not finish the thought. Behind him at their oar benches sat his men. They stared straight ahead. They had not stirred, not even to brush off a fly or scratch an itch. Their faces were slack and empty, their arms covered in scars and crusted scabs. Old burns.
I had lost him long ago.
The air whipped around us. “Do you hear?” he shouted. “I should punish you.”
“No,” I said. “In Colchis you may work your will. But this is Aiaia.”
A second moment’s true surprise on his face. Then his mouth twisted. “You have done nothing. I will have her in the end.”
“That may be true. But I do not think she will make it easy. She is like you, Aeëtes, as oak to oak. She must live with that, and so, it seems, must you.”
He sneered, then turned and lifted his arm. His sailors moved their joints as one. The oars beat the water and carried him from me.