Chapter 11
Medea
“How should we kill Father?” I asked Chalciope as we walked along the seashore. “Poison, perhaps, or a knife in the back?”
A gust of wind blew, emerging from the sea like a horde of wrathful nymphs, snapping our clothing against our bodies and ruffling
the seagrass along the dunes. Though we were far from the palace and any listening ears, I found myself glancing around anxiously.
What we spoke of was treason at best; at worst, a crime against both gods and humanity. “Or perhaps I can develop a spell
that will stop his heart,” I added.
“No,” Chalciope said sharply. “Don’t tarnish your gift with the stain of murder. Your mother would not have wanted it.”
I respected Chalciope’s point, though I was inclined to think that Hekate would like nothing more than seeing Aeetes perish.
But there might be a reason Hekate had not killed him herself during these long years. Aeetes was a child of the sun and possessed
of strange magics.
“I have spoken to my contacts among the guards,” Chalciope said, picking her way around clumps of seaweed. “You and I are
not the only ones who have grown weary of Aeetes’s cruelty. There are others who share our sympathies, and soon we will make
our move.”
“We should wait for your sons to return first,” I said, reaching down to pick up a round stone worn smooth by centuries of sand and wave.
“That will make the issue of succession much clearer. If it all goes wrong, Absyrtos might end up sitting on the throne.” A terrifying thought, and it made us both shudder.
“Medea, please, we’ve spoken about this.” Chalciope sighed. “Don’t torment me with hope. The boys have been gone for six long
months, they cannot still be alive.”
“The auguries are unmistakable,” I insisted. “The boys still live.”
“You and your auguries,” Chalciope said with a sad smile. She gazed at the distant horizon, the flickering point where sky
met water, as if she might catch sight of a small ship carrying four boys.
“Should we . . . do we have to be the ones to kill him? Father?” I asked, the enormity of the act resting heavy upon me. As
much as I despised Aeetes, he was a fixture of the world, like the sky or the glaring sun. To kill him might bring down calamity
upon us. I’d dispatched temple sacrifices, but never another human being, and my stomach felt queasy at the thought.
“If not us, then who?” Chalciope replied.
I looked at her profile. She had changed over the years, turning from the gentle sister of my memories to a woman made of
iron.
“I will not allow Aeetes to leave any more mothers bereft,” she continued, gazing out at the sea. “I will not let his mad
reign continue. And I will avenge my beloved Phrixus, killed too soon.”
Her words surprised me. It seemed that Chalciope really had loved her husband after all. I wondered if I would come to love
the man I’d eventually marry, whoever he might be.
From the corner of my eye, I studied my sister. Chalciope was a stalwart woman. If she saw a hungry mouth, she fed it; if
she saw a dirty bowl, she washed it. And, it seemed, if she saw a tyrant oppressing his kingdom and people, she sought to
end his life.
My sister, I realized, was a stranger. Chalciope had looked after me in earliest childhood, but she’d gone to the home of her husband when I was still very young, before we could truly come to know each other.
Above us was the stormy sky, and around us the green hills that had been my earliest companions. Once, they’d comforted me,
but now they seemed like nothing so much as a prison. The whole of Qulha was like a pillow pressed over my face. I suddenly
knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I needed to escape.
No worthy life could be lived here. If I ever wanted to rise to my mother’s sphere, I had to get away.
“I will help you however I can,” I said, thinking of Xanthippus and how to free him as well as myself. “In return . . . please,
help me find a good husband and a new home.”
“You would leave? After what we are about to do, you would leave it all behind?” Chalciope’s eyes were pools of sorrow, but
then she shook her head. “No, I understand. I won’t be Aeetes and trap you here. When I’m queen, I’ll summon all the eligible
young princes in all the kingdoms nearby, and you shall have your pick among them.”
She threw her arms around me, hugging me tight.
“Oh, my sweet sister,” Chalciope whispered into my hair as I looked over her shoulder at the vast expanse of the shimmering
sea. “Remember me, always. Remember that I loved you enough to let you go.”