Between Pagasae and Iolcos there is a wood of cedars. Here the trees grow thickly and shut out the sky. Lower down on the ground are oleanders and laurels, and below them, in their season, aconites. In the middle of the wood is a small glade through which a stream flows; fresh water when the tide is on the ebb, salt water when it is on the flow. I had been here many times when I was a child, when Melanos was in a good mood and brought us down to see the sea and to play hide-and-seek as a special treat. He told us it was dedicated to Artemis, the virgin, the ‘High Source of Water’. Like little ones, we never questioned him, but repeated the prayer he spoke and then got about our game.
Now we, the men of Argo, lay in that wood as night came down and the owls began to call. Medea’s time was not far away, and at Atalanta’s order, we had made a litter of sapling-boughs to carry her when she first began to groan and to bite her lower lip. All the same, she tried to march with the men for a while, not wanting to seem weak in their eyes. But as we had mounted the last rise before the grove and as the walls and roofs of Iolcos showed themselves for the first time in the dusk, she had leaned against a rock, the sweat standing in great beads on her forehead. Then she gave in and let us carry her, making some wry jest about the richness of the litters that queens were offered in Hellas.
Our plan was, at first, to scale the town walls of Iolcos—they were very low and we had ropes from the ship to help us—and then to go boldly into the palace and capture it. But when she had rested a while and her first pains seemed to die away, Medea rose from her rude couch and whispered to Atalanta, who now stayed beside her always.
Shortly, Atalanta came to me and said, ‘Medea the Queen has made few requests to Jason, her husband. Women at the verge of birth are often capricious, yet by the laws of the Mother, they must be obeyed. What Medea asks is not capricious, Jason, but of service to every man here. Medea shows, even at this hour, her great love for you. You may not refuse her if you wish to prosper for the rest of your days.’
I said, leaning on my elbow beneath a bay tree, ‘What does the queen ask, priestess?’
The men listened for the answer; for now all were under the spell of the Colchian, to greater or lesser degree.
Atalanta said, ‘Medea desires that you let her and me go into Iolcos alone. We shall tell anyone who questions us that we are the only survivors of the voyage and we shall be treated with kindness and respect. If you doubt that, then there is another thing I shall put to you—she is a queen, I a priestess. As such, we are safe from the hands of common men. Let us go and we shall achieve the purpose you desire without the loss of a single man of the Argo. Is it agreed?’
I said, ‘But in her state . . .’
Atalanta smiled and said, ‘In her state, all men will honour her. A lithe virgin might not come off so easily, queen or not, but a woman near her time is inviolate.’
I looked at the princes and the Spartans for advice and after a while they nodded. Heracles did not join them, but went to the litter where Medea lay and bowed low on the grassy turf before her, kissing her bare feet in homage.
We were all weary and by now, after our march, somewhat dispirited at the sight of the city we had to take and the deed we had to do. I glanced around and saw that the men under the bushes had dug the points of their javelins into the ground, as men do when they set up camp at night, not meaning to fight until the morning light comes again. This was sufficient answer for me. So I said, ‘Tell Medea that you may go and that I pray the gods will hold their cloaks over you both until you return.’
Atalanta did not go straight back to Medea, but went instead to a little mound beside the stream in the glade and began to dig at what seemed an ant-hill, with her hands. As we watched, we saw her feel about and at last draw forth something wrapped in bands of yellow linen. She slowly uncovered the thing and we saw that it was a small image of Artemis, thickly covered in gold leaf, but still bearing the shape of a goddess.
She called softly to me, ‘This and the unborn child inside Medea are the only tokens, the only weapons, we shall need to gain you a kingdom, Jason.’
So the two left us, Medea leaning on Atalanta’s shoulder, but not so heavily as I would have expected.
Heracles came back to us and squatted down on his haunches tugging at his thick red beard. ‘The women have the hearts of great warriors,’ he mumbled. ‘Yet if Pelias harms them, I swear that of Iolcos, not one stone shall be left standing upon another by dusk tomorrow, Jason.’
I took his thick wrist in the darkness and said, ‘I shall be beside you, brother, and it will not be sweat that drips from my javelin-point.’
Meleager began to cry out like a wild dog and to say that I had sent his lover to her doom, but one of the others, Iphitus of Mycenae, flung him to the turf and held his hand over the fool’s mouth. Iphitus was a good fellow, though over-arrogant because of the fame of his brother, King Eurystheus, who had set up many splendid tombs, in which the dead men wore masks of solid gold. And this at a time when the rest of Hellas had to be content with bronze, or even natural copper dug out of the ground, for their helmets.
As the hours passed, we chewed at dry barley cakes which we had brought from the ship, and drank stream water from our helmets. Luckily the tide was on the ebb and the water was quite fresh.
It was during one such visit to the stream that I thought I saw Acastus before me, on his knees, drinking, and I slapped him on the back to tell him that his kingdom was not far away now. But when the man turned, I saw that he was Idmon the Argive who claimed to be son to Apollo.
This set my mind working so I went back through the grove and searched for Acastus. He was nowhere to be found. Nor had any man seen him leave the wood.
Then another thought struck me: if Acastus, whose father was to die, had gone, then what of Admetus, whose little betrothed, Alcestis, lay fast asleep in Iolcos? I searched for Admetus then, and could only learn from the man who had lain next to him that Admetus had gone beyond the wood to relieve himself. But he was not with us now. . . .
I made a roll-call, quietly, not to disturb any passing herdsman. Yes, the two princes had gone from us.
I went back to Heracles and the Spartans and told them. Castor, who never spoke ten words if two would do, said, ‘Princes! Trustless dogs!’ Then we began to buckle on our swords, meaning to go after them towards Iolcos.
But before we could do this, there rose a strange wailing beyond the wood, and we heard the sound of rushing, thudding feet. We shrank back into the bushes as two forms ran headlong among the boughs. There was a little moonlight and we saw that they were women—they were in their night-attire, blood-drenched and wide-eyed. At first I had thought they were the women who had left us, but as they came closer, shrieking and tossing their tousled heads from side to side in anguish, I saw that they were Evadne and Amphinome, the daughters of King Pelias.
They halted a moment at the little stream and tried to wash the blood from their arms and faces, crying all the while. Heracles rose from behind the laurel-bush where he lay and went to them. They screamed at the sight of him, immense in the dim light. But he caught Evadne and held her roughly by the quaking shoulders.
‘What news, woman?’ he said, his great beard wagging in the girl’s face. ‘Tell me or I will throttle you!’
Evadne’s blank eyes gazed through him. ‘Kill me, kill me, I beg you,’ she howled. ‘I, who have torn my father’s body at the command of a witch, beg you to kill me. Look, I have no knife or I would have done it myself.’
Heracles flung her from him. She rolled on the ground for a while, beating the damp turf with her clenched fists; and then she rose and staggered after her sister into the darkness beyond the wood, still crying bitterly like a mad woman.
Polydeuces turned to me and said grimly, ‘Well, at least Pelias is dead then, Jason—whoever killed him. That is a good thing.’
Castor said, ‘A good thing if they are not setting some trap for us . . . A good thing if our own women come back safely.’
I noticed that Castor, who had never been over-friendly towards Atalanta before, now spoke of her and of my wife as ‘our women’, as though he felt some kinship, some possession, towards them, and I smiled, although to tell the truth I was in no smiling mood, deep down.
Then suddenly everything seemed to happen in that little cedar grove of Artemis.
The bushes parted again and we saw Medea come staggering like a drunk woman, clasping her lower belly and howling like a she-wolf. Atalanta tottered behind her, singing and clutching at a bundle which she held to her breast. Her face and the front of her garments were red and shining in the moonlight.
Medea fell in a heap beside the little stream in the glade and began to heave. Atalanta ripped off her flounced skirt and knelt beside her to do what had to be done.
And, as we men watched from the bushes, in a sort of horror, the child was born. It was like an awful wrestling match at the games when one of the men must die. Then she lay back and groaned, her breathing slow and harsh. Heracles wanted to go to her but the Spartans and I had just enough wit left to hold him back, for such a thing was forbidden until the mother and her baby were washed clean again.
My legs and jaws were quivering beyond my power to stop them. Then that quivering turned to joy as I heard the child cry out loudly, like a new-born lamb. And that joy turned again to horror when Atalanta stooped, took up the baby and held it in her arms. . . . For she had suddenly stripped the covering from her bundle and now we could all see that she held the white head of Pelias, its eyes rolled back and sightless, its mouth gaping to show the yellow teeth and gums.
Slowly she bent and put both trophies into the arms of Medea, who lay back exhausted on the rough couch now. And Medea just as slowly groped at the head and then, with wet hands, daubed the baby’s face and body. . . .
I heard her say, ‘Seldom is a child washed in the sacred blood of a king! It is a good omen!’
I think I was about to rush out and tear both baby and head away from her, but at that moment there was a great scuffling and shouting, a great thudding of feet upon the ground, and into the clearing ran a squad of the black Libyan Guard, their javelins raised for the cast. Behind them, many in their night-attire, came townsfolk of Iolcos, eyes staring, hair uncombed, mad with fury, shaking sticks and fire-spits, their only weapons.
I shouted, ‘To me, men of Argo; the queen and her prince must be saved!’
I heard feet about me, not many, but I thought nothing of that at the time; and then we were standing about Medea, our swords out, in a tight ring. Atalanta lay upon the queen’s body, shielding it with her own. Heracles snatched up the baby and held it to his great bear-like chest as though it was the fruit of his own loins.
And all round us stood the Black Guard, frozen like images, their hands drawn back to pin us with their javelins.
I yelled, ‘Come on, then! Let us begin the play! I’ll take any three of you with me.’
Castor and Polydeuces shouted out their own challenges and began to bite their lips until the blood ran into their beards. Orpheus, who was somehow among us with his lyre, struck up a chord or two and sang:
‘In the Grove of Artemis
The heroes stood their ground,
Blessed of the Mother,
A queen in their midst.
Who dares assail such warriors,
Such guardians of the Child?
Who dares come forth
And test the Mother’s fury?’
The Libyans rolled their eyes and made low grunting noises in their chests, uncertain whether to attack or not, brave and fearful at the same time.
Then the bushes parted again and a tall figure stepped forward. At first I thought it was Pelias come back from the dead, for he wore the kilt, the necklace, the leg-guards and the high black fleece headdress. In his right hand he carried the great sword of Poseidon.
But when he spoke I knew that it was Acastus, son of the murdered king.
He said clearly, ‘I dare come forward, to claim my father’s head. Who shall deny me will suffer the vengeance both of Zeus and of Poseidon. For one head, twenty will roll in this stream tonight.’
Heracles began to scream out a challenge to Acastus, but Medea reached up and silenced him.
Then, helped by Atalanta and Castor, she rose, unsteadily but bravely, and pointed her finger at Acastus.
‘Who killed Pelias?’ she said in a high voice. ‘I will tell you—his daughters, Evadne and Amphinome. So the gods have rewarded them with madness.’
Acastus struggled to keep his voice even and replied, ‘Who gave them the laurel to chew? Who set them on to kill their own father, from whose body they came, causing them to tear him to pieces like wild dogs over a dead sheep?’
Medea began to laugh at these words, her voice soaring in the moonlight above the heavy boughs of the cedars. I shuddered where I stood, near her. A Libyan before her gave a snuffling groan and then launched his javelin. It was as though he could stand this thing no longer. The shaft passed between Medea and Heracles and struck a tree-trunk behind us. Acastus turned as swiftly as the lightning strikes and took the man below the jawbone with the great sword of Poseidon. No one else moved. It was as though we all stood in the presence of the gods.
Then suddenly the baby, my child, began to cry out again, and broke the spell.
A woman in the crowd began to weep loudly, until the men with her struck her on the mouth to silence her. The Libyans began to lower their javelins and to draw back a pace, into the shadows of the great cedars, as though afraid.
Acastus held his sword point downwards now, so that it dragged in the turf. With his left hand he pushed back the great black sheepskin and looked me in the eye.
‘All is finished, Jason,’ he said. ‘Pelias is dead; my people have made me king in his place. There is not room for two kings in Iolcos.’
I lowered my own sword and stood before him, watching every move he made in case this should be an act of treachery.
I said, ‘What lies between us, both you and I know, Acastus. There is right and wrong, upon both sides. What would you have us do now, King of Iolcos?’
I said the last words mockingly, but he did not take them so. Instead he answered, ‘Give me back my father’s head, so that his body shall go to greet the gods entire. And leave half of your cargo of gold upon the beach near Pagasae, for it was truly my father’s gold. In return I give you his ship and the rest of the fleeces, to do with as you please.’
In some curious way, I was suddenly aware that we, the crew of Argo, were few in number; that many must have deserted us when the Libyans first ran into the glade. I think we were not more than a dozen, at the most, two of them women, and one a poet whose only weapon was his lyre.
Bitter at the heart I said, ‘The bargain is made, Acastus. And all the folk here have heard it. Yet one day I may visit you again, with more men at my back, and then I shall remind you how you broke your oath of friendship to me.’
The crowd hissed through their teeth, but Acastus only smiled and held out his hand for the head of his father. Atalanta gave it to him, by the long black hair. It swung, mocking in the moonlight.
Then he said, ‘You can visit me whenever you choose, Jason, and with as many men as you can bring. I shall not run from you, never fear. Now go, and start you on your way, and thank the gods that I am a merciful king.’
Behind him I saw Admetus my cousin, holding Alcestis by the hand. She was weeping bitterly as she looked up at her dead father’s swinging head. Among the crowd, also, I noticed many of the men who had sailed with me to Colchis and back. They stood with the townsfolk as though they had never been my comrades, had never seen me in their lives before.
So I bowed before Acastus and then, as the Libyans parted their ranks to let us through, we lifted Medea on the litter and carried her and the baby slowly through the wood of Artemis.
We did not look back, nor did anyone fling a javelin at us. There was only a great sighing in the grove, as though the dawn breezes mourned among the boughs.
And when we were clear, the twelve of us, I said, ‘So, we sail to Corinth now, Medea? Is that it?’
She nodded and gave suck to the little one at her breast. I did not care to watch as the morning light strengthened.
‘To Corinth,’ she repeated slowly. ‘That is, if we have men enough to handle the ship now.’
On the shore at Pagasae we flung half of our cargo of fleeces as we had promised. If we had had greater numbers of oarsmen, I should have sailed away with the whole cargo, but Acastus knew what he was doing. He knew that with our few men he could catch us before we were out of the gulf if we did not keep our word.