In her room, Medea arranges these flowers on the long table, curling nest of snakes in the air, pure white encased in light purple as if the tint were netting, as if these petals were the capture of something. Black seeds a hundred small eyes, unnoticed at first, but so dark they refuse place, hang separate from the soft flesh of the flower.

When her sons rush in, she tells them not to touch. They lean as close as they can, their faces near, grubby hands on the table twisting toward bulb and stem.

Get out, she says. Stay away from those. She pushes them out the door and they run off shouting in some new game. Jason’s arm around her, that’s what she would like, the two of them watching their sons play, then going inside. This beautiful room, beautiful city, no longer slaves. If Jason were true, this would be the good time of their lives, the easy time. Simple.

Medea lies down to rest, exhausted somehow, and when she wakes, it’s almost dark, the sun fallen. She’s alone and caged here, not allowed to walk at night. She’s missed the rest of her day. And where are her children?

The moment she rises, slaves bring in food. They’ve been waiting, watching, everyone always watching her. Where are my sons? she asks.

We’ll bring them, she’s told.

A small table for the food, the larger one given over to the crocus. Medea sits and waits. Some stew of lamb, prepared by a slave standing at a cauldron, same as Medea only days ago. Change so abrupt. All gained and lost in a blink.

Stew of king and ram. Acastus waiting for it to cool, then pulling pieces of his father free, washing for burial. Clear enough the hair and head of a king, the curled horns of a ram, but what of the rest? Whose entrails, whose splintered ribs, whose chewed balls? On that floor of ash and blood, trying to decide which parts are a man.

Pelias. The king whose power was without limit. Now Kreon.

Aeson charging through the door, almost knocking her over in her chair. Slick arms, smell of sweat, hot breath, and she can feel his pulse, feel his heart beating against her. Then Promachus worming his way in, grubby and snot nosed and whining. She pulls and he burrows. Animal. Everything in human life that matters is animal and nothing more. Jason no different from any bull. Medea rutted against the same as any cow or ewe or sow, first by the male, then by the litter. This is how Medea is erased and does not become a king, no Hatshepsut.