Hours of this, Medea on the stern where her brother’s remains have fused to the wood, dried and shrunken and infested with white maggots. Most of him still here, almost enough to fashion a man. Missing a thigh, a forearm, a head, but the rest intact.

The deck too hot to touch. They must stay exactly where they are and not move, each on an island of wood cooled by sweat. The breeze uncertain, in puffs from one direction then another, in back eddies, and they feel its heat when it comes from land.

Helios high overhead when they finally pull up the anchor stone, four of them, wet rope darkening the deck. Others have already begun rowing, turning the bow toward sea.

The boat a heavy weight dragging, water swirling from the oars without effect. Slow lumbering creature filled with rock. The distance to Iolcus unknown and unbearable.

Jason a stranger, standing just before her on deck but distant, commanding the helmsmen to stay close to shore, crawling along the headland toward the point. The sea divided, darker line for wind and wave, the storm died down but not yet gone.

The altar on shore, remaining for all to see. Great blackened fire pits. But soon enough, the goatherds will tear everything apart, rebuild their huts. So the next altar will be of stone. When they arrive in Iolcus, Jason will build an altar to Hekate in marble, and a temple larger than any other. No other god will come before Hekate, no other priestess before Medea.

The headland extending, but finally they reach the edge and feel the wind. The men soaked in sweat and cooling now, a welcome breeze. Waves buried and sucked into dark rock and shredded into white. The boat pitches and rolls.

The men row hard, waves driving them back, the point remaining beside for too long, but they do finally clear and Medea watches the headland recede, searches the sea for any sign of her father’s ship. His golden mask and spear and shield. She imagines he could appear over the water without any ship at all, standing just above the waves, coming closer, unstoppable. Eyes visible behind that mask, gray and cold.

Creaking of the hull beneath her, bent and shuddering, and for all its weight it feels fragile, bowed and ready to snap. They will find only waves below their feet, and they will not be like her father. They will sink down, no sign left, and her father will search forever until he becomes a god. Gods made of any action unresolved. Her grandfather in his chariot. Hekate in wind and fire. The sea god in waves. Nute swallowing without end and always giving birth again. Her father searching for the pieces of his son. The fear they have for Medea must also be without end.