Rough fingers with their own life, feeling what pulls at the line, testing the weight and making shape out of darkness, corollary forms. A mind dedicated to darkness, like her own.

When the net rises again, the basket has narrowed and come alive, molten spray as fish hit the back end, flap of tails and fins trying to leap free. If day were to come now, early, each form would be cast and frozen forever, curl of a spine and fin ribboned and water hanging above solid, immutable.

The fisherman tilts his head to the side as if listening. A still point. Gauging weight and balance. He hauls in quickly, muscles corded and bare and purplish, the light changing rapidly, no longer silver but bruised and dark, the sea made of flesh. Hauling in with quick strokes, perched on the edge and perfectly balanced, always upright, bearded and mute and rapt and trolling the great pools below. Thief and priest.

Ancient art. From time before telling, one of the first arts, older than her own. She puts her hand on his shoulder as he pulls, feels the ripple beneath the surface, and he does not pause. He is beyond reach.

The net rising now, stones clattering at the bulwark, and he grabs as if it were a throat, brings it closer and stands to haul upward, steps back quickly until all is on deck beside Medea, flash of scales blood silver and panicked, twisting, a dozen braids of light each pulsing on its own, mouths gasping and sliding away, loose pouch collapsing.

The fisherman kneels beside her again, his knife a dark shadow moving quickly. Each fish chopped and torn, entrails flung into the sea, scales scraped and gathering in great constellations among her brother’s remains. Dusted with stars that come from blood and salt and all that is hidden and unknown. This is better than anything she could have imagined, perfect burial for a prince.

Joined, she says. You are a weaver.

But he slits and flings and chops and scrapes and pays no attention to her, lost in movement and the echo of that movement.

11

11

Endless night and endless day and night again, and no sign of her father, no other ship on this black water. World without light. No other humans, no gods. Only the unstill boat, sleep an impossibility, and the fickle wind, sliding along every edge of the world.

Blowing from the side now, enough breeze to sail, yards twisted, hanging over bow and stern, everything tipped, bulwarks dipping dangerously close to the waves. The crew gathered on the uphill side for weight, oars shipped. A time to rest, but fear of drowning prevents that. And fear of land, how close, and whether they might be blown onto it. Invisible in this night. A greater darkness somewhere down low, but with each blink the horizon changes and tilts and shadows reverse and no reference.