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Chapters (53)
  1. COVER PAGE
  2. PRAISE
  3. ALSO BY
  4. AUTHOR BIO
  5. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  6. EPIGRAPHS
  7. 1
  8. 2
  9. 3
  10. 4
  11. 5
  12. 6
  13. 7
  14. 8
  15. 9
  16. 10
  17. 11
  18. 12
  19. 13
  20. 14
  21. 15
  22. 16
  23. 17
  24. 18
  25. 19
  26. 20
  27. 21
  28. 22
  29. 23
  30. 24
  31. 25
  32. 26
  33. 27
  34. 28
  35. 29
  36. 30
  37. 31
  38. BOOK TWO
  39. 1
  40. 2
  41. 3
  42. 4
  43. 5
  44. 6
  45. 7
  46. 8
  47. 9
  48. 10
  49. 11
  50. 12
  51. 13
  52. 14
  53. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Medea the one who would end a god and all his descendants and the day-lit world. She would do this. She knows this is true, that whatever binds other people to each other has no hold on her. She is bound only by elements, by water and air and earth and fire and blood. She will do what her father will not and what Jason will not. She should be queen with no king, a Hatshepsut.

Where the Argo might take her. Iolcus, Jason’s home, but who can say where else? Egypt, birthplace of the older gods, an older world. All ships drawn there to see the long echo of time.

But first they must outrun her father. It will be light soon, and nowhere to hide on this long open coast.

Jason, she calls. And when he comes, she turns away from her father, lies back in the remains of her brother, all the Argonauts watching. Skin lit by torchlight from far over the water, wandering, a luminescence that might originate in him or be only imagined. Eyes depthless, lit and black again. But his urgency is real, his heat. She pulls him close, binds him, mining his breath and heart. All else has been lost. This is what she has now. She will master this.

2

2

Night prolonged, Hekate hearing. Medea no longer a maiden, her blood mixed with her brother’s and dripping into the sea. She understands now that her father must be broken, every last part of him broken, all taken away, that the prophecy was about this, about the humbling of a king. Medea the destroyer of kings. She would have a world without them.

Her Minyae so proud of their golden fleece, a theft ordered by another king, Pelias, in Iolcus. But there are hundreds of golden fleeces, untanned hides sifting the heavy dust of gold from every mountain stream that feeds into the great valley of her home. Hung from trees to dry before the gold is beaten and shaken from them. Something witnessed and taken far away and told and retold until there was only one fleece, made itself of gold, and to take it is to take a king’s power.

Jason has hung it now from the lower yard, beneath the sail, and believes the ship will be faster. But his men will find gold dust on their shoulders and backs and will begin to find their outlines in starlight, and by the time they’ve reached Iolcus, the fleece will be only a sheep’s hide, with no gold left in it at all.