The earth beneath her solid, unmoving, air close and heavy, everything slowing, a kind of burial. And how many years to be buried alive before being buried below? How many days? Time most frightening of all.

In the morning they are kicked awake and dragged by guards into the stone street before the citadel. Hot sun, hot stone. Pelias descending the wide steps from his terrace above, wearing the hide of a bull, two attendants behind carrying the great horns, yellowed bone heavy and smooth and curled and cruel even beyond death.

Pelias never known, always changing shape, born and reborn from somewhere beyond those massive stones. Spearmen always on every side, all alike and hidden behind helmets, become something other than human.

A crowd gathered, everyone pressing closer to see, and Jason and Medea at the center, held in place.

Iolcans, Pelias says, raising one arm. Jason and Medea would like to be married, so I have come to join them. Slaves who may not be parted.

His men bring heavy wet rope from the Argo, and Medea is pressed close against Jason, embracing him as the rope is wound from their calves upward, pulled tight with each turn, digging in. The two of them crushed against each other barely able to breathe.

The last tie cinched around her head, pressing her face into his neck. Some pose of affection enforced. Medea sucking a bit of air from the side of her mouth.

Pelias’ men step away, she and Jason left to stand on their own in the sun.

I have welcomed my nephew home, Pelias says, and his young wife. I wish them every happiness.

Sandals on stone as he leaves with all his men, and the sounds of the crowd around them, the sun hotter and hotter, without mercy. Sweat from Jason’s neck running into her eyes, stinging. She can’t see or breathe.

The two of them a great weight up high being pulled off center, their legs farther and farther away below, shrinking, a base diminishing. Moments of laughter from the crowd, but most have left before long, only the stones remaining, a hundred smaller suns to match her grandfather above, able finally to punish, hanging directly overhead and pulling back the reins, holding in place, letting all burn.

All the same man: Helios, Aeetes, Pelias. Relentless, unforgiving, erasing all else, and this erasure must be fought. Medea will not fall. She wills herself and Jason upright, swinging above these burning stones, hands and arms and feet going numb, losing circulation. The ropes, tied wet, cinch tighter now as they dry. Practiced cruelty, torture. Her body and Jason’s ground together, bone against bone. Creaking of lines around them, moored to the empty air. Feet becoming stumps, tiny spikes of feeling in otherwise dead slabs.