Enchanted Fire

by Roberta Gellis

  “She is a woman, and Gifted,” another man said slowly. “She might be a danger to us.”

  “No, I do not think so.” Idmon had been staring steadily at Eurydice. “She has a spell prepared, but it is for defense only and I think that is her way. I do not sense anger in her nor dishonesty. I would say take her.”

  “What,” Hylas exclaimed, “another Seer? For all the good you or Mopsus has been—”

  “If Hylas does not want her, I say we take her,” a superbly muscled but short man with curly dark hair shouted.

  Another, who looked exactly like the one who had just spoken, laughed. “I agree with Castor!” he exclaimed.

  “You always agree with Castor, Polydeuces,” the wet man who had called Eurydice a whore remarked.

  “That’s what twins are for, Ankaios,” Polydeuces said smugly. “And Castor always agrees with me. That way we have two votes instead of one for and one against, which results in nothing. I know you are a good steersman, but you have to know which way to go. If the girl has an idea to offer us, why not take it?”

  “She’s offered us nothing,” Ankaios replied.

  “So much will I offer,” Eurydice said. “The man who knows the way to Colchis lives to the east, past the Hellespont.”

  There was a silence, then Ankaios shrugged and remarked, “Well, we were going east anyhow. Since her advice will not change any plans, why not take her since Idmon says she is harmless, and—”

  “In fact, you must take her,” Idmon broke in suddenly. He turned to Jason. “You know I will not finish this voyage with you. I Saw that when I came aboard. Whether that is the reason or simply that I sense less and less as we travel away from my temple, I do not know. But this I See. She will do the ship and crew no harm and one aboard the Argo will need her and will be saved from death by her.”

  “So be it,” Jason said. “Every man in my crew is precious to me. If she will do the others no harm and save one, then the woman is welcome.” He turned to Orpheus. “Take her down to the ship and see if you can find some suitable garments for her.” Then he grinned. “Hylas’ chitons should fit her well.”

  A cry of outrage went up, and Hylas dashed past them down the trail to the ship. Orpheus laughed and when he came to her side, Eurydice said, “I had rather go naked, I think. Can you imagine having to listen to that voice all day, every day, complaining about his deprivation?”

  “Rather than that, I would go naked and give you every garment I have,” Orpheus replied as he led her down the rough path toward the ship. “But Jason was only jesting. There is a common chest from which those who damage their clothes can draw. Fortunately neither that nor the ordinary ship’s stores were taken when we went ashore at Lemnos, or most of us would have nothing but what we had on our backs when we escaped and nothing to eat.”

  “There are fish in plenty,” Eurydice said, “and game and roots and mushrooms. I had no weapons for taking the larger beasts, but I was not really starving.”

  “Fish?” Orpheus raised his brows. “We are not that hungry, nor likely to be. When the casks are full the crew will hunt. They planned to look for a town or village to ask directions.”

  He looked curiously at Eurydice when he said that, wondering if she would show concern. If she did, it was likely she had lied about herself or the people in the area. She looked back calmly, however, clearly indifferent to whether they would find anyone. Orpheus asked, “Do you know of any inhabitants?”

  “I do not think there are any settled places as you go down to where the land ends. There is a small village to the northeast.” She smiled at him. “I have not gone anywhere near it because I did not want them to know I existed, so I can’t say anything about the people.” She shrugged. “If they are like those of other small villages, however, you will find them both superstitious and ignorant.”

  Orpheus bit back an angry retort. He came from a small village, which he loved very much. Those people might be ignorant and superstitious, but they had other qualities—kindness, a willingness to share whatever little they had, a sense of responsibility for one’s fellows—that were far more important than a wide knowledge of the world. If Eurydice had never learned that, he thought, it was too bad.

  “I do not find village people so distasteful,” he said. “I come from a small village myself and the people there were very kind to me. From their own small resources, they hired a teacher for me when they understood I had a special skill in music.”

  Eurydice grinned. “I was born in a village too, and they had sense enough to send me off to the temple of the Goddess to be trained and educated. I was grateful for that, but it does not make them easier to talk to or less ignorant and superstitious.”

  To that truth, Orpheus could make no real reply, particularly because he felt an unseemly impulse to return her grin. During his last visit home, he had been sorely tried by the village elders, who persisted in giving him advice that was totally useless. The next moment, the impulse and the memory it stirred made him ashamed of himself, which made him angry at Eurydice. He uttered a kind of grunt and hurried her along down the path to the ship. He was finding Eurydice an uncomfortable responsibility.

  After rather stiffly introducing Eurydice to the men guarding the ship, Orpheus found her a cloak and a chiton in the common chest. When he returned to the group near the river, he reported what she had said to Jason. The last of the casks was just being set into a carrier to be returned to the ship, and Jason listened with interest.

  “I am almost inclined to believe her,” Jason said, “but it is not wise to take even the most reasonable statements from strangers on trust. And since we need to hunt anyway, we might just as well look around for ourselves.”

  Orpheus agreed without hesitation. Because he did not use a bow—to save his fingers from calluses in the wrong places—he joined the party of exploration headed for the village Eurydice had mentioned. There he was given a vivid exhibition of the truth of Eurydice’s remarks. The inhabitants of the village were, indeed, poor and incredibly ignorant. Not only did they look utterly blank and shake their heads when Ankaios asked about Colchis, but they did not seem to be very sure of the name of their own land, one giving it one name and another calling it something else. All they had in the village was fish—fresh, dried, and rotten. Someone remarked to Orpheus as they hurried away without really searching the place that the village had no walls. Gagging, Orpheus pointed out they needed none, nor any defense. Had not the stench driven the heroes of the Argo into flight?

  Though they ranged up the seacoast and some leagues inland, they found no other town or village nor any sign—like woodcutters’ trails—that there were other inhabitants. When the light started to fail, they broke off what was plainly a fruitless enterprise. And after the parties of men who had separated to hunt and explore all returned to the ship to share game and information, Orpheus learned that Eurydice had spoken the truth about the rest of the area as well as about the village and villagers—at least as far as the men had gone. There was no sign of inhabitants to the southwest; however, they had seen no sign of the land ending either.

  Orpheus found himself oddly irritated by this evidence of Eurydice’s honesty. On the one hand, he was pleased that his decision to bring her to Jason had been justified; on the other, her good faith demanded the same from him, which meant he was still burdened by his responsibility for her. She had been drawn by his music, after all, so he was bound to shield her from any danger that attraction brought upon her.

  Unfortunately, Orpheus was afraid she would not be easy to protect or even grateful for his efforts. She had not hesitated in stating what assurances she wanted from Jason; a properly behaved female would have waited for him to speak for her. And there was a boldness in her great, dark eyes, which she never lowered as a modest woman should, and a kind of confidence in her unbowed head and straight back that set his teeth on edge. Still, much about her cried out for protection: she was so small and looked so fragile; her movements we
re so light and quick, like a little bird’s; and she had been badly treated, cast out by her own people.

  When they gathered around the fires for their evening meal, most of Orpheus’ doubts were dissipated—at least for the moment. Eurydice made her way to his side, avoiding the eyes of the other men. She was clean and fresh and modestly garbed, the man’s chiton he had found being long enough to reach her ankles, and the cloak covering her bare arms and shoulders. He took her to Jason, who greeted her pleasantly after invoking and sacrificing to the gods, and who nodded kindly when she asked if she might pour a libation to her Goddess. Plainly Jason was well pleased by the confirmation of the facts Eurydice had been willing to share. Probably, he was hoping she really did know of someone who could direct them to Colchis. If so, his quest would have taken a giant leap forward. Orpheus almost grinned when Jason apologized to her for having to join the men for their meal and gestured her to a seat nearby, but his amusement over the smooth way Jason was trying to keep their informant both close and satisfied evaporated immediately.

  “You need not apologize to me,” Eurydice said, smiling brilliantly. “Thracian women do not eat apart from their men.”

  It was only a small setback, because after that she devoted herself to her meal, speaking softly only to him and comparing with him the experience of being a student of music and traveling around the courts in Greece and of being a student in the temple and learning from tales and tablets and scrolls of parchment. Both were enjoying themselves until Jason rose and declared that, the water casks being full and fresh meat sufficient for several days wrapped and hung, they would sail east in the morning.

  “East?” Eurydice exclaimed, also rising to her feet. “But I thought you wished to travel through the Hellespont.”

  Everyone turned to look at her. Orpheus gasped with mortification and pulled at her cloak, and to his rage and horror she slapped his hand away.

  Looking affronted, Jason said, “So we do.”

  “Well, you will never reach the Hellespont by sailing east,” Eurydice said. “You must sail first west and then south until you go around the southern tip of the Chersonesus before you can sail east into the Hellespont.”

  “Nonsense,” Tiphys, the chief steersman, said angrily. “We sailed east from Lemnos, and east of Lemnos is Troas.”

  “I do not know where Lemnos is, so I cannot argue with you about that,” Eurydice answered sharply. “I know that the southern coast of the Hellespont is, indeed, Troas, but I also know the ground on which my feet are set and I tell you, if you sail east from here, you will come to the coast of Thrace, which will force you to turn north and then west toward Macedon.”

  “You have been to sea?” Tiphys countered, sneering slightly. “You have sailed this route?”

  “One does not have to sail a ship to know the land on which one stands,” Eurydice snapped back. “In any case, if you had come ashore on Troas, you would have to sail north to reach the Hellespont. This land is not Troas.”

  “Why not?” Hylas piped up, laughing.

  The question was so idiotic that Eurydice’s mouth opened and closed without a sound.

  Others laughed, too, despite the general distaste for Hylas. The idea of a woman telling Tiphys, who had brought them across the open sea—out of sight of land—to a safe shore, how to steer was so ridiculous that even Hylas’ silliness was supported.

  With a superior smile, Hylas continued, “What can a house-bound woman know? She hears a man say, ‘This is Chersonesus,’ and Chersonesus it is to her. Perhaps this small place is called Chersonesus. What matter?”

  By then Eurydice had got her mouth closed. Her gaze flicked to Orpheus, but he sat silent, and her eyes lit with fury. She had just finished telling him, while they ate, of her education in the temple of the Goddess. He knew she was no house-bound woman, no uneducated fool. Why would he not speak out and say so? Apparently, he was not the man she thought he was when he seemed to confront Jason to support her. Drawing breath, she turned to look at Jason.

  “I have warned you,” she said. “I am in no hurry, so it is no matter to me which way you sail. Just do not blame me the day after tomorrow when the evening sun shines into your eyes as you sail ‘east’ toward the Hellespont.”

  Jason looked across the fire at the two Seers who sat together. “Well?” he asked. “The woman has been right about everything she said—not that she said much—so far. Is she right about being unable to reach the Hellespont by sailing east? Is it possible that some wind or current drove us farther north than we believed?”

  Tiphys frowned at that. It had been as much the shock he felt at a woman speaking up so boldly as any certainty of their landfall that had caused his protest. The Hellespont, he knew was a narrow passage. If they had somehow sailed into it, he should be able to see land to the north—and there was none. Moreover, it was true that the route to the Hellespont along the coast of Troas was north. He was beginning to be sorry he had raised his voice against Eurydice.

  Mopsus shook his head at Jason. “I feel land ahead, but whether that is a league ahead, ten leagues ahead, or the mountains at the far end of the world, I cannot tell you. It is not my art, Jason. I can look at a man and say he will win renown, or die unknown, or even sometimes that he will succeed in what he strives for tomorrow, but I cannot point you in the direction of Colchis and say what kind of land you must overpass to reach it.”

  “Have you tried to read this woman, Mopsus.”

  “Of course, but I have discovered nothing you do not already know. I do not sense hate or spite in her—only a little contempt, which might mean that she is more powerful than she claims. Also, there is a feel of truth about her, and equally a feel of hidden things, which might be only what she admitted she is hiding—the name and place of residence of the one who knows the way to Colchis—or might be deep spells overlaid with spells of concealment.”

  Jason glanced down at Eurydice, but the firelight was too uncertain to let him read behind the open expression. She seemed mildly amused, but the half lidded eyes and slightly curved lips hid her considerable shock. Eurydice had not expected so clear and accurate a reading from Mopsus. That he could sense magic so well was an additional danger.

  She hastily pushed those thoughts aside, feeling the silence growing too long while Jason looked at her. Raising her eyes to Jason she made herself sigh in a long-suffering way. “I never saw any of you before in my life. I never heard of any of you before. I have no reason to feel anything other than gratitude to you for helping me escape those who fear me for no reason. I do not even know why you wish to go to Colchis—and I do not care. If I had deep spells of such danger that they needed to be overlaid with concealments, I ask again, why do I need to hide and escape my pursuers and why have I bothered to beg you to help me instead of demanding that you do so? What profit could I gain from delaying you or sending you to sail in the wrong direction? Since I am going with you, could you not soon revenge yourselves on me if I gave bad advice?”

  “Certainly you might gain from misdirecting us,” Jason retorted. “You could be sending us off to a place where pirates would meet us or could delay us so they will have time to gather and attack us when we are forced to retrace our route.”

  “And coming with you to be slaughtered?” Eurydice replied, sighing again. “That would make sense only if I were staying ashore.”

  “That’s true enough, Jason,” Castor said. Then he asked Eurydice, “How far is it to the end of the land where it turns toward the Hellespont, if we sailed west as you suggested?”

  “Two days’ walk,” she replied. “Less, really. It took me two days to reach this place from there, but I spent some time gathering food and resting. I was not in any hurry. Once I came to the end of the land and knew I could go no farther and could not escape that way, I had only the choice of returning and being taken by my enemies if I could not find a way past them.”

  “Ten leagues, then?” Polydeuces suggested. When Eurydice first shrugged
and then nodded, he said to Jason, “That is less than a full day’s sail. She knew about the village and she knew the land is empty to the southwest, so her claim to traveling around is likely true. And this will be a good test. If we find the Hellespont by the day after tomorrow, Eurydice can stay; if not, we can put her ashore—”

  “Oh, no, you will not wish to do that,” Eurydice interrupted, laughing. “Remember those pirates that Lord Jason expects to fall upon you on your return. Surely you will wish to keep me aboard so you can slit my throat when they appear and threaten you.”

  Orpheus lifted his head. The movement drew her eyes and she saw his affronted stare. Eurydice shrugged again, but she fell silent, recalling she had thought, when she first met the men by the river, that it would be unwise to antagonize Jason. Orpheus’ expression was a warning. She had been stupid to show her contempt, and she had better find a way to apologize that would not merely exacerbate what she had said. Fortunately, Idmon saved her again by suddenly rising and holding out his hand.

  “You will not put her ashore,” he said. “She will be with the Argo still when you reach Colchis. So much I Saw when she first came to us at the riverbank. Nor do I feel any immediate threat of battle. I cannot See the path we should follow, but does it not seem reasonable to you, if I have Seen her at Colchis, that we take her advice about the direction?”

  “But to sail west when we have been going east all along does not seem reasonable,” Tiphys murmured querulously.

  “It is as much south as west,” Eurydice suggested in a much softer, placating voice.