Enchanted Fire

by Roberta Gellis

  The men who had hurried down the ladder were all behind and beside the ship. Heracles held center position with his shoulder under the keel. Orpheus sang out again, “Make ready. On the count.”

  Eurydice looked over her shoulder. Those still aboard, except Orpheus and Jason, were amidship, near the stepping for the mast.

  “Now let us heave!” Orpheus sang.

  On the last word, those amidship all ran forward into the prow. On the same word, those at the stern lifted and pushed. The Argo slid forward with an audible grating. Had she been the size of a normal ship, Eurydice was certain she would have been well afloat. As it was, Orpheus sang out again.

  “The black ship from!”

  And again.

  “The pebb’ly strand!”

  And Argo was in the water, rocking in the swell. Those who had rushed to the prow to help tip the stern upward, now hurried to places well apart from each other at the long oars and dipped them, pulling or backing, to hold the ship steady while the men who had pushed from the stern splashed to the ladder and climbed hurriedly up. Eurydice shrank back into her corner as they streamed past her, shouting and jesting in their usual fashion about who had pushed hardest and who had fallen face down into the water when the ship launched itself away from them.

  Each had his accustomed place, however, and the laughter and jests in no way diminished their speed in finding those places. Eurydice was amazed at how swiftly they were all seated, alternately one man below and closer to the wide gangway that ran the length of the ship, one above and nearer the side of the ship. The oars were stepped also, one higher one lower, but even so, Eurydice could not see how they would not strike and foul each other.

  Across from her, Tiphys was cautiously lowering the great steering sweep into water, and Orpheus came hurrying back, pulling from his breast a beautiful flute. On this, he sounded four lilting notes, the first three quick and light, the fourth louder and long. The men all lifted their heads to watch him, hands fast on their oars. On the fifth note a roar of voices rang out.

  Free the black ship

  From her te-ther

  Soon the green land

  Falls far be-hind.

  On the first two words, every man raised his oar and leaned forward, on the third, every oar dipped smoothly into the water, and on the long last word, the men pulled back in perfect time. No oar touched any other, none lingered in the water longer than any other to drag against the forward movement. Eurydice turned her head and watched wide-eyed as the shore did, indeed, fall swiftly behind and her short hair stirred in the breeze created by their rapid forward movement. The flute, high and sweet, could be easily heard above the rough chorus and kept the time as the men chanted verse after verse, not great poetry perhaps, but perfectly suited to its subject and its purpose.

  Jason and another man stood in the prow scanning the sea as far as it could be seen and looking into the water for rocks and bars. Once the man beside Jason cried a warning, and Tiphys altered the angle of the steering sweep, grunting against the kick of the rudder bar.

  They passed the arms of land embracing the cove far sooner than Eurydice expected. The motion of the water became stronger but slower. The tempo of the flute altered, and with it, that of the chorus and the dip and pull of the oars. Tiphys glanced at the southwestern headland as often as he glanced at Jason, who was still scanning the sea in all directions.

  Suddenly Eurydice shivered. Jason was looking for sails. Not many ships plied these waters, as most traders chose to pass through the Hellespont where towns were scattered on both the north and south shores. A few, though, did seek the cities of Cobrys or Lysiimachia for the timber and other produce of Thrace. If Jason saw a ship, would he order her killed or thrown overboard before he even discovered whether it was a pirate or a trader? She looked too, murmuring a simple spell for enhancing the sight even though she had no idea what a distant ship would look like.

  Jason bawled an order that she was too frightened to understand. Eurydice bit her lip to keep from crying out, but no one looked toward her. Then she heard the creak of wood against wood as a dozen men drew in their oars. She stood frozen, gripping the rail behind her. A dozen men? It could not take a dozen men to subdue her. And Orpheus was playing his flute without even a glance in her direction. Surely they had come to an understanding. Surely he would say a word in her defense! In the next instant she was biting her lip again, this time in shame. Five of the men were bent over, struggling to remove a large post, full four or five men’s heights, from beneath the central gangway. Even Eurydice’s suspicious and fearful mind could not believe that a ram of that size needed to be used against her.

  She saw then that two others were fixing tackle to the top of the post and realized that they were preparing to raise the mast. The base was fitted into the hole and three men began to lift it while five others hauled on ropes. It settled into place with a thud, with Heracles alone holding the rope at the prow to steady it. The ropes were then fixed to the stern-post behind Tiphys and to other hooks, and the forward rope was tied to the post that held the figurehead at the prow. The yard holding the reefed sail was brought forth, fixed to the ropes that dangled from the tackle at the mast head, and hauled up. A few men fastened more lines here and there about the ship to steady the yard, while all the time the rowers pulled at the oars in time to their chanting to keep the prow slicing through the waves.

  Eurydice did not see how the fastenings that held the sail furled were loosened, but suddenly it began to slide down, kept from flapping free on one side by the astounding strength of Heracles and on the other by three lesser men. Those lines also were made fast. Once more Jason called an order. The sound of the flute and of the men’s voices stopped abruptly. The oars remained suspended above the water. Eurydice drew a deep breath. In the comparative silence, the swift motion of the ship between the blue waters below and the blue sky above felt like flying.

  Few were aware of Eurydice’s sensation. Most of the men were too accustomed to the effect. They heard the sound of the wind, the ropes creaking, the waves slapping the side of the ship, the sound of the oars being drawn in, their companions groaning and stretching after their stint of hard labor. Orpheus slapped his flute gently against his hand, glancing sidelong at Eurydice, but she did not move, staring straight ahead. He shrugged and tucked the flute away into a pocket in the case of the cithara before he also stretched and shook his hands. Still, Eurydice seemed frozen and he sighed and stepped closer to her.

  “I wonder why it is more tiring to play the same notes over and over than to play a very complex melody,” he said, smiling.

  She turned toward him slowly, almost reluctantly, and when she looked up, her eyes were glowing like black pearls. “When they let down the sail,” she breathed, “it was like setting a bird free.”

  Orpheus blinked. He had twice sensed a kind of rigidity and shortened breathing in Eurydice, which he had thought betokened fear. Naturally, he could not break off playing. The rhythm of the flute was essential to the safety of the ship. Without his lead, the men’s chanting would grow ragged and oars would soon clash. She would not know that yet, and he had not had time to tell her, so she might have expected his attentions sooner. He had expected to have to soothe her, and to make everything seem more ordinary, he had spoken the most mundane words that came to him. Apparently she had not even heard his remark. What he had read as terror was delight.

  He was aware of an odd dichotomy of emotion…again. With Eurydice he was never certain of what he felt. Partly he was relieved that he would not be responsible for caring for a sick and hysterical woman. He had had that unpleasant experience when he had been asked (because he had traveled widely and would know best how to protect her) to escort a village girl to the great shrine at Eleusis to be consecrated to the goddess Demeter. The girl had been no trouble at all on the rough overland journey to Heraclea, patiently enduring every hardship, silent and obedient to any order he gave. But from the moment they had bo
arded the ship, which he had thought would be the easiest and most pleasant part of the trip, she wailed and wept and whined without intermission during the smoothest passages and screamed senselessly each time the water became the least bit rough. So, on the one hand, Orpheus was very glad that Eurydice was enjoying herself, but on the other, he hoped she was not going to start again giving Jason or Tiphys instructions.

  “Have you been sailing before?” he asked, touching her arm to draw her attention back from the billowing sail and the sea, to which it had returned.

  “No,” she replied, lifting her shining eyes to him more readily this time. “I come from a village near Aprus in the mountains. When I was in Lysamachia, I saw ships—though none so large or beautiful as the Argo.” She sighed with pleasure, but as she turned to look forward again, her foot caught on the blankets. “Oh,” she said, looking down, “I am sorry I did not bring the blankets back where they belonged, but with the men running about I was afraid I would get in the way.”

  “You need not apologize, that was wise,” Orpheus replied. “There is much to be done when the ship is getting under way. In a little while, everyone will settle down. I’ll stow the blankets later. With the sea so calm they will come to no harm here and will make a comfortable place to sit.”

  Although she did not immediately seat herself upon hearing his hint, as a village girl would have done, neither did she make any inappropriate move. For a time, she continued to stand and stare at the sail, at the waves, and out at the sea around them. Orpheus watched her, not knowing whether to warn her not to look at the waves lest the movement make her sick, or to say nothing and hope that if he did not suggest sickness she would not be afflicted. He had never been subject to the nausea that overcame some on the sea, sometimes even experienced sailors, and an Athenian witch had once told him that the Gifted were rarely troubled.

  After awhile, however, Eurydice sighed and sank down beside him on the blankets. “It is so beautiful,” she said. “I can almost imagine what it might be to fly.” Then she frowned. “But I am afraid…”

  “There is nothing to be afraid of,” Orpheus soothed. “You need not fear rocks so far out, and anyway Lynkeus is the best lookout there is. I swear his eyes are so keen he can see to the horizon and also beneath the waves.”

  Eurydice seemed a little surprised by his remark, but she only said, “Lynkeus is the man who stands with Jason?”

  “Yes.”

  Orpheus wondered what had surprised her. Whatever it was had passed. Her attention fixed now on Lynkeus, at whom she stared for a while, her nostrils flaring, almost as if she were sniffing. It was an odd gesture, particularly because it would be impossible to pick out any one man’s scent in the breeze that blew by them. Then she shook her head and smiled at Orpheus.

  “Probably he is Gifted,” she said. “Many aboard this ship are Gifted. I did not realize that.”

  “Nor did I,” Orpheus said doubtfully. “How can you tell?”

  She shrugged. “I am not sure, but I think just as Idmon and Mopsus could tell about me. Usually one of us knows another. But most of the men are fortunate in that their Gift is of one kind only, like Lynkeus, who can see what others cannot, or like you, whose Gift is tied to his music, which is already so wonderful that most folk do not notice the magic and fear it when you do use it. For me, it is worse. I have no special skill, except to be able to channel Power to spells. This makes the common folk fear me.”

  “Mostly they fear what they do not understand. But among us there is nothing to fear, neither from the crew or from the sea.”

  Eurydice decided not to ask whether that would be true if another ship were sighted lest Orpheus believe she expected to see one. Still, her anxiety over that possibility spoiled her pleasure in watching the ship fly through the water. More to distract herself than for any other reason, she said, “I told you that I did not care why Jason wished to go to Colchis, and in a way that is true, but I cannot help but be curious. If he would not mind my knowing…”

  “Oh, no, it is no secret. Everyone on the ship knows. But it is a rather long story:”

  “Well, we have plenty of time.” Eurydice smiled.

  Orpheus laughed. “I suspect before I am done you will be sorry you asked. However, you can stop me whenever you like.” He leaned back, took a breath, and in a soft, but “singing” voice began: “Kreutheus, king of Yolcos in Thessaly, had a son, Aison, and a stepson, Pelias, the latter by his wife Tyro’s liaison with Poseidon before she and Kreutheus married. In the fullness of time, Kreutheus died and Aison succeeded to the throne. He then married Alcimede, and to them Jason was born. But Aison died when Jason was barely a few months old, and Pelias took the throne. Alcimede did not trust Pelias—”

  Almost hypnotized, Eurydice jerked herself to full awareness, shook her head, and said sharply, “If Alcimede had not been kept ignorant and house-bound, she could have ruled in her son’s name until he was old enough. Once Pelias was on the throne, Alcimede was wise not to trust him. A true heir a few months old could too easily be swept away by some childish illness—and his mother with him.”

  “There are honorable men in the world, Eurydice,” Orpheus snapped in turn. “In fact, it seems possible that Pelias is such a one.”

  “That would be strange in Poseidon’s son,” Eurydice said, but less aggressively. “The sons of gods are usually too driven to prove their semi-divinity to be bound by honor or anything else.”

  She knew Orpheus was not trying to enchant her to bend her to his will; it was just his habit to use that voice of his when he told a story. She must fight the influence, nonetheless, or she would end up as docile as a cow. Perhaps if she kept breaking into the hypnotic flow of his voice, she would stay safe. Orpheus had frowned, as if her remark had come too close to the truth, and he did not like it. Eurydice smothered a smile. Honest, he was, particularly about his own faults and failings, but he was certainly also fond of draping a stinking corpse in flowers and pretending it was not there.

  Mischievously, she asked, “Was Pelias really Poseidon’s son?”

  “That is what Tyro said.” Orpheus’ lips twitched. “A son may know his mother, but he must take her word as to the name of his father—and that is a very good reason why women should be house-bound and watched.”

  “Nonsense! All that does is teach a woman to be sly. A man whose wife is a free woman who has bound herself to him by her own choice can be very sure without watch and ward that all his children are his own. Never mind that. We will never agree. Do you think Poseidon was Pelias’ father?”

  “I could not venture a guess. I have never met any of these people. So far as know, Poseidon has given no sign of interest in Pelias—but Poseidon is said to have fathered many children and has shown little affection for any of them. Why are you so interested in Pelias’ and Poseidon’s relationship?”

  “Because if Poseidon is Pelias’ father and wishes to favor his son’s continued rule of Yolcos, the sea is not a particularly safe place to be.”

  Orpheus stared at her, then nodded. “A sensible thought, but late in the game. We have already voyaged from Pagasai to Lemnos and from Lemnos here without suffering unusual storms or monsters. I do not think you can count our virtual imprisonment by the women of Lemnos as a hazard Poseidon set for us. Of course, Athena herself blessed the ship. I saw that myself.” He shuddered slightly. “I do not think even Poseidon would cross that Lady.”

  Eurydice smiled. “Good. That is one less thing to worry about. Plainly since Jason is here, Alcimede’s plan to keep him safe succeeded.”

  “Certainly, but it seems she need not have been so suspicious. Like a woman, she had never forgotten her spite against Pelias, so when she knew she was dying, Alcimede bound Jason to go to Yolcos and take back his father’s throne.”

  With raised brows Eurydice said, “Just like that? I begin to think you may be right about Jason’s mother. She does not seem to have had a brain in her head. Did it not occur to her that after al
l the effort she spent to protect Jason, she might be thrusting him into danger by sending him off all alone to wrest a throne from a king—unless…is Pelias a cruel and unjust king?”

  “Not at all. In fact, Jason says the country is well ruled and all the folk, even those in the countryside, speak well of Pelias, calling him just and wise.”

  “I do not envy Jason his task in overthrowing such a monarch.”

  “That is the whole point of what I was saying about Alcimede being foolish, to which you would not listen. When Jason arrived at the court of Yolcos, Pelias welcomed him very warmly. He acknowledged Jason’s right and bewailed the fact that Alcimede had taken him away so that he had had no opportunity to teach Jason how to rule. Then he offered to call together a council of the nobles and present Jason to them.”

  “Hmmm.” Eurydice’s eyes narrowed. “Now I am rethinking my opinion. Perhaps Alcimede was not a fool. A man who has ruled well for—what?—twenty years who welcomes the young man who will push him off the throne…I don’t know. Power…” She ran the tip of her tongue between her lips. “It is very hard to give up power even if you never allowed yourself to misuse it.”

  For a moment Orpheus did not reply. Then he said stiffly, “It is unjust to think ill of a man because he does what is right.”

  “So you agree with me.” Eurydice laughed.

  “I did not agree with you,” Orpheus said heatedly. “I said just the opposite, that one must think well of someone who does right.”

  “I know what you said.” Eurydice made a little moue of impatience. “I was only speaking of your obvious doubts.”

  “Why should you say I have doubts? I told you—”

  “Or-phe-us…” Eurydice drew out the word with pained patience. “If Pelias was so eager to step down for Jason, tell me what Jason is doing on this ship, in the middle of the ocean, heading for Colchis instead of Yolcos?”