Authalides. Nestor, Honey-Voiced, rode in this morning. He will be very valuable - he can talk his way out of anything. Hermes gave him the gift of persuasion. My cousin Admetos is on his way, they say, and I think Akastos, the king's son, yearns for our adventure, though his father will never let him go. Meleagros and Perithous are coming, both strong rowers.'
I wrestled the basket onto the edge of the landing stage and leaned on it, out of breath. 'I don't know any of these people,' I objected. 'How many crewmen have you now?'
'I still need six more - no, five. Idmon the seer has agreed to come with us. Oh, Nauplios, don't look so worried!'
'I'm not worried, I'm out of breath,' I lied. 'Who's expected?'
'Alabande, he's a friend of Ancaeas, a quiet man, they say, but strong. Poseidon Earth-shaker! Who is that?'
I shaded my eyes. A slim girl dressed in a short tunic clasped at the neck with a bronze brooch in the shape of a bear was walking through the market with the confident, long-legged grace of a deer. She bore a bow and a quiver. She had a rolled cloak at her back and, unlike any but the boldest Achaean women, looked every man she saw in the face. She seemed to be asking questions.
'She's looking for me,' declared Jason hopefully, springing onto the landing stage and running into the centre of the square. I followed him, dragging my shells into a safe place, and we stopped in front of the girl and stared.
She was beautiful, but not desirable - by which I mean it seemed wrong to think of her as a woman, as she patently didn't. She had breasts, but she paid no attention to them… I am not explaining this well. All I can say is that Atalante the Hunter, favoured of Artemis, suckled by a she-bear and raised by the priestesses at Brauron, was no more a woman than I am. She was a virgin and a comrade.
She became one as soon as she grinned at Jason and me and said in her husky voice, 'I am Atalante of Calydon, and I wish to join the quest for the Golden Fleece. I can row and sail, and I can mostly hit a target with an arrow.'
I stared at her chest. Under the bear-brooch, she wore only one ornament. It was a necklace made of amber beads, strung with two boar's tusks. It must have been a gigantic boar. The one which had nearly killed me had tusks about a span long. This monster had borne armament fully the span of both my hands. The tusks had been polished and gleamed like ivory, extending from Atalante's corded, muscular throat to her nipples. I had heard of the hunt of Calydon. Atalante's arrow had killed that boar. Her knife had cut its throat. I was full of admiration.
So was Jason. He held out his hand, palm slapped, then Atalante the Hunter exchanged the kiss of brotherhood with Jason and with me. We sat down and bought some wine and watched the ships coming in.
It was darkening. I heard the thud of wooden mallets from the shore, where Argos swore at his men who cut thousands of pegs which would be hammered into the planks of the ship. She was going to be beautiful, our ship. She was narrow, with a high poop and stern, as yet undecorated. The woodcarver - heedless of the insults flying around from the shipwrights, whose language would have curled Poseidon's hair - was chiselling out a bow-post for the ship, though I could not yet see what it was meant to be. A bull, perhaps, for Iolkos and Earth-shaker?
Two men and four boys were stitching together our sail, patterned red and white as is the custom of Iolkos, from long strips of dense, perfect weaving. My mother had given me one length of bright red cloth, which she had been keeping for my wedding. I believed that she feared I would not return to be married to any fisherman's daughter.
'Have you the twenty-four?' asked Atalante, accepting a cup of wine and swallowing it in a gulp. She poured herself another.
I was fascinated with her. She looked female - her face would have been girlish if she had been a boy, but for a girl it was boyish. She had brown eyes and a complexion much damaged by the weather, not like any woman I had seen. She was a puzzle too complex for one of Dictys' sons to solve, so I sipped at my wine and watched the road.
We heard someone playing a stringed instrument. It was a sweet, trilling note, often repeated, as though the player was working on composing a tune. Without any announcement a man came into the market, head bent over his lyre, navigated his way to the tavern apparently by feel, and sat down with his back to us.
He was outlandish. His hair, instead of being of human colour, was as red as new copper wire. It curled over his forehead and flowed down his back, parting over his broad shoulders. He wore a green tunic, completely without decoration even in the weave, and there were no bracers on his wrists or rings on his fingers. He was utterly absorbed in his music. The tortoiseshell soundbox rested on his knee. One hand damped the strings from behind, the other plucked them from in front. His fingers were long and strong, the nails as hard as horn. I noticed that his well-shaped feet were bare as a beggar's, and he was as stained with travel as any farmer. But the music which he drew from the lyre had silenced all conversation in the market, and the people stopped packing up for the night and drew close, intent on the pure, plangent notes.
Atalante said, 'Stranger, your music is most welcome, but speak to us. Who delights Iolkos with such music?'
He lifted his head and smiled. 'Lady,' he said in reply. 'I am Philammon the bard, and I seek Jason, son of Aison, for I am ordered by my master to join this quest.'
'I am Jason,' said my lord eagerly, 'Greetings, Philammon. Who is your lord?'
'Ammon Apollo, of course, and through him Orpheus.' His voice was an instrument as thrilling in its way as his lyre. It was impossible not to listen to the voice of Philammon the bard, given the gift of song by Orpheus, the sweet singer. His smile was sweet, holding power.
I remembered that the cult of Orpheus had followers all over the Aegean - a religion of great mystery. I was about to offer him a cup of wine when Atalante said, 'I know that you may not drink wine or eat flesh, Philammon, but we have here spring water and wheat bread. Will you eat with us?'
He stared at each of us in turn. When his eyes met mine I felt that he knew all about me. It was most unpleasant. He held us all with his eyes - even Jason wriggled under his cool regard - then smiled again, picked up a flat loaf of bread, and broke it in four pieces.
'I will eat with you,' he said.
It was quite dark when we had finished our meal. The torches had been lit outside Pelias' palace. We could hear the sound of heroes feasting inside, the barking of their hunting dogs and occasional smash of crockery. Argos had taken his son Melas and one to his own house. The light caught the ribs of the uncompleted ship, which looked uncomfortably like bones.
But since the coming of Philammon my mood had improved. Just to be in his company was comfortable. He knew all about me. And he still liked me.
The market-place was silent, the road empty. Then I heard the sound of weary footsteps. A heavy tread, and light feet pattering on ahead.
'Here, my lord,' said a boy into the darkness. 'This must be the town.'
'Is this Iolkos?' asked a quiet voice.'
I called, 'This is Iolkos. Come and have some wine, if you come in peace.'
'I come in peace,' agreed the man, and he and his companion walked to our table across the empty market. The boy dropped a bundle of cloaks and cooking pots with a clatter and threw himself down next to Atalante, who clipped amiably at his ears for shoving.
The man sat down heavily and removed one boot, looking mournfully at a hole in the sole. He wiggled one finger through it, then dropped it and took the offered wine cup, draining it at one draught. He laid a silver piece on the table, and refilled his cup.
He was ragged and dusty and old. His tangled grey hair was receding away from a lined brow, and there was a bunch of blue flowers behind his ear. He had bright grey eyes, shaggy eyebrows, and some sort of cured skin over his shoulders. He was tanned by at least fifty years in the weather, and his thigh, next to mine, was iron-hard and seemed to be made entirely of whipcord and bone. A long scar ran down his bare arm, and he wore an amulet of the Mother Hera around his neck.
The boy was pretty and knew it. His black curls were threaded with