by Laura Gill
I did not recognize the name as a tributary of Argos, but then there was much about my father’s dominion of which I had never learned. “Stork?” I repeated, translating. That was what the name Pelargos meant.
“Yes.”
Storks lived in marshlands, and there was marsh along the coast between Argos and Tiryns. I considered my next query while she ladled savory-smelling stew into a wooden bowl. “Are we near Argos? Sparta?”
“Oh, we’re nowhere near the mainland. Why would you ask?”
I stiffened. Was I already giving away too much? “Then where are we?” How much time had passed in Hera’s domain? Just a few hours ago, it seemed, Acrisius’s men had forced me into the chest. I remembered studying the sky and the spectacular caldera, then resting in the shade. Helios’s chariot remained static the entire time, the afternoon lasting forever.
“Where?” The old woman blinked as if I had stated the sky was purple. “The isle of Seriphos, where else? You certainly don’t sound like you’re from here. If I may ask a guest, are you from the mainland?” She handed me the wooden bowl.
What to say? If I dared mention Argos, how long would it be before Acrisius heard of my miraculous survival and sent men to finish the job? “No, I...”
She harrumphed. “Are you sure?”
How could I not know where I had come from? Maybe she thought my memory had flown. “Arcadia,” I blurted. “I’m from the mountains of Arcadia.”
“I see. Ah, but you’re not eating anything.”
I stared into the bowl without seeing the contents. Long ago, the princess of Argos had learned something of the islands from her tutor; the nearest was days away. Time must move differently in the immortal realm. Hera had spoken of the vista in the future tense. She had mentioned healing my and Eurymedon’s hurts. I could not quite believe that we were whole and unbroken, and free from the chest. How long had we been in the chest, and our spirits flown elsewhere?
I felt a rough shake. “Are you all right?” the old woman pressed. Her wrinkled brow bespoke concern. Her face loomed near mine, her eyes squinting. “You look pale.”
Her observation brought on the sudden urge to cry. I caught myself, focusing instead on my surroundings: the house, the fire burning on the hearth, the warmth spreading from the bowl to my hands. Where was I again? I needed a moment to remember. Pelargos, among my rescuers. “I’m sorry.”
She gently took the bowl and set it aside, then dragged over a second footstool to sit upon. Her callused fingers touched my cheek. “Oh, but you’re ice-cold. Here, you must take this.” Quicker than I could protest, she unfastened her shawl and draped it around my shoulders; the worn wool smelled of her body. Stale. “Never mind about where you come from. What should we call you?”
Her question sent my mind spinning again. Not Myrtale. She was a consecrated virgin who belonged to the Mountain and the Mistress, and I was a new mother adrift in the world. Danaë had died long ago. For a woman with no sense of belonging, there was only one name that fit. “Outis.”
As I expected, my host was taken aback. “Nobody?”
“Yes.”
She heaved a ponderous sigh. “Well, Nobody-girl, if that’s what you prefer. I am Klymene. Diktys is my nephew. Come, let’s get some hot food into you, take away that paleness. I can hear your belly growling from here.”
I heard it then, too, my stomach gurgling and protesting, and was abashed. And the offering—the offering! How could I have forgotten something that vital, especially after the gods had just spared my life and Eurymedon’s?
Klymene brought down the household gods. To Zeus and Poseidon went the first libations, according to the custom of the household, then came Hera and Hestia of the Bright Hearth. In addition, there was Posidaeia, consort of the god, and Diktynna, the Cretan Mistress of the Nets. Praying to the immortals without giving due reverence to the Mistress unsettled me. Klymene’s deities had bodies dominated by strange, triangular heads. I felt vulnerable, confronted by a whole new set of unfamiliar immortals.
Klymene talked while we ate. I picked at the fish stew and listened, grateful that she refrained from asking any more questions. Pelargos was a fishing village on the southeast coast of Seriphos. Diktys and the other fishermen had discovered the chest floating in the shallows that morning, and used their nets to drag it ashore. Klymene set a reassuring hand on my forearm when she caught my troubled look. “We won’t mention that again.”
She wanted me to lie down and rest after eating, but I could not sit still without first seeing Eurymedon, and did not think I would be able to sleep without experiencing nightmares. It took some convincing, but when Klymene noticed my breasts leaking she agreed to reunite me with my son.
Outside, the day was gray and blustery. A rocky shoreline curved east and west. A larger town loomed in the distance; that was Livadi, Klymene said, and the faint haze across the water to the south indicated the nearby isle of Sifnos. Whitewashed houses crowded among ancient olive groves along the village heights, while down below on the beach I observed a group of men sitting cross-legged on the sand with a net between them, mending it with hooks. Women lingered in the shade of doorways spinning wool, grinding corn, and gossiping, just as they had done on the Mountain. They and their children looked questioningly at me. Two of those women were looking after my child, I had been informed, yet I saw him nowhere.
Klymene led me toward one of the nearer houses. Everywhere we went, the neighbors had questions. Who was I, and where had I come from? “Outis,” Klymene said, by way of introduction. “I know, it’s not a name. She insists on it. She’s from Arcadia. I know, it’s far inland, but that’s what she claims.”
I was reunited with Eurymedon in a dusty courtyard. A girl only a few years younger than me supervised more than a dozen children while a pair of women worked wool in a doorway. Two babies occupied baskets between them. Without introduction, I retrieved my son and, rocking him, offered him a nipple he did not want; someone else had already nursed him. I checked him for injuries; he had none. Indeed, he looked clean and content, and in my mind I knew I should calm down, that it was normal for other women to help raise a child, but my maternal instinct as well as recent experience informed me otherwise.
Huamia, the younger of the two women, addressed me. “He’s a darling. No trouble at all. You can leave him with me and my mother if you want to rest. I have plenty of milk.” She had ample breasts and a broad, kind face.
I demurred. “I don’t want to impose.”
“Impose?” Huamia looked incredulous. “Why, a stranger is a gift from Zeus, and your miraculous arrival this morning...” Lost for words, she appealed to Klymene. “Has she eaten? Does she want to rest? She can’t be in any condition to visit, after...” She caught herself with a self-conscious biting of the lips. “Sorry.”
“She was concerned about the child. His name is Eurymedon, by the way,” Klymene answered. “But she’s eaten. Maybe now she’ll take my advice and rest.”
“What’s your name, girl?” The other woman, a middle-aged version of Huamia, addressed me. “Where are you from?”
Again, Klymene replied on my behalf, and made the familiar excuses, that ‘Outis’ was the name I insisted upon, and that I would answer all other questions when I was ready. “She shouldn’t bother with tending the baby just yet. Perhaps she might rest for a while with you while I prepare a place for her at home?”
I did not wish to go inside and take the bed the women offered, but preferred to remain outdoors with Eurymedon. So the women arranged a nest of fleeces under a nearby oak, and created a windbreak using a thick blanket. Philagra instructed her granddaughter, the girl I had seen earlier, to keep the other children quiet while I rested. “Father Zeus has sent a stranger. Who knows but she might be a goddess in disguise.” Hera would not have liked that notion, had she overheard.
Rest, I did, without ever quite falling sleep. I dozed, made content by the dappled daylight and Eurymedon’s nearby presence, the briny smel
l and rhythmic surge of the sea, and the murmur of human voices.
Then a shadow moved into the light. A solid presence marked by footfalls on gravel and the rising and falling of human breath. When I sensed someone crouching beside me, I cautiously opened my eyes, only to have my heart give an involuntary start upon encountering a flesh-and-blood man. “What do you want?”
“Easy, it’s only me,” Diktys said reassuringly. “It’s growing late.” He extended his hand. “Let me escort you and the baby home.”
Home. A disconcerting word. Nonetheless, as wakefulness and common sense replaced my instinctive panic, I timidly placed my hand in his to let him help me to my feet. For a moment, the world spun. “Whoa!” Diktys seized me around the waist. “Are you all right?” I stiffened. Acrisius’s men had done that, too, when forcing me into the chest.
The dizziness subsided and I freed myself. “Yes,” I said shakily. To cover my frazzled nerves, I concentrated on bundling together the fleeces and blanket, and shaking them free of sand to return them to my hosts. The adolescent girl, Huamia’s daughter, hastened outside to take them from me. Diktys neither spoke nor intervened.
As I started to lift Eurymedon from the borrowed basket the girl interjected, “No, lady. My grandmother says to tell you you’re to take that with you, since you’ve no cradle to lay him in.”
Without being invited, Diktys accepted both the burden and the gesture. “Tell her thank you, Agapia.”
“I can carry my son.” But as I reached for Eurymedon, Diktys maneuvered my son and basket beyond my reach. No, not again. I was tired of being separated from my child, no matter how well-intentioned this time. “Give him to me!”
My vehemence took Diktys aback. “No need to snap at me, young lady. I mean only to help. You’re clearly weak and unsteady.” He appeared genuinely abashed as he surrendered the basket and its precious cargo. “Here.”
A cold breeze blew off the sea; Klymene’s shawl did not suffice to ease the bite. Early spring brought a swift dusk. The beach was empty. Glowing hearth fires beckoned from open doorways. Along the way, Diktys kept his comments lighthearted. He admired Eurymedon, inquired after my health, and assured me that Klymene had prepared a comfortable bed. I wished he would stop talking. His attempt at conversation left me flustered.
Within sight of his house, he suddenly stopped me with a gentle hand on my arm. “Did I do something wrong?”
I glanced away. “No. You’ve been very kind, you and everyone, but I...” But I what? Goddess above, how was I supposed to speak openly with a man?
“But you’ve just come back from death,” Diktys finished. That was what I meant, yes, but just as I nodded, relieved that I would not have to explain further, he spoke again. This time, his tone changed. No less solicitous, only more serious and determined. “Your name isn’t a name. Whoever you are, young woman, and wherever you’ve come from, we can’t call you ‘Outis.’ That’s a nothing-name, a mask for someone who’s hiding from something—or someone.”
“I don’t...” But Diktys clearly was not the type to back down if I requested that he leave me be. I tried again. “I have no real name.”
“So you have no family?” I shook my head. “And no husband?” When I gave an identical response, Diktys further pressed, “How can it be that you have no name? That’s impossible. Why, everybody has a name.”
Answering even a portion of his question meant opening myself to deeper interrogation. I said simply, “I don’t have one.”
“Are you a runaway slave, then?” He frowned, then noisily cleared his throat. “No. It’s not my place to pass judgment on a stranger. Zeus forbid that I should give a guest offense.”
I did not answer.
When he spoke again, Diktys resumed the interrogation. “Someone tried to murder you and your child. Someone with means. I had a closer look at that chest and its bedding before. They’re of good quality.”
My heart beat erratically inside my chest, so loudly that I was sure he could hear. “I would rather not talk about it.”
He kept going, “And you’re not a crude woman, either. Your hands are rough, your skin brown from the sun, but there’s something about you that isn’t common.” He let the comment stand, without implying a question. His next statement, however, was a direct query. “I understand if you’d rather not discuss it, but I have to know: will forgetting about whoever did this bring trouble to the village? Your person is still protected by Zeus’s laws of hospitality, and your child’s, but...”
“You would rather we left?” I finished.
“Don’t put words in my mouth,” Diktys said sharply. “The gods obviously preserved you and brought you here for a purpose. And I’ve been a boor, hammering you with these questions. All I really wanted to know was if you had somewhere to go, or anyone to take you in.” I shook my head, even as I realized that it had become too dark for him to see. I voiced my answer. To my surprise, and consternation, he laughed, “Then you have no business leaving!”
I searched for a proper response. Had he been serious and admonishing, I would have soberly thanked him for his hospitality, and that would have been that.
Diktys continued, “We should get you and your son in out of the cold.” He hastened me along. “The other elders want to speak to you. They’ve agreed to wait until tomorrow. Don’t worry. We all witnessed the miracle this morning, and there’s no danger of our turning you out.”
Inside, Klymene had reheated that morning’s stew and baked fresh bread. Diktys waited until I washed and ate something before returning to the subject of my name. “We can’t call you Outis,” he argued. “Is there something else?”
Various names flitted like butterflies through my head, but as I had never before been offered the choice I suddenly found that I could not decide. Names were assigned by the family, not taken for oneself. “I have no idea.”
Diktys took that as an invitation to make suggestions. “Why not a flower name like Klytie? How about Tyche, because you’ve been lucky? Kallixenia, because you’re a beautiful guest-friend?” His grin evaporated when I did not reciprocate. “Or maybe Dorea,” he stammered, “because you’re a gift from Poseidon?”
So many choices, none of which spoke to me. I did not want to offend my hosts by rejecting suggestions outright, but it was too much all at once. “I don’t know what to choose.” Definitely not Kallixenia. “May I have time to think about it?”
“Why not leave the matter to the gods?” Klymene began collecting the used bowls and spoons, while motioning that she did not require my help. “Our guest should offer prayers of thanksgiving tomorrow, anyway.”
With no libation or other offering to speed the prayers along. “If you have a sanctuary, perhaps I could donate my service to the deity. I have some skill in herbs and ritual.”
Diktys’s beetled brows knitted together in a frown. “You’ve served in a sanctuary before? As a priestess?”
Had I revealed too much? I imagined his eyes boring through me, reading my every secret. “I-I dedicated some service, yes.” My voice quavered. Surely he noticed. “I learned the usual rites and some mysteries as girls do, but...”
“You’re asking too many questions, Diktys,” Klymene chided. “Of course she knows the female mysteries! And what girl doesn’t know simple herb lore and how to approach the goddess? Leave your prying for when she’s fully rested and not so afraid. It’s in her voice and the way she looks at us: she’s frightened.”
“Because there’s a powerful family behind this,” he told her. “That chest and its bedding didn’t come from anything but. The damos wants to know who she is and where she came from, and I can’t say I disagree.”
Fearing Klymene might concur and encourage her nephew’s delving for information, I swiftly interjected. “I’m no danger to you. I’m not even from the island. Those who did this are far away. They need never know.” I heard myself pleading and was embarrassed. Would I have to grovel on my knees before the elders tomorrow? What would
the Women of the Mountain have said had they heard me just now?
Incredulous, Diktys stared. “Are you begging, when you have guest-right? Were your kinsmen so stingy with strangers that you expect to be cast out, alone, with a young child? I understand you don’t want to be a burden, that you’d rather keep your secrets, but you also understand that Zeus demands certain obligations from me as a host, don’t you? I now have a duty to protect you and the child, if it should somehow ever come to that.”
I nodded and tried to offer some explanation. “Of course you have obligations. Forgive me. It’s just that, well, I’ve spent most of my life among women. I’m not accustomed to the conversation or company of men.”
In the firelight, his frown diminished, now seeming more like a twitch of curiosity than a sign of irritation or contemplation. “Then I see that I’m absolutely right to leave you in Klymene’s hands.” A gurgle from nearby brought him up short as he started to say more. “It seems your little one agrees, or maybe he’s hungry?” Diktys accompanied his shrug with a sheepish smile. “I’m afraid I have scant experience reading the language of infants.”
I used the distraction as an excuse to leave the hearth. Lifting the baby from the basket Huamia’s mother had provided, I took him into the next room where Klymene had prepared a bed for me. To my dismay, I saw that she had used the chest’s bedding. Suddenly, I felt an overwhelming urge to burst into tears, to gather up everything and hurl those loathsome fleeces and linens out the door, to cram every scrap into the hearth fire and heap on the kindling, but I wrestled down the impulse because I knew my hosts would not understand. Naturally, Klymene thought she was doing me a kindness, even though it meant scavenging the chest that had briefly been my tomb.
“How old is the boy?”
“What’s that?”
“How old is Eurymedon?” Diktys called from the hearth. “You didn’t say before.”
I returned to the doorway, but kept my back turned so Diktys could not see my breasts. “Four months at the next change of the moon.” Was he fishing for information about my son’s paternity?