“The water, Aglaope, if you wish to eat before this bird of yours goes stiff and tough, and takes more work to chew than it’s worth—if it isn’t already bringing us more trouble than we need, and all because of your dreaming.”
“Do not be so churlish, Ligeia,” her grandmother said, from her bed on the other side of the fire. “The girl has brought us a meal we would not have otherwise, and we should be glad of that much. What Circe does or doesn’t do can hardly make things worse.”
Her mother sniffed, but her shoulders drooped, her head dipping slightly. “Water, Aglaope,” she said again, but kinder. “And I’ll have the blood drained and cooking by the time you return.”
Aglaope’s jaw tightened, but she did not argue. It would serve nothing to do so, no matter how much she might wish it. Her mother would never understand, and neither would her grandmother—not truly. To them, she would always be a child with a head full of dreams. But at least her grandmother did not begrudge her the right. The right to dream and hope for something better, something more than this hungry, miserable life.
But as she walked past their small cistern, filled by the winter rains and from which they drew their fresh water so carefully during the long dry summer, she could not help but notice how low the water level was. Not for the first time, either, but in the back of her mind, she wondered if perhaps it would be the last.
And what will you do, Siren, if the rains do not come?
Goddess or witch, surely Circe had no spells powerful enough to halt the rains.
Did she?
The falcon did not offer much in the way of meat, truly, but it was still more food than they’d eaten in a moon, at least. The bones were thrown into a second pot of fresh water to boil and brew, with the last pinch of herbs from the shipwreck before Circe’s, to make a heartier broth for the coming days, and for the first time in what felt like seasons, Aglaope did not fall asleep with her stomach still grumbling.
But she tossed and turned all the same, worrying over Anthousa’s threats, and her mother’s words. Had she truly doomed them all by killing Circe’s falcon? Or had they been doomed already, whether she angered Circe by such an act or not?
Likely the latter, she decided, staring up at the stars. If Circe had power over the rains, she would use it. She already had meant to, by the handmaiden’s own words. Just as she meant to stop Akheloios, should he travel her way, to prevent him from coming to save them.
And no matter what her mother said, Aglaope was beginning to think Circe held him already, keeping the deathless god from his wives, his daughters, from giving her the child they would need to live on, trapped upon their rocky island.
Aglaope could not stand the thought of succumbing to such a scheme. She could not stand the thought of remaining here, forgotten and starving, year after year. If Akheloios was not Odysseus himself, he was certainly among his crew, just waiting for the opportunity to leap from the ship and swim toward her song. She had to hope, to pray, that his power was greater than Circe’s own. That Akheloios would find his way to her, and then, together, they would find their way off this desolate island, and back to the rich, green earth.
The thought settled her, and Aglaope let her eyes drift closed.
And that night, when sleep finally claimed her, she dreamed of flying.
Her shoulder blades itched all the next day, as if her back longed to spread the wings she only knew in her dreams. As if her body remembered it was meant to fly, not climb, to reach her nest upon the spire, and watch dawn’s rose-red fingers stretch across the sky.
Circe’s handmaiden did not come that morning, and Aglaope smiled, smug and satisfied with her work. A day without the constant heckling, or the taunting of a falcon’s flapping wings above her head. She sang of joy and victory, even in something so small, thanking the gods for the skill they had given her to bring the falcon down, and praying for protection too, that Circe’s anger might not harm them any longer.
And of course she sang for a ship, with food and supplies, but more than that, too. She sang for Odysseus, born of Hermes’s blood, to slip free from Circe’s bindings and sail on. Let him come, she prayed. Let him come, and let him find his way through our rocks in his sleek, black ship, whole and sound and safe.
Let him come, and take me away.
* * *
III
The food and broth from the falcon’s flesh and bone ought to have made them stronger, and Aglaope certainly felt the better for eating. While the broth lasted, and she chewed upon the last hard scraps of smoked and salted meat, the climb to the spire became easier, and the long days of song left no rasp in her voice.
But her grandmother still spent her days in her furs, chilled even in full sun, and too weak to rise but for the most urgent and basic needs. Ligeia cared for her as best as she was able, even using a cloth soaked in precious sweet water to bathe her face of the dust and salt that could not be escaped.
“Do not fuss over me,” Thelxiope said, pushing her mother’s hand away when she moved to wipe her brow. “I am old and tired, and that is all.”
“You are ill,” Ligeia said sharply. “Not simply old or tired, but feverish too.”
Aglaope hesitated in the shadow of the rocks, unnoticed still by the two. This was the first mention of illness she had heard and the words twisted her stomach.
“It is nothing,” Thelxiope said. “Only the same ebb every woman faces as she ages, growing cold and dry like a husk. And it will come for you, too, Daughter, in your time, should you live long enough to see it.”
“Hush,” her mother said. “Of course we will live. Truly, Mother, you sound like Aglaope with such nonsense, now.”
“She is not wrong to worry, Ligeia,” Thelxiope chided, and Aglaope’s heart warmed. Perhaps her grandmother did not only humor her, after all. “You know as well as I do that we have never suffered so long between ships as we do now. That fool war of theirs—the Trojans and the Achaeans—it has drained the life from so many. Fewer men to sail, and even fewer who are willing to venture far from their homes after so many years away, not while they still live fat and happy upon their spoils.”
“It will not last,” her mother said. “Akheloios will not let us starve. He never has before.”