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it slightingly, sire, but it was the King of Heaven’s own garment and enables its wearer to call rain out of a dry sky. It comes from here, from Iolcus, you know. It adorned the statue of thunder-wielding Zeus in the Temple on the Hill—until some three hundred years ago, when it was stolen by a raiding party from Colchis, where it has been kept ever since.”
    “And we haven’t lacked rain in all those three hundred years.”
    “The weather is about to change, Your Majesty. God-time is not our time; things ripen slowly in the heavens. Now the High Ones decree drought but have promised the power of the Ram to whoever wears its pelt, and that is the power to make rain.”
    “You speak as if all this were something new. But for six generations now, one crew after another of ne’er-do-wells and criminals on the run have been tapping the treasuries of gullible kings—fitting out ships and sailing away to retake the Fleece. And none of them ever did. They got themselves killed in various ways, or turned pirate or something, but the famous Fleece stayed where it was.”
    “Yes, sire. And what you are being promised is that Jason also will perish on this quest.”
    “I can arrange for him to perish right here today and spare myself the expense of ship and crew.”
    “You ignore the meaning of your dream, O King. The gods want you to send Jason for the Fleece. They promise he will not return, but the Fleece will. And you shall wear it and end the drought—and be so idolized by your people that you will be able to mistreat them to your heart’s content and arouse no whisper of complaint.”
    “I’ll give in on one point,” he said. “I won’t put him in a cage. His presumptuous head shall be quietly separated from his shoulders and flung on the dung heap. That will end the legend of the lost prince.”
    I spoke silently to my father. “Oh, Hermes, the king is stubborn. Send him a sign, I pray.”
    I heard the king clapping for a page boy. The lad came running. “Fetch wine,” said the king. Then he turned to me. “All this theology makes me thirsty.”
    The page appeared with two crystal flagons of wine. The king seized his goblet and raised it to his mouth. I was amazed to see the wine shrink away from his lips. He stared into his goblet in disbelief.
    “Did you see that?” he muttered. “How’s yours, still full?”
    I sipped a bit. “Seems all right,” I said.
    “Give it to me!”
    I handed him the great crystal cup. He lifted it to his mouth. Again the wine shrank from his lips. He dashed the cup to the ground; it shattered on the slate path.
    “I thirst … I thirst! Bring water!” he roared.
    The page came running. He bore a pitcher full of water. The king snatched it from him but stopped and poured a little out first to see if it was really there. It splashed on the path. He lifted the pitcher and gulped … raised it higher and higher as his mouth sucked frantically. He flung the pitcher from him.
    “Misery!” he moaned. “I must drink. I’m dying.”
    “Ah, King,” I said. “The gods have sent you a sign. This is a hint of what drought will be like—when even kings thirst.”
    “Demon-craft! These are not gods but devils! You are a demon, serving demons! I’ll have you burned! Impaled!”
    I listened to him, unafraid. He wasn’t used to suffering, this fat king, and I knew he was too maddened by thirst to be able to croak out any orders for my execution. I spoke gently. “The gods are being merciful, sire. With this little flick of their whip they are urging you back to the path of righteousness and preserving you from the greater torments of drought.”
    “All right … all right. I’ll spare him. I’ll send him for that damned Fleece. Do you swear he’ll die on the voyage?”
    “The Fleece shall return; he shall not. Look, King, your pitcher overflows.”
    Indeed, the pitcher had righted itself on the path, and water was welling out of it. I picked it up and gave it to him.