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innocently what was in the jars, Chiron’s face had become as dark as a storm cloud. “Do not even think about asking,” the centaur had ordered.
    Is it too late now to find out the secret of the jars? Jason wondered. Tears prickled in his eyes, and he willed himself not to let them fall. Chiron will live. He has to live.
    Jason spent a fitful night, starting awake every time Chiron twitched or groaned. Near morning, when the old centaur seemed the worst, breathing out in long, rattling rales, Jason went to the door of the cave and got down on his knees. He’d never prayed to the Fates before, though Chiron had taught him many prayers, yet this prayer seemed simply to breathe from his lips.
“O Moirai, allotters of life, of death, hear me.
    Clotho holding the distaff, hear me,
    Lachesis drawing the thread, hear me,
    Atropos with the abhorred shears, hear me,
    Do not cut short this good creature’s time.
    He is a teacher whose students need him.
    He is a healer whose patients need him.”
    Here Jason took a deep breath, then ended:
    â€œHe is a father whose only son needs him.”
    This time the tears fell unchecked from his eyes and left streaks along his cheeks. He didn’t bother to brush them away.
    â€œJason …” It was scarcely a whisper. It sounded more like a feeble breath of air hissing through a crack in a wall.
    Jason scrambled back to Chiron on his hands and knees and put his ear close to the old centaur’s mouth.
    â€œJason …”
    â€œI’m here, Chiron, I’m here.”
    â€œThe jars …” Chiron croaked. He made a movement as if trying to get up.
    Jason put a hand on his shoulder to hold him down. “They’re gone.”
    Chiron’s eyelids drooped wearily, and he nodded. “Of course, you thought to look. You remembered after all this time.”
    â€œThe door is open,” Jason said. “Nessus didn’t even bother to close it back up.”
    â€œHe knew I had the jars,” Chiron wheezed. “Demanded I give them to him. I refused. Tried to stop them but could not. Now the power is his.”
    â€œWhat power? What’s in those jars?”
    â€œGorgon’s blood.”
    Jason sat back on his heels. “I don’t understand. What would the centaurs want with Gorgon’s blood?”
    â€œThe power of life and death.”
    Jason shook his head. “I still don’t …”
    â€œSurely you remember the story I told you.”
    Jason said softly, “Forgive me, master, you have told me many stories.”
    â€œOf the great hero Perseus.”
    â€œAh,” Jason said, nodding. “Perseus. How he hunted down Medusa, the most fearsome of the three Gorgons.”
    Chiron smiled and pushed up to a sitting position despite Jason’s protests.
    â€œOf course I remember,” Jason said. “Her hair was made of snakes and her face was so ugly, the sight of it turned men to stone.” He also remembered shivering in fear when Chiron first told him the story. He’d only been six years old then. “But what about the blood?”
    â€œWhen Perseus cut off her head,” Chiron said, “there were two veins in her severed neck. The blood that flowed from the left vein is the deadliest poison in all the world. The merest drop of it can kill a man instantly.”
    â€œAnd in the right vein?”
    Chiron struggled to his feet. “The blood from there is a medicine that can heal any wound or cure any sickness.”
    Jason caught his breath. It took a moment to digest all this. But then he asked, “How did the Gorgon’s blood get here?”
    Chiron gave himself a shake all over before replying. “Long before you ever came to Mount Pelion, another child was put in my care. Asclepius, the son of the god Apollo.”
    â€œYou have said that name to me before, master.”
    Smiling, the old centaur went on. “I raised him, taught him as I