Bellerophon and the Winged Horse
Bellerophon arrived at the court of King Iobates carrying a sealed letter he had been asked to deliver — not knowing that the letter said: Kill this man. Find a way.
Iobates read it and smiled. He had just the thing.
"There is a creature devastating the south of my kingdom," said the king. "The Chimera — lion's head, goat's body, serpent's tail. It breathes fire. My best soldiers have tried. You will go next."
Bellerophon was not afraid — or not very — but he was not reckless either. He went first to the prophet Polyeidus and asked for advice.
"The Chimera cannot be fought on the ground," said the old man. "Its flames are too wide, too hot. You need Pegasus — the great winged horse who drinks at the spring of Pirene, in the hills above Corinth. But you cannot catch him. You can only wait, and offer him your trust."
Bellerophon climbed to the spring and waited. He slept there three nights on the bare hillside, eating nothing but what grew nearby, listening to the wind.
On the fourth morning, the air above him stirred and a shape descended — large, white, utterly silent on enormous wings. Pegasus dipped his head to drink.
Bellerophon rose slowly and walked to the water's edge. He held out his open hand, palm up, offering nothing but itself.
The horse raised his head. His dark eyes, wide as moons, studied Bellerophon for a very long moment. Then he stepped forward and pressed his warm muzzle into the offered hand.
Bellerophon climbed onto Pegasus's back. The wings lifted them clear of the treetops and then they were in open sky — cold and blue and filled with light.
They found the Chimera in a burned-out valley, the ground around it black and still smoking. From above, Bellerophon could see all three heads at once: the roaring lion, the curious goat, the hissing serpent. The fire came from the lion's mouth in great orange sheets.
But fire rises, and Pegasus flew higher than fire. Bellerophon drove the creature back pass by pass, finally pinning it against a cliff face until it stilled.
He expected triumph when he returned to Iobates. What he got instead was more impossible tasks — a war against the Amazons, a battle against the king's own guards — for Iobates kept expecting him to die and kept being surprised.
At last, when every task was done and Bellerophon was clearly not going to oblige by dying, the king admitted what the letter had asked. He gave Bellerophon his daughter's hand in marriage and half his kingdom.
But Bellerophon's favourite thing was still the moment before dawn when he would find Pegasus waiting at the spring, wings folded, breath clouding in the cool air, ready to carry them both into the sky.
Some gifts cannot be given, he had learned. They can only be patiently waited for — and freely offered.