Ceyx and Alcyone

Ceyx (Κήυξ) was the son of Eosphorus (Lucifer in the Roman myth, meaning "Morning Star"). Ceyx was also the brother of Daedalion. Ceyx told the hero Peleus of the fates of his brother and Chione, the daughter of Daedalion. Ceyx was the king of Trachis, a region in southern Thessaly.

Ceyx was known for his wisdom and hospitality. Heracles stayed in Trachis as his guest, as well as Peleus, the son of King Aeacus of Aegina.

Heracles left Calydon with a new wife, Deïaneira, and lived with Ceyx in friendship. Heracles aided Ceyx in the war against the Dryopes and the Lapiths. However, Ceyx could not protect the children of Heracles (Heraclids) against Eurystheus, the powerful king of Mycenae and Tiryns. Ceyx advised Iolaus and the Heraclids to seek refuge at Athens.

Peleus was exiled from Aegina for murdering his half brother, Phocus. Phocus was the son of Aeacus and the Nereid Psamathe, sister of Thetis. Ceyx was attending his brother's funeral when Peleus arrived in his court as suppliant.

While as a guest of Ceyx, Peleus' cattle were attacked by a giant wolf sent by Psamathe. Ceyx would have hunted the wolf with Peleus, but Ceyx's wife Alcyone pleaded with her husband not to go.

It was because of his prayer to Thetis (Peleus' future wife) that she persuaded her sister Psamathe to pardon Peleus for the murder. Psamathe transformed the wolf into stone.

Ceyx was married to Alcyone (Ἀλκυόνη), the daughter of Aeolus and Enarete. (In the story told by Ovid's Metamorphoses, her father, Aeolus of Thessaly was mistaken for Aeolus, the keeper of winds).

Ceyx wanted to find out how his brother had died from the oracle at Delphi. Rather than journey by land where he would encounter enemies, he decided to go by sea.

Alcyone felt foreboding over her husband's journey, so she tried to dissuade him from travelling to Delphi by ship. Ceyx refused to let his wife go with him on the voyage and promised to return within two months. Alcyone was miserable and depressed, weeping over her husband's absence.

Ovid gave a long account of how the storm wrecked Ceyx's ship. The ship sank because of the violent sea. Throughout Ceyx's ordeal, Ceyx's thoughts were fixed on his wife. Ceyx could not swim to safety, before one last wave pounded and drowned him.

Every day and night, Alcyone prayed to Hera for her husband's safe return. Her prayers were muttered in vain. Before the end of the second month, Hera sent Morpheus to Alcyone.

Morpheus arrived in Alcyone' dream, in the form of her dead husband. Morpheus told Alcyone how her real husband drowned. When she woke, Alcyone was inconsolable. The gods took pity on Alcyone, so they transformed her and her husband into kingfishers or halcyons.

A less romantic version of the fate of Ceyx and Alcyone is found in Apollodorus' work. The gods transformed Ceyx into a sea swallow and Alcyone into a kingfisher or halcyon as the sign of wrath and punishment, not out of pity. Ceyx and Alcyone had dared to call themselves Zeus and Hera.