Lost in the Labyrinth (15 page)

It seemed hopeless.

Icarus was cheerful, waving to me as I parlayed with the guards. Daedalus, on the other hand, was bad tempered and crotchety, though he appeared to hold no rancor against me or mine.

"What news of your mother?" he demanded as soon as I approached.

"She is very ill," I replied. "I do not think that she can get well again."

"I'm sorry for it, Princess," he said gruffly. "She's a good woman, your mother, and a good queen. Besides which, I conclude that our deaths will follow shortly after hers. Ah well, in a way it would almost be a relief if it weren't for the boy here." Seeing my look of surprise, he grumbled, "Life in this little box is not worth living. I shall go mad if I cannot turn my hand to something. I am not accustomed to idleness."

"It's true," said Icarus. "He complains about his inactivity from morning till night."

"And you, Icarus?" I said shyly. "Are you well?"

"Oh, I am very well. If it were not for my father's distress I would be quite at my ease. I sit and think, you know, and watch the birds."

"Lazy little wretch," Daedalus remarked.

"Yes," Icarus agreed. "I have not your energy. In this situation it is perhaps just as well. I think that the guards grow tired of hearing my father's laments."

I thought hard for a moment, then turned to the guards, who had been quite openly listening to this exchange.

"My mother may die at any moment, or she may yet survive for many days—it is in the lap of the Goddess," I said. "If I were to bring Daedalus one or two things from his workshop so that he would have some occupation, the time might pass more easily for all of you." I added, "You would be very welcome to examine everything I brought, as you have examined the food I brought just now."

The guards looked uneasily at each other.

If there had been a true queen in the palace below us instead of an incapable invalid and an uncrowned girl, I believe that they would not have dared to agree. As things stood, no one seemed to be in charge, and I could see that they, with nothing to do but listen to Daedalus railing against his captivity and lack of employment, would welcome a period of peace and quiet.

"Perhaps—but no knives, my lady," said one of the guards sternly. "I won't be held responsible for allowing prisoners to have weapons."

"No, nor axes, nor scissors, neither," chipped in the other guard. "Nothing with a sharp edge or point, or—or anything that could be made to have a sharp edge or point by grinding it against the stones."

"But," I protested, "that would mean that I couldn't bring any tools at all, not a needle for sewing, not even a sharpened stick for drawing on clay tablets—"

"No needles," agreed the guard. "No sharpened sticks."

I turned back to Daedalus, staring at him intently. "Would you like that? If I were to bring you some sort of work from your shop?"

"You would place me, and my son as well, even more deeply in your debt than we already find ourselves, my lady. I would be grateful indeed."

"What would you like? Can you think of anything—?"

"Wait a just a moment, my lady," interrupted one of the guards, looking suddenly suspicious. "Maybe it would be best if the prisoner weren't allowed to specify what, exactly he's to have. They say he's a clever one." He regarded Daedalus with disapproval.

I bit my lip in disappointment.

"Very well," I said. "Goodbye. I shall return as soon as I can."

I walked slowly and soberly away. Once out of sight of the guards, I began to run.

I
HAD REMEMBERED SOMETHING ABOUT THAT TOWER ROOM, YOU
see, that the guards most likely did not know. Indeed, I thought it unlikely that anyone save we three, Daedalus, Icarus, and me, knew of it, or the tower would never have been thought a suitable prison for the wily inventor.

Daedalus had laid much of the stone of the tower himself, and whatever Daedalus put his hand to always had some distinguishing feature that made it unique. Some rooms he built might have a floor intricately patterned with different-colored blocks of stone, or a window seat, or a built-in stone table with a gaming board inlaid into the top. Quite often he constructed safes like the one in his workshop. I knew he had once or twice built a secret door that could not be detected except by the most determined inspection.

On that day so many years ago, he showed me the secret of the tower room. It was nothing much, only that it was possible, by standing on top of the table that was the sole furnishing of the room, to remove one of the blocks of stone making up the roof. By pushing up on the stone and moving it to the side, a rectangular gap was made in the ceiling, out of which an agile person might crawl onto the very rooftop of the tower.

He had done it in order to extend visibility just a little bit farther; a better vantage point could be achieved by standing on top of the tower rather than inside it. We three had climbed up there that day and sat a little while watching the sun set. Icarus would have liked to stay longer, I know, and I was always happy to be where Icarus was, but after a few moments Daedalus was urging us back inside so that he could busy himself with some new task.

The existence of that loose stone did not compromise the security of the tower as a jail cell for any normal prisoner. A normal prisoner would not know of it, and besides, once on top of the tower there was a drop of three stories to a stone roof or a far greater drop of eight stories to a paved courtyard. No one could survive such a leap uninjured, even if there were no guards below ready to recapture him the moment he landed.

The exit to the roof therefore, did not solve the problem of how to release Daedalus and Icarus. On the contrary, I could not for the moment imagine how it was to be managed. Still, it offered hope. With a clever mind like Daedalus's, who knew what might be done? If only he had been allowed to choose what supplies he wanted!

I am no artificer. I could not imagine what sort of equipment would be useful in such a predicament; I could not even guess what most of the things in Daedalus's studio were meant to be used for. The ban on sharp or pointed objects made my choice especially difficult—nearly every tool I could identify as such was either sharp or pointed, or could be made so by grinding it against stone. Once again I searched through Daedalus's belongings, trying desperately to think.

It seemed too great a task. If Icarus and Daedalus could manage to climb down the tower, there were the guards to deal with. And if the guards could be overcome, then I would have to arrange the departure of Icarus and Daedalus from the Isle of Kefti. And if I could do all of this, why then. I had a new cause for sorrow. Because I would lose Icarus as surely as I would if Acalle had him killed. Unless—

Unless I were willing to do as Ariadne had done. Unless I went to Athens with him.

My heart flew up at the thought and then plummeted like a stone. Athens! Exile from Kefti! How could I bear it? Yet how could I bear to part with Icarus?

Sorely troubled, I thrust the subject out of my mind. I would think on it later. What was required now was a way out of the tower.

I turned my attention back to the contents of the workshop. I wished I was as clever as Daedalus; this conundrum was too hard for my small wits.

At last I thought of the hiding place in the floor. Perhaps there would be something there.

I shifted the sacks of feathers and examined the contents of the safe. Some fine jewelry, cunningly crafted out of gold and silver. A wonderful carving from rock crystal of a griffin. Goblets made from horn. A black steatite vase intricately etched with harvest scenes. Several tools apparently placed here because of their value and rarity, all either sharp or pointed in shape.

I flung myself backward onto the pile of sacks with a groan. There was nothing here that would be of any use in our present dilemma.

As I lay upon the feathers, gazing about me in the languor of despair, my eye fell upon the wooden framework of a wing. Immediately images began forming in my brain.

I saw Icarus and Daedalus standing on the top of the tower, with great white wings strapped to their arms and backs. Daedalus's face was serious and drawn, Icarus's glowed with an internal flame. Daedalus spread wide his feathered arms and launched himself off the tower; Icarus followed. Away they flew, father and son, sailing through the skies like great white eagles, across the sea toward Athens, away from Kefti, away from me.

I sat silent for a long moment. Then I stood up and began to gather together what was needed to build two sets of wings.

The guards eyed my pile of materials. "That Daedalus is a deep one," they murmured to each other. "He's more a magician than anything else, or so they say."

Still, even putting their heads together and thinking hard, they couldn't imagine what mischief Daedalus could devise with several sacks of feathers, a pot of glue, a small quantity of fabric, some leather strips, and a pile of miscellaneous wood pieces—for I had dismantled the frameworks already constructed, in order to disguise their purpose.

"What's this for?" demanded one of the guards.

I had an answer to that question ready.

"I thought that Daedalus, and Icarus too, if he so desires, could make feathered masks for the ceremony of the Blessing of the Boats."

"Hmmm..." The Blessing of the Boats was a midsummer ritual marked by much festivity and gaiety—most of the palace-dwellers as well as the residents of Knossos Town would go masked that night to the celebration after the blessing. The heaps of feathers and wood were far greater than needed for such a task, but I hoped the guards would not realize that.

"Since you are being so kind," I added, "Daedalus might like to give you the results of his labor for the occasion."

"I would indeed," Daedalus called down from the window. I could tell by the emphasis that he had understood the real purpose of my choice of supplies.

"Can't see much harm in that," observed the first guard tentatively.

"Nor can I," said the second, scratching his head.

"Oh, let him have it," said the first. One guard therefore remained at the foot of the tower keeping an eye on me, while the other unlocked the door and toiled up the stairs with the collection.

"I thank you, my lady," Daedalus said, bowing to me through the window. "You are more than kind. This ought to be a sufficiency of materials to complete the task. We are grateful to you."

Icarus poked his head out of another window. "No, father," he said mildly, "You are mistaken. There are feathers enough, but I do not believe that we have an adequate supply of wood. There is a little grove of trees that yields this particular sort of wood—strong, but light and pliable—just beyond the clearing where we took his Highness, Lord Asterius, to amuse himself not long ago."

He looked at me intently, infusing his next words with meaning.

"I wish to make not two masks, Princess, but three. I would make a mask for you as well, that you might remember my father and me when we are gone. When you wore it, it might seem as though you were still in our company."

I understood him. He was proposing that not two but three sets of wings be crafted, so that I might accompany them in their flight.

"Will you do it, my lady?" he asked.

"I will think on it," I said slowly. "I can promise no more than that."

"And with that I must be satisfied," he replied courteously. "But do not forget that your mother's life hangs by a thread, which may be severed at any moment. If you think too long, the opportunity to give you this material evidence of our love and gratitude may be lost."

I nodded and left them to their labor. I had much to consider.

The most likely outcome of such a mad scheme was destruction. Human beings are not meant to fly through the air. I tried to imagine what such a death would be like. I shuddered to think of the moment of impact. Yet this was a noble doom. I am not beautiful, as I think I have said, but that particular death would make me so—in the tales told afterward, at least.

And if we did not die, if we succeeded? Why, then, I would be a stranger without family or possessions in an alien place where they did not even speak my language, wholly dependent upon Icarus and Daedalus.

Oh, Ariadne! I thought.
What has befallen you, my sister? If I knew your fate I might learn from it to shape my own.

Yet even as I thought this, I knew that Ariadne's fate, whether good or bad, could be no guide for mine. Icarus and Theseus were two different men, as Ariadne and I were two different women.

Icarus would protect me to the best of his ability in that strange world across the sea. I had no fear of that. But, although he spoke of his love in wishing me to join him, he also spoke of his gratitude.

Ariadne is proud, but in this matter I am prouder still. She did not seem to care why Theseus married her, so long as he did it.

The thought that Icarus might marry me for gratitude alone stuck in my throat like a stone. The suspicion that his every kiss and caress proceeded not from love of me but from a love of his own honor—in time that would kill my happiness. I could be satisfied only by seeing an ardor equal to my own reflected in my husband's eyes.

He loved me, I knew, at least a little. But did he love me enough to quiet my pride?

I would be a burden to him; I could not be otherwise. Life in Athens would be difficult at first; he had never set foot there and knew the language imperfectly. And he was little more than a boy.

If I stayed at home I would be left to face my sister Acalle's anger alone. She would not have me put to death—I was her heir until she married and bore a daughter. But if she learned of my involvement, she would have to take some sort of action against me.

How should I choose? An alien, cold world with Icarus, or a world made alien and cold by his absence?

I did not climb the mountain that day, or the next, or the next. I could allow myself a little time at least, while they completed their own wings. In the torment of my mind I could do nothing but rove the Labyrinth, tracing and retracing its halls.