Snuff the Magic Dragon (and other Bombay Family Bedtime Stories) (Greatest Hits Mysteries) (2 page)

If Sparta followed me, he would know that I went to pursue my assignment. If he didn’t, well, that was fine too. Either way, just getting to Knossos felt like I was actually accomplishing something.

A light breeze stirred the trees around me, and I felt a little peace. Running away in the middle of the night did not frighten me. No one would be traveling at this late hour, and if they were, they would not notice me. It was like being invisible. I liked being invisible.

A twig snapped loudly behind me. On instinct, I slipped around the nearest tree and peered back into the darkness, waiting. He emerged soon after, his blonde hair practically glowing in the dark. Sparta worked his way past me on the road, neither looking right nor left. He seemed completely unfazed at walking alone. I waited to see if he would search for me, but he just kept going, staring straight ahead. If he hadn’t been following me, then he’d guessed where I was going. Which meant he expected me to complete the mission.

I smiled and kept to the trees, never taking my eyes off him. I had the advantage. And that made me feel better.

As dawn broke, Knossos was already crowded and busy. I lost sight of Sparta in the maze of people, but that was all right. Turning into a narrow alley, I found an inn that would be suitable, paid the innkeeper a little extra to forget I was there, and once inside my room, I collapsed on the bed.

I awoke hours later and panicked at first. I’d promised Codros four days, and I had less than three left. Getting to Knossos seemed like a big part of the plan, but the truth was I had no plan. None. Whatsoever. And Sparta was waiting out there somewhere. I had to pull it together.

After a quiet dinner of snail stew in a dark corner of the inn’s main room, I left the inn to explore the city. My dark hair and skin allowed me to fit in with the people of the city. I wore a gray veil around my head for additional subterfuge—it unnerved me to think there was someone out there looking for me. No one ever looked for me.

The palace walls surrounded the town, and I found myself drawn toward its center. The rumor was that a labyrinth, designed by Daedalus, dominated the grounds. And that was where Minos joked about keeping the Minotaur prisoner. I was hoping that being there would launch some sort of inspiration.

As I wove in and out of the everyday rabble, I heard snatches of conversation about the labyrinth. Workers bragged about working on the structure with such bravado I knew they were all lying. Daedalus was known for carefully selecting his craftsmen.

Still, there was a lot of community pride in the work, and I grew more anxious to see it. The streets were even more crowded now, and I felt like I was wrestling my way through the sea of bodies. At last I found a bench near a bright red wall and sat to gather my thoughts.

“You found it.” Sparta joined me on the bench, and I stared at him blankly. Where had he come from? Had he been following me all this time? Impossible! No one followed me.

“This is the opening.” He pointed to a sign that said, simply,
Labyrinth
. Huh. I thought it would be more dramatic than that. Oh well.

“I just waited here for you to show up.” Sparta smiled and cocked his head to the side. “I knew you would.”

I wanted to strangle him. I wanted to drag him inside and beg the gods that there really would be a minotaur inside that would eat him. Maybe bringing back Sparta’s gnawed-on carcass with a bull’s horn would be proof enough for the Athenians.

“So, let’s go,” Sparta said.

My jaw dropped open. “You don’t just go in! These things require
planning
!” I said as if I really knew. “And it’s not a tourist spot—you can’t just go in and have someone carve your likeness onto a stone tablet with your arm around the Minotaur!” Okay, I was flustered. This guy found me. Me! Someone who doesn’t get found. Someone no one knew or noticed or worried about. I was furious. I was impressed. I was terrified.

He nodded. “You’re right. What… are you just checking it out or something?”

“Of course I am!” I recovered quickly. “Why on Olympus did Codros think
you
could help me?”

“I already told you. I have some special skills.” Sparta looked a little pissed. And he was so attractive, I struggled with the urge to calm him down and make him happy.

“What skills?” I asked. “I mean, I think I should know, now that we’re here and all.”

“Soon,” he said.

Now I was pissed.

“Fine!” I snapped a little too loudly. “Then you stay here for the rest of the day, doing surveillance. Make note of anyone who comes or goes and what the procedure is. I’ll find you tonight.” I had no intention of finding him tonight.

“What’s
surveillance?”

I threw my hands up in the air and stomped off dramatically. A few minutes later, I swapped my gray veil for a red one as I faded into the crowd. My thoughts were racing. Did that boy really think you could just walk in and kill a nonexistent creature? No! You needed a plan! You needed to be prepared!

That’s when I realized that I really didn’t know what I was talking about. Hell, I didn’t even know what surveillance was—in fact, I’m pretty sure I made that word up just now. As for planning, I’d never killed anyone for money before. How exactly did one do that? The idea of planning was a nice touch though. And clearly, I’d have to do that once I calmed down.

I skirted the labyrinth wall until I’d put a lot of distance between me and Sparta. Were my eyes playing tricks on me? A small part of the wall seemed to be shaded differently—like it was a fake door from a fresco. It wasn’t real…didn’t even look real. But I couldn’t resist running my hands over the stone.

Except that it wasn’t stone. It was fabric painted to look like stone. My hands passed through the material, and I realized that this was some sort of secret door into the maze. After looking around to make sure no one noticed, I slipped behind the curtain to the darkness inside. To my surprise, the curtain drew tight behind me, as if it were a door. How was that possible?

My wonder turned to worry once I realized that it was now pitch dark inside, and I had no idea where the cloth was to get back out. I could chew out Sparta about having a plan when, in reality, I was winging it.

Someone else was in the darkness with me. I could hear them breathing. Did they know I was here? My hands reached the wall, and I frantically slid them around to find the door I’d just stumbled through.

“Hello!” a booming male voice said only inches away. “Nice to have company!”

Uh-oh. There really was a minotaur. And he could talk. And he wanted a playmate. And I’d have to kill him and drag his stupid body all the way back to my village. And that would totally suck because I wasn’t sure I could even kill him, let alone get him out of here and get through Knossos with a huge, dead minotaur sight unseen.

“Come this way,” said the voice as a hand clamped down on my arm and dragged me away. “It’s so nice to have someone to talk to!”

This minotaur seemed a little too happy. But maybe he got that way when some idiot accidentally stumbled into his lair.

I didn’t fight as we moved together through the darkness. Mainly because I was in shock. It isn’t every day you come face to face with something you thought didn’t really exist. Maybe that’s how philosophers felt. I just allowed myself to be twisted and turned through a snakelike hallway. We stopped suddenly, and I saw a crack of light glimmering through some sort of door. My captor grunted and pushed, and the sound of stone grinding on stone filled the air.

“Have a seat!” my host said, and I saw to my surprise that it wasn’t a minotaur. Actually, I almost would rather it was. Instead, I was in the presence of none other than King Minos himself.

“It’s okay!” he laughed, pointing at an ornate chair with cushions on it. Once I sat, he sat and looked at me expectantly.

“Oh! Um, your highness!” I stammered. You didn’t just
hang out
with King Minos. That just wasn’t
done
. You had to be announced by a guy with a lute or something. Yes, I was pretty sure that was right. “I’m so sorry to have interrupted you! I should be on my way!”

It really was embarrassing. I was the girl no one saw or noticed. Now, in one day, I had this gorgeous Athenian actively looking for me, and I was expected to make conversation with my king—a man who terrorized the Aegean Sea with his navy. A man whose will was so terrible it made the gods tremble. A man who was rumored to be the son of Zeus himself.

I thought I was going to throw up.

Minos frowned. “Are you all right, girl? You’ve gone green!”

I shook my head vigorously. Throwing up in the presence of such a king would not do. “I’m fine, just, um, surprised to see you here, Your Majesty.”

“I guess that would be strange.” He stroked his beard before breaking into a huge grin. “Do you play Hide and Seek? The queen won’t play with me. And I love that game! Of course, as king, I get to do all the hiding…” Minos nodded his head hopefully.

“I should probably be getting back…” I rose to my feet on shaking legs.

Minos pouted
and stuck out his lower lip. “At least talk to me or tell me a story.”

“Um, okay?” How could I refuse? “What do you want to talk about?”

“Oh, I don’t know…not the weather. That’s so boring. Everyone always wants to talk about the weather around me. Why is that?” He seemed genuinely confused, and possibly insane. A little of each, maybe.

“Well, maybe they’re intimidated by you and figure that the weather is the safest topic?” He sure intimidated me. I could see how “look at those clouds” or “it might rain” would be preferable to anything that might end up with your head being removed.

“Intimidated?” Minos said, staring off into space thoughtfully. “What does that mean?”

I froze. This wasn’t good. You always heard about these tests from the gods and how if you answered the riddle wrong, or cut off the wrong Gorgon’s head, you’d end up deformed and guarding a golden fleece or something.

“I like bubbles!” Minos bounced happily into another topic. And that’s when I realized that my king, the sovereign of my land, was an imbecile.

“I like bubbles too,” I said slowly. “Your highness,” I said as an idea came to me, “what about the Minotaur?”

The king burst into laughter, rocking back and forth with glee. I took that to mean he wasn’t upset in an “off with your limbs” kind of way.

“Oh, that’s good! Really good!” Minos wiped away the tears that streamed down his face. “Minotaur indeed!” He clapped his hands joyfully, and I waited for the laughter to subside.

“So there’s really no Minotaur?” I asked carefully.

“No! You mean people really believed that? You must tell me how you heard it!” His breathing was slowing and he was starting to calm down from the laughing fit.

“They do…especially the Athenians.” I nodded to show that I really knew stuff.

“Yay!” Minos clapped his hands again. “I hate those stupid Athenians! They’re always ‘Athena is smarter than Zeus’ and ‘Our city-state is bigger than yours.’ I’m glad they think it’s real.”

I finally had a plan. “Your Majesty, they believed it so well, they hired me to come and kill it for them.”

“Did they?” His eyes were bright. “What did they offer you?”

“Money. A lot of money. But I have to bring back proof that I killed it.” On the one hand, I was relieved that there was no Minotaur. On the other hand, proof would be a bitch.

“Bah. I don’t want money. I could help you, and it would be great fun! But money is a silly thing to offer.” Minos wiggled his fingers in the air. I had no idea what that meant.

“Maybe your highness could help me come up with something…some sort of proof I could take back? If you don’t want money in payment, maybe there’s something else I could do?” Unfortunately I now was worried what a crazy man would want.

“I know!” he roared. “You can tell me your name! I’ll take that as payment!”

“Okaaaay…” For a moment, I weighed the thought that I should give him a fake name. But it was such a simple thing, and if this mad, jolly king was going to help me, it wasn’t much to ask at all.

“My name is Bombay.”

Minos scowled. “That’s a funny name. What does it mean?”

I shook my head. “Nothing, as far as I know. It’s just what my parents named me.”

The king froze for a moment, and I wondered if I’d been wrong about him. Maybe he was really smart, and there was a man/bull monster. How did I know he wasn’t the tyrannical and cruel dictator we’d heard he was? Had I made a horrible mistake?

Minos was still not moving. Was he processing what I was really saying? After all, I’d just admitted to treason with his arch enemy. It felt like my throat was closing, and I began to sweat. I was dead. Really and truly dead…

The king slapped his thigh. “Right! That will have to do, then! Now let’s see, what can we use to prove you did your job, Bombay the slayer of the Minotaur?” He looked around the room, poking cushions, lifting the tapestries, and basically acting crazy. Great. Even the king had nothing in the plan department. You’d think a leader of my known world could come up with something, right?

“Hello?” Sparta’s voice called out behind the walls.