We reached the island of Crete just before noon on the seventh day. The sun threw off great sheets of light from the water, turning the sail incandescent. Around us ships crowded the bay: Mycenaean barges, Phoenician traders, Egyptian galleys, Hittites and Aethiopians and Hesperians. All the merchants who passed through these waters wanted the rich city of Knossos as their customer, and Minos knew it. He welcomed them with wide, safe moorings and agents to collect for the privilege of using them. The inns and brothels belonged to Minos also, and the gold and jewels flowed like a great river to his hands.
The captain aimed us squarely at the first mooring, kept open for royal ships. The noise and motion of the docks clattered around me: men running, shouting, heaving boxes onto decks. Polydamas spoke a word to the harbormaster, then turned to us. “You are to come at once. You and the craftsman both.”
Daedalus gestured that I should go first. We followed Polydamas up the docks. Before us, the huge limestone stairs wavered in the heat. Men streamed past us, servants and nobles alike, their shoulders sun-darkened and bare. Above, the palace of mighty Knossos glowed on its hill like a hive. We climbed. I heard Daedalus’ breaths behind me and Polydamas’ in front. The steps were worn smooth from years of endless hurrying feet.
At last we reached the top and crossed the threshold into the palace. The blinding light vanished. Cool darkness flowed over my skin. Daedalus and Polydamas hesitated, blinking. My eyes were not mortal and needed no time to adjust. I saw at once the beauty of that place, even greater than the last time I had come. The palace was like a hive indeed, each hall leading to an ornate chamber, and each chamber to another hall. Windows were cut in the walls to let in thick squares of golden sun. Intricate murals unrolled themselves on every side: dolphins and laughing women, boys gathering flowers, and deep-chested bulls tossing their horns. Outside in tiled pavilions silver fountains ran, and servants hurried among columns reddened with hematite. Over every doorway hung a labrys, the double-axe of Minos. I remembered that he had given Pasipha? a necklace with a labrys pendant at their wedding. She had held it as if it were a worm, and when the ceremony came her neck bore only her own onyx and amber.
Polydamas guided us through the twisting passages towards the queen’s quarters. There it was more lavish still, the paintings rich with ochre and blue copper, but the windows had been covered over. Instead there were golden torches and leaping braziers. Cunningly recessed skylights let in light but no glimpse of sky; Daedalus’ work, I supposed. Pasipha? had never liked our father’s prying gaze.
Polydamas stopped before a door scrolled with flowers and waves. “The queen is within,” he said, and knocked.
We stood in the still and shadowed air. I could hear nothing beyond that heavy wood, but I became aware of Daedalus’ ragged breath beside me. His voice was low. “Lady,” he said, “I have offended you and I am sorry. But I am sorrier still for what you will find inside. I wish—”
The door opened. A handmaid stood breathless before us, her hair pinned in the Cretan style at the top of her head. “The queen is in her labors—” she began, but my sister’s voice cut across her. “Is it them?”
At the room’s center, Pasipha? lay upon a purple couch. Her skin gleamed with sweat, and her belly was shockingly distended, swollen out like a tumor from her slender frame. I had forgotten how vivid she was, how beautiful. Even in her pain, she commanded the room, drawing all the light to herself, leeching the world around her pale as mushrooms. She had always been the most like our father.
I stepped through the door. “Twelve dead,” I said. “Twelve men for a joke and your vanity.”
She smirked, rising up to meet me. “It seemed only fair to let Scylla have her chance at you, don’t you think? Let me guess: you tried to change her back.” She laughed at what she saw in my face. “Oh, I knew you would! You made a monster and all you can think of is how sorry you are. Alas, poor mortals, I have put them in danger!”
She was as quicksilver cruel as ever. It was a relief of sorts. “It was you who put them in danger,” I said.
“But you are the one who failed to save them. Tell me, did you weep as you watched them die?”
I forced my voice to stay even. “You are in error,” I said. “I saw no men die. The twelve were lost on the way out.”
She did not even pause. “No matter. More will die on every ship that passes.” She tapped a finger to her chin. “How many do you think it will be, in a year? A hundred? A thousand?”
She was showing her mink teeth, trying to get me to melt like all those naiads in Oceanos’ halls. But there was no wound she could give me that I had not already given myself.
“This is not the way to get my help, Pasipha?.”
“Your help! Please. I am the one who got you off that sand-spit of an island. I hear you sleep with lions and boars for company. But that’s an improvement for you, isn’t it? After Glaucos the squid.”
“If you don’t need me,” I said, “I will happily go back to my sand-spit.”
“Oh, come, sister, don’t be so sour, it’s only a jest. And look how grown you are, slipping past Scylla! I knew I was right to call you instead of that braggart Ae?tes. You can stop making that face. I’ve already set aside gold for the families of the men who were lost.”
“Gold does not give back a life.”
“I can tell you are not a queen. Believe me, most of the families would rather have the gold. Now, are there any other—”
But she did not finish. She grunted and dug her nails into the arm of a handmaiden kneeling at her feet. I had not noticed the girl before, but I saw now that the skin of her arm was purple and smeared with blood.
“Out,” I said to her. “Out, all. This is no place for you.”
I felt a spurt of satisfaction at how fast the attendants fled.
I faced my sister. “Well?”
Her face was still contorted with pain. “What do you think? It’s been days and it hasn’t even moved. It needs to be cut out.”
She threw back her robes, revealing the swollen skin. A ripple passed across the surface of her belly, from left to right, then back again.
I knew little of childbirth. I had never attended my mother, nor any of my cousins. A few things I remembered hearing. “Have you tried pushing from your knees?”
“Of course I’ve tried it!” She screamed as the spasm came again. “I’ve had eight children! Just cut the fucking thing out of me!”
From my bag I drew out a pain draught.
“Are you stupid? I’m not going to be put to sleep like some infant. Give me the willow bark.”
“Willow is for headaches, not surgery.”
“Give it to me!”
I gave it, and she drained the bottle. “Daedalus,” she said, “take up the knife.”
I had forgotten he was there. He stood in the doorway, very still.
“Pasipha?,” I said, “do not be perverse. You sent for me, now use me.”
She laughed, a savage sound. “You think I trust you with that? You are for after. Anyway, it is fitting that Daedalus should do it, he knows why. Don’t you, craftsman? Will you tell my sister now, or shall we let it be a surprise?”
“I will do it,” Daedalus said to me. “It is my task.” He stepped to the table and took up the knife. The blade was honed to a hair’s edge.
She seized his wrist. “Just remember,” she said. “Remember what I will do if you think to go astray.”
He nodded mildly, though for the first time I saw something like anger in his eyes.
She drew her nail across the lower portion of her belly, leaving a red slice. “There,” she said.
The room was hot and close. I felt my hands slicked with sweat. How Daedalus held that knife steady I do not know. The tip bit into my sister’s skin, and blood welled, red and gold mixed. His arms were taut with effort, his jaw set. It took a long time, for my sister’s immortal flesh fought back, but Daedalus cut on with utmost concentration, and at last the glistening muscles parted, and the flesh beneath gave way. The path lay bare to my sister’s womb.
“Now you,” she said, looking at me. Her voice was hoarse and torn. “Get it out.”
The couch beneath her was sopping. The room was filled with the overripe stink of her ambrosial blood. Her belly had stopped rippling when Daedalus began to cut. It was tensed now. As if it were waiting, I thought.
I looked at my sister. “What is in there?”