Dark of the Moon

THESEUS

chapter 32

ARTEMIS SETTLES herself and leans against Ariadne's leg. The girl looks different; her hair is piled on top of her head, and its weight makes her slender neck look fragile. Under her enormous eyes are delicate greenish shadows, which make them look even darker.

I recognize the smell of the arena and the excitement of the crowd. The bull baiting at home isn't on such a grand scale, and many people consider it a low-class entertainment. It's never been my favorite sport—I'd rather see a good footrace or a javelin toss, and it positively sickens Konnidas, so he never took me as a child—but this is one Kretan entertainment, at least, that will be familiar.

Or so I think. It turns out that like everything else here, bull baiting on Krete is bound up in tradition and ritual, and I don't understand most of what is going on. Even so, it's exciting. The boys are well trained and highly skilled, and they are frighteningly bold. The spectators gasp when the gilded horns flash within a palm's breadth of a slender torso or when a powerful hoof stomps the ground where a long foot had danced just a moment before. Enops has a narrow escape, but his teammates pull him out of reach, and he shows remarkable courage by plunging right back into it. His face has gone almost as white as Ariadne's.

Before the bull appears properly exhausted, the boys are suddenly armed with long, slender spears. I nudge Ariadne to ask why they don't wait until the sport is over before the killing, but she either doesn't feel my elbow or is concentrating on the spectacle. I turn to the man next to me, a court functionary who has traveled extensively and has been helpful in explaining Kretan customs to me. I shout my question into his ear over the rhythmic clapping and stamping of the crowd.

He appears unwilling to yank his attention from the scene in front of us, but he is too courteous to ignore me. "They can't wait until he's exhausted, sir," he shouts. "The god has to be given his chance."

The spectators have leaped to their feet as the boys dance faster, still maintaining unity in their steps, circling tighter and tighter around the bull, who appears bewildered at the swirling mass of dancers, their spears pointing directly at him even as they gyrate and crouch and jump and spring.

The bull lunges. It's difficult to imagine something that huge moving so fast, but in an instant the circle of dancers is broken and the animal is hunched over, butting and pawing at something on the ground. The rhythm of both the dance and the applause is broken as the spectators shriek and the boys blunder out of the way, knocking one another down, tripping over their fallen comrades, and scrambling for the fence that separates them from us. Members of the audience reach their hands over, but not, as I had expected, to help the youths to safety. Instead, it is to push them back into the dirt, where they land sprawling, scramble to their feet, and try again to escape, only to be met by the same resistance.

Ariadne and the Minos are standing and clinging to each other. Ariadne buries her face in her uncle's chest as he clutches her with one arm, his other hand over his mouth.

Nobody makes any effort to save the small figure being buffeted by the furious bull. Given the limpness of his body, I doubt that anything can be done. Still, it doesn't seem human to leave him there to be mutilated. The spectators, quiet now, are staring down as though at a dog worrying a rat, or at a hawk plucking a duckling away from under its mother's sheltering wing.

When the bull has spent his fury, he raises his head. His eyes, dull with blood lust, sweep the arena. The man with the scarred chest, whom I had earlier seen training the boys, barks an order. The boys glance at one another. The man shouts at them. One by one, led by Enops, they pick up their spears and re-form their ring.

The dance begins again, but now the audience does not keep time. Something is more solemn. Even the bull seems to feel this as he swings his heavy head from side to side.

A naked body flashes, and Enops leaps onto the bull's back. With both hands, he plunges his spear between the broad shoulders. A sound between a bellow and a wail trumpets from the huge throat as the bull's head strains upward and the boy leaps down. A hind leg kicks out and lifts him off his feet. Enops flies like Hermes with his winged sandals, black hair streaming, and crashes into the fence, where he lies in a heap while the bull roars and runs and shakes his huge body, to free himself of the weapon that remains in his hump. No one, neither bull nor dancing boy nor spectator, pays any attention to the still form huddled against the fence.

The animal has spent some of his strength, and the dark blood streaming down his sides appears to confuse and madden him. The other boys, emboldened either by Enops's example or by the bull's distress, rush in, and in moments, one spear after another is lodged in the enormous body. The bull moves heavily, ignoring both the boys on their feet who scatter at his approach and the two figures remaining on the ground, one pulling himself up to sitting against the fence and the other motionless in a dark pool.

The beast stops and lowers his head, puffing and scraping the ground, and yet another boy takes advantage of this pause to jump onto his back. I recognize him: it's Simo. His legs aren't long enough to straddle his mount, but he manages to keep his seat as the bull wheels and snorts. The boy yanks a knife from his belt and, bending forward perilously far, in one swift motion cuts the bull's throat. The animal crumples to his knees, his eyes rolling back in his head, and the boy leaps off, lands squarely on his feet, and turns his back to the bull in contempt.

The crowd goes wild, cheering and shrieking, "Simo! Simo! Simo!" He bows to them. The tone of the calling voices changes into one of warning, and the boy glances behind him and then turns just as the bull, blood streaming from the gash in his throat, hoists himself to his feet, lowers his head, and stumbles forward. Simo stands his ground, facing his enemy. The bull drops to his knees again, wavers, and crashes heavily onto his side.

The Minos holds up his right hand. Those near him fall quiet. The silence spreads until the only sounds left are the harsh last breaths of the bull and an occasional groan from Enops, still pressed against the fence. Everyone looks expectantly at the Minos. He stands with his eyes closed for what seems a long time and then declares, "It is done!"