Dark of the Moon

THESEUS

chapter 43

THE GUARD tries to stop me, but I sweep him aside and stride into the king's dining hall. Once again, my father is there; once again, Medea sits opposite him, with their son on her lap.

The king freezes at the sight of me, but his wife springs to her feet, clutching little Medus. "My quarrel is not with you," I tell her, but her eyes are wide and fixed on me, "nor with my brother." She glances at my father and then scuttles across the floor, the little boy protesting that she's hurting him, and disappears out the door.

The king rises, looking at the sword in my hand. "Come to slit my throat at my own table with my own weapon?"

"It's better than the death you planned for me," I say. "But as it turns out, it was I who killed the monster, not the other way around."

"Oh, indeed." His sneer is audible. "As you killed the man who tried to cut off your feet? And as you fed the thief to the turtle?"

I flush. "The blood of the innocent Minotauros fouled this blade. I need to clean it with the blood of a king."

He looks shaken for a moment but then draws himself upright and spreads his hands, palms upward. "I am weaponless," he says.

"Don't worry," I answer. "I have no intention of fighting a defenseless old man in secret. Arm yourself; we will meet outside, in full view of your people, and only one of us will walk away."

I quail at my father's look of confidence, but then I harden myself. True, he has many successful fights to his credit; he is taller than I, and his sword is twice as long. But I'm younger, and I have my rage, bottled up in Krete and on the voyage home. That, and the hours I spent practicing with the Kretan soldiers.

We circle each other in the arena formed by pine boughs, looking for a weak spot. Before I can see more than that his right leg moves stiffly, he lunges at me, shouting a battle cry. His men join him in a raucous chorus. The king swings his sword, but it moves slowly, and I duck under it. I come up behind him and thrust my own weapon at his kidneys, but he flings himself sideways.

We face each other again. He is sweating and panting, but I know better than to assume that he is tiring already. Gray beard or not, this is a warrior.

His sword flashes again, and this time I feel a hot pain as he slices my left thigh. It's not enough to fell me, though, and I bring my own sword up hard and fast under his, and his weapon flies from his hand. It sails through the air and over the heads of his men, who turn to watch it disappear off the cliff and into the sea.

A groan rises from the soldiers, and for the first time, the light of fear shines in the king's eyes. I advance two steps in his direction, and he falls back one step before clearly forcing himself to stand still.

My breath feels harsh in my throat. I spit a glob of snot and dust into the dirt. "Do you yield?" He doesn't answer, so I raise my sword.

"Yield or die," I say, and this time he says, "I yield."

I expect to feel a surge of joy, of triumph, but something holds it back. Perhaps it will come when he bows to me as victor. I lower my arm and advance to him warily, feeling the pain in my thigh at each step. "Drop your sword," he says. I hesitate. "I don't trust you," he goes on. "I won't submit until your hand is empty. I have no weapon, and it's cowardly of you to approach me armed when you have defeated me." The men around us murmur agreement, so I stoop, lay my sword on the ground, and advance.

The king stands with his head bowed. When I'm an arm's length from him, he moves faster than I would have thought possible, and bronze glints in his right hand. I seize a pine bough and thrust it at him. His dagger cleaves it nearly in two before its blade shatters. I reach back blindly, and my fingers close on the hilt of my weapon. I swing it up and bury the blade to a hand's depth in his belly.

Nobody moves. My father looks at me, then at the sword protruding from his midsection. He pulls it out, and blood spreads across his robe. "You haven't killed me," he says hoarsely. He turns and takes a stumbling step, then another, and then he's trotting, blood dripping and then pouring from his belly, his mouth, his nose. The men part to let him through.

"Father!" I call, but whether to stop him or to curse him, I don't know. "Father!"

He says again, "You haven't killed me." He throws his arms wide and shouts, "Poseidon, take me!" as he flings himself off the edge of the cliff. I pull to a stop and lean over. His body bounces off the boulders and splashes into the water. Then there is no sound except the scream of the seagulls and the crash of the waves.

A shuffling behind me makes me turn. Aegeus's men, all of them, are on their knees, and as I watch, they bend and press their heads to the ground. The soldier at their front stands, approaches, and prostrates himself in the dirt. "My lord," he says.

"Get up," I say. He scrambles to his feet, and as we proceed on our way he tries the delicate balancing act of telling me how the people are all rejoicing that the king is dead without insulting the new king's father.

It has been a most interesting homecoming.

I feel a pang—a small one—at the thought that I'll never really know my father. Then I remember Konnidas, and my heart warms. I'll send for him and my mother as soon as I'm settled. She'll be perfect as mistress of the palace, issuing orders and countermanding them just for the fun of it.

It's not long before the poets are telling the tale of my adventures. They misunderstand a great deal. Before I went to Krete, I, too, believed that the Minotauros was born of the unnatural union of a bull and the queen. I believed that he ate people, that he lived in a maze so bewildering that the only way to find your way out of it was to follow an unwound ball of yarn. If I were to tell people of the Planting Festival and about the bull's head worn first by the Minos and then by the man chosen as the god, they would be disappointed. I agree that the truth is not as good a tale.

Some even say that my father, seeing the black sail on my ship, thought I had died on Krete, and that in his grief he committed suicide by jumping off the cliff. I find it absurd that anyone would believe such a tale. He tried to send me to my death, after all, and would have rejoiced rather than been stricken with despair if the monster had eaten me, and the many witnesses to our final battle could contradict that nonsense, but I don't mind what people say.

It does sadden me that they think I killed the harmless Asterion in order to escape from him and that I abandoned sweet little Ariadne on Naxos against her will. I've tried to explain, but mercy killing and leaving behind at her request a woman they see as the spoils of war are not actions they deem worthy of a king, so I let it be.

For although I am a different kind of king than my father, a king is what I am, and I will rule my people.