The Cartographer's Daughter

9. The Minotaur

"Immediately on being born, the monster was imprisoned in the center of the maze, under the palace of King Minos on the island of Crete," my father said one night, his arms gesturing emphatically. We were in the middle of my favorite game. After pulling every book from the shelves, we had sat on the floor arranging them into walls and corridors and dead ends.

My father stood in the center, a giant towering over his labyrinth, his arms flailing so wildly with the story that he threatened to knock it down. "It was ugly, with the body of a man and the horned head of a bull, and being made of a bit of each creature, they say it could eat nothing. Driven wild by hunger, the beast would tear apart any creature in its path and resort to crunching on the bones. Every seven years, seven young Athenians - about your age, actually," he teased, winking at me, "were sent as tribute to wander the maze until they found the Minotaur and met their end." He crouched down, mimicking the vicious monster lying in wait.

"Why were Athenians sent to the maze?" I asked.

"Because it was the Athenians who had killed King Minos' son."

"But why did they have to die?"

"Because Crete was reminding the Athenians how powerful it was. Don't interrupt, it's almost your part."

I nodded vigorously, clutching my ball of yarn.

"And so one day, the Athenian warrior Theseus got fed up with the sacrifice of his people. He conspired with the Minotaur's half-sister, Princess Ariadne - that's you, ready your clue," he said, snapping his fingers and pointing at the ball of yarn. My father explained that the word - clue - is the ancient word for a ball of thread, like the one in my hands. Its double meaning comes from the very story that was unfolding. I set it at the entrance to the maze. "She gave him a ball of thread so that he could follow his way back out."

I rolled the ball of yarn along the floor between the books, tracing the crooked twisting path that would lead to my father. When it touched his toes, he recoiled in mock-horror, picked up the ball, wrapped string around his shoulders, waist, arms, gnashing his teeth in a fight with himself. In a death blow he wrapped the yarn around his own neck, stuck out his tongue and crossed his eyes, and collapsed in a heap on the floor, creating an earthquake among the books. They tumbled down in a halo around him.

"Theseus defeated the Minotaur," my father said from his back on the floor. "That was the end of the human tributes, and the end of Crete itself. The old world was wiped out with the monster. Athens rose to power in its stead, and Theseus became the new king of the known world."

"Were there any monsters after that?" I asked, nudging his foot. He didn't stir.

"Of course there were. There always are."

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