The path seemed safe enough.
Aegeus, nodded his men forward and a thousand Athenian soldiers marched confidently into the valley.
Two years had gone by since Theseus had returned home – two years of peace and prosperity for Athens. But always in the background hung the dark threat of Four-Fingered Laius, Aegeus’ evil brother. The King knew he must seek and destroy him before he brought the country to its knees with his bunch of ruthless guerrilla fighters.
And now Aegeus looked anxiously at the mountains on either side. There was absolute silence except for the Crunch! Crunch! Crunch! of his soldiers’ boots.
Then, from a bank of ferns high above him, a partridge broke cover. The King glanced round; something must have disturbed it. He caught a glimpse of something shiny reflected by the sun. Then it was gone.
What was it? He smiled wryly to himself. He knew only too well.
‘Back! Back! Back!’ he shouted. ‘It’s an ambush!‘ But it was too late. With a terrifying roar the camouflaged soldiers of his treacherous brother Laius rose up from the mountain slopes and a hail of javelins and arrows rained down on the Athenians.
Immediately Aegeus’ men formed themselves into the shape of a giant tortoise, covering themselves and their comrades with their shields, leaving only tiny slits through which their archers could fire back. But slowly and methodically their enemies moved down the mountain towards them. Any minute now they would be overwhelmed. A rather nasty massacre was just around the corner. The Athenian tortoise was about to be crushed.
But then, high in the mountains, a trumpet rang out. Then another. Then another. The ambushers swished round in fear to see where the sound was coming from. They had an awful feeling that the people playing trumpets weren’t members of a jazz band. And they were right. Galloping towards them were five hundred hand-picked Athenian horsemen, and at their head was a young boy on a white charger. It was Prince Theseus, furiously waving a short chunky sword around his head — a sword with a ruby in its handle.
Aegeus’ army cheered, stopped acting like a tortoise and charged their attackers. And, of course, there was nowhere for evil Laius’ guerrillas to run to. They were sandwiched between Theseus’ horsemen and his father’s foot soldiers and it was definitely the nastiest sandwich they’d ever tasted.
The battle was short and bloody. The cowardly Laius and a few of his nobles sneaked away right at the beginning, but the rest of his army soon lay dead on the battlefield. It would be a long time before they’d cause trouble again.
Aegeus and Theseus stood silently watching the last few guerrillas being dragged away, then turned and playfully slapped each others’ hands.
‘Congratulations,’ said Aegeus. ‘Your plan worked. Let the celebrations begin. Pull out the large banqueting tables. Summon forth the amusing clowns with big red noses. Tune the big guitars for a lusty sing-song and let’s get so drunk we have to get dragged home by our hair.’
But when they arrived back in Athens, there were no celebrations: no crowds, no banquets, no massive barrels of second-rate grog. Everywhere was completely deserted except for a small group of women dressed in black, standing by the city gates, wailing and rubbing black ashes into their faces. Aegeus leapt off his horse and rushed up to them.
‘What’s happening?’ he bellowed. ‘We’ve just won a great victory – what possible reason is there for you to stand howling here like mourners weeping for the dead. Come on! Lighten up!’
‘The men from Minos are here,’ came the quiet whisper of a reply.
Aegeus’ face went grey. Then, almost absentmindedly, he wiped a tear from the cheek of one of the women and walked on towards the palace leading his horse in silence.
‘Who’s Minos?’ asked Theseus, trotting behind.
His father sighed before he replied. ‘Minos is King of Crete, which is the most powerful state in Greece. Every nine years, to keep out of trouble, Athens has to send him seven caskets of gold, seven young men, and seven young women. The gold goes to King Minos himself. The young men and women go to the Minotaur.’
‘The what?’
Aegeus grasped Theseus by the shoulders and looked deep into his eyes as he explained the horror. Theseus had never seen his father look frightened before.
‘Somewhere below the Palace of King Minos lives a monster called the Minotaur. It is half a giant man, and half a giant bull, with dark green scaly skin and broken teeth stained red with human blood. Every year, Minos sacrifices fourteen young Greeks to it. He sends them into his maze, which is so brilliantly designed – God knows by whose sick mind – so full of twists and turns that it’s impossible for anyone to find their way out. But the Minotaur knows every inch of it. The young men and women who enter it never come out – the monster eats them alive.’
‘And this year, it’s Athens’ turn to provide a meal for the Minotaur, is it?’ asked Theseus.
‘That’s right,’ replied Aegeus. ‘Tonight, in the temple, the young people will draw lots to decide who should go.’
‘Well, I’ll go, for one,’ said Theseus, ‘and try and sort this thing out.’
But Aegeus tightened his grip like a vice on the shoulders of his only son.
‘No. You are the King’s son. The next King of Athens. You must stay.’
That night the entire population crowded into the temple to witness the choosing of the fourteen victims.
At the altar the priests set up two enormous pots, one made of jade and the other of onyx. And each pot was full of stones – one for each boy and girl in the city.
A gong sounded and a long queue of Athenian girls shuffled up to the jade pot, dipped their hands in and pulled out a stone. If they picked a white one they were safe, if it was black they were doomed. Soon the temple was ringing with cries of relief and cries of terror, and seven young girls knew they were going to die.
Then it was the boys’ turn. One after another they approached the onyx pot and the shouts and cries rang out again. But when six boys had drawn out the cursed black stones, there was a commotion at the back of the crowd. Someone was pushing his way through.
‘It’s Prince Theseus,’ hissed an old woman, and the crowd pulled back to let him pass. He strode up to the altar, drew his sword and brought it down hard on the onyx pot. The pot smashed into pieces, scattering the pebbles across the temple floor. Then the Prince bent down, picked up the remaining black pebble and put it in his pocket.
‘I’m number fourteen,’ he said.
Next morning the fourteen young Athenians were led out of the city and down to the harbour. The Cretan ship was waiting for them; blood red, with an enormous carved bull’s head on the bow, and huge jet black sails.
Aegeus looked at his son, his face a mixture of pride and sadness. Theseus threw his big arms round his father.
‘I’ll come back,’ he said. ‘We all will.’
‘If you return safely,’ replied Aegeus, ‘lower those hideous black sails as you enter the harbour, and hoist white ones in their place. Then I’ll know you are still alive.’
‘Okeedokee,’ laughed Theseus. ‘And cheer up. They’ll be white.’ Then he jumped on board, for all the world like someone going on a holiday cruise.
The people of Athens watched as slowly the boat sailed out of the harbour. And they stayed there, still and silent, until it vanished over the dark horizon.
For days, the blood red ship sailed through the open sea, until early one morning the young Athenians heard an eerie drumming sound. They raced up on deck and saw ahead of them the land of Crete. It was not what they expected of a great city. The beach was littered with rotting vegetables and dead sea birds, the hillsides were covered with squalid shacks. Beggars and skinny dogs picked their way through the muddy streets. But the worst thing was the smell, like an open sewer.
Yet in the middle of this city of slums was a massive magnificent grey palace. Clearly one man had all the money and all the power and he wasn’t sharing it. And clearly he was a nasty piece of work.
As the boat drew nearer the drumming grew louder and louder until it was so deafening that the Athenians had to cover their ears. Then the boat stopped and the drums went quiet. Lined up on the sand was a long procession of musicians and from their ranks stepped fourteen young women who climbed aboard and placed a garland round the neck of each Athenian in turn.
The last to receive one was Theseus. A short dark Minoan girl with serious eyes said, ‘Welcome. I am Ariadne, daughter of King Minos.’
Theseus said nothing. He merely ripped off the garland and angrily threw it in the sea. He wasn’t having anything to do with all this pomp and ceremony. ‘As I see it,’ he said, ‘me and my friends are about to be murdered and that’s that. This is no time for flowers and dignified speeches.’
Then the drumming began again and the long procession, with the Athenians in the middle, wound its way up to the palace. There was a small iron grill in the palace wall. As they approached, it swung open and the Athenians were stripped of their weapons and flung inside. Then the gate swung shut again. Ahead of them was a dark tunnel with a blaze of light at the end of it. Cautiously they walked onwards until they burst out into the open again and a huge roar filled the air.
They were in the middle of an enormous arena, like clowns in a circus, and all round them on stone seats were thousands of Minoans, laughing and cheering and clapping. For the Minoans this was clearly party time – there were souvenir Minotaur mugs, Minotaur hats with little wooden horns, and the ice-cream sellers were doing fast business with their Minotaur Special – vanilla with two chocolate flakes, one for each horn.
Theseus stood calmly in the middle and stared haughtily around. Up on a high throne in the Huddle of the crowd, he could see a burly man with long black hair, wearing a crown made out of bulls’ horns. That must be Minos. But who was that next to him?
Theseus couldn’t believe his eyes.
There, beside the King, stood his old school master, Daedalus, the teacher who was so brainy and so boring that Theseus had sent him packing!
And at that moment, Daedalus himself caught Theseus’ eye. But he didn’t jump with shock, or anything like that. Instead, slowly and imperceptibly, he just shook his head. Theseus guessed immediately that it was a sign that he should pretend not to know him, and so he looked quickly away.
By now a procession of young Minoan women, led by Princess Ariadne, were handing out exotic food and drinks to the Athenians. Ariadne presented Theseus with a gold plate on which wobbled a grey green jelly with a dead fish in the middle of it.
‘Accept this exquisite Minoan delicacy,’ she said in a loud voice, and then softly whispered, ‘Stay awake tonight. Someone wants to see you. I’ll take you to him.’
That night Theseus lay in his cell waiting and vaguely considered that he might die tomorrow. It didn’t bother him too much. ‘You’ve got to go some time,’ he thought, ‘and back home I might have been run over by a municipal donkey and cart.’ But at that moment, slowly and quietly the door opened and there stood Ariadne. ‘Follow me,’ she said and they padded down long grey corridors lit by a few flickering torches.
Soon they were in Daedalus’ room.
‘When you were a child,’ he said, ‘you used to yawn in my lessons and look out of the window. There was always a comic hidden in your text books. You wouldn’t listen when I told you that a Prince needs to develop his brain as well as his muscles. But it will take more than strength to get you out of the Great Maze – no one has ever paid a visit to the Minotaur and returned to tell the tale.’ Theseus knew that Daedalus was right. For once in his life he listened to his lesson, and he listened hard.
‘Take this ball of string with you. Then at the entrance, tie one end to the door and unwind it as you go in. That way you’ll be able to find your way back again.’
‘But how will he kill the Minotaur?’ asked Ariadne anxiously. ‘Its skin is tougher than the strongest metal in the world.’
‘True – but it has one weakness,’ replied Daedalus.
‘And you should always go for your opponent’s weak spot,’ added Theseus.
Daedalus smiled ruefully. ‘I’m glad you remember something I taught you,’ he said. ‘Yes – there’s one thing that’s strong enough to pierce the Minotaur’s skin, and that’s the horn on its head.’
‘So I’ll have to talk it into stabbing itself?’ asked Theseus cheekily, just like when he was a boy.
‘Something like that,’ replied Daedalus. ‘Work it out for yourself. If you succeed, Ariadne will show you how to escape from the palace. But you must take her with you. She’s strong and clever and hates her father’s kingdom. If it’s discovered that she aided your escape, she’ll be killed.’
‘But what about you?’ asked Theseus.
‘I’ll come if I can,’ said Daedelus.
‘But how come you’re here in the first place?’
‘I built the maze,’ answered his old teacher, and bowed his head in shame.
Ariadne led Theseus back to his cell.
‘Good luck tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Are you frightened?’
‘No!’ replied Theseus stoutly. ‘Well … a bit.’
‘No need. You’ll be all right,’ said Ariadne and she kissed him.
After she’d gone, Theseus lay listening to the silence – a silence broken only by an occasional bull-like roar from somewhere deep under the palace.
At noon the cell doors swung open and the Athenians began their journey to the maze. They marched for miles down gloomy winding corridors. Cold and damp began to seep into their bodies as they plunged deeper and deeper into the bowels of the earth. The walls were rougher than the stubble on a giant’s beard and tiny. slithery animals jumped on them and nipped at them as they passed, having a nibble before the Minotaur had his big meal. Then, at the end of a long flight of slippery steps covered with green slime, they saw ahead of them a gigantic carved bull’s head with blazing torches for eyes, and a massive black studded door where its mouth should have been. The Minoan guards heaved the door open and the Athenians were roughly shoved inside. There was a slam, then a rattle of chains and the door was bolted behind them.
They were inside the maze. And if history was anything to go by, it was the door of their coffin that had just closed behind them.
It was pitch black, and they had to grope about to get their bearings.
‘AAAARRGHHH!!!’ Someone let out a terrified scream: he’d tripped over something. It was a skull – a human skull. One of the young men began to moan with terror.
‘Oh, get a grip!’ snapped Theseus sharply. ‘Here. Do something useful. Tie this string to the door. I’m going exploring.’ And with that, he began to inch his way through the maze, unrolling the ball of string as he went. The other Athenians just assumed he’d gone mad and waited for their death.
The walls were jagged and sharp, like enormous stone thorns; they tore at Theseus’ clothes and ripped his hands. And now he could smell the foul stench he had noticed when they first arrived – a smell of sewage, and rotting meat and death – it was so strong his stomach churned and his eyes watered.
‘GRRAAAAOOOOW!!!!!’
He started in fright as the blood-thirsty bull’s roar resounded in his ears and echoed and re-echoed round every wall of the maze.
Then there was silence. Everything was quiet and still.
First Theseus waited. Then cautiously he turned a sharp corner. Ahead of him was something dark and enormous with blazing yellow eyes and hot breath. In the half light its shiny skin glistened like the skin of a toad – but it was twice the size of an elephant.
Theseus knew he was face to face with death itself.
But there was no time to be afraid – in a second there was a clatter of enormous hooves and the beast reared and charged at Theseus, slobbering and chuckling as it came. Theseus leapt and dodged out of its way. A moment’s silence, then a crunch of stones as the monstrous bull turned and charged again. Again Theseus dodged, and this time the Minotaur’s horns missed him by a cat’s whisker – and a pretty skinny whisker at that. There was a screech of pebbles, and it charged yet again. Theseus made to jump, but instead, his foot slipped on something disgusting and wet. It might have been a kidney. The Prince of Athens fell defenceless on the floor.
The Minotaur seemed to know it had won. It let out a triumphant bellow and lowered its head to deliver the final thrust. But when it was almost on him, Theseus sprang up with a last burst of energy and vaulted astride the monster’s head, riding it like a wild bull. He grasped one of its horns, and heaved and twisted. There was a terrible crunching sound, like a young tree being torn out of the earth by its roots. Then …
‘ARRGGHHH!!!!!!!’
Back at the entrance, the Athenians heard a terrible cry. A death cry. They waited in terror. Then they heard the sound of something coming towards them. It was breathing heavily. They clung to each other, knowing death was on its way. And then …
‘Wow – I’m puffed!’ said Theseus. ‘Anyone want a ball of string?’
The Athenians were so stunned with relief, they couldn’t speak.
‘Oh, yes, and by the way – the Minotaur’s dead,’ added the young hero.
In triumph, the Athenians hurled themselves at the massive studded door. On the other side the guards tried to keep it shut, but they didn’t stand a chance. BLAAAMMM!!! The door burst its hinges and crashed to the ground. Beneath it lay the guards – squashed flat like armoured pancakes. The Athenians raced out – and there, in the shadows, stood Ariadne. ‘You’ll be wanting this,’ she said, and threw Theseus his stubby sword and a big nervous smile. ‘Now follow me.’
And very much alive, they bounded up the green slimy stairs that only an hour before they had gone down to their death. On they pressed through secret doors and tiny passages, killing any Minoan who got in their way, until at last, in a tangle of plumbing, they came to a massive drain pipe. ‘This is the way out,’ said Ariadne. ‘Nothing personal.’
One after another they climbed into it and slid down, down, down until with a mighty plop they found themselves lying on the ground outside the palace walls.
But there was not a moment to rest. Above them they heard a roar: ‘Stop the prisoners! Stop my daughter!’ They looked over their shoulders and saw the outline of King Minos, his crown of bulls’ horns glinting in the afternoon sun.
‘Thanks for having us!!’ the laughing Theseus shouted back, and sprinted down to the beach and onto the ship. With one blow of his sword, he cut the mooring rope free and swiftly the Athenians grabbed the oars and hoisted the black sails, bound for home.
BLAAM!
Behind them the city gates burst open and there was Daedalus racing towards the quayside pursued by hundreds of Minoan soldiers.
But his skinny pink legs just wouldn’t carry him fast enough. The boat was already pulling out towards the open sea.
‘Jump!!!!’ shouted Theseus, while there was still a chance. ‘Swim to the boat!!!!’
‘I can’t swim,’ Daedalus shouted back, and a second later the soldiers had surrounded him. ‘I never learnt how,’ he muttered to himself as they led him away. ‘No matter how clever you are, you’re never quite clever enough.’