“Walk, Ariadne,” Icarus’s voice says in my earpiece.
I step forward, spotlights on me, the slow steady beat of a drum echoing, setting the pace of my march to the stage. The competitors stand. The crowd roars as my image is projected onto the Jumbotron. My arrival is as reliable as the pistol starting a race. Finally, someone will bleed. The crowd is excited. Vortigern is a good competitor. He is strong. He understands what he’s up against.
It is so loud that it covers the sound of the beating drum. So loud it fills my head.
On the Jumbotron, they project Theseus looking at me. It stops me cold.
“Seriously, Ariadne, this is not hard. Walk,” Icarus says.
I force my legs to move. Force my step to match the slow beat of the drum, which is burned into my muscle memory from the times I’ve done this before. Force myself to breath. To slow down my racing heart.
With every step, I’m closer to Theseus. Better able to see him.
His bare legs in his war kilt, his strong arms. Those hands. His eyes, on me, watching me. Like I’m the only person in the world.
I nearly stumble going up the steps to the stage.
“Steady, Ariadne,” Icarus says.
The crowd has hushed. The drumbeat is gone, replaced by the keening of a bouzouki.
I take a long, deep breath, tearing my attention away from Theseus. Toward the opening to the maze. I walk up the stairs slowly, calming myself with each breath. At the top of the stairs, I turn to face the crowd. To say the words I always say.
It is different now, because they can see me.
“Here are the bravest and most beautiful of Athens. They have come to face the mighty Minotaur. To discover the will of the gods—and their fate.”
The crowd cheers.
“Take your place in line,” I say to the competitors.
In a series of moves choreographed and practiced early today, everyone moves from their assigned places where they will watch The Labyrinth Contest to line up in two rows alongside the path that Vortigern will walk down, the path that will lead to the maze behind the stage.
At the front of them, Vortigern waits for me. Theseus is at the back of the line, closest to me.
I force myself not to look at him.
“Vortigern of Athens, are you ready to face the Minotaur?” I ask.
“Yes,” he says. His voice is clear and strong. “I am ready to kill the Minotaur.”
The crowd roars.
“Now the Keeper of the Maze will lead Vortigern to the Labyrinth,” Daedalus announces.
The crowd cheers even louder.
I take Vortigern’s hand in mine, and we walk to the steel doors. With a series of thunks and clicks, the locks disengage, and the doors glide open inwardly. We walk through into the cavernous tunnel, and the sound of the crowd in the stadium drops away.
I lead him into the darkness, the tunnel narrowing and sloping steeply down, and the motion sensor lights turn on, lighting his path forward.
Vortigern bounces on the balls of his feet.
“It’s time, Ariadne,” Icarus says in my ear.
I let go of Vortigern’s hand.
“Wish me luck,” he says.
I say, “Go, Vortigern,” keeping my voice low and solemn. “Discover your fate.”
He lifts his head and runs into the maze, and I turn and walk quickly back to the gates. The cameras aren’t watching me anymore. Now they’ll be focused on Vortigern. I walk through the gates, and they close with a clang behind me.
Once I’m back on the stage, I look out at the stadium floor. Sheets of fabric that had been pooled on the ground have been pulled up to make a giant scrim, visible to every seat in the stadium. This is where Vortigern’s fight with the Minotaur will be projected, giving everyone here a front-row seat.
No one cares about me now; I can get out of here. In a matter of seconds, I’ll be off camera, out of view. Then I’ll get in the golf cart that is waiting for me, and it will speed me to the entrance, where a black SUV will return me to the palace. Back to my room. To my VR headset. My games. Oblivion.
So I don’t have to see what happens.
So I don’t have to watch my brother eat.
I walk through the line of competitors, keeping my head up. Not looking at them.
As I walk past Theseus, he grabs my arm.
“Ariadne, stop.” He is not smiling now. “Where are you going?”
I should ignore him. I should keep walking. I have to get out of here before Vortigern gets to his first obstacle. I don’t have much time.
“I don’t stay for this part,” I say.
“Don’t tell me,” he says. “You go back to your room and play video games.”
I nod. “I have to go,” I say, stepping away. But Theseus keeps his hand on my arm.
“Wait, Ariadne,” he says. “You can’t pretend you aren’t part of this. Stay here with me. Watch.”
I pull away from him.
“Stay.” His voice is harsh. “It’s the least you can do. If you are so set on protecting the Minotaur, at least you should see what he is. You should see what you are protecting.”
“I know what he is,” I say.
“Do you? Do you really?”
“Yes,” I say, but my voice is not as certain as I want it to be. Do I know? Really? When was the last time I watched my brother eat? It was when I was a little girl with the cows.
“I can’t,” I say. “I can’t.”
“Stay, Ariadne,” Theseus says. “You owe it to Vortigern. What are you afraid of?”
Theseus steps closer, his body next to mine.
“Competitors to their seats,” a production assistant says, coming up from behind the stage.
I look at the spots where the competitors will be sitting, fourteen chairs in a row, one empty one where Vortigern was. Every night there will be one more empty chair. Unless one of them kills the Minotaur. One of the production assistants has set a small stool next to Theseus’s seat. Icarus wants me to sit next to Theseus. He wants me to watch.
“Stay,” Theseus says. His face is calm, and brave, and his eyes have that look in them. The one we share. The look of someone who has been swept up by forces they cannot control.
I cannot give him everything he wants.
However, I can give him this.
I nod and follow him over to the stool to watch.
FOURTEEN
Daedalus’s voice fills the stadium. “Vortigern of Athens has reached the first branch of the tunnel.”
On the screen, we see Vortigern face a branch in the tunnel.
“Which way will he go?” Daedalus asks. The music underneath is suspenseful, adding to the atmosphere.
From the left fork, a growl sounds, echoing off the concrete walls.
Vortigern hesitates.
Next to me, Theseus says, talking to himself as much as to Vortigern, who can’t hear him, “Don’t hunt the Minotaur yet, man. Wait until you have a weapon.”
The maze is full of obstacles that can also be used as weapons. Learning to use those weapons against the Minotaur is an important part of the competitors’ training in Athens.
Vortigern doesn’t do as Theseus suggests, turning instead toward the Minotaur’s growl. As he moves forward, the motion sensor lights turn on, illuminating the path with their pale light only when he is a few yards away from whatever is next.
In the stadium, the camera shifts to the Minotaur. He is near his room, but he has caught Vortigern’s scent. His eyes are dark red.
The camera switches to Vortigern still making his way through the tunnel.
Then we have video from the stands. Acalle, leaning forward and watching. She is biting one of her perfect fingernails. Has she gotten attached to Vortigern? Did Icarus warn her about that, too?
When we see Vortigern again, he’s picking up speed, jogging.
Another roar echoes from deep in the maze, but closer than it was.
Next to me, Theseus whispers, “Don’
t run, man, don’t run. There isn’t any hurry.”
The camera jumps to show us a dark pit ahead of Vortigern. He can’t see it yet.
The lights flash on at the last possible minute, and Vortigern pulls up short.
Daedalus tells the crowd, “Vortigern has discovered his first obstacle—the Pit of Fire—a thirty-foot stretch of tunnel where the floor has been replaced with a fiery pit, ten feet deep. Platforms are placed at eight-foot intervals. Vortigern’s task will be to jump from platform to platform, without getting barbecued.”
The screen shows a video of the obstacle. The bottom of the pit is covered in volcanic rocks, with jets of red flame shooting up.
Theseus says, “He should have gone the other way. There are no weapons there.”
Vortigern looks at the obstacle, obviously trying to decide the best way to run it.
“The problem,” Daedalus explains to the crowd, “is that while it is easy enough to reach the first platform, how will he get to the next one?”
“Look on the wall,” Theseus says, beside me. “Look on the wall, you idiot.”
Just then, Vortigern notices it, too. Tied to a cleat on the wall is a thick rope. Vortigern grabs it.
He leans back on the rope and lets himself swing forward, landing heavily on the first platform.
The crowd cheers loudly, and Acalle is smiling.
In the maze, another rope is tied to the wall beside Vortigern, and he manages the next platform and the next with relative ease. Now he has the flat ground of the tunnel ahead of him, but it is a bigger gap to get there than the others have been.
He backs himself to the edge of his platform, then swings out hard, throwing his body forward at the last minute with so much force that he ends up splayed out on the floor.
“Not bad,” Theseus says, and the crowd cheers.
This is why I don’t watch; I don’t want to be rooting for these young Athenians. I don’t want to be confused about my loyalties.
That’s another lie.
I don’t watch because I can’t stand to see the Minotaur this way.
As if the producers are reading my mind, the next shot is not Vortigern, quickly making his way through the turns of the maze. It is the Minotaur.
His hot breath coming quickly.
He comes to a turn and is still for a moment, turning his massive head from side to side, sniffing the air. I try to see some sign of my brother in this face.
He isn’t there.
I see only hunger.
The Minotaur takes off at a loping run and the camera switches to Vortigern, who is walking slowly through the tunnel, looking for dangers.
At another fork in the tunnel, Vortigern turns right. After he has walked for a few minutes, there is a whirring sound.
“What the…,” Vortigern says, taking a big step backward as a line of sharpened wooden stakes slams down from the ceiling, then retracts as quickly as it came down.
“Vortigern has found the Stake Wall,” Daedalus tells us.
The image switches to a video of the obstacle. Five rows of stakes smashing down from the ceiling. Twelve feet separates each set of stakes, but they go up and down quickly at different rates.
“It will be up to Vortigern to make it through safely before he is found by the Minotaur…”
We see that the Minotaur has come to the same split in the tunnel that Vortigern passed a few minutes ago. The Minotaur raises his head, smelling the air. He takes the turn, following Vortigern, and the music increases in intensity.
“There has to be a pattern,” Theseus says, watching intently. “There has to be a system.”
Vortigern stares at the stakes as they go up and down. Sometimes there is barely a second between them, not enough time to make it through, but other times they stay up long enough to run under them and face the next set, rising and falling in their turn.
A roar echoes through the tunnel.
Vortigern turns and sees the Minotaur standing at his full height.
Beside me, Theseus whispers, “Come on, Vortigern, it’s four fast, one slow, two fast, one slow, man. Get out of there. That’s no place to make a stand.”
Vortigern must not have figured it out. The next time the stakes come down, he grabs one of the lengths of wood, pulling hard and ripping it from its mounting in the ceiling. He turns to face the Minotaur, holding the stake out as a weapon.
In the stadium, the crowd roars.
This is why they came. This is why they are here.
Vortigern is trapped, and the Minotaur knows it.
His bellow of triumph fills the tunnel, its amplified reverberation filling the stadium above.
I want to close my eyes. I want to look away.
Vortigern brandishes his stick at the Minotaur.
“Come on,” Vortigern shouts. “Come and get me!”
Beside me, Theseus sighs.
In the maze, the Minotaur’s eyes never leave Vortigern and his sharpened stick. Then, exactly as he did with me last night, the Minotaur drops his head and charges.
Vortigern holds his stake steady, pointing it right at the Minotaur’s heart. At the last minute, he dodges to the side, using the stake to stab the Minotaur’s chest, then running past him.
My hands cover my mouth.
A gash opens up the Minotaur’s chest, blood staining his skin.
His roar is full of rage.
The Minotaur spins, focused on Vortigern.
They have traded positions. Vortigern has the open tunnel behind him, and the Minotaur is in front of the Stake Wall.
Beside me, Theseus says, “Run.”
Instead, Vortigern runs at the Minotaur, holding his spear in the attack position. At the last minute, the Minotaur shifts to the left, avoiding the spear and using his right horn to gouge a long cut in Vortigern’s unprotected left flank, the cut drawing blood and worse from his gut. The force of the Minotaur’s blow slams Vortigern into the narrow tunnel wall, and the spear drops from his hand.
Vortigern reaches for the wound, as though he could possibly close it with his hands.
With a savage push of his arms, the Minotaur sends Vortigern backward into the space where the stakes have risen up into the ceiling, and before Vortigern can roll, before he can protect himself, the line of stakes comes down, the sharpened wood slamming into his soft body.
Vortigern is screaming and screaming as the stakes impale him and blood soaks the ground.
Around me in the stadium, the people are cheering. They got a fight. They got what they wanted.
I look down the row of competitors, their faces numb.
The camera shows Acalle in the stands. She is pale, tears making mascara run down her cheeks.
“Get out of there, Ariadne,” Icarus says in my ear, urgent. “Don’t watch this.”
I nod. I can’t see this. I’ve seen enough.
I stand, but Theseus grabs my wrist.
“Wait,” he says. His eyes on me are fierce. Certain. “You have to watch.”
“I can’t,” I whisper. I am shaking like sails in the wind. My teeth are chattering with the awfulness of what I have seen.
“Stay,” Theseus says. “You owe Vortigern that.”
Every part of me is pushing to be away from here. “Why would he want me to see this?”
“Then stay for me.”
His gaze is clear, serious. Honest.
“Stay with me, please.”
I sit back down on the stool and look up at the screen. Feeling Theseus’s hand tight in mine.
The Minotaur pulls the limp body of Vortigern out from under the stakes. This boy who was alive, awake, strong, moments ago is limp and dead.
The Minotaur bends down over Vortigern’s body, and when he rises up, his snout is covered in blood.
In my mind, I am not here, in the stadium. I am in the pasture with the cows. When my brother tore their flesh with his teeth and his horns. His face covered in blood and gore.
His eyes are the color of dried bloo
d, full of hunger as he bends again to Vortigern’s body, as he lifts his head and crows in triumph.
There is nothing of the gods in this.
* * *
I gag, vomit rising in my throat. I know I will be sick right here if I don’t get away. I yank my hand out of Theseus’s and bolt away from the stage. Theseus is behind me.
A cameraman pulls out of the line, ready to follow me, but in my earpiece, Icarus says, “Leave her. Let her go.”
Out of the stadium, I rush toward Temple Row. I have to get back to my room. Block out what I have witnessed. Lose myself.
I make it to the Temple of Zeus before I cannot go any farther. I vomit prolifically on the pedestal under the statue of the Thunder God. The Father God.
His lidless eyes look down, watching me the whole time.
I kneel in front of Zeus, retching and heaving.
My heart races in my chest as I try to force away the image of my brother’s snout coated in blood and gore.
I am crouched before the statue, hands on my knees. Hollow inside, the pile of vomit staining the white marble of the pedestal.
“How can this be what you demand?” I whisper to the god who I kneel before. “How can you have made my brother into this?”
Footsteps come up behind me, but I don’t turn. Is it my bodyguards, coming to take me back to my room? Icarus coming to bring me back in front of the cameras?
Then a hand rests on my shoulder, and I know, instantly. It’s Theseus.
He gently moves my hair away from my face.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s get you up.”
I’m still wobbly and shaking as I stand, and we walk around to the back side of the statue, where there is a marble fountain. The water bubbles up from a sacred spring, and you are supposed to wash before entering the temple. I hold my hands under the cold clear water, then take a drink, swallowing the bitter taste of my own sick.
Together, Theseus and I sit on the bottom step of the temple, looking out at the back of Zeus and the row of temples beyond.
“Now do you see?” Theseus asks me quietly. “Do you understand what you are supporting? What you are making possible? It’s horrible, Ariadne.”
I nod. “Yes, I can see it.”
“Then why are you still part of it? Why won’t you help me end it?”
Lifestyles of Gods and Monsters Page 17
