The Lost Labyrinth
Will Adams
To Robert, Eleanor and Grace
Crete, 1553 B.C.
The food hadn’t quite run out yet, but it would soon. And last night the snows had arrived, laying a white blanket over the plain, cutting off the pass. No relief would be coming now. Not for a month at least. More likely not until spring.
It was over.
The fire had gone out days before. There was no more wood. Not that Pijaseme needed a brand to navigate these caves. They were a natural labyrinth, yet he knew them better than any man who’d ever lived. He’d spent fifty-two summers in the service of the gods here, presiding for the last ten over the temple outside, during which time he’d led the discovery and consecration of three new galleries. But he kept his hand to the wall all the same. So much had changed these past years that it was reassuring to know that some things were immutable.
He could remember the moment still. It had emblazed upon his mind. For years, the goddess had been angry. For years, he and his fellow high priests had sought to understand their offence, the better to make reparation. But each of them had offered different solutions, and the goddess had grown unhappier. He’d been on the final descent to Knossos for the great harvest gathering when a light like sunrise had burst upon the northern horizon. For a moment he’d been euphoric: he’d prayed all his life that the goddess herself would come while he yet lived. But then he’d realised she’d come in anger.
And what anger!
Her roar had deafened him for days. Her hail of molten rock had set forests on fire all across the island. The waves she’d sent, as tall as mountains, had destroyed their fleets and ports. She’d blacked out the sky for many moons and assailed them with an extraordinary violence of storms. Ash had fallen calf deep upon their fields, killing their crops and trees and herds, blighting them with boils and deadly wasting diseases and causing this brutal, endless famine.
He reached the great gallery. It was brighter than he could ever remember, the sunlight that filtered through the thin crevice in its roof magnified by the mirrors of snow around its edges. A flake fell coldly against his temple, then ran like a tear down his cheek. He watched more arrive, fluttering slow as
tiny feathers. Perhaps this was what the island needed. A purge of clean pure snow. Perhaps when it melted, it would take the ashes of the past with it, and the island would be born anew.
But Pijaseme wouldn’t be there to see it.
He’d already prepared the poppy-juice. Now he poured it into the goblet. A gust of wind played the crevice like a horn as he did so. The Minotaur was roaring. He looked up at it towering above him, set there by the gods themselves as guardian of the island’s oldest and most sacred labyrinth, which was why so many craftsmen and architects had made the pilgrimage here, to glean inspiration for their palaces. He poured a small libation in the basin at its feet before draining the rest in one go, grimacing against the taste. Then he walked down the corridor of axes to the great throne, where he set the bull’s mask and horned crown upon his head and tried to buckle the sacred robe around his throat. But he was too weak from age and hunger to bear its weight, so he left it draped over the throne’s high shoulders instead.
The poppy-juice began to ply its comforts. He felt his goddess smile, pleased by his choice of penance. He picked up the bone-handled knife and teased the wrinkled pale skin of his inner forearm with its tip.
It had been a fearful time, not knowing why the world had changed, or what to do. Survivors
had converged on Knossos from every corner of the island, seeking comfort in numbers, terrified not merely by the cataclysms, but also by the knowledge that there was nothing now to prevent their one-time subjects coming here to take their revenge for all the casual cruelties they’d suffered at their hands. Nothing to stop them looting the holiest places of their sacred treasures, either.
It had been Pijaseme himself who’d suggested a solution to this latter problem—hiding all those treasures here, in the sure knowledge that no outlander would ever find them. He’d stood up before the council and given his oath that the goddess herself had visited him in a dream, and so ordered. They’d all been so eager for her forgiveness that they’d acquiesced at once. The treasures had duly arrived over the next few moons, Pijaseme giving each party in exchange a receipt for what they’d brought, along with a fired clay disc imprinted with signs so that their successors could find this labyrinth again, should none of them still be alive when finally the island recovered.
How he’d exulted as the treasures had stacked up! He’d been certain that the goddess would reward him. But her anger hadn’t died. If anything, it had grown more savage, more personal. While other communities had seemed to reach and pass through the worst of this blight, his own had suffered more and more. She’d taken his surviving
children, and their children and grandchildren too, until only he and his beloved grandson Eumolpos had been left of their once great family. And finally he’d acknowledged in his heart the true reason for her fury. There had been no dream. He hadn’t brought these treasures here for her glory; he’d brought them for his own.
The exodus had taken place earlier that summer, when it had become clear that yet again there’d be no harvest. Eumolpos had taken charge, scavenging for wood in the mountains, dragging the timbers down to the coast, building a ship in which the few survivors had sailed north in search of a new land to settle. Their ancestors had arrived here from across the sea, after all. It seemed only fitting that they should leave that way too.
It had been a wrench to watch them go. Eumolpos had been Pijaseme’s heir as high priest at the temple. But there was no temple any more: Poseidon earth-shaker had seen to that. And at least this way Eumolpos would carry with him his memories, his knowledge of the sacred objects and rituals. At least this way, the goddess would still be worshipped. Before he’d left, Eumolpos had asked Pijaseme to go with them, albeit with lowered eyes. But Pijaseme was too old and proud. Besides, he’d taken a sacred vow to look after these treasures to the death. And, to the death, he would.
Despite the poppy-juice, the pain was fierce as
he stabbed through the leathern skin of his wrist, then gashed jaggedly upwards along his forearm. He didn’t let it stop him though, not with the goddess watching. He switched the blade from hand to hand, then slashed his other forearm too. Blood fell in slow waterfalls to form red lakes upon the dusty rock.
It was fitting. It was as it should be.
It had been his life to please the goddess. And he had failed.
Broward County Jail, Fort Lauderdale, Florida
‘Visitor,’ grunted the guard, heaving open the heavy steel door of Mikhail Nergadze’s cell. ‘Come with me.’
Mikhail took his time rising to his feet. It was a point of self-respect in places like these that you never gave the uniforms anything for free. Besides, he already knew who it would be. That court-appointed psychologist with her sneering upper lip and her aggressively folded arms. He’d always had an instinct for women like her. And sure enough, she was waiting impatiently for him in the dusty white-tiled interview room, dressed with her customary sharp-edged chic in a navy suit jacket and pencil skirt, her black hair cropped almost as short as his own prison crew-cut, just the
faintest touches of perfume and make-up. Yet, he noted, faint though those touches of perfume and makeup might be, they were still there.
‘Mister Nergadze,’ she said sourly, enunciating each syllable like an insult.
‘Doctor Mansfield,’ he nodded. ‘This is a pleasure.’
‘Not for me, I assure you.’ She gestured curtly for the guard to remain inside the room, then invited Mikhail to take one of two facing chairs. She waited until he was seated, then put down her briefcase by the other chair, produced a micro-cassette recorder that she placed on the floor between them, and sat opposite him. Then she brought out a set of papers on which she began to make notes on with a bulbous green fountain pen, glancing at him every few moments, like an artist working at a portrait, hoping no doubt to pique his curiosity. But Mikhail refused to bite. He folded his hands loosely in his lap and waited. It was perhaps five minutes before she sighed and rocked forward, passed two stapled pages to him, along with a blunt stub of pencil, as though he couldn’t be trusted with her pen. ‘Look at these for me, would you?’
‘Why?’
‘Do you really have so many better things to do?’
Mikhail shrugged and took the two pages, ran his eyes down the list of questions, gave her a dry cold look. But he didn’t mind playing. The opposite, if anything. He knew it would tear at her all
the more when his family’s army of lawyers finally got him out, which they would any day now; because without a body the police had nothing, and everyone knew it.
Failure to conform to social norms.
An easy starter. It never failed to astonish Mikhail that anyone should conform. Tick.
Regular bouts of irritability and aggression.
Tick.
Impulsiveness.
Tick.
She had a nice figure, this shrink. He had to give her that. Terrific legs. Tan and shapely, long and smooth. Yet muscled, too. A ballerina’s legs. Ideal for clasping tight around a man’s waist. Making the most of them too, as far as professionalism would allow, at least, with her high heels and a slit in her skirt that showed rare flashes of thigh, and constantly drawing attention to them by folding one over the other, or allowing them to part just wide enough to offer a glimpse of the shadows beneath. Not much else to write home about, unfortunately. A face like a toad, with flared, upturned nostrils, and her complexion still raw from the ravages of teenage acne.
Disregard for the safety of others.
Tick.
Irresponsible behaviour.
Tick.
Multiple short-term marital relationships.
Tick.
Her manner didn’t do her any favours either, all snorts and squints, as if her main ambition in life was never to let anyone get the better of her. But she was young and female, when all was said and done; and Mikhail had learned long ago to take what pleasures he could in institutions like these.
Lack of regard for promises, deals and agreements.
Tick.
Manipulative.
Tick.
Lack of empathy.
Mikhail paused. He’d always been slightly perplexed by questions about empathy. It was like colour-blindness. People who couldn’t distinguish between red and green, that was one thing; but how to know that his perception of yellow was the same as everyone else’s? Empathy was like that, almost impossible to judge relatively. Over the years, a number of psychologists had shown him pictures of people’s faces, as though they thought he suffered from Asperger’s syndrome or something. But Mikhail had never had any difficulty distinguishing happy from sad, surprised from intrigued, angry
from lustful; and he understood what each of those emotions were too, having experienced them himself. Besides, people kept accusing him of being manipulative, and how could he manipulate people if he lacked empathy? He could be a bully, yes, or excessively demanding; but
manipulative
? Surely that demanded a certain level of fellow-feeling. So he’d always thought the real question was, did he give a fuck? With empathy, he reckoned you were supposed to give a fuck. He thought that was probably the whole point of it. And the answer was no. He didn’t give a fuck. But here was the nub: How could he be sure that that made him unusual? How did he know that other people gave a fuck (or at least, any more of a fuck than he did)? He only had their word for it. Perhaps he was just more honest than they were. The way he saw it, no one truly gave a fuck how other people felt. Not truly. All they gave a fuck about was how other people felt
about them
. That’s why they postured and pretended concern, because they thought other people would respect them or love them more. But, what the hell, he knew the answer she wanted. More to the point, it was the one that would gnaw at her most when he walked out of here a free man.
Lack of empathy.
Tick.
Lack of remorse.
Tick.
Though he’d never really seen what the fuss was about remorse, anyway. Such a dishonest emotion. If you couldn’t live with the consequences of your actions, do something else, don’t wail about it. More to the point, don’t get caught. Mikhail couldn’t remember the last time anyone expressed remorse
before
they got caught? No, best left to politicians and TV evangelists.
Often in trouble as a juvenile.
Though it had never been his fault. Tick.A parasitic lifestyle.
He bridled a little at the choice of word. He was no parasite; people just understood that they
owed
him, because of the kind of man he was. But fuck it, he was on a roll: Tick.
He looked up at her. ‘Where do you live?’ he asked. ‘Somewhere around here?’
‘Just finish the list.’
‘Only we should get together for a drink when I get out.’
‘I don’t make dates fifty years in advance.’
Pathological dishonesty.
He’d be lying if he said otherwise. Tick.Cruelty to animals and other people.
‘When you say cruelty,’ he asked, ‘do you mean physical violence? Or do you include mental cruelty as well?’
‘Would it make a difference?’
Fair point. Tick.
Considers themselves outside or above the law.
Tick.
He glanced up sharply enough to catch her staring at him. He smiled knowingly, and she tossed her head and looked away, haughty as a rich girl’s pony, as though she thought Mikhail was so far beneath her, it was an ordeal even to be in the same room as him, as though she had to
steel
herself. But he hadn’t forced her to visit. Nor had the court, not this time. No. She’d come here on her own account.
Rampant fantasies of personal prowess and triumph.
Yes, he thought. Last night I dreamed about coming after you, you bitch. Tick.
Exaggerated sexuality.
He paused again. ‘Do you mean that I exaggerate my sexuality? Or that my capacity for sex is uncommonly large?’
She smiled thinly at him, reluctant to give him anything. ‘The latter.’
Exaggerated sexuality.
Tick.
‘Is that why you’ve been masturbating over me?’
‘Just finish the list.’
‘When you masturbate over me, do you imagine me naked?’
‘The list, please, Mister Nergadze.’
‘Mikhail, please.’
Demands immediate and complete compliance from those around them.
Tick.
Superficial charm.
He hesitated over this one, too. ‘Superficial?’ he asked.
She frowned, surprised he’d stumbled over such a common word. ‘Superficial means, er, like, er, on the surface.’
Mikhail felt himself being lifted up by a gentle wave of anger, that his Eastern European roots and accent had yet again been mistaken for stupidity. It had happened so many times during his years of exile in England and America that perhaps he should have grown used to it, but it still had the power to catch him by surprise. On the other hand, gaol had taught him to keep his safety-catch on,
to bide his time for the chance that would soon come. He waited for the wave to subside again before replying. ‘I know what
it
means,’ he said. ‘What I’m asking is what
you
mean. Charm is, by definition, superficial, wouldn’t you say? I think the word you’re looking for is “false”, isn’t it?’
She coloured a little. ‘I suppose false would…yes, that would be fine.’
He crossed out ‘superficial’, wrote in ‘false’ instead. Tick.
Envious of others.
He frowned. Would he really switch places with anyone else? To get out of here, maybe. But what the hell. Tick.
Often bored.
Tick.
He handed her back the questionnaire. A perfect score. She took the pages with a slight smirk, as though she’d just won a bet with herself. Mikhail smiled too. He liked cocky shrinks. They thought they were so insightful, so well-armoured. It fucked them up all the more when he got inside their heads. ‘You never answered my question,’ he said.
‘What question?’
‘Do you imagine me naked? When you masturbate about me?’
‘Masturbation, Mister Nergadze?’ she asked dryly. ‘Are you not confusing me with yourself?’
He looked into her eyes and held her gaze. She tried to stare him out; she didn’t stand a chance. When finally she broke and looked away, her throat turned lovely hot confused colours, and he felt a familiar stirring in his loins that confirmed to him the true reason she’d come back, which had nothing to do with his so-called disorder. At least, it had everything to do with it, but not in a way her professional association would approve.
She composed herself again, turned back to him, flint in her eyes, wanting pay-back. ‘So,’ she said, ‘you want to tell me what really happened that night?’
‘I already told you what happened.’
‘The
real
story.’
‘Oh, the
real
story.’
‘You want to, you know. In the end, men like you always boast about their…exploits.’
Mikhail nodded at the guard still standing by the door. ‘And men like him send us to the chair for it.’
She turned to the guard. ‘Leave us, please.’
The guard glowered at Mikhail. ‘You sure about that, ma’am? This one’s a mean son-of-a-bitch.’
‘I asked you to leave us alone.’
They both watched him out. Mikhail could tell
she was pleased with herself; demonstrating courage and trust, just like they counselled in the textbooks. The steel shutter in the door shrieked open, and the guard put his eye to the viewing window, his face magnified and made even uglier by the glass.
‘What if he can lip-read?’ asked Mikhail.
‘You want to trade seats?’ she asked. ‘So as he can’t see your face?’
‘I want him not to watch at all.’
She went to the door, held a murmured but intense conversation. The door closed, then the shutter over the viewing window. She sat back down. ‘Well?’ she asked. ‘Ready to talk now?’
‘With your tape recorder on?’
‘This session is confidential. I assure you, nothing will be used against you.’
He snorted and raised an eyebrow. She sighed and switched off her machine. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell you what you want to know. But I want something from you first.’
‘What?’
‘I want to know why you’re so interested in me.’
She studied him a moment, as if to assess him for sincerity. It always amazed him how credulous these people were: she seemed to have forgotten her checklist already. He kept his expression impassive, knowing she wanted to tell him, her own cleverness bottled like champagne bubbles inside her,
pressing for release. When she began to talk, she quickly grew excited. She stood up, began walking back and forth across the narrow room, gesturing grandly. She was working on a paper for the journals, it transpired. Her subject matter was narcissistic sociopaths. That Mikhail was one would be obvious to any first-year student, of course; but most people with narcissistic personality disorder were either cerebral or somatic, which was to say arrogant because of their intelligence or because of their physique and athletic prowess respectively. He was both. That in itself made him a curiosity. But there was more. Most narcissists were, at heart, self-loathing. It was their very hatred for themselves that drove their desperate need for adulation and worship from the people around them, their need for what she called narcissistic supply, and which she talked of as though it were a drug. When they were deprived of that supply, their fantasies about themselves collapsed, they fell into depression and despair. But he, while displaying all the signs of classic narcissism, seemed immune to depression and despair, even when his narcissistic supply was denied him, and she wanted to know why. Criminal narcissism was her thing, and she sensed in Mikhail an opportunity for a real advance, because if she could find his secret, maybe it would offer a way to palliate self-loathing in others
and so break the narcissistic cycle altogether. She got all excited and earnest, wobbling a little on her heels as she walked, red patches glowing on her throat and cheeks, like a litter of kittens seen through a night-sight. Finally she stopped and gave him one of those
well, there it is
shrugs, expecting him to honour his part of the deal, tell her how he’d raped and murdered that innocent little thirteen-year-old Lolita.