The Reign of Wizardry (20 page)

“Captain Firebrand!”

It was the voice of Ariadne, strong and golden, yet with a husky little catch in it.

“You came—I knew you would!”

She climbed down flimsy steps. The full moon caught the red waves of her hair, strong enough to show color. Her white body was tall and sinuous as ever, intoxicating in a low-cut gown of clinging green. The serpent girdle writhed about her slender waist, and
the ruby eyes glittered balefully.

She came swiftly to Theseus. Smooth bare arms slipped about him, drew him to her. Her face lifted, white and alluring under the moon. Theseus kissed her—but he kept a firm grip on the hilt of the Falling Star.

Her clinging lips drew reluctantly away from his. She caught his tense sword arm, drew him toward that fantastic, unsubstantial construction.

“I’m so
glad, Captain!” Her voice throbbed huskily. “I have waited for you—and for Keke, my poor white dove, that was frightened by the fighting and flew away. But I’ll leave Keke.”

Her persuasive vibrant arm slipped around him again. “I knew that you would come to me, when your work in Crete was done. Because you promised. And I am ready, Captain. We’ll be in Egypt before dawn!”

Theseus held back.
“What is this thing?”

“This is the most wonderful fruit of all the wizardry of Crete,” she told him. “It is a machine, that flies like a bird. Daedalus built it—and it is safer than the first, fragile machine, that killed his son. It is moved with an engine of fire, and it can lift us safely over the sea to Egypt, as fast as a vulture flies.”

Her warm arm tugged again. “Come, my captain!”

“But why must we go to Egypt?” demanded Theseus. “Tonight?”

“Don’t you see?” Her golden voice was muted, pleading, anxious. “It is because of what you have done. You have destroyed the Dark One. You have slain Minos. You have raised the people, against all the warlocks and the gods.”

Her warm body shuddered against him, and he felt the cold, writhing stiffness of the silver serpent.

“Don’t you
see?” She clung to him. “I must go, to save my life. The people would burn me in the temple of Cybele.” Her tremulous lips kissed him. “But I waited for you, Captain.”

Theseus crushed her tall, slim body against him, kissed her until they both were breathless. But he was watching Snish,
over her shoulder, and he kept a good grasp on the Falling Star.

“Come on, my captain,” she begged huskily.
“The machine is loaded with my jewels and all the silver it can carry. If you aren’t happy in Egypt, we can fly on, beyond, even to the edge of the world.”

But Theseus waited, watchfully. “I’m not sure,” he whispered, “that my task in Crete is done.”

Her tall body tensed against him, and: “You have killed Minos,” she protested quickly. “You have roused the people against the wizards and broken
the power of the Dark One. What else have you to do?”

Theseus watched a white dove that came fluttering up out of the dark stairwell. It alighted on Ariadne’s perfumed hair. She lifted a white hand, brought it down to her lips, kissed its beak.

“My little darling Keke!” she whispered. “My poor white dove. Was it lost? Is it afraid? Does it want to fly with us, on the wizard’s wings, to Egypt?”

Cooing softly, the dove fluttered back to her shoulder. It cocked its head, and a bright eye looked at Theseus. That eye glittered under the moon. There was something familiar in its bright blackness, something—dreadful!

Ariadne reached for the hand of Theseus.

“Now, Captain,” her golden voice rang eagerly, “Keke has come back. Let’s go—before the people storm the tower or fire it.”

But Theseus
had stepped swiftly back. The Falling Star was ready in his hand. As if itself alive, the steel blade flashed up through the moonlight, slashed off the head of the cooing dove.

The bird fell from the bare white shoulder of Ariadne. It fluttered on the roof and lay still. Her golden voice went sharp, in a cry of grief and anger.

“What have you done?” She sobbed. “My beautiful Keke!”

But Theseus
stood back from her, alertly watching the white headless bird. He saw it swell under the moon, and change. It became a man’s body, nude, dark, gnarled, hairy, shriveled with years. It was headless, like the bird, and thick black blood spurted from the severed neck.

Theseus found the shaggy black head, lying beyond the feet of Ariadne. He turned it over with his toe, so that he could
see the face.
Snarling up at him, hideous in death, he saw the dark, skeletal visage of Daedalus.

White and motionless, Ariadne made a small choked sound.

“No, I’m not ready to go with you to Egypt,” Theseus told her in a slow, grave voice. “I believe that I have another task to do. If you wish to wait, I’ll come back to you when it is done.”

He turned to Snish.

“Come with me again,” he told the popeyed,
shuddering little wizard. “Find me the brass man, Talos. I want to see what he looks like—dead!”

The white features of Ariadne stiffened again with terror. Her mouth half opened. Her hands lifted in a frantic gesture toward her throat. Then it seemed that something paralyzed her. Her scream was stifled.

“I’ll wait,” she whispered.

And Theseus followed the quaking little wizard down the stair.

T
HESEUS WALKED
close at the heels of Snish, down into the black, dusty workroom of the dead warlock. The trembling yellow wizard lit a new torch from a dimly glowing brazier, and Theseus saw that the black vulture was gone from its perch on the silver ball.

Snish was a sallow green with fear, and the torch fell out of his quivering fingers. Theseus picked it up and followed him down
that narrow winding stair into the ancient pile of Knossos. He could hear the frightened clatter of the wizard’s teeth.

“Once, in Babylon,” came the sobbing nasal wheeze of Snish, “I was an honest cobbler. I had a wife who was faithful except when she was drunk—and that was seldom, for we were very poor.”

He stumbled on the narrow stone steps, caught himself.
“Knossos will kill me yet!” he gasped
apprehensively. “And I was happy in Babylon—if I had only known it—until that magician brought me his boots to mend. I wish that I had never heard of wizardry!”

He paused on a narrow landing, and his huge yellow eyes blinked fearfully against the torch.

“Master,” he croaked hollowly, “have you thought what you are doing? This brazen man has no humanity. He knows no pity. He may squeeze the life
out of me, for letting you disturb his slumber. And he’ll surely destroy you, Captain Firebrand. In a thousand years, he has not been vanquished.”

His trembling hands made an urgent gesture. “Why don’t you forget this folly, master?” he wheezed uneasily. “Why leave your bones to rot in the pits of Knossos—when there is a goddess waiting for you?”

Theseus came up to him, clutching torch and sword.
“I came to Crete to do a task.” His voice rapped hard. “It isn’t done. Lead on.”

With shuffling, uncertain steps, Snish guided him ahead. It began to seem a little ominous to Theseus that they came to no open court or shaft, saw no light burning, found no human being. Only once, for a moment, did they hear any sound—distant shouting and the far-off clash of arms.

“What is that?” demanded Theseus.

Snish paused and turned to listen, and it seemed to Theseus that his bulging yellow eyes were staring through the damp black walls. His huge bald head nodded slowly.

“That is your comrade, Cýron the Gamecock,” he said. “He has come to join your men, and they are hunting the last of the Minoan priests to their lairs. This night is indeed the end of wizardry in Crete!”

“Cyron?” Theseus stared
doubtfully at Snish. “But I left him to hold the compound!”

Snish listened again, at the niter-crusted wall.

“The Gamecock is telling your one-eyed cook what happened. He left three women to tend the watch fires in the palisade, and laid an ambush for the Etruscans on the road from Ekoros. He convinced them that the people had risen against them. They took the compound and fortified themselves
to wait for day.”

“Good old Gamecock!” Theseus grinned, returned to frowning soberness. “Lead on, wizard.”

He followed Snish, and the dim sounds faded. They descended
into a dank, brooding stillness that Theseus well knew, from the time he had been in the dungeon. It was the silence and the fetor of death.

Following on closely, Theseus coughed from the acrid sting of decay in the air. He started
to the dull, hollow echo of their footsteps. Suddenly it seemed to him that Snish, for a stranger newly come from Babylon, was ominously familiar with this dark labyrinth. He hung back, at a long hall’s entrance.

“Where are you taking me?” Apprehension croaked in his own throat. “Where is Talos?”

Snish pointed down the black-pillared hall.

“We can wait here, master.” His huge yellow eyes rolled
uneasily, and his voice was a rasping whisper. “If you still seek to die. For Talos will come this way.”

Theseus looked anxiously down the lofty avenue of square black columns, but nothing moved among them. He listened, and heard only the hissing crackle of the torch and his own hastening heart.

“We’ll wait,” he said. “But how do you know that Talos will come?”

The yellow eyes of Snish blinked
at him, gravely. “I’m a wizard,” wheezed the squat Babylonian, “if only a very minor one.” He came waddling back to Theseus, his ugly, wide-mouthed face pale and tense in the torchlight. “I know another small device, master,” he wheezed, “that can serve when Talos comes!”

Theseus stepped back, watchfully. “What is that?”

Snish reached out a quivering hand. “Give me your sword, master,” came
his nasal rasp. “My insignificant arts can make it invisible, so that you will seem to stand facing Talos with empty hands. That small advantage might well decide the fight.”

But Theseus held the sword, set its bright point against the wizard’s middle.

“The Falling Star has served me well,” he rapped. “And it will again—as it is!”

The yellow flame of the torch flared brighter in the yellow
eyes of Snish. They seemed to expand. Their glare, for a moment, was almost terrible. They reminded Theseus—But Snish was abruptly shivering and breathless.

“M-m-m-master!” he stammered faintly. “It’s T-T-T-Talos!” His quivering yellow arm pointed past Theseus, down
the brooding hush of the black colonnade. “The b-b-b-brass man, coming—”

Gripping the sword, Theseus crouched and turned. There
was only darkness between the rows of columns. He moved the torch, and silent, monstrous shadows leaped among them. But there was no gleam of brass, nor any tread of metal feet. Swiftly, he turned again.

Snish was gone. Where he had been, stood—Talos!

The brazen giant was bending. The torchlight shone on his bright, flexing skin, and his flaming eyes were huge yellow lamps. Splendid muscles
bulged his colossal body, and tendons thrummed like lyre strings. The fist of Talos, knotted into a huge brazen mace, was descending in a swift and deadly blow.

Theseus ducked. He swung the Falling Star, putting all his strength into a swift, instinctive thrust. The mighty fist slipped past his shoulder. And the steel nicked the mighty beam of the giant’s forearm.

Theseus leaped back. “
You
—”
he whispered. “Talos!”

His prompt defense had been all automatic. Now belated terror toppled upon him like a falling wall. Cold sweat covered him, and his quivering hand loosened on the Falling Star.

Talos crouched lower, uttering a tremendous brazen cry of pain and rage. It was like the bellow of some monstrous beast. Slow drops of liquid flame dripped from the slashed waist. They spattered
into little blazing pools on the stone floor.

“Well, Captain Firebrand!” The sudden laughter of Talos was deafening thunder in the long hall, and his yellow-flaming eyes were brighter than the torch. “If you could see the look on your face!”

Both gleaming fists balled, he stalked upon Theseus.

“Talos, you see, was no fool, after all!” boomed that terrible voice. “For he was also the little
Babylonian cobbler, who was always aiding you, Captain—to reach this moment of your destined death.”

The numbed brain of Theseus was groping back. The fearful little wizard, he realized, had always contrived to slip away just before Talos appeared.

The giant laughed again. “Snish came to aid you,” rolled the voice of Talos, “because it was written in the screed of
time that a red-haired Greek
should win in the games, and vanquish the Dark One, and slay Minos—and written also that then the wizardry of Knossos should prevail again!”

Talos crouched lower.

“With the aid of Snish, all the destined events took place with the minimum of harm. When they had taken place, we had hoped for you to leave Crete, with the daughter of Minos—who offered to give herself up to you, for her father’s
sake. But you refused to go, and now your time has come to die!”

He brandished a mighty metal fist, and a drop of flame from his bleeding arm splashed the thigh of Theseus. He flinched, and the brass giant laughed again.

“Now, do you think that Talos was the fool?” The great voice rolled and reverberated among the massive black columns. “Or were you? Snish guided you past the wooden wall, and
past the wall of brass. But, mortal, there is still the wall of wizardry. While it stands, Knossos cannot fall. Think of that—and die!” Bellowing like a brazen bull, Talos lumbered forward.

Theseus still shuddered from the shock of fear. The treachery of Snish had not completely surprised him, for he had clung to a resolve to trust no wizard. Yet it seemed to him now that he had let himself be
guided to the door of final defeat.

He had accomplished nothing real. All his seeming victories had been no more than the moves of a toy man, in a game of the gods of Knossos. He was certain now, that the old woman had not been Minos. Talos, he thought, would surely kill him now. And the reign of wizardry would continue, as if he had never striven to end it.