Authors: Mary Renault
Next I found a great place full of crooked shadows, where old furniture was stored, lamp-stands and vases. A long arm of it stretched away into the dark; but peering down it, I could just see piles of dusty shields and spears. Then I was sorry I had not marked my way; and working out a flake from the nearest pillar, I scratched on it the trident sign of Poseidon. After that I marked each one I passed.
From there the thread led into a passage all in darkness, where I could only feel my way along the walls. My face tickled with cobwebs, and a rat ran over my foot. I thought of snakes, and trod delicately. This passage sloped upward, and the air felt warmer. At the end was another lamp, and a great room of archives: shelves of scrolls rustling with mice; moldy rolls of ancient leather; bundles of palm leaves inked with faded signs; chests and baskets full of clay tokens and tablets. The dust made me sneeze, and the mice went scampering.
Then after a narrow place again there was a light. I came into a long chamber that was a storehouse for sacred things. There were tripods and bowls, anointing vases with wide bases and narrow necks; libation cups with breasts sculpted on their sides; sacred axes and masks and knives of sacrifice; and a great stack of dolls with jointed limbs. The thread wound about, round piles of incense-stands, and emblems on long poles, and a gilded death-car such as princes are wheeled on into their tombs. It passed a tall press, bulging open with women's vestments, gold-crusted and smelling of cassia. Then there were stone steps leading upward, and a door ajar. The end of the thread was tied to its handle.
I pushed the door, which opened without a whisper. Now there was tall space all about me, and a clean floor below. I smelled scented oil, beeswax, incense, spiced wine, and burnished bronze. A great shape reared before me, dark against glimmering lamplight; the back of a woman ten feet high, standing on a plinth and crowned with a diadem. It was the Goddess of the great sanctuary, where the nobles had bid for our dedication when first we came. But now I stood behind her, in the hidden place.
Then I saw that within her shadow another stood, smaller and darker. It was a woman, wrapped head to heel in a long black robe. Nothing showed but her eyes. They were Cretan eyes, dark and long, with thick lashes and soft brows, and the forehead above them was smooth as cream. More I could not see, neither her shape nor her hair, for the robe she was folded in covered everything; only that she seemed slender-waisted, and was not very tall. I closed the door on the thread behind me, and came in. My borrowed cloak was filthy with dust and cobwebs. I dropped it, and stood waiting.
She made a little gesture to call me nearer, just slipping her finger-tips out of the robe. I approached to within two paces of her; then I could tell by her eyelids she was young. But she did not speak, only drew the robe about her so that it hid even her fingers. So I said, "I am here. Who sent for me?"
She spoke at last, but without dropping the robe from before her mouth, so that her voice came small and muffled; yet it had a clearness, as a blade has though it is sheathed. "Are you Theseus, the bull-dancer from Athens?"
I thought it strange she should not know me; all Knossos goes to the dance. "If you doubt that," I answered, "I cannot prove it." But her eyelids trembled, and were young; so I said, "Yes, I am Theseus. Who wants me, and why?"
"I am a priestess," she said. "I serve the Goddess-on-Earth. She sent me here to question you." Then she let the robe slip down from her face. I saw it was made delicately, unpainted, and very pale. Her nose was straight and fine, and her mouth seemed small because the eyes were so dark and wide. When she had unveiled her head, she paused, looking at me, and pressing herself back against the base of the statue. I waited, and then said, "Yes?"
I saw the tip of her tongue move across her lips. The old woman, too, had been afraid. Yet I could not believe that here in the holiest place anyone would murder me. Nothing seemed sense. I saw the robe moving, where her fingers twisted within.
"It is a heavy matter," she said, "touching impiety. The Goddess says you must be questioned." There was a tight bunching in the robe where she had clutched it up. "You must answer, on pain of cursing. We have heard that the High Priestess of Eleusis chose you King of the Year; that after you had married her, you roused the people against her, and put her to death; that you have maimed the Mother's worship and profaned the Mystery. Are these things true?"
"Only," I said, "that I am King of Eleusis. The Goddess chose me, or so I was told. And it was the last year's King I killed, according to the custom, not the Queen."
She wrapped the robe tighter, so that it showed her crossed arms. "What is that custom? How did you kill him?" I said, "With my hands, at wrestling." She gazed at me with big eyes, then only nodded. I said, "I was away in the border land, when the House Snake stung the Queen. She took it as a sign of the Mother's anger, and went away. I do not even know if she is dead; I will swear, if you like, that I did not kill her."
She looked down at her hidden hands. "Did you grieve? Was she very dear to you?" I shook my head. "She had tried three times to have me killed, once by my own father's hand unknowing. She deserved to die. But I left her to the Goddess." She paused, then said still looking down, "Why was she angry? Had you been with someone else?"
"Only in war," I said, "as happens everywhere. No, it was not for that; she thought I would change the custom. And so I did; I come of a house of kings. But I never profaned the Mystery. The people were content, or they would have killed me themselves."
She said after a pause, "And you will swear all this is true?"
I answered, "What oath shall I take? I have told you, as it is, on pain of cursing." Her lips parted, and shut quickly. I thought, "She had forgotten that. She is a priestess, yes; but what else?"
"That is true," she said. "You need not swear." Then she was silent again. I saw the cloth stirring over her hands.
"What now?" I thought. "And if all this is so heavy, why not an older priestess? It is not common, to trust such things to girls."
She stood in thought, twisting and untwisting a fold of the robe. I said, "I have been with the bulls three seasons. If the god is angry, or the Goddess, they have not far to reach for me."
She said again, "That is true." I saw her lick her lips and swallow hard. "Perhaps the Mother has some other thing in mind for you."
I thought, "Now for the truth," and waited. When no more came, I said, "It may be so. Has she sent you some omen?"
She opened her mouth; but only breath came out of it. Her breast rose and fell within her arms. "What is it?" I asked, and came a little nearer.
Suddenly she spoke in a little high voice, swift and breathless. "I am here to question you. You must not question me. We must know these things in the sanctuary; that is all. That is why we sent for you."
"I have answered," I said, "as well as I can. Am I to go back the way I came? Or can I walk across the courtyard?" And I bent down for my cloak; but I was watching her.
"Wait," she said. "You have not leave to go." I dropped the cloak again; I had only wanted to get some sense from her. While I waited I saw that her hair was fine, waving of itself, with a silky burnish. There was a small waist in the close-drawn robe; and they must be tender breasts, which her arms cradled so softly. "Come, speak," I said to her. "I shall not eat you."
A lock of hair, which fell down within her robe, went suddenly straight as if the end were being pulled. "I was to ask you," she said, "to ask you for the Goddess, that is, for the records of the sanctuary..." She stopped, and I said, "Yes, what?" Her eyelids blinked, and she said faster than ever, "We have no account of the Mother's rite in Athens. What is the ceremony, how many priestesses take part, how many girls? What victims are offered? Tell me from the beginning, and leave nothing out."
I stared at her surprised. At last I said, "But, Lady, there are six girls in the Bull Court, all Athenian born, who know the ritual. Any one of them could tell you, better than a man."
She began to speak, then bit it off in the middle. Suddenly her face, which had been so pale, was as pink as the morning mountains. I strode toward her, and rested my hands on the plinth either side of her shoulders, to keep her where she was. "What game is this? Why ask me things to no purpose? You are keeping me here—for what? Is it an ambush? Are my people being harmed while I am gone? No more lies now; I will have the truth."
My face was close to hers. Her eyes were swimming like the eyes of a netted fawn; and then I saw she trembled all over. Even the thick robe shook with it. I was ashamed I had threatened her as if she were a warrior; yet it made me smile too. I took her between my hands to hold her still, and she gave a little gasp, like a swallowed sob. "No," I said, "do not say anything. I am here, and it is no matter why. See, I obey you, and do not ask a reason any longer. I have reason enough."
She turned up her face, flooded with changing color; and something hovered in my mind, that I could not name. Now I was near, I smelt the scent of her hair and of her body. "Who are you?" I asked. Then my breath caught in my throat; I knew.
She saw it in my eyes. Hers opened black and wide; with a quick cry she ducked under my arm, and ran. I saw her shadow slipping away round the great image, and ran after. All the huge hall stood empty and echoing, but the only footsteps were my own. The black robe she had been wrapped in lay trailed along the floor; even the whisper and clink of her skirt was still. I paced about, looking where she might have hidden; the further door she could not have reached in time, yet I had heard something closing. "Where are you?" I called. "Come out, for I will surely find you." But my voice rang too loud in the hollows of the sanctuary; I felt the Presence angry, and dared not call again. Then, as I stood still, my shadow leaped out black before me, from some new light behind. I sprang round, remembering I was unarmed. But when I saw whence the light came, then indeed my breath grew thick. The plinth had opened, beneath the image. Within, a clear blue fire danced on a tripod. It shone upon the Earth Mother, living, crowned with her diadem; her arms stretched forth over the earth were wreathed with twisting serpents. Her hands grasped their middles; the light shone on their polished skins, and I heard their hissing.
My heart was a hammer shut in my breast; I made the sign of homage with a shaking hand. Rooted on my feet I looked at the Earth Mother; and the Earth Mother looked at me. And as she looked, I saw her eyelids tremble.
I stood still, and stared, the flames nickered, and the Earth Mother looked straight before her. I took a pace forward, softly, and then another, and one more. She had not had time to paint her face, and the diadem leaned a little. As I came, I saw her gasp from holding her breath. She held out her arms stiffly, and the serpents wriggled, disliking the light, and wishing for their house again. But I did not watch them as I drew near; I watched her face. When I stretched out my hand toward them, I knew well enough that their teeth were drawn.
In her dark eyes, two little mirrored flames stood flickering. At the mouth of the shrine, I reached inward, and slid my fingers over her hand. As I closed it in mine, the snake, released, twined for a moment round both our wrists, and bound our two hands together; then it fell slithering, and poured itself away. Out of the Earth Mother, mistress of all mysteries, looked a maiden flying; a girl who has gone one step forward and three back, and wants to punish what scared her. I took her other hand; its snake had escaped already.
"Come, little Goddess," I said. "Why are you afraid? I will not hurt you."
7
In the corner of the temple, behind the image, was a curtained doorway and a little room. It was where she went to eat, when the rites were long; to be dressed, and painted. It was simple like a child's, only that the litter was sacred emblems and vessels, instead of toys. There was a bath in the corner, painted blue inside with swimming fish. Also a bed, for her to rest on if she was tired.
To this room I carried her. It was where she put off her gold-weighted diadem, and her heavy robes; where her women loosed her jewelled girdle, which no man had undone before. She was shy, and I only saw the place a moment before she blew out the lamp.
Later the moon came up, plunging down a steep court to spill light upon the floor. I lifted myself on my arm to look at her; my hair fell down on hers, and she twisted them both into one rope.
"Gold and bronze," she said. "My mother was fair, but I am all Cretan. She was ashamed of me."
I said, "Bronze is more precious. From bronze come honor and life. Make my enemy a golden spear, and a sword blade too." I did not like to speak of her mother, after all I had heard; so I kissed her instead. She hung all her weight upon my neck, and pulled me down to her. She was like a young salamander meeting flame; afraid at first, and only when flung in knowing its own element. There is an old saying that the house of Minos has sun-fire in the blood.
We slept, and woke, and slept. She would say, "Am I awake? Once I dreamed you were here, and could not bear to waken." I proved to her she was awake, and she slept again. We should have been there till morning; but in the hour before dawn the old woman came into the temple, and prayed aloud in her high cracked voice, and struck the cymbals, before she pattered away.
It was about this time that I learned to sleep by daylight. Even the shouts of the echoing Bull Court could not wake me.
The second night, the thread was stretched a new way for me. There was a trap in an old disused lamp room, very much nearer. It was the old woman who had led me so roundabout, to keep me from learning the way. She was a kinsman, on the distaff side, to Pasiphae the dead Queen. The new way got me there much quicker; and it still passed the ancient armory.
This night there was wine set by the bed, and two gold cups to drink it from. "They look," I said, "like libation cups." She answered, "So they are," making nothing of it. My mother had taught me respect for sacred things. But my mother was only a priestess.