The Minoan Cipher

CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

Kalliste felt as if she were crawling out of a coal pit. Although her eyes had blinked open, darkness encroached at the periphery of her vision. She pushed the shadows aside by sheer will power, slowly sat up and swung her legs over the side of her bed. Her lips were dry, she had a coppery taste in her mouth and her head pounded.

She couldn’t understand why she had a super hangover. She hadn’t had a drop of wine. After downing a slice of bread, she had nibbled on fresh fruit. She glanced at the bowl and the partially-eaten orange. Of course. They had drugged the fruit and the wine. She swept her arm around in anger. The bowl and its contents crashed to the tiled floor. She was about to consign the wine jug to the same fate, but a gurgling below her breastbone warned that she had a more urgent Priority.

Staggering to her feet, she rushed to the washroom and made it to the sink barely in time to disgorge the tainted fruit. She stuck her head under the tap and washed away the sour taste. Then she splashed cold water on her face and brushed her hair back with her fingers. Kalliste was glad there was no mirror. Her face must be a fright.

Her captors wanted her out cold. If she had sampled the wine as well as the food she would have been in la-la land when they came to take her away.

Kalliste went back to her bedside and used her fork to tear the blue fringe away from the tablecloth. She twisted the tassels and wrapped them around the fork handle to create a crude brush. She dipped the makeshift brush into the wine and drew an outline on the tablecloth of the Maze from memory that went back to her childhood days. She was ninety percent sure she’d got it right, even down to the bull’s head in the center of the diagram.

Seconds after she hung the tablecloth in the shower to dry, she heard someone at the door. She emptied out the rest of the wine, dashed for the bed and pulled the sheets over her body. Lying on her left side, she held the jug by its handle behind the crook of her bent knees. Through the slits of her slightly open eyes she saw the priestess enter and shut the door behind her.

Unlike earlier visits, when she carried a tray of food and wine, the priestess was empty-handed. As Kalliste concluded, the last food delivery must have been planned as the final meal. That’s why it packed a drug punch. She clamped her eyelids tight. There were the soft footfalls of sandals on tiles, then she felt the brush of warm air against her cheeks and heard soft breathing. The priestess was leaning close to make sure Kalliste was unconscious.

The warm air stopped. Next, Kalliste heard a scraping sound. She opened an eye. The priestess was down on one knee, sweeping pieces of broken pottery with one hand into another. She went to put the shards on the table, but stopped short and stared at the tabletop. Kalliste’s heart sank. The priestess must have noticed the tablecloth and the wine jug and figured something was amiss. Kalliste could imagine what was going through the woman’s mind. If the fruit and wine had knocked Kalliste out, when did she have time to dispose of the tablecloth and the jug?

She looked straight into Kalliste’s face. Kalliste flipped the sheet back and swung the jug around in a short arc. The vessel shattered in pieces against the woman’s skull. Her hands went limp. The shards fell from her hands onto the floor. Her eyes rolled in her head and she keeled over like a felled tree.

Kalliste vaulted out of bed. She picked up the table and held it high over the limp body, but the priestess was out cold. Kalliste slipped the axe medallion over the woman’s head and looped the chain around her own neck.

She shimmied out of the flounced skirt and tossed it aside. The ankle-length garment would slow her down. She pulled the light outer skirt off the priestess and wrapped it around her waist. She couldn’t help noticing the ropey muscles and the thick calves. The woman was an Amazon who would have squashed her like a bug if Kalliste hadn’t put her out of commission.

She thought of tying the priestess up with the discarded skirt, but she didn’t have time to figure it out. She gambled that the priestess would never venture out into the Maze without the protection of her medallion. Kalliste took several long deep breaths to slow the beating of her heart, then slid the door open.

Waiting in the passageway like a couple of puppies eager to go for a walk were the two dog creatures. Even sitting on their haunches, the heads of the animals were at her eye level. Kalliste took a deep breath and started forward, only to stop. Damn. She had forgotten her map. She went back inside to retrieve the tablecloth. It took superhuman effort to march past the unconscious priestess, then out into the passageway again. The dog creatures pattered behind her.

Kalliste tried to ignore her companions and concentrate on finding her way out. She made steady progress toward the center of the maze. She had to back out a couple of blind alleys. The foul-ups were more due to the slap-dash nature of the tablecloth map than her cartographic skills.

Despite her fear and anxiety, Kalliste couldn’t help but appreciate the ingenuity and labor that had gone into the construction of the Maze. Knossos was like child’s play compared to this network of tunnels. The passageways were at least twenty feet across and she estimated the ceilings that dripped with moisture were around ten feet high. Lily said that the Maze builders could trace their origins back to Neolithic times.

The Maze must have had its inspiration in the caves their ancestors called home tens of thousands of years ago. As perverted as Lily and her followers were, they had been the jealous guardians of rituals and language born at the dawn of civilization. Kalliste couldn’t wait to write a scientific paper. She almost laughed at her presumptuousness. Here she was, trying to make her way through a gigantic puzzle deep in the earth, followed by a couple of toothy monsters, and she had herself practically accepting a Nobel prize in science.

According to her map, she was practically halfway through the Maze, approaching the large rectangle where the bull’s head had been drawn on the scroll. Because of the size and location of the space, Kalliste assumed that it might be the bull court Lily said was no longer used. She would make quick time across the open space, and pick up a passageway on the other side.

The lighted tunnel jogged to the right and the left, then ended abruptly. There was nothing ahead but pitch-black darkness. Not a pinpoint of light. She brushed aside fears of falling into yawning pits. She would let her eyes get used to the darkness, allow her senses to take over and try to move ahead in a straight line. Keeping her hands extended until she encountered the wall indicated on the map, she would then grope her way along the surface until she found the opening for the passageway.

She turned to check on her companions. They had disappeared. They must have fallen silently back as she approached the bull court. They were hideous creatures, but it wasn’t their fault. They had been bred as killers by humans who were the real monsters.

She took a tentative step into the darkness, then another and another. She moved with more confidence with each step, thinking that this was what a blind person experienced every day of his or her life. The lack of sight heightened her other senses. Her nostrils picked up a musty, damp smell. From somewhere came the sickly-sweet scent of rotting meat. Her heartbeat ratcheted up at the prospect of stepping on a dead animal that may have wandered into the court, but she continued resolutely on, arms waving in front of her like the antennae on an insect.

After a few minutes passed, Kalliste guessed that she might be halfway across the court, which is when she heard the scuffling noise from directly in front of her. She stopped and listened. A different sound echoed in the darkness.

Clop-clop.

The noise sounded like hooves on stone.

Then came a snuffle and a snort. She was not alone. An animal was moving around the unlit court. She froze. Her mind was whirling. She didn’t know whether to make a dash for the opposite wall or turn back to the portal she had entered. The decision was made for her. The clopping moved around behind her, and when she turned, two blazing red eyes blinked on in the darkness.

She began to run.