Circe(39)

He nodded, but I saw he was thinking of harvest time, and the feeding that must come. He glanced at the molds behind him, tinged red with heat. “I will be finished with the cage tomorrow morning.”

“Good,” I said. “It cannot come too soon. I will work the spell then.”

When the door closed, Ariadne stood waiting. “You were speaking of the baby that was born, were you not? He is the one that must be kept until he’s killed?”

“He is.”

“The servants say he is a monster, and my father shouted at me when I asked about him. But he is still my brother, is he not?”

I hesitated.

“I know about my mother and the white bull,” she said.

No child of Pasipha?’s could remain innocent for long. “I suppose you may say he is your half-brother,” I said. “Now come. Take me to the king and queen.”



Griffins preened, delicate and regal, on the walls. The windows spilled sun. My sister lay on her silver couch glowing with health. Beside her, on an alabaster chair, Minos looked old and puffed, like something left dead in the waves. His eyes seized on me as snatcher-birds take fish.

“Where have you been? The monster needs tending. That is why you were brought here!”

“I have made a draught,” I said. “So we may transfer it to its new cage more safely.”

“A draught? I want it killed!”

“Darling, you sound hysterical,” Pasipha? said. “You haven’t even heard my sister’s idea. Go on, Circe, please.” She rested her chin on her hand, theatrically expectant.

“It will bind the creature’s hunger for three seasons of each year.”

“That’s it?”

“Now, Minos, you’ll hurt Circe’s feelings. I think it’s a very fine spell, sister. My son’s appetite is a bit unwieldy, isn’t it? He’s gone through most of our prisoners already.”

“I want the creature dead, and that is final!”

“It cannot be killed,” I told Minos. “Not now. It has a destiny far in the future.”

“A destiny!” My sister clapped delightedly. “Oh, tell us what it is! Does it escape and eat someone we know?”

Minos paled, though he tried to hide it. “Be sure,” he said to me. “You and the craftsman, be sure it is secure.”

“Yes,” my sister crooned. “Be sure. I hate to think what would happen if it got out. My husband may be a son of Zeus, but his flesh is thoroughly mortal. The truth is”—she lowered her voice to a whisper—“I think he may be afraid of the creature.”

A hundred times I had seen some fool caught between my sister’s claws. Minos took it worse than most. He stabbed a finger through the air at me. “You hear? She threatens me openly. This is your fault, you and your whole lying family. Your father gave her to me as if she were a treasure, but if you knew the things she has done to me—”

“Oh, tell her some of them! I think Circe would appreciate the witchcraft. What about the hundred girls who died while you heaved over them?”

I could feel Ariadne, very still, beside me. I wished she were not there.

The hate in Minos’ eyes was a living thing. “Foul harpy! It was your spell that caused their deaths! All you breed is evil! I should have ripped that beast from your cursed womb before it could be born!”

“But you did not dare, did you? You know how your dear father Zeus dotes on such creatures. How else can all his bastard heroes win their reputations?” She cocked her head. “In fact, shouldn’t you be slavering to take up a sword yourself? Oh, but I forgot. You have no taste for killing unless it is serving girls. Sister, truly, you should learn this spell. You need only—”

Minos had risen from his seat. “I forbid you to speak further!”

My sister laughed, her most silver-fountain sound. It was calculated, like everything she did. Minos raged on, but I was watching her. I had dismissed her coupling with the bull as some perverse whim, but she was not ruled by appetites; she ruled with them instead. When was the last time that I had seen true emotion on her face? I recalled now that moment on her childbed when she had cried out, her face twisted with urgency, that the monster must live. Why? Not love, there was none of that in her. So the creature must somehow serve her ends.

It was my hours with Hermes that helped me to an answer, all the news that he had brought me of the world. When Pasipha? had married Minos, Crete was the richest and most famous of our kingdoms. Yet since then, every day, more mighty kingdoms were rising up, in Mycenae and Troy, Anatolia and Babylon. Since then too, one of her brothers had learned to raise the dead, the other to tame dragons, and her sister had transformed Scylla. No one spoke of Pasipha? anymore. Now, at a stroke, she made her fading star shine again. All the world would tell the story of the queen of Crete, maker and mother of the great flesh-eating bull.

And the gods would do nothing. Think of all the prayers they would get.

“It’s just so funny,” Pasipha? was saying. “It took you so long to understand! Did you think they were dying from the pleasure of your exertions? From the sheer transported bliss? Believe me—”

I turned to Ariadne, standing beside me silent as air.

“Come,” I said. “We are finished here.”