Phoenicia One

Just East of the Ruined City of Knossus, on the Island of Crete

The late afternoon sun was obscured by a dark shape. It rose slowly in the blue sky, silhouetted against the yellow light. As the huge shadow fell over the dig site the laboring excavators looked up to see the cause of the sudden darkness. A loud whirring sound filled the air, accompanied by a strong wind. The noise grew, and the wind blew harder. The diggers stopped their work. A few covered their ears, some ran in fear. Most stood up to stare. Finally the source of the disturbance, an enormous ship-like craft, abruptly lost altitude. As the vessel descended it became more visible.

They had expected the arrival of this strange ship, but not its size. No one among them had ever seen anything like it before. Shaped like a bireme, there was an enormous inflated balloon above the craft where a sail should have been. A propeller at the rear of the ship (in place of a rudder) seemed to be the cause of the noise. The underside of the vessel had been flattened out, so as to provide a steady landing. Tiny figures could be seen walking about the deck of the airship, performing unknown tasks. It descended onto an open grassy field prepared for it a few miles away from the workers.

Two men and three horses were waiting for the airship. The shorter of the two, Demetrious, was uneasy. His companion was awe-struck.

‘So this is what they’ve been up to back home,’ he said in a stunned voice.

‘Yes, this and more. Only the very important get to use things like this airship, Pyramus. Do you know what that means?’

Pyramus rolled his eyes. ‘I’m going to guess that it means our guest is important.’

‘That’s right. He is the personal advisor to the Emperor himself. Second most important man in all Phoenicia. Maybe in all of central Trellarya. So don’t mess this up for me.’

‘If he doesn't like what he sees,'' Pyramus replied, ''it's your head on the chopping block, not mine.’

‘Thank you for the vote of confidence.’ Demetrious sighed. ‘But he will approve. We've been working at double capacity, and it’s not like we're in any hurry. Still, Lord Adastros is supposed to have a temper. We've hardly scraped the surface of the Knossos site alone. We’re on schedule, but the schedule wasn’t very detailed.’ He was talking mainly to himself now.

‘You wrote the schedule for him, sir.’

‘Still…’

''Have you met him, sir?’

‘Not met him, not exactly.’ Demetrious sighed again. ‘But I've seen him! This man is adviser to the Emperor! Whatever he says goes!'

‘We have been through this before...’

There was now silence between the two. Their relationship was very paradoxical. When Demetrious was put in charge of the Crete project he had virtually no idea what he was doing. Pyramus, his assistant, had the brains. His knowledge complimented Demetrious’ leadership, his ability to get people to do things. Demetrious resented the debt he owed Pyramus, and it showed during their interactions. But he did respect his assistant, and, in fact, Demetrious even envied Pyramus.

‘It’s landing,’ Pyramus said.

‘I can see that! Are we ready? How do I look?’

‘Fine. You look fine.’ The wind whipped Demetrious’ hair. As the airship touched down the noise lessened, and propeller slowed. Demetrious could see the Lord Adastros now, looking down on them from the deck. A gangplank was lowered, which Adastros descended. He raised one hand in greeting. Demetrious noticed the man’s dress: he wore only a simple tunic, with ought toga. He had a sword-blade at his side, but it was only a ceremonial weapon, unsharpened. ‘Demetrious?’ Adastros was looking at Pyramus. The foreman leaped forward.

‘I am Demetrious, my lord. Welcome to Crete! It is an honor to meet you!’
‘Is that so?’ Only Pyramus noticed the sardonic way in which Adastros spoke.

‘Yes, my lord!‘ Demetrious continued. ‘I think you will find that we are on schedule. We have located the Palace at Knossos and began work there. We have already found what we think is the treasure vault, my men - our men are working there right now! And might I say again what an honor it is to meet you in person!''

‘Yes, yes,’ said Adastros impatiently. He pointed to the horses. ‘Are these for us?’

‘Of course, your honor! It is a few miles to our camp, and we’ve had no need for any sort of chariot until now.’ Adastros grimaced and swung himself onto one of the steeds. Demetrious and Pyramus followed suit, and together they began down the dirt path to the dig.

All the while Demetrious rambled on about the excavation, and all the artifacts they were finding. Urns and chamber pots seemed to interest him as much as money interested a tax collector. He spoke about what remained of the city. The lower sections of the city walls remained intact; the upper parts having collapsed onto the streets along with the houses. The marketplace had been partially indoors also, so when the earthquake struck virtually everyone had been killed. Few seemed to have survived the first quake, but were killed during the aftermath when they foolishly sought shelter in any remaining buildings.

During Demetrious’ monologue about the native wildlife of the isle, Adastros interrupted. ‘This is all well and good, foreman. But what I am really interested in is the Palace. Especially the throne room.’

Demetrious looked a little surprised. ‘Oh. Yes, of course! Pyramus? Can I have the plans to the Palace?’ Pyramus reached into his satchel and withdrew a scroll. ‘We got this from the family that designed the Palace hundreds of years ago, from Tyre.’ He handed over the according scroll, and Adastros unrolled the parchment. ‘There,’ Demetrious said, pointing. ''Is where we think the Throne Room was. There are doors all around, leading to antechambers and various halls. This one,’ Demetrious pointed again. ‘Mysteriously leads to . . . nowhere. It would make sense for secret, unplotted rooms to store treasure, no? The diggers are working through the rubble in front of the door as we speak.’

By this time the trio had traveled to the main gate of Knossus. The brick walls were only about six feet high, where before they had towered several stories high. They passed through the gates and along a path cleared of rubble. The air still stank a little: no one had been there to clear away the bodies of the dead Cretans, and they had decayed where they fell. An inglorious burial for such an amazing people, Adastros thought.

As they neared the center of the city he saw a series of tents erected in an area cleared of rubble. ‘Here we are, my lord!’ Demetrious announced, unnecessarily. ‘We are only a few meters from the palace site. Would you like to rest a bit first, or go there directly?’

‘Directly, if you please, foreman. A servant comes behind me with my personal effects, so I am unprepared to rest now. Lead on!’ They dismounted their horses and went forward on foot. With Demetrious in the lead, Adastros looked over Pyramus. He had stayed quiet through almost their entire encounter, and maintained a façade of subservience to Demetrious. But Adastros could tell the humility was just that: a façade. He had met many politicians in the years he had worked for the Baltzar dynasty, and Pyramus resembled many of them. True, he had only known the man in for a few hours, and couldn’t be sure. But Adastros never achieved anything in his life by hesitating. ‘I wish to speak to you tonight, Pyramus. Come alone.’

The other man looked at him blankly. Adastros just turned and followed Demetrious.

* * *

Pyramus approached the Lord Adastros’ tent hesitantly. He wasn’t sure what the man wanted from him, but he had an unnerving feeling that it had something to do with Demetrious or the Emperor. And since Pyramus had never met (or even seen) the Emperor once in his life, he guessed it was the former. But Demetrious would do anything that the personal advisor to Emperor Baltzar asked him to. He was a suck-up like that. Whatever his superior wanted was his command. Still . . . His primary interest was archeology, or what counted for archeology in this day-in-age. And he believed that the Knossus dig was mainly about old pots and pans of the Cretans.

Pyramus, however, knew better. The dig was about what drive all men: money. Knossus was one of the richest cities in all of Phoenicia. Mainly due to it’s location on the island, the city and surrounding villages could expand farther than any of the mainland cities could. And the fishing was incredible. Cretan fish, of any variety, from the cold north waters of the island, were considered delicacies.

Yes, money was what it was about. The lord Adastros would ask him to supervise some secret export of all the jewels from the Palace, or some such nonsense. And Pyramus would have to accept, because Demetrious had gotten one thing right: this was the right-hand man of the Emperor, and had complete immunity. If Pyramus even thought about reporting to Demetrious, Adastros could kill him and his master, and sleep well that night too.

With all this in mind, he entered Adastros’ tent. Adastros was sitting at a rickety desk, looking over the plans to the throne room. He stood up when Pyramus entered. ‘I Pyramus! ’ He said. ‘Thank you for coming. Please, sit.’ He pointed to his own chair, and sat himself down on his cot. But as soon as Pyramus seated himself, Adastros stood up again. He paused, then began. ‘Let me be blunt. The moment I saw you I knew what type of person you were. You are a thinker. You have a very good idea of what is going on around you, correct?’ Pyramus stayed silent. ‘You and I both know that your superior is a fool. He thinks only about old things and dead cultures, nothing that has any effect on the present.’ Adastros was pacing around the tent. ‘The real reason I am here. Yes. The throne room.’ Here it comes, thought Pyramus. ‘Have you ever heard of a man named Daedelus?’

Silence. Daedelus? ‘Why do you ask?’ Pyramus’ mind was rushing. Crete. Daedelus. Knossos. Crete. Daedelus. Knossos . . . AHA!

‘I have reason to believe,’ Adastros began, slowly. ‘That the Labyrinth exists.’
Silence. Again. Pyramus looked at the ground, stroking his beard thoughtfully. ‘And I thought you just wanted money,’ he said.

Adastros shook his head. ‘That is the Emperor’s prerogative, sir. Not mine. I serve a higher calling.’

‘You don’t serve the Emperor?’

‘Oh, I serve the Emperor. I ways he recognizes, and some he doesn’t. My loyalty lies with him: he is the one hope this land posses of becoming great, of competing with the more powerful nations. Do you understand our national position, truly?’

‘We share a border with a land populated by . . . Monsters! Few even know what they look like! Some mixture of slugs and insects, I hear. They act as one individual. Imagine an army working in complete unison. If you have been in as many wars as I have you will know what a terrifying idea that is. All around us: strange things. Faeries, wizards, fiends of every description. We need the upper hand in the war that I know will come!’

‘And you think the Labyrinth will provide you with this weapon?’ Pyramus was beginning to understand the Lord Adastros. He was driven by something completely different from most men. Not greed, or self-righteousness, or even fear (despite evidence to the contrary). He was driven by xenophobia. The fear and hatred of strangers. Anything non-human, anything different from what he was, was wrong and evil. He would have lived a good live several hundreds of years ago, when all the nature creatures were driven from the mainland into Germania. All the fauns and centaurs, dryads, naiads and oreads. Everything slightly spiritual or out of the ordinary or supernatural. But after the persecutions persisted, the nymphs and satyrs willfully fled into the uninhabited forests, an have stayed there ever since, mostly forgotten.
Pyramus tore himself away from his own ruminations. ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘Just keep your master occupied,’ Adastros smiled. ‘He can’t stop me, of course, but I don’t want word getting out about what I’m really interested in. It would make my job much harder. And bloodier. So you will help me?’

Pyramus paused. ‘Yes,’ he said

‘This will come back to you, Pyramus. I promise you that. Now get out. I want to sleep.’

Pyramus left the tent, and walked off to think.

* * *

When the door broke in, and the shafts of dusty sunlight penetrated the darkness, the smell of the air told Adastros he had found what he wanted. ‘Give me a torch,’ he said to one of the attendants.

‘Are you sure you wish to descend first, lord?’ Demetrious asked. ‘Send a servant, or one of these remarkable pieces of ingenuity!’ He directed the last comment towards the automaton Adastros brought with him. It was five feet high, and covered in bronze plating. ‘I still don’t understand how it operates! It takes commands, but I don’t see how that can be!’

‘Demetrious!’ Adastros cautioned. ‘Can we focus at the matter at hand?’
‘Oh, yes, of course. I apologize.’

‘The automatons are not agile. They are mainly for manual labor. They are very strong.’

‘If you wish, you may absolutely descend first, my lord.’

‘Thank you.’ Adastros rolled his eyes. ‘May I have a torch?’ An attendant quickly did as he requested. ‘I shall descend. Please continue to clear the surrounding area.’ With that, he stepped through the broken door, and into darkness.

His flames licked the cobwebs and painted bizarre shadows on the brick walls. The ceiling arched over his head. Several paces down the hall turned, and all light from the sun was gone. Adastros began to feel claustrophobia pushing in his lungs, but he ignored the feeling. He followed the tunnel deeper and deeper. When he came to a series of steps, he halted. His torch showed nothing of what lay below. It had been five minutes since he entered the chamber, with no sign of anything. Was it possible that he was going nowhere at all? But the steps . . . Had to lead somewhere. He would not let fear control him. He stepped forward.

The steps kept going down. But the hall was widening the deeper it got. Soon he couldn’t see either walls or the ceiling. He paused to wipe the sweat from his brow. The torch wasn’t shedding enough light. Why? It was burning brightly. But if he didn’t find anything soon, he would have to return to the surface. He felt blindly to his right for the wall. Leaned against it when he found it. He brought his left hand down to his side, unintentionally pressing against a brick. It gave! He started around, held his flame to the brick. It had sunk maybe half an inch into the wall. Quickly, he felt the rest of the wall. Another brick gave to his touch, then several more. When he had pressed ten different bricks in, and paused. What was the purpose of this? Would the cave collapse on him? But for some reason, he pressed against another brick. Then another. CRACK
There were whirrings and clackings. The grinding of gears. Light filled what was revealed to be an enormous cavern. Adastros stared. ‘By Jove . . . I found it!’ But something roared.

* * *

‘Did you hear that?’
‘No. What was it?’

‘It sounded like . . . Screaming.’

‘Screaming?’

‘Yes, fatuus! Screaming!’

‘Demetrious?’

The foreman came towards the two young men, standing where the Lord Adastros had been last seen, at the entrance to the tunnel. ‘What do you need?’ He asked.

‘Hiram says he heard something.’

‘That’s right, sir. I thought I heard screaming,’ Hiram said.

‘From the tunnel?’ Demetrious asked.

‘That’s right, sir.’

‘Hmm . . . ’

‘Wait! There it was again!’ Hiram said.

‘Yes, I definitely heard it that time, too.’

‘Guards!’ Demetrious shouted. They rushed over. ‘Hiram and Adad here say they heard screaming. Please investigate.’ The guards looked at each other, somewhat fearfully. But they were saved, because the screams got louder. Shouts of gods names were now distinguishable among the random noises. Suddenly, the Lord Adastros came tearing out of the tunnel. His face, previously so composed and emotionless was stricken with fear, his eyes wild and dark hair disheveled. Sweat poured down his face. ‘Balor!’ He shouted, completely without composure. ‘Balor save me, what have I done?’

Demetrious seized him by his shoulders. ‘My lord! What was it? Have you been attacked?’ But his question was answered before Adastros could answer. A roar echoed out from the tunnel. The guards stepped back, and lowered the spears. All the workers around the courtyard who hadn’t noticed the disturbance noticed it now. The ferocious noise sounded like three beasts at once. The ground shook, and the wall around the tunnel seemed to throb, as though some creature was trying to break through it. And the entrance collapsed. An enormous lion leaped through the falling stone. Fire spewed from it’s mouth. And it wasn’t a lion. No lion had two heads, a second one protruding from it’s back. Lion’s didn’t have tales with snake heads. Lions didn’t breathe fire.
The Chimera roared again. The guards dropped their spears and fled. Hiram and Adad tried to follow them, but the Chimera was to fast. It’s tail whipped and wrapped around Adad’s throat, jerking him backwards. Hiram shouted and ran to help his friend, but the lion-head flames caught him full on, and he ran away, flaming.

‘By Jove!’ Demetrious shouted. ‘By Jove, Jove, save us! Guards!’ Nothing happened, excepting the Chimera tossing aside Adad’s mangled body. Only he and Adastros remained now. Free of the tunnel’s constricting halls, Adastros seemed to have recovered himself somewhat. He looked around for a weapon, and saw only the broken spears of the cowardly guards. But he did have his ceremonial blade. He withdrew it from it’s sheath. He had to slay the monster! Otherwise it would ravage the whole city! Destroy everything he had worker for!

He looked closely at the Chimera, trying to spot a weakness. But before he could think of anything, it opened it raging maw and shot a spurt of flame towards him. He leaped quickly behind a toppled pillar. I glanced behind him at he monster, and saw it turning to face Demetrious. ‘Demetrious, run!’ he shouted. The foreman didn’t need to be told twice, and turned to flee from the Chimera. Adastros made a silent prayer to his god. And the Chimera followed Demetrious. Adastros closed his eyes, and leapt from his hiding place. Before the serpent-tale could detect him, he swung his sword at it’s neck. It took two swipes to decapitate the snake, and by that time the monster had noticed it was being attacked. It reared over Adastros, who fell over. But he still grasped his sword, and he thrust it upwards, into the chest of the beast as it descended upon him. He had to put all his strength into the thrust, but the dull tip did penetrate into the monster. It howled again, in pain. Adastros rolled quickly away. ‘Stalvart!’ He shouted. The Chimera spun to face him again, and approached slowly, savoring the kill. It’s mouth opened. Adastros saw the fire forming down it’s gullet. He had never thought he would die like this, just after he made the discovery of a lifetime. But he closed his eyes and accepted his fate.

It never came. He looked up, and the monster was lying on it’s side. Further examination showed several thing metallic blade-spikes protruding from it’s back. He stood up, and saw his automaton. It must have heard him cry it’s designation, and come to his rescue. All of his personal automatons were equipped with projectiles, in case of emergencies. It had been a good idea on his part, apparently. ‘Saved by a piece of machinery,’ he muttered.

‘Demetrious! Come out! It’s dead!’ His shout echoed around the courtyard. Demetrious’ head appeared around a doorway.

‘Phoebus above! You killed it! I don’t believe it. Oh, dear gods! What is the world coming to? Where did this come from?’ Demetrious collapsed onto a boulder. Adastros approached him.

‘Are you all right, my friend?’ He was smiling,

‘I’m fine, my lord. Are you?’

‘I think so, now. That was actually fun.’

‘Fun!’ Demetrious looked aghast. ‘That was fun?’

‘Not at the time, but now I find myself strangely invigorated.’

‘Phoebus above!’ Demetrious said again. ‘My poor heart!’

‘I think you should call it a day, friend.’ Adastros was in a very good mood.

‘Yes, indeed. I need some water.’

‘You get yourself some water. I need to send a message to the mainland.’

‘To the Emperor?’

‘Yes, the Emperor. And someone else. I’ll need some reinforcements, if I’m going go back down that tunnel.’

‘Reinforcements? Back down the tunnel?’ Demetrious shook his head. ‘Will there be more of these monsters?’

‘Oh yes,’ said Adastros, grinning. ‘Lot’s more, I’m afraid.’

End Phoenicia One