She never said to me, “Eunostos, you ought to comb your hair or get a new pair of sandals.” It was always “Perhaps you should…” or “Don’t you think…” Sometimes she worked through her brother. Two weeks after their arrival he told me in confidence, “Thea hasn’t complained, but I think she misses Cretan plumbing.”
“But she has a hot shower,” I protested. “Or else I bring her a tub. What more does she want?”
“What she wants is a bathroom,” he confided. It is universally acknowledged that the Cretans are the best plumbers in all the lands of the great Green Sea. Not only do they pipe water into their palaces, but they build limestone toilets with wooden seats and, wonder of wonders, a lever for flushing. Like my ancestors, I am something of an engineer, and I lost no time in diverting a part of the spring from the garden. With her usual delicacy, Thea did not refer to my innovation, but she showed her gratitude by making me a pair of leather sandals which pinched my hooves like chains on a mule. At least in the house, I had to wear them or hurt her feelings.
Once out of the house, however, I kicked them under a tree and happily pursued my business in the forest; now that my cave no longer received a weekly sacrifice—the local farmers, it seemed, were feeding the conquerors instead of the Minotaur—I hunted daily to keep my guests in meat. But one such hunt landed me in a much more serious predicament than the mere discomfort of sandals. I had bagged a wild pig with my first arrow and started back to the house with the carcass strapped across my shoulder.
“Ho there,” a voice boomed from the trees, and Moschus, the Centaur, cantered up beside me with thumping hooves and a swirl of dust. A robust fellow, Moschus, in spite of his years. His flanks glistened with olive oil; powerful muscles rippled beneath his coat; chestnut hair tumbled down the back of his neck in a glossy mane. It was true that his hair had begun to thin, for Moschus was a good two hundred years old; he had been a colt in the days when the Beasts had lived on the coast, sharing their secrets with the fast-learning and still friendly Cretans. But age became him as it did the oaks and the cedars.
Physically, at least. His intelligence, never high, had begun to decline before I was born. His noble exterior suggested learning and promised wise utterances, but his only interests were wenching, storytelling (bawdy), and playing the flute, and his conversation was threadbare on all other subjects.
“Heard about you and the kids,” he said.
“Oh,” I said, noncommittal. “Did you?” I did not want him to suggest a meeting. Thea would not understand his libertine ways.
“Big daddy himself. Though I hear the girl is not exactly a child (heh).”
“Not in years,” I said loftily, “but she’s led a sheltered life.”
“Time for a party then—lower the parasol! How about tonight?”
“Busy. Tanning hides.” I pointed to the pig on my shoulder.
“Tomorrow night?”
“Cutting gems.”
A look of suspicion narrowed his equine eyes. “I thought your workers did that.”
“Too many gems; not enough help.”
“The next night?”
“At your house?” I sighed, defeated.
“You’re a better host. More beer, more room. Zoe and I will come after lamplighting time.”
“Zoe too?”
“Who else? You know we’re keeping company.” With a loud, anticipatory neigh, he galloped into the trees.
I groaned. Zoe, the Dryad, and Moschus, the Centaur. I loved them devotedly as friends, but together they well might precipitate an orgy.
I knelt to retrieve my sandals, wondering how I would broach the party to Thea.
I found her visiting with my three workers. With the help of Icarus and several bribes of raw meat, she had won their confidence—at least, their acceptance—and often watched them work. Not only were they lapidaries, but blacksmiths, weavers, dyers, shoemakers, and tanners, and their various tools of trade—loom, forge, anvil, assorted vats and tables—lent to my shop the air of a small but handily equipped marketplace. To see only three of them with so much equipment had astonished Thea until I explained that I myself was the fourth worker and, like my extinct countrymen, equal to any four Men or two Telchines. It was not a boast but a simple statement of fact.
The shop was illuminated by six large lamps in the shape of fishtailed ships which navigated the air on swaying chains. One of the workers stood at the forge, holding a bent dagger over the flames; another worked at a table, cleaning the dirt and shale from gemstones; and the third examined a large carnelian, smoothed to the round flatness of a seal, and bobbed his head in evident perplexity.
Thea was watching the holder of the stone as he turned it over and over between his multiple legs. The room was warm with the heat of the forge, but she looked immaculate in her saffron kilt; as far as I knew she never perspired. Three meticulously arranged curls adorned her forehead like pendant snails.
“Eunostos,” she said. “Have you ever seen such a gem?” Its smoky gray surface imprisoned the six fires of the lamps in a small constellation, and the many-faceted eyes of the Telchin reflected them again to numbers beyond counting.
“Would you like it to wear as a ring?” I asked.
She looked like a child who has just been offered a dolphin or a rare, white-plumed griffin. “Oh, yes, but don’t you trade these things to the other Beasts?” I had told her how every Beast contributed to the self-sufficiency of the forest: I traded my gems to the Centaurs for seeds to plant in my garden; the Dryads built wooden chests and swapped them to the Thriae for the honey stored in their great hexagons; and even the little Bears of Artemis gathered black-eyed Susans in the fields and strung necklaces to trade for dolls.
“Not this one,” I said. “What design would you like?”
She thought. “A blue monkey.” Her eyes looked beyond me, wistful no doubt with memories of the palace at Vathypetro, the well-ordered garden, and of course her father. “Is that possible?”
“A blue monkey and—” I whispered to the Telchin. In spite of their skill, they are not inventive, and unless you give them suggestions, they will settle on one design and duplicate it a hundred or more times. Nodding sagely, he set to work with a pointed file.
“May I watch?” Thea asked.
“No,” I said. “Surprises are best.” And then, unobtrusively: “Thea, some friends are coming to call. After supper, two nights from now.”
She reserved judgment. “How many?”
“Just two. A Centaur and a Dryad.”
“Zoe,” she said. “You’ve mentioned her several times.” It was almost an accusation.
“An old friend,” I explained.
“Older than you?”
“Let’s see. About fourteen times as old.”
“Elderly then.”
“Not exactly. Dryads reflect the state of their trees. Zoe’s oak is well-preserved.”
She stifled a sigh. “But have we enough wine in the house?”
“Beer,” I said. “Beer is what they drink. Both of them.”
“A woman drinks beer?”
“She can outdrink me!” Then, subdued: “I brew it from barley right here in the shop. You ought to try some.”
She smiled magnanimously. “Perhaps I will. You attend to the beer and I will bake some honey cakes.” She paused. “It’s good I’ve finished your new tunic.”
“Tunic?” I cried. In the spring and summer, no male Beast wore clothes. Why should he? The air which blew from the torrid continent of Libya was warm and dry, and female Beasts were no more disturbed by a free expanse of masculine flesh than Cretan males by the bare breasts of their women.
“Yes,” she said, fishing the depths of a basket with nimble fingers. “The Telchines wove it, but I did the dyeing and needlework.”
“I see you did.” Lavender, with embroidered sleeves. “Why not a loin cloth?”
“For Icarus, perhaps, not for you. You are—well, more mature.” She observed the hair on my chest as if she were thinking of scissors. “Try it on now and see if it fits.”
