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Authors: Fred Saberhagen
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waterpipe, one of the main conduits bringing water down to the House, crossed overhead. The pipe was well masked by concealing brickwork, and most people passing beneath would not realize that it was there. But I knew that it was there, and that this wall just to my left now was as thick as four men's bodies lying head to toe. And just outside that wall, though you could never guess it from inside the Labyrinth, was a free, open sunny slope, at this season probably aglow with wildflowers.
Thunder grumbled, and the indirect daylight in the maze suddenly grew dimmer.
I had still a few more turns and branchings to negotiate; I, their designer, at each turn made the proper choice unthinkingly.
… and then I was emerging abruptly into the Labyrinth's central open space, a modest stone's throw across. Here the Bull could feel inwardly secure; his inhuman spirit was really at ease only when he knew he was surrounded by artificial complexity. The space was an easy stone's throw across, partially roofed by connected domes. On the far side of the broad stone dais, waist-high, that occupied the middle of the circular space there yawned the several dark mouths of the Bull's own private rooms, which I had never entered since their construction had been completed.
In the middle of the the dais, like the gnomon of a sundial, there stood in sunny space a big stone chair upon whose humped seat no human could comfortably have rested. On this chair the White Bull sat waiting, as if he had been expecting my arrival.
"Learn from me, Dae-da-lus." This had come to be the Bull's regular greeting to me, in place of any more conventional salutation. His speech had not improved noticeably since that first day about five years ago when we had first encountered each other on the seashore.
Silently I walked closer to the dais, which was surrounded by a gently flowing moat, a couple of strides wide and no more than about ankle-deep. The dweller in the Labyrinth had no physical need of such an open flow of water, but he loved it, as he loved the Labyrinth itself.
As I approached, the Bull, an almost manlike figure clothed in different lengths of silver hair, stood up to welcome me. His hands, extended in a learned gesture of greeting, were far from human, something I had failed to notice at our first meeting, bewildered by his overall strangeness as I was then. Each hand bore two thumbs on opposite sides of the palm, each thumb fully opposable to the four fingers. Yet fingers and thumbs looked clumsy and sometimes were. Each fingernail was so enlarged as to be almost a tiny hoof, a miniature of the real hooves that were the Bull's feet.
"Learn from me, Dae-dal-us," he said again, when I had reached the dais without speaking. I came to a stop leaning against the waist-high rim of stone, standing on the last of the short series of stepping-stones that enabled more fastidious human visitors to cross the moat easily without getting their feet wet. Rain was falling now, drumming on the roof and filling the nearby cisterns, trickling into the moat.
There was movement in the corner of my eye; Talus, the Bronze Man, had entered the circular space from a side passage, and was standing motionless, distant lightning reflecting dully on his metal skin.
"I have tried enrolling in your school," I replied to the Bull at last, my voice a heavy rasp. "The results were not pleasing to either of us."
"Learn." The deep voice somehow sounded more bull-like the more I listened to it. The voice could be as stubborn as a wall. "The secrets of the a-toms and the stars are mine to give."
"Then what need can you have for one more student, an aging craftsman like myself? There must be great numbers of young minds ready and eager to learn from you. I understand your school is becoming a fad all across the eastern Mediterranean. More than a fad. From the Egyptians to the south to the barbarians far in the north, great numbers of the wealthy and powerful are coming to want
Thunder grumbled, and the indirect daylight in the maze suddenly grew dimmer.
I had still a few more turns and branchings to negotiate; I, their designer, at each turn made the proper choice unthinkingly.
… and then I was emerging abruptly into the Labyrinth's central open space, a modest stone's throw across. Here the Bull could feel inwardly secure; his inhuman spirit was really at ease only when he knew he was surrounded by artificial complexity. The space was an easy stone's throw across, partially roofed by connected domes. On the far side of the broad stone dais, waist-high, that occupied the middle of the circular space there yawned the several dark mouths of the Bull's own private rooms, which I had never entered since their construction had been completed.
In the middle of the the dais, like the gnomon of a sundial, there stood in sunny space a big stone chair upon whose humped seat no human could comfortably have rested. On this chair the White Bull sat waiting, as if he had been expecting my arrival.
"Learn from me, Dae-da-lus." This had come to be the Bull's regular greeting to me, in place of any more conventional salutation. His speech had not improved noticeably since that first day about five years ago when we had first encountered each other on the seashore.
Silently I walked closer to the dais, which was surrounded by a gently flowing moat, a couple of strides wide and no more than about ankle-deep. The dweller in the Labyrinth had no physical need of such an open flow of water, but he loved it, as he loved the Labyrinth itself.
As I approached, the Bull, an almost manlike figure clothed in different lengths of silver hair, stood up to welcome me. His hands, extended in a learned gesture of greeting, were far from human, something I had failed to notice at our first meeting, bewildered by his overall strangeness as I was then. Each hand bore two thumbs on opposite sides of the palm, each thumb fully opposable to the four fingers. Yet fingers and thumbs looked clumsy and sometimes were. Each fingernail was so enlarged as to be almost a tiny hoof, a miniature of the real hooves that were the Bull's feet.
"Learn from me, Dae-dal-us," he said again, when I had reached the dais without speaking. I came to a stop leaning against the waist-high rim of stone, standing on the last of the short series of stepping-stones that enabled more fastidious human visitors to cross the moat easily without getting their feet wet. Rain was falling now, drumming on the roof and filling the nearby cisterns, trickling into the moat.
There was movement in the corner of my eye; Talus, the Bronze Man, had entered the circular space from a side passage, and was standing motionless, distant lightning reflecting dully on his metal skin.
"I have tried enrolling in your school," I replied to the Bull at last, my voice a heavy rasp. "The results were not pleasing to either of us."
"Learn." The deep voice somehow sounded more bull-like the more I listened to it. The voice could be as stubborn as a wall. "The secrets of the a-toms and the stars are mine to give."
"Then what need can you have for one more student, an aging craftsman like myself? There must be great numbers of young minds ready and eager to learn from you. I understand your school is becoming a fad all across the eastern Mediterranean. More than a fad. From the Egyptians to the south to the barbarians far in the north, great numbers of the wealthy and powerful are coming to want
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