Crete
by Sára Zeithammerová
The breeze was warm and the sun was shining. Jennifer Williams stared at the parting
white clouds and the sun rays tickled her tanned face and heated her black hair tossed across her shoulders. The sea spread before her like a magic carpet woven through with white thread and orange fishes. Her brother James sat besides her sipping his lemonade and looking at the waves as they were playing around with some seaweed. Bump! The white boat lightly crashed into their finish; Crete. Jennifer, James and their father were going on a trip to the Knossos palace. A tour guide was waiting for them on shore. The other tourists scampered out of the boat. James didn’t want to go to the palace.
“I wanted to stay at home,” he said angrily as the tour guide was pointing to a dolphin fresco in the throne room. They were already in the palace. Jennifer was quickly trying to sketch one of the dolphins on the back of the advert, when she spotted a small square hidden in the middle of the fresco. On it were three simple shapes. An eye, a circle and a curve which looked like a pair of horns. She didn’t pay any attention to it long; she was listening to the tour guide.
“The Minotaur,” the tour guide said “was a beast who was known to live in a labyrinth under the palace…”
“Ow!” Jennifer hissed as James poked her in the back “What is it?”
“Did you see the square?” he whispered.
“Yeah, so?”
“It’s 3D. What if it’s a button?” He looked around to see if anyone was watching, but everyone was staring at the tour guide. He put his palm on the square and pressing it with all his might. Suddenly the ground rumbled. Then cracked. Then with a shriek of the panicking crowd and smash of the ground closing back again Jennifer and James tumbled down with a thump in a pile of moldy bones somewhere underground...
“You OK?” asked James shining his torch in Jennifer’s face.
“Thanks for pressing it!” hissed Jennifer hitting him with a bone “Now we’ll be stuck here forever!” She started to cry. The hysterical sound echoed through the labyrinth like a police siren. James was a bit more logical. He walked around the pile of bones and didn’t stop going hmmmmmmmmm.
“I don’t know about you, but I’m going adventuring,” he said snatching up her sandwich and the dark swallowed him up. Jennifer waited. She waited for a few minutes but James wasn’t coming back.
“I have to go after him,” she mumbled. She saw a ball of string chucked in the corner.
“Theseus must have left it behind,” Jennifer whispered and tied the string to one of the stone pillars and holding and unrolling the string, she set off into the maze.
Looking at her watch she had been walking through the maze for few hours. The maze was cold and damp and spiders and mice were crawling everywhere. The pillars were covered with cobwebs and dust. As the string was running out, Jennifer saw a light ahead. She slowly moved towards it and hid behind a pillar. She peeped out and clasped her hand over her mouth to stop herself from shrieking. A large furry beast was walking around the dimly lit chamber preparing a big dinner. And what was he having?
James was tied up in the corner, unconscious.
“Oi!” Jennifer shrieked “Let my brother go!” She leapt out of her hiding place like a ferret.
The beast turned. It had large gold tusks, orange eyes and a long light pink tongue. His fur stank of corpses and muscles and dark blue veins were bulging out of every part of his body. Jennifer gulped.
“Let him go,” she said with a cowardly tone in her voice.
“How dare you that’s my lunch!” he boomed.
“Not lunch. It’s past lunch. It’s dinner time,” Jennifer said cheekily.
“I don’t care!”
“But…”
“I don’t care,”
“What about if we have a quiz and who wins get your..um..dinner,”
“No quiz!” boomed the Minotaur.
“Sporty stuff?”
“No!”
“What then?”
“Nothing, you will never save your brother now. You will end up on my dinner plate as well as him!” the Minotaur beat his great chest and lifted Jennifer clear off the ground. His enormous furry hand clamped her shrieking mouth shut. With Jennifer still in his hand he moved towards the table. He didn’t hurry one single bit. He picked up a knife. The silver, polished blade gleamed almost evilly at Jennifer in the dim candlelight, but Jennifer shut her eyes tight and screamed…..
DRRRRRRRRRRRIIIIINNNG!
Jennifer opened her eyes. She was in a bed. She was OK. Her forehead was covered with sweat and her duvet was kicked back. Where was the Minotaur? Where was the nightmare?
“Come on Jenny!” shouted James in the doorway “The boat to Crete is leaving in 45 minutes. Mom says you’d better shake a leg or we’ll go without you!”
Now Jennifer remembered where she was. She was in the hotel called the “Golden Athena” where she James and her parents were spending their summer vacation.
“Come on Jenny!” James said trotting over to her bed. She gave him a big hug.
“Hey, what’s the matter with ya? Yesterday you said you hated me because I secretly ate some of your chips we had for lunch. But come on or we’ll really leave you behind!”
She brushed her long black hair until they didn’t feel like cloth but light spray smoothening her shoulders. She put on her best white dress and a beige cowboy hat. Finally she went downstairs, into the hotel restaurant and gobbled up two toasts with fresh strawberry jam, three crispy, hot strips of bacon and drank two glasses of cold orange juice. Then the family sat into their green landrover, drove for a few minutes, parked safely and got onto the white boat which was bobbing on the deep blue sea. Soon they all could see the island-Crete. The tour guide was waiting for all the tourists on shore. In the palace Jennifer desperately tried to sketch a fresco the tour guide was showing on the back of a curled up napkin she found in her pocket when James tugged on her sleeve.
“What?”
“Look, isn’t it interesting?” whispered James pointing to a 3D square in the crumbled wall. It was shiny with three simple shapes on it; an eye, a circle and a curve which looked like a pair of horns. James touched it and some black powder got of the shapes he had touched. It was fresh.
“It looks like a button,” murmured James and placed his forefinger and thumb on the square.
“Don’t press that you idiot!” shrieked Jennifer and looked at the surprised crowd in embarrassment.
“Jennifer, what did you say to your brother?” asked her father and mother. Jennifer scowled and said nothing. She didn’t even hear the ground close behind her……
