Osirionis
Chapter Three
Yod
Theseus Meets Minos
Wake up. Theseus! Wake up!”
Jim opened his eyes and returned the manifold to normal. “I shall deal with the Minotaur alone! I shall not need your help, now leave me so that I may sleep!”
The youths thus frightened dared not to disturb him again. Many hours layer, the ship of doom found its moorings. The Cretan authorities disturbed his sleep in order to prepare him for sacrifice. Jim woke up swearing that he would pay them dearly for their rudeness and disrespect. He marched off the ship with an attitude threatening to do severe body damage to those who came within reach of him. He agreed to being chained only when the authorities promised to kill all the youths via slow torture unless he toned down. Jim toned down only after Genie assured him that now was not the time to give away too many secrets concerning his great strength. The authorities then gained a false sense of security when they succeeded in putting the last of the additional chains on Theseus.
“You’ll be fine bait for the Minotaur!’ The guards laughed.
“I’ll make hamburger from your Minotaur!” Jim retorted.
“We’ll have to make sure you’re the first to see him then!”
“I wouldn’t have it any other way!”
Knossos, the capital city of a great sea faring empire had an excellent relationship with Egypt. Kore, Ayesha’s city, existed as an independent state. The extreme wealth produced by the island had managed to maintain economic independence for the tradesmen who so adeptly tended to the day to day affairs of the island of power and fire. The island itself was a natural fortress and the Kore fleet converted easily into men-of-war. Kore dominated the copper and bronze trade, and their ships were able to destroy other ships using an explosive powder to launch incendiary missiles from very secret firing devices cast of bronze. No other kingdom knew the secret to this powder, and Ayesha’s servants guarded the secret jealously.
It wasn’t long, as the guards had promised, before Jim was facing Minos, with his “daughter”, the high priestess of Knossos, Ariadne, standing by his side. Ariadne and Jim recognized each other immediately, as had Medea. Jim was not disguised, but had his natural appearance. Both the Amazons had immediately recognized “Theseus” as actually being Qblh. Ariadne was also Cecelia’s sister, with whom Jim had worked a psychic link to find the way through the maze on Artemis. Qblh also needed to retrieve a golden peg from Ariadne. The true maze to conquer in this case was not going to be the labyrinth; it was going to be the solution to the problem Ariadne posed to him.
“My Lord Minos, this Theseus seems to be such a strong lad, perhaps it may be a better idea if you allow him to serve me rather than to sacrifice him to the Minotaur.” Ariadne was in no mood to be responsible for advocating the execution of the Qblh of Isis as if he could be killed in this time and age.
Minos had already heard reports concerning the unruliness of Thesues. He had severely injured several of the guards. None of the wounds were life threatening; Jim had simply wanted to leave a reminder to each of the guards that had insulted him that he could indeed kill them. To permit Theseus to live would be out of the question. Half of his guards wanted front row seats to watch Theseus executed. Another large percentage demanded prolonged torture because of the assault on their fellow guards. “I am sorry, dear daughter. This one has too much fight in him, and to allow him to live would not be a good decision. Yet, if he swears allegiance to the Minotaur, and sacrifices his companions, perhaps I may allow him to live.”
Jim spit in Minos’ face.
“I am truly amazed. That must have been a good thirty feet uphill. You shall be the first to be sacrificed to the Minotaur.”
“You can eat your Minotaur for dinner tomorrow then.” Jim retorted.
“For a doomed man, you seem to be a little too insolent to the judge who has the power of life and death concerning you.”
“You have nothing in your power, which I do not permit you to have, but I suppose it is time to start putting an end to that.”
“Too much insolence. Take him to the labyrinth now.”
Ariadne was only too aware of the doom of her master now. “Please no, Minos. Spare his life. Surely he will be tolerable if you permit me to have him. I can keep him under control.”
“You my dear are the greatest desire of every man on this isle. If I were to grant him permission to live as my son-in-law, what kind of king would I appear as to my subjects; one who allows my daughter to sleep with my enemies? Certainly that would be not exhibiting the wisest of actions to my kingdom.”
Ariadne knew that there was no way that she would be able to change the king’s mind, she only whispered under her breath loud enough for Qblh to hear. “Perhaps it would be wiser than you think.”
“Yet, I will permit you to give him one last chance to shift his allegiance.”
Jim only smiled back at Ariadne as he was led away to the dungeon.
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The people of Knossos were as children with respect to the magic that the Venetains had brought to Earth, but the actual knowledge concerning how the Venetians had actually performed their feats of great wonder always remained a complete mystery to the Earth locals. They had not yet learned to correctly associate the relationship between all the things that their senses could perceive, which meant they had no ways of understanding “g-force neutralization” or “time dilation”, even if Jim were to begin to explain how he traveled time. The language syntax of men of this ancient age had no accommodation for post-classical physical theorems. They could barely get beyond three-dimensional geometry. Yet, soon men would be able to keep semi-accurate records of history leaving less room for tampering with the past. It would be too easy to create the assumed “conditions necessary”, or so one would think. Jim had learned, so far, that he could not alter time. Now he was going to be guilty of interfering with the past by boldly volunteering to go back in time to do as he wished and he was going to become a legendary hero and king as well. Was this actually going to be done without the knowledge of Isis? Her uncanny sense of what was going to happen seemed to be beginning to make sense to him.
The Venetians, currently on Earth, also apparently possessed this knowledge as well. Jim remembered Ariadne from the parade of maidens and was aware that she and he had a date within the pleasure dome.
Jim had an interesting thought. Persephone in accordance with his own time line was “now” in the Pleasure Dome expecting his retrieval. He needed to get her back to Earth to tie up the time loop in the correct fashion, and he needed to get the key from Ariadne and to get her back in the proper time stream. The only natural thing to do seemed to be to make another hop to Artemis, and retrieve the key from Ariadne when she came to visit him in his dungeon cell. A small joke it would be to Minos that the doomed man would be soon having a bout in the Pleasure Dome of Artemis with Ariadne, instead of languishing over the “death sentence”.
Jim was not in his cell long when Ariadne instructed the guards to release him to her charge. “The king and I need to speak to Theseus in private.” To Theseus she turned,”Theseus, we need to talk.”