Myths And Legends 6 By English Author S D HUDSON

Hello.

This is SD Hudson.

Welcome to my story series,

Myths and Legends.

Are you ready?

Then sit back,

Relax and listen as I transport you back to another time and another place.

Once upon a time near the Aegean Sea in the island of Crete,

There lived a man called Didylus.

He was an engineer and a brilliant inventor,

But no one was more aware of how brilliant he was than himself.

His pride had often got the better of him,

And when the skill of his nephew,

Talos,

Had come near to rivaling his own,

Didylus pushed him from a rooftop to his death,

And as a punishment he was exiled.

He talked with him into exile his young son Icarus.

He idolized his son.

To hear him talk,

You might think he had invented his son,

Not just fathered him.

Now on Crete stood a palace with striped pillars and numerous chambers,

Courts and halls,

And in the greatest of them all sat Minas,

The king of Crete.

His throne was inlaid with gold and jewels,

And he was a mighty king,

A son among other kings,

It was said.

He ruled an empire of subject states all around the Aegean Sea,

And before him Didylus came bowing low.

Welcome,

Didylus,

Welcome to our court,

Said Minas,

The king of Crete.

Your name is well known to us,

And we have heard of your skill.

That makes you very welcome here,

For now we have a task that only you can achieve.

If you complete this task successfully,

We will be hospitable to you and your son.

Didylus looked through the glass at the sky above.

The sun was so bright and the sea beautiful as it licked about its shores,

Catching the light and glittering.

He longed to live here with his son,

And he was grateful to King Minas,

For he could easily achieve anything the king asked of him.

Yes,

I will be happy to work for you,

He said.

So King Minas rose from his throne and led Didylus and Icarus to a door set with iron bars.

From the room beyond came a warm stench.

It smelt like a farmyard.

We desire you to build us a stronghold beneath our house,

From which nothing,

Not anyone or anything can escape,

Not even the Minotaur.

He showed Didylus the beast from behind the iron bars.

Its hands came to grasp the bars.

They were huge.

They looked like human hands,

But they had hair on them,

Curly and black,

And each hair was thick and as stiff as wire.

Didylus looked into its red,

Furious eyes and was terrified to see the Minotaur's limbs were as hard as wood.

Then all of a sudden a Minotaur opened its cavernous mouth and roared at Didylus,

Flinging back his head.

Its head looked like that of a huge black bull.

Didylus bowed to the king.

Great king,

You are great indeed,

But you can choose no better architect than I.

I will make a prison for this beast,

And the names of Minas and Didylus will be remembered for the rest of time.

I swear by Apollo,

No man or monster will escape from the prison I make.

So Didylus drew up some plans and scratched them out onto tablets of yellow wax.

These plans were far too complex for anyone to decipher but himself.

Then he set troops of slaves and labourers to work,

Enough men to make an army.

Deep beneath the palace,

With picks and spades and hammers,

They gouged out the rocks of Crete.

Some hacked at them and smashed them to pieces,

And some carried the rubble they left behind away on their backs,

Whilst yet others cut pillars out to support the roof.

Little by little they tunnelled out a labyrinth,

A fine maze,

With many tunnels and passages.

It had so many false turnings and alleyways,

A hundred men could have wandered there and died through getting lost.

And so in the labyrinth lived the Minotaur.

Didylus meanwhile lived in the service of the king with his son,

And he grew more clever every day.

The son of Minos's favour shone on him more brilliantly the cleverer he got,

And nothing seemed to move him from the favour of King Minos.

But then one day the guards came to seize Didylus and Icarus and drag them before the king.

So,

Said King Minos,

You boasted that no one could escape your labyrinth,

But now the Minotaur is dead.

A man has killed our son and understood the maze and sailed away.

Now you and your son shall be cast into the maze yourselves,

And if you escape from there,

You will get no further,

I swear to it.

As clever as you say you are,

You have failed me,

And you shall live in the labyrinth for the rest of your days.

So Didylus with Icarus was cast into the prison he had made for the Minotaur,

But he took with him a ball of golden thread.

He looked in the darkness like an image of the golden sun and this,

This was what he would guide himself to the end of the labyrinth with.

He began to unroll it ahead of them,

Through the turns and the windings and the confusions of entrances and alleyways.

And at last they reached the cave at the heart of the labyrinth,

And that was where the corpse of the Minotaur lay rotting on dirty straw.

The Minotaur looked not even half as scary as it had when it was alive.

There were feathers from birds devoured by it all around him,

And Didylus picked one up and examined it.

Hmm,

Minos might rule the land of Crete and the sea that surrounds it too,

But Icarus,

I tell you my son,

King Minos does not rule the sky.

Icarus did not know what his father meant by this,

But he watched as Didylus lay feathers,

One on top of each other in four separate rows,

Each diminishing in size from one end to the other.

Then from out of his tunic he brought some wax and needle and a fine strong thread.

He began to sew the feathers together with the needle and the thread and soften the wax to use it to stick the smaller feathers together as one.

Icarus watched his father's patient hands.

He saw the small feathers as they stuck together in the sticky wax.

Sometimes he helped him by holding the feathers or pulling the end of the thread.

And at last together they completed the rows upon rows so that they almost looked like a wing.

They bent them together and curved them into his shape,

And once finished they completed two fine wings,

Big enough to carry a man.

There was one pair for Didylus and another for Icarus.

They followed their thread on and on through the winding tunnels of the labyrinth until they found a secret entrance.

Then all at once there was light.

It burst upon them out of the dark.

They were almost blinded and had to bury their eyes against it.

And then the air rushed at them too,

A strong air full of honey and thyme.

Now they must escape.

But how could they ever escape the island of Crete?

They would use their wings.

Didylus fixed the smallest pair of wings to his son Icarus,

And he fixed the largest pair to his own arms,

Explaining all the while what they had to do.

We must use our arms just like the wing bones of a bird,

He said.

We must make sure the feathers rise and fall gently,

As a bird would do.

But mind Icarus,

My son,

Don't fly too low and don't fly near the sea,

For the feathers when wet will not carry you.

But remember,

Do not fly too near the sun,

For the sun's heat will melt the wax and make the feathers fall away.

Icarus listened carefully,

But he was impatient to begin flying,

So he began to move his arms experimentally so the air caught the feathers on his wings.

Didylus ran ahead of him along the hillside,

And when he had gained some speed he jumped into the air,

Shouting at Icarus to follow him.

They flapped their arms with awkward chopping strokes,

But they did not soar as they expected to like other birds.

They flew awkwardly instead.

Didylus kept close to his son Icarus and instructed him,

But he was no more elegant a bird himself.

If he wasn't careful he would lose the knack and fall down just as fast as Icarus would.

At one point they even knocked into each other,

Their wings entangled and fell hard on the bruising stone.

Then Icarus caught up a rhythm and a pattern of flight and swept into the air and away.

He laughed with joy and delight,

And almost at once Didylus followed him.

They had found the rhythm at last.

Their arms were flowing smoothly now up and down,

And the feathers took on such life that they did not seem like arms at all.

They were birds,

They could fly,

And as the wind took them up,

Up,

Up,

Higher and higher still,

The men on the ground below began to notice them.

Farmers stopped what they were doing and looked up into the sky.

Washerwoman dropped the clothes they were scrubbing and fishermen let fall their nets.

Who were these strange flying gods,

They said to themselves?

And Didylus certainly did feel like a god.

He had invented human flight,

He was the first man ever to fly.

What say you mighty gods?

He called out.

I have invented wings for a man to fly and look at my son.

Even though he is a boy he flies like an eagle through the air.

And he was right,

Icarus had mastered the gift of flight.

He skimmed low,

He flew high across the shimmer of the sea.

Don't forget not to fly too low,

Said his father,

You don't want to get your feathers wet.

So Icarus flew higher and higher still.

Didylus meanwhile was focusing on his own wings,

He didn't realize the danger Icarus was heading towards.

Icarus meanwhile forgot what his father had told him and he flew as if drawn to the sun like a moth towards a flame.

It was beautiful,

It was warm and it was so bright.

Then slowly the wax on his wings began to melt.

It softened gently at first,

Then it dripped a little in slow thick drops and then all at once a feather fell,

Drifting,

Turning and floating down towards the sea.

Then another followed,

Then another and so on and so on until so many feathers had fallen,

Icarus started to fall himself.

He flapped his arms harder and harder but there were not enough feathers left to hold the air to keep him in flight.

Didylus looked up and saw his son plunge headlong faster than the feathers towards the sea.

The startled waters closed above his head and all that remained of Icarus were waxy feathers floating high above him as he sank down,

Down,

Down to the sea bed below,

Never to be seen again.

The End Thank you for listening.

I hope you enjoyed this story.

If you did,

Please consider listening to my Tales of the New World,

Fantasy stories of an anthropomorphic haven high at the top of the thereby