The slightest aberration would give comfort. Perhaps with time he might be able to perceive, or even to invent, some kind of imperfection in this prison, some promise of alternatives, however minimal. Icarus sat and watched the straightness of the corridor, looking for some sign of hope: the bending of a line, perhaps, or the suggestion of a shadow here or there. Daedalus took up a sharp pebble and started scratching at the wall again, immediately lost inside his own abstractions. Go, boy, find the Minotaur.”Īn old joke, past ageing now with constant repetition. “Yes… When I have finished my designs, you see. “When I am ready,” said the architect, and laughed, too hard this time. “And when will that be?” asked Icarus again. “I did not build this labyrinth to no purpose.”īut so that you yourself might be incarcerated in it. “When he can find us,” Daedalus replied, and laughed. “And when will King Minos release us?” he asked. My father, you are more the child than I, with all your games. “When we are released from the labyrinth,” his father answered, and his eyes were simple in the half-light, young.Īh, when we are released, we shall escape, thought Icarus. “When?” he asked, although he knew this was a pointless question. And you will find another set of walls for me in Athens. The Phoenix rises from its ashes only to return to them. The newborn Phoenix, yes, thought Icarus, who understood. I have been thinking: together we shall fly more freely than the newborn Phoenix as it rises from its ashes. But taking from each bird its special quality, we shall take unto ourselves the powers of the greatest birds imaginable, and we shall fly to freedom. Perhaps the magpie for its impertinence, for we shall be impertinent in our adventure, and the tiny sparrow for its hardness: I have not yet decided. We shall employ the feather of the eagle for its swiftness, and of the seagull for its ease of flight.
See? Your father is a man of many talents, Icarus, more than just an architect. And then, by attaching the wings to our own strong arms, we shall fly across the sea to Athens, and to freedom. Here on the wall you see how I have sketched the wings of geese and eagles… see? And here the mallard’s wing? And here the dove’s…? We shall collect the feathers from all kinds of birds, the strongest, finest feathers, and we shall arrange them into the form of great wings and bind them into shape with wax. I have been thinking these long days: my little brain has not been idle. “And we shall take wax,” his father said, “and feathers.
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