Dani smiled and put her hand on his arm. “It’s fine. Really. My life right now…it’s…it’s complicated.”
That was one way to put it. Definitely too complicated to get into in the last ten minutes of their bus ride to the palace of Knossos where soon they’d be crawling around ten square kilometers of sprawling ruins, learning about the lives of the Minoan civilization with thousands of other tourists. At least theywere going in the latter half of the day after the crowds had hopefully thinned out.
“Well, then, you can tell me all about it over dinner tonight,” Harold said with a wink. “Only as friends. I promise.”
Dani smiled. “Okay. Friends.”
“I was only teasing about the date thing earlier, you know. I know I’m here on this whole single seniors’ thing, but ever since my Patricia passed away five years ago, I haven’t been able to imagine life with someone else.” There was a crack in his voice, and suddenly he stopped talking, pulling his lip in to keep it from trembling. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to get morose. You probably came here to enjoy an adventure, not think about dead people.”
Dead.
The word thumped in her chest. Suddenly the words that she still refused to accept flashed through her mind:
Greek American Archaeologist Presumed Dead
By the time the newspapers printed that headline, the story of Dr. Theo Galanis’s disappearance had already been blasted all over the news and social media. When Dani had first learned that he’d gone missing, his last known whereabouts being a marina where he’d chartered a boat for a journey off the coast of Neapoli, she hadn’t been able to breathe. Theo had arrived in Greece one week earlier. He was supposed to have been there for only a couple of months, six tops, having been contacted by his old friend on behalf of some archaeological society to assist with a dig on the Peloponnesian peninsula given his expertise in ancient Greek archaeology. The details were a little fuzzy, as was any paper trail with the specifics.
In the weeks that followed, they’d come to find out that his friend hadn’t actually contacted him and the alleged archaeological society didn’t actually exist. The supposed Peloponnesian dig site, unheard of. So after he’d been missing for four months and the boat was found beaten up and washed ashore on Kythira—without any sign of survivors—well, everyone had assumed the worst.
Dr. Theo Galanis, the love of Dani’s life, was dead.
And she’d never even told him how she’d felt.
A solid thirteen months had passed since he’d vanished. At the one-year anniversary, his family held a memorial service, even though it was too early to declare him legally dead. The family had intended the service to give them all closure, but the only thing it had done was make Dani restless. She still couldn’t picture life without Theo in it, evenifonly in his role as Eddie’s best friend. Maybe she and Harold had more in common than she thought, being unable to imagine life without that one special person. But this trip was supposed to be her opportunity to get out and finally see the world. To do all the things she’d planned to do after high school.
And if the memorial couldn’t give her closure, hopefully this trip would.
She’d go to Greece, the country of Theo’s heart. See the sights. Taste the food. Soak in that Mediterranean air. Go to all the places he’d talked about from his travels. And then she’d say goodbye to him forever. Finally get busy livingherlife, instead of someone else’s.
The singles thing was supposed to be an added bonus.Maybeshe’d meet someone on the trip who could make her stomach swirl the way Theo could. Wouldn’t that be fitting,after all? To meet a new man of her dreams in the very place she’d lost her first love?
Okay, maybe not actual love. They’d never even kissed. But she felt something for Theo she’d never felt with anyone else. And now, she’d never know what it could have been.
“Attention, Silvers!” Cosmo called out on the bus PA system. “We’re arriving at Knossos. We’ve got two hours here before closing. Now, let me take you back in time,” he said, waving his hands in the air like a mystic and hunkering down as he lowered his voice, “to the seventeenth century BC, when the Minoans ruled the region. We’ll traverse the ruins and picture our lives behind the walls, with creatures lurking in the depths of the palace. But don’t get lost, or theBEASTmight get you!” he said, bringing up his hands like a grizzly bear attacking its prey.
Plenty of oohs and aahs from the group accompanied his description.
“Or,” he said, matter-of-factly, standing straight and dropping his arms along with the mysticism, “there is a self-guided tour available at the ticket office that you can listen to on your phone at your own leisure. Either way, we’ll meet back at the bus at sixteen forty-five to depart at seventeen hundred on the dot. Do not be late.”
With that, the bus lurched to a stop and the group of fifteen unloaded, shuffling their way in a wad toward the entrance gates after Cosmo scanned the tour group through.
The grounds appeared unassuming as they first passed through the ticket turnstiles. The site was much more tree covered than Dani had imagined based on the research she’d done before the trip. It honestly wasn’t at all the grand castle that she’d pictured in her head. There were some giant pits called koulouresat the entrance of the West Court, which Cosmo explained may have been used to store grains. A processional corridor. But as they followed a pathway to the right and then finally rounded a corner, the palace and all its glory came into view.
A giant courtyard at least the size of four football fields sat in the center with partially reconstructed limestone buildings on either side. Some were still in a state of repair and excavation. Others were reimaginings of explorers who’d come before. Painted frescoes with depictions of Minoan life lined the walls—re-creations, Cosmo explained, of Sir Arthur Evans, the British archaeologist who staked claim to the discovery of Knossos. There was an air of disdain in Cosmo’s voice—apparently, Evans had taken some liberties in his reconstructions—but the paintings were works of art, nonetheless.
They climbed stairs. Snapped pictures of giant jugs. Squeezed into the “throne room,” even though the worn slab apparently might not have been a throne at all. But it made for a better story.
Dani absorbed everything around her, from the structures to the cypress and olive trees, and even the mountainside behind them, trying to imagine what it must have been like to live here thousands of years ago. There was still much excavation work to be done, as evidenced by the actual archaeologists still working in areas roped off from the public. To think, what more could be found? She was starting to understand the thrill Theo got when he was on a dig, a similar rush to that feeling from her younger, more adventurous days.
“And here we have the Minotaur,” Cosmo said as they sidled up to a fresco on the far side of the grounds. “I’m sure you’ve all heard the tale of the Minotaur, yes?”
Dani’s travel companions all seemed to nod in unison. She remembered the gist of it—a bull-like man trapped in alabyrinth—but she couldn’t tell you much more than that. Theo would be thoroughly disappointed.
“Ah, good. Now, let me tell you therealstory,” Cosmo continued. “King Minos, ruler of Knossos, was said to have built a labyrinth underneath the palace to hide the creature that had been born out of the love his wife had for a majestic white bull. Trapped in the center of the labyrinth, half man, half bull, the Minotaur was a beast unlike any other. Its strength, unmatched. Its ferocity, unimaginable. Terrifying eyes that glowed red, like rubies on fire. Teeth that could tear apart a body in a single, gnashing bite. Only the bravest even dared challenge it, but none succeeded. Some say the Minotaur is still hidden in the depths of this palace to this day. Others believe it is simply another Greek myth. But it hasn’t stopped explorers from trying to find it.”
Cosmo was using his spooky voice again, and Dani had to admit he was a talented showman. And she loved a good story, always surrounding herself with half a dozen books at any one time—and those were only the ones on her immediate TBR list. Working at a library made it difficult for her master TBR to be anything other than a mile long, and it was full of fantastical tales.
But that’s clearly all that this beast was—a tale. If no one survived an encounter with the Minotaur, how would they even know? Did anyone actually believe this as anything other than fiction?
