eyes . . . On their feathers, I mean,’ Michalis added. ‘I suppose the eyes are meant to be watching over King Minos and his kingdom.’ He laughed again and took Calli’s arm.
‘They are such strange creatures,’ she said, still affected by the unexpected spectacle.
‘I know, they are bizarre,’ Michalis replied. ‘I’ve been fascinated by them since I was a boy. They used to bring us here from school on day trips – I remember many of the girls were scared of them.’
‘They are disconcerting,’ she said, ‘but I wouldn’t say scary.’
‘I looked them up a few years ago to find out a bit more about them,’ Michalis continued. ‘And I discovered there are all sorts of myths and mystical stories attached to them.’
‘Really, what did you find out?’ Calli countered, noting to herself that, recently, mysticism seemed to follow her wherever she went.
‘Apparently they represent an awakening, they’re a metaphor for transformation or something . . . which is hardly surprising, is it? Just look at them!’ Michalis laughed, and ushered Calli into what was believed to be King Minos’s throne room.
Michalis’s words, though spoken lightly, struck Calli as oddly profound. Wasn’t that similar to what Maya had said to her? Time for change, time for new beginnings? Hadn’t she told Calli something like this before they parted? So, was this bird a sign? A symbol of her new awakening, for her own transformation? Who knows? she thought, turning to look at Michalis who was cheerfully expounding all he knew about the site, about the Labyrinth and the Minotaur and the splendour of the Minoan civilization. As he spoke, Calli’s mind started to wander off again towards that poor duo, father and son, who millennia ago had tried to escape by turning themselves into birds.
According to Greek mythology, Icarus’s father Daedalus was a brilliant artist and a clever craftsman, who along with his son was kept prisoner by King Minos until he had constructed a labyrinth in which to retain his wife’s monster son, the Minotaur. As the myth goes, Zeus had sent a bull to seduce Queen Pasiphae, and the child she gave birth to was a creature, half-man half-bull, who had to be constrained.
Their only way of escape, Daedalus decided, was by air so he used his ingenuity and artistry to construct the wings which so nearly took them to safety. Daedalus had warned Icarus to avoid flying too close to the sun as their wings were glued together with wax and would melt, but the boy in his haste and excitement forgot his father’s wise words and the inevitable happened, thus plunging him into the sea and to his death.
Calli as a child had visited the site of Knossos with her parents and had been told this story several times, but in those days she considered it as just a fanciful fairy tale. Now, standing among those ancient ruins, she reflected on her Ikaria experience and the story resonated quite differently from those childhood days. Calli’s Ikarian story, as Maya had said before she left the island, had followed her. Everything she heard, everything she saw these days, seemed to offer a kind of symbolism: her encounter with Maya had opened her mind to concepts she had never considered or cared about before.
Visiting Ikaria, meeting Maya, Paolo and all those others who had welcomed her with such ease and acceptance into their circle, had revealed a new side of herself that Calli hadn’t known she possessed. Until then she had lived a life full of preconceptions, full of self-defined rules and assumptions. To be creative, she believed, meant you had to be an artist, a writer, a painter, a photographer and so on; to be an intellectual, you must have a formal education with a degree or a PhD, be an academic, a scholar. To be successful, you had to be professional. Calli took a deep breath and looked around her. None of these rules applied anymore, and none of it mattered. What mattered was an open heart and an open mind.
‘Shall we have a cup of coffee somewhere?’ she heard Michalis say, snapping her out of her reverie. ‘I know a great little kafenio on the way back to the village that makes the perfect baklava!’
‘Now you’re talking!’ she said cheerfully and linked her arm through his as they made their way back to the car.
‘I really like your company, Calli,’ Michalis said rather unexpectedly, turning around to look at her. ‘I am so glad