by Don Hall

ONCE, AT THE ENTRANCE TO AN ACIENT MOUNTAIN FORTRESS, THERE WAS A MINOTAUR.

He was an ordinary Minotaur, assigned his earthly task to guard against anyone entering the mountain without doing battle. He had never been bested although it had been close a few times.

His day was fairly routine. He slept the night with one eye open, woke at the break of dawn, washed up, had some coffee, and stood stoically, his handy two-sided axe in his hand, until nightfall. He'd take a quick lunch around 1:00pm—usually some fruit or grass—and dinner was at dusk. As a younger Minotaur, he had been challenged countless times by armored warriors hellbent on the secrets under the mountain but now, as he approached 756 years, he was slower. The fur around his horns was laced with white and sometimes he'd find he had sprung his ankle just sleeping or his lower back required a bit of stretching after standing all day.

It had been a century or so since the last warrior and the Minotaur was questioning his life choices. He could've settled down, married a female Minotaur or Unicorn, and lived a more active existence but the days of those choices were far behind. He missed the warriors. He was quite the storyteller and after besting them in battle, he'd pour them a bucket of wine and spin yarn after yarn to their delight. He hadn't spoken to anyone nor had anyone spoken to him in so long he wondered what words even sounded like.

The Minotaur could see the ocean and often sat at the edge of a cove just fifteen feet from his post. He sat and wondered about the world and his place in it.

One morning, he heard splashing in the cove. He grabbed his axe and marched to the edge and saw the most beautiful creature he had ever seen. She was a Mermaid and her green scaled tail radiated a kaleidoscope of bright sun reflections. Her hair was scarlet and her breasts were round and lovely, the nipples like pencil erasers.

"Hello, Ms. Mermaid. Welcome to the Cove Before the Mountain Pass. I'm Carl, the Minotaur Guardian."

She splashed under the water and swam closer. She pushed up so that her elbows rested upon the shelf of earth and smiled a crooked little smile that made Carl's heart beat three times faster.

"Heya, Carl! I'm Sabrina. I had no idea there was a Mountain Pass here. Wassup?"

"Not much. Just guarding the entrance. You're not gonna try to get past me, are you?"

"Nah. You look too big and strong." She smiled that heartbreaker again and swam away.

Carl knew better than to fall for a Mermaid. Notoriously fickle and prone to deception, Mermaids had a viciousness only equalled by their beauty. He had a buddy from Minotaur Training who dated a Mermaid. She said she was committed to him, that he was the only Minotaur she would ever give her heart to, but then he found out that she pretty much gave it up to every seaman she encountered. The heartache his buddy felt was so intense, one of his horns atrophied and fell off. Took him sixty years to grow it back.

Carl settled back in place and continued his mundane existence but he couldn't quite get the effect Sabrina's smile had on him to fade. The sound of her voice was musical. Her eyes were the most amazing shade of blue-green.

The next day, just as he was finishing his third cup of coffee, he heard a splash.

"Hey, sailor! How's your morning?"

"Sabrina!" Carl called back, a bit more enthusiastically than he thought he should.

"I was swimming by your cove and thought of you. Anything new to discuss?"

Carl thought. He didn't have anything new but he wanted her to stay a while so he said "I dunno. I was pondering the relationship between Zeus and Hercules earlier. You know, that whole father god and son demigod dynamic. What do you think?"

The two chatted about that and various things of no import for so long, Carl missed his lunch. When she left, he ached for her to come back.

By the third day, Carl couldn't think of anything else but Sabrina. Counter to his personal admonition, he had fallen horn over hooves in love with this Mermaid and, given he couldn't swim nor leave the entrance to the Mountain Pass, he was stuck.

✶

SABRINA WAS AT A CROSSROADS IN HER LIFE AS A MERMAID. She had, like most Mermaids, a self destructive streak and an attraction to risk and immediate gratification. Most male creatures were dull except for the ones so broken that they instantly jumped into the sea to be with her. These sad fellows were always the same—insecure, jealous, desperate to be wanted by such a vivacious divinity as she. They were so easy to seduce and so predictable. She frequently grew bored with them and just as often found another before ending it with the one she came to the dance with.

Three weeks prior to meeting Carl, she had determined that her latest conquest was one too many. She was trapped by her own insatiable desires and need to consume men like a vulture eating the flesh of the dead. Seducing lonely sailors had become too routine and deceiving these idiots so simple. She needed something, someone, different. She craved a place of stability.

That was when she encountered her Minotaur.

Carl was not like the sailors she enchanted. He was not broken. He was not desperate. He was older than she preferred, sure, but he had a job. He was responsible. He was dependable. He was everything her list of destroyed men were not. Carl was a challenge and an escape.

Yes, he was landlocked and sort of ordinary. She decided that she could pretend to be what he wanted as long as he didn't ask her too many questions or need too much of her.

"Carl," she whispered, "I wonder what it would be like to be joined with you?"

"J-joined?"

"Together. More serious than dating. Committed to one another. Would you like that?"

"Yes. Yes, I'd like that very much."

"I have to warn you, Carl. I'm a Mermaid. We Mermaids are a capricious bunch. If I agree to this, there are a few rules you'll need to follow. First, I'm an ocean creature and so I'll leave you here alone for stretches at a time and you cannot ask me where I've been or what I've been doing. You'll have to trust me. Can you trust me?"

"Trust is not earned, it is given. I can give you my trust."

"Second, it is in my nature to take without giving. I do not receive gifts well because you won't be able to understand what I want on any given day. Do not try to surprise me with presents. I know what I want and I will take those things and discard anything I don't want without regard for your feelings."

"Do you like gift cards?"

"Yes. Gift cards with a gift receipt are fine."

"OK. I think I can handle that."

"Third, you are not my type. I will want you change a few things about yourself to keep me interested and avoid my getting bored with you. I get bored very easily. Being bored is the worst thing ever. If I get bored, I will have no choice but to leave you. I'm a Mermaid and that is in my nature."

Carl stood stone-still and thought about her three conditions. It didn't sound like a very good deal for him. Then he looked up and she smiled at him, her tail swishing back and forth behind her in the cove.

"I accept."

✶

DECADES PASSED. Carl's cove was littered with flotsam and jetsam Sabrina had found in the ocean arranged like treasures tossed away by humans. Carl found himself more lonely than the seven and a half centuries before. Sabrina, true to her word, disappeared for months at a time and when she returned offered no explanation or consolation. True to his word, he never asked about her trips.

For years she had admonished him for things he did or enjoyed. She had been frustrated with his horns and he allowed her to file them down making him look more like a sow than a bull. She taunted him about his weight. She would say terrible things about him one day and the next praise him as a paragon of masculinity. He had read about Stockholm Syndrome and thought this is what it probably felt like.

The first ten years or so had been remarkable. She took as she said she would but he never minded. He wanted to make her happy. He loved nothing more than the sound of her laughter. When she determined to focus her attention on him, it was magical. So magical, in fact, when she was away the absence of it felt like withdrawals from an addiction. He loathed how much he missed her when she was out in the ocean. It made him, a Minotaur, feel small and weak. Needy.

Despite all of this, Carl was generally happy. Sabrina gave him a reason to smile. Her joy, he thought, was his joy. Until one day he decided to break the rules.

"Where've you been? You've been gone for six months."

Sabrina turned suddenly serious. "You don't get to ask me that."

"I'm asking."

Her eyes turned blood red. She opened her mouth and, for the first time, he saw that she had three rows of razor sharp teeth.

"You do not ask me about my business. Ever."

Carl was a Minotaur. He rose up to his full height, holding his massive axe in his right hand. "Where were you?" he growled.

Sabrina suddenly went sweet like a light switch had been flipped. "I'm bored. I'm leaving. I'm sorry you had to ask me, Carl. But I warned you." She turned in the water and swam away.

Carl sat down on a rock and wept.

She had warned him.