King Minos was very pleased.  Unfortunately, King Minos was also very greedy.  He wanted Daedalus to work only for him and so he had his Royal Guards take Daedalus and his young son Icarus and lock them away in a cave high above the sea.  The only entrances to the cave were through the labyrinth guarded by the King’s soldiers (not to mention the Minotaur!) and an entrance overlooking the sea high up on the side of a cliff.

Daedalus didn’t mind his imprisonment at first.  Whatever Daedalus needed King Minos provided without question -- food, drink, tools of all shapes, rare metals, leather, parchment and even candles so he could work late into the night.  Daedalus lived happily for many years working away on an endless variety of wondrous inventions.  And young Icarus, although sometimes bored, was usually quite happy helping out his father and playing with the mechanical toys Daedalus made for him.

It wasn’t until Icarus became a teenager that Daedalus began to wonder if being locked away was the best thing for his son.  And Icarus, tired of the cold, damp cave began to complain that he had no hope of a life of his own.

On his sixteenth birthday Icarus broke into a rage, “But father, I want an adventure – maybe even to meet a girl and have a son of my own! I can’t very well ask a wife to come live with me in this lonely cave over the sea.  I hate this cave.  I hate the King.  And I hate you!”

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