Pasiphae.
There were stories about her. She didn't believe them. However, names are important things. Not infrequently, she was told that a name can mean more then just a collection of sounds. That always stung. She didn't know why her mother chose that she should share a name with such a character. But myth and superstition be damned. She was Pasiphae, and she would make her own way.
In fact, the name was fitting. No one could remember her bethrothed's name. They all referred to him as "the bull", or Bull to his face.
The story went that when he was seven, his mother had sent him out of the house and into the fields. If you will not treat me with respect, she said, then you might as well join the wild where you belong. And sure enough, he ran out into the woods, and was gone for several hours. His mother, getting worried, called on the local woodsmen to help her locate her wayward son. There had always been some sort of intrigue between Bull's mother and the woodsman, but that was only spoken of in hushed tones. The woodsman, after some persuading (of what nature no body knew of), set off into the woods to track down the boy.
Bull was found an hour short of dawn the next day. Tired and dirty, he had looked up surprised to find his mother and the woodsman come tramping through the shrubbery to where he had decided to make his new home. Looking down at the boy, his mother released a high pitched shriek of shock. In front of the boy lay a bull, taken from one of the nearby townships. It had been slaughtered, and now was surrounded by a haze of flies.
The boy was unperturbed.
"Mother" he said in a calm voice, "why do you look so shocked?"
The woodsman knelt down next the carcass, and placed a hand on its hide.
"Been dead for about twelve hours, lad. Explain it?" The woodsman had always been a man of action, a man of strength. Tact was not his forte. This time however, his voice was softened. Awed. To kill a bull requires a great deal of strength, far beyond that of a seven year old child. Something else would be at play here.
"I did it" the boy replied, without a hint of emotion. On his hands, blood was crusted into his fingernails and streaked on his palms.
His mother crossed herself.
From then on, the boy had been known as Bull-killer, then Bull. His strength had grown as he did, until everyone in the village feared to make him angry. It was as if in killing the bull, he had gained not only its physical abilities, but also its rage. However, Bull refused to enter the forest again. When questioned, he would scoff that he had already proven himself once there. But his face would always turn a little green, and he would glace over towards the dense thicket of trees at the outlay of the town.
But as to what – or whom – he met out there, or the events which took place that night, the Bull remained silent.
When he was nineteen, he decided that it was time to stop bedding field-girls and find himself some stability. In an attempt to soften a perceived wrong, the town's watchmaker offered up his daughter to him. The Bull, observing a well built, handsome girl, knew that he could do worse.
They were engaged that day. And that night, Pasiphae cried at the cruel irony her namesake had created for her.