Chapter 30 A Skilled Escape Artist
A Skilled Escape Artist
Sascia’s muscles lock up. The Labyrinth stacks its black walls around her, shadows leering in the corners, thick and alive with too-long claws and sightless skulls and gore-dripping fangs. A despairing terror grips her throat; she shouldn’t be back here. Not again.
The aesin are panicking, bodies pressed against the narrow passageway. A face appears in her eyeline, but Sascia’s mind refuses to bring the world into focus, to accept what is about to happen. Palms cup her cheeks in a feather-light touch.
“Sascia?” Nugau is saying. “Sascia!”
In the princess’s voice, her name is a foreign incantation, the vowels too melodious, the s too thick—that’s what pulls her back. Nugau has never called her anything but human and little gnat before.
“When I met you, the you from the future,” Sascia stammers, “you told me I would try to help you. That I would almost die in a labyrinth of terrors. After my first Trial, I thought I had changed that future. I thought I had survived it.”
A frown disfigures the planes of Nugau’s face. “Nothing will happen to you. I won’t allow it. But first, we need to move, little gnat.”
In the narrow corridor between the towering walls of the Labyrinth, Orran is shouldering out of his dress jacket and Thalla is hitching her floor-length skirt to her hips, revealing a duo of daggers strapped to her thigh. She hands one to Orran.
“I’ll stall them,” the lady says.
Before Sascia thinks to ask who, Thalla steps into the center of the corridor, palms out.
Her eyes mellow into a translucent white, the veins in her neck a stark silver against her skin.
Mist beads out of her fingers like vapor steaming off a pot—in seconds, the entire passage is clouded with the haze of her magic.
A howl rips the air. It is the wail of a wolf calling at the moon, but rough around the edges—it’s coming from an aesin throat.
Sascia has heard this reckless wildness before, in the tunnel after she jumped into the Maw.
Ktren, the Queen’s spy and leader of Sascia’s haters.
Footfalls follow, and the sound of open palms slapped on the walls.
Panic seizes Sascia anew, her eyes seeking Nugau’s.
“We aren’t the only ones the Queen dropped into the Labyrinth,” the princess confirms. “Ktren and their friends are going to try to interfere. My mother likes to discipline with lessons. This is ours, for your performance this morning. We chose to involve ourselves with your Claim, and now we will become a part of your Trial in earnest.”
“This is why the aesin admire the Queen,” Orran says in their low, rough voice.
They stand guard at Thalla’s back while she maneuvers the fog to shield them.
“She is astute and methodical. She aims to solve three problems at once: the human’s new skills, the princess’s defiance, the crowd’s support. ”
“Only if we fail,” Nugau says. “And we won’t. Thalla’s mist will camouflage us, which will buy us time with both Ktren and the Queen—as long as she can’t see us and can’t feel us touch the walls, she won’t be able to shift the Labyrinth to block our path.”
Another howl echoes down the passageways.
“And if they catch up to us? They sound like”—Sascia’s chest rattles—“dozens.”
“If they catch up to us, we will fight.” Nugau’s voice softens. “The Queen believes you will cower before her Labyrinth. But she does not know. You are an Ariadne. This is your Labyrinth. So find us a way out.”
Ariadne: the name blankets Sascia in the warmth of magic, the worn softness of myth.
All Labyrinths have a way out and all Ariadnes know how to find it.
Sascia is a skilled escape artist, squeezing her way out of dark sewers and failed exams and the black depths of the Maw.
She can do it today too, with Nugau holding her hand, with Mooch guiding her steps, with Orran and Thalla surrounding her.
On the long bone of Sascia’s clavicle, Mooch gives an encouraging flutter of its wings.
It cannot guide them by flying ahead, as Thalla’s fog has settled thick and liquid around them, making it impossible to see beyond a few feet.
They cannot touch the walls to guide themselves, and they can’t make any noise. Sascia will have to improvise.
“Form a line,” she says, “and take each other’s hand.”
The three aesin shuffle into a row behind her: first Nugau, then Orran, and Thalla at the rear so that she can control the mist with her free hand.
“Mooch,” Sascia whispers. “Can you guide us by touching me? One tap is right, two is left, three is straight ahead.”
The moth nibbles at the base of her neck, then taps two times.
“Left,” Sascia instructs.
As one, the four of them move. The mist consumes all sounds: their footsteps, their breaths, the wild beating of their hearts.
Sascia feels as though she’s taken a dive in a tranquil pool; the only things she can sense are the swish of her dress around her thighs, the soft taps of Mooch’s wings on her collarbone, Nugau’s fingers around hers.
Minutes pass in absolute silence. The first gong rings.
They have woven deep into the heart of the Labyrinth, taking turn after turn, when the ground begins to tremble.
Nugau draws them to the center of the passageway. “Don’t touch the walls!”
Distorted shouts reach them from the direction of the spectators. The mist hides the audience from view, but Sascia can hear astonishment in their voices, and then a mix of disapproval and excitement.
Pointed ears perked, Nugau listens. “The Queen has flattened the walls on the first half of the Labyrinth. Ktren and their group can move freely now. They’re headed toward where the mist is thickest. Thalla, can you widen the reach of your magic?”
“I can. Orran,” Thalla whispers to her partner, “don’t let me faint.”
Serpentine swirls of white slither to the floor and uncoil up the walls, over them, swallowing as much of the Labyrinth as Thalla can manage. The mist hazes the entire passageway; Sascia can see no farther than the tip of her nose.
“Thalla can only hold this for a few minutes.” Nugau’s voice comes from someplace behind her. “We need to move faster, Sascia.”
At the base of her neck, Mooch taps three times.
Picking up the pace, Sascia pulls them straight ahead, then left and left again.
They build a frenetic rhythm of running, turning, running again.
With the mist so heavy, black walls appear out of nowhere—she has to swerve and snap her limbs close to avoid crashing into them.
An adrenaline-fueled drumbeat pounds relentlessly in her chest. They depend on her, Nugau and Orran and Thalla.
Above, the second bell reverberates down the Labyrinth.
Mooch taps, two times—
Sascia shifts her body to turn left—
Then feels its third tap. Not left. Straight.
She crashes into the wall, shoulder first. The pain is minimal; it’s the horror that roots her to the spot. She has touched the wall. The Queen knows where they are now.
She shouts, “Run—” but the command is ripped from her mouth.
The Labyrinth ripples like a mirage pulled apart at the seams. Both ends of the passageway are sealed shut. The wall on their left disappears. The four of them frantically reach for each other as the ground beneath them tilts.
Sascia cups a hand protectively over Mooch’s body as she tumbles down the slope.
The soft fabric of her dress tears, the jagged rock nips at her exposed flesh, and all around her the misty plains of Thalla’s power slacken.
White gives way to milky gray, then clear air.
Realization jolts through Sascia like an electric current: the Queen tipped them back down to the beginning of the Labyrinth, where the arena is flat and mistless.
A command tears through Nugau’s lips; in response, he and the other two aesin draw their weapons.
The second their feet connect with solid ground, they are running.
They fall into formation like a well-oiled machine, Orran in the center, Nugau and Thalla at his sides.
Rivulets of Dark warp around Nugau’s hand and solidify into her curved scythe.
Thalla’s thin dagger glimmers with white mist. Orran’s wings flick open and he shoots up in the air, soaring over the ground.
Ktren’s group bursts into view: two dozen of them, three, four, faces Sascia recognizes as the council’s guards. They surge through the vast expanse of the arena, a small army headed their way. Orran swoops down and clashes with four of their enemies, knocking them a dozen feet back.
Sascia is still flat on the ground. She’s still panicking. Mooch is safe against her chest, but no one else is and she can’t help them—she’s too small, too weak, too human to be of any use.
“Little gnat!” Nugau calls back from where she holds the line a few feet away. “We are all here with you, but this is your Trial. You’re the only one who has to make it across the Labyrinth. We’re going to hold them off and you—”
“I won’t leave you!” Sascia cries.
“Yes, you will!” Nugau snaps. “You cannot fight your way out of this—but you can outsmart it instead. So move.”
And Sascia does move. She jumps to her feet and steels her shoulders.
Over the stretch of flat ground behind her, she can see the way back into the Labyrinth.
But ahead, Orran is snapped from the air by a meaty hand and tossed across the floor like a rag doll.
He skids to a stop at Thalla’s feet, his shirt torn and hanging in tatters from his back.
Blood is running down his temple. A roar tears from Thalla’s throat.
Nugau swings her blade over her head. At the lowermost point of its arc, Dark explodes from it, a swooping slash of shadow that zips down the arena.
The blast hits the first line of the soldiers square in the chests.
They are knocked off their feet, but others are instantly there to replace them, blades drawn, mouths sneering.
“Orran!” Nugau cries. “Can you fly?”
Thalla has wrapped her arms around her partner, pulling them to their feet.
Her fingers catch their jaw. “You do not die tonight, Orran S’uravot.
You do not die without me.” She presses her lips against Orran’s, a stab of a kiss, and stands to face Ktren and their soldiers. “Get Sascia out of here.”
Orran’s feathers ruffle, wings elongating.
He breaks into a run. Sascia places Mooch in the hollow beneath her ear, where it’s safest, and opens her arms. Orran crashes into her, his arms a cord of muscle around her waist. He struggles under her weight, but his wings beat furiously around them—they shoot into the air.
Sascia’s stomach plummets. The ground rushes past and, after a few seconds, so does the Labyrinth; Orran means to fly her over the last part of the maze, straight to the exit.
Twin war cries torrent down the arena. Over Orran’s shoulder, Sascia spots Nugau and Thalla launch into the battle. The two move faster than her eyes can track, strikes of the blade and grunts of effort the only things she can make out.
Orran swerves a hard left—her body nearly slips out of their grasp.
A wall of black has spurted out of nowhere.
The Queen is none too pleased about Orran’s plan to fly straight out of there.
The passageways rush up to meet their height, walls towering taller and taller until they crash into the ceiling.
The new architecture plunges them into darkness, making it even harder to spot the sides.
Orran veers left and right as best they can, but the way through is too narrow for the span of their wings.
“You’ll hurt yourself,” Sascia cries over the rushing wind. “Get us to the ground.”
The aesin obliges, swooping through the air for a gentle landing.
Sascia immediately scans her surroundings, but the towering tunnel of the Labyrinth allows no light but the Darkprints on Mooch’s wings and Orran’s cheeks.
It doesn’t matter; if her calculations while they were airborne were right, they’re less than five turns from the end of the maze.
If they hurry, they can make it out before Nugau or Thalla get hurt.
“Are you good?” she asks Orran. “To keep moving?”
Eyes closed, face tilted up to the ceiling, Orran is taking deep breaths. His face and back are torn with dozens of small scratches; blue blood dots his dark skin. But at her question, he straightens and flashes her a wicked grin. “Always.”
They move faster: Mooch leads, Sascia follows, Orran pulls up the rear.
Both their breaths are labored, their feet heavy with exhaustion, but they keep walking, counting the turns.
Orran has tucked in his wings to avoid touching the walls.
The Queen has fallen prey to her own trick by connecting the walls to the ceiling—she can’t see them now either.
Time passes like blinks between dreaming and waking—all of a sudden, Sascia takes a turn to find the exit at the very end of the passageway.
“We made it,” she whispers.
“We did,” Orran says.
She grabs their arm and pulls them along, sprinting the last few feet to the exit—
Something slick swishes through the air.
Orran is ripped out of her grasp.
She turns, breath lodged in her throat. The walls have returned to their normal height. She can see the perimeter of the cavern, laden with aesin—they are unnervingly quiet. The Queen sits as nonchalant as ever on her throne.
And Ktren stands at the other end of the passageway.
Their fingers are extended in her and Orran’s direction, but there is no weapon in them.
Orran is looking at her. The white is showing around the pupils of his eyes. His smile has deformed into a look of surprise. A dagger sticks out of his back, right where his wings grow from his spine. His left wing droops, dark blue blood soaking his feathers.
“Go,” Orran whispers. “Once the third bell rings, it’s against our laws for Ktren to hurt me. I’ll hold them off until then. Go!”
At the other side of the passageway, Ktren edges closer, a hand claiming a new dagger.
Orran struggles to stand, but their strength fails them; they collapse on their side.
Sascia casts a glance over her shoulder. The exit is there, a simple, inconspicuous absence of wall between passageways. If she runs, she will be there in less than a minute—if she runs, Orran will take another dagger for her.
She is a skilled escape artist, dodging every obstacle in her path.
But this time, she’s not going to run.
She squares her shoulders and turns to face Ktren.