Chapter 19
LIORA
It’s always when I feel safe—even for a moment—that the Maze remembers me.
My compad flashes red: INELIGIBLE STATUS DETECTED. The letters burn in my vision. My pulse stutters. Ineligible. I taste bile. What does that even mean now?
Gyon stands in front of me, arms out, trying to steady me. I can feel the static crackle in the air behind us. I turn, hand to the wall.
Electric arcs leap across the floor. A strip of light glows behind him. Before I can scream, the field slams him back.
A terrible snap—bone shatters. He howls, a sound so savage it makes the walls tremble. His body is thrown across the floor and slams into a bulkhead with dry impact. Blood sprays. I lunge forward, clawing at the wall, nails scrabbling on cold metal. “Gyon! No—!”
The Maze Master is silent. It doesn’t mock, doesn’t cheer. Dead quiet. Like the world itself is conducting its breath, waiting.
My scream echoes. My fingers leave gouges, metal warped. My eyes blur with tears and rage. I feel his blood on my skin, hot and sticky.
Dravven’s voice slashes through my panic. “Liora! Back away from that wall!”
I roll, pressing myself toward Gyon’s body, but corridors shift. The field pulses again and I’m pushed back. My hand slips off the wall. My breath comes ragged.
I struggle upright. The air presses heavy; the hum of the Maze feels like a heartbeat in my ears.
Dravven is there next to me, yelling over the roar, pulling me upright. “Stay with me!” he says. His face is tight. His eyes burning. I want to curse him for being here. Want to curse him for everything.
But all I can do is stumble.
We limp through the corridor. My arm throbs. Every step is agony. The stench of burnt electronics, heated metal, and ozone fills my nostrils. I taste dirt and fear.
His voice behind me says lightly, “You bonded with the Reaper?”
I choke. “Don’t—” my voice breaks. “Don’t ask me that.”
He doesn’t push. Not with the Maze breathing down our necks. He just pulls me forward.
We pass through electrostatic traps, shifting floors, panels that close and open like jaws. The Maze is punishing us for something.
I wonder if part of it punishes me for daring to love him.
We emerge into a vast cube chamber. No exit. No door. Just infinite walls of metal. The lights flicker in cold whites and blues. The floor is glass over molten conduits. The hum is low and resonant, like a beast breathing under the floor.
The Maze Master splinters across every wall. Dirk Husker’s face, huge, his grin stretched across every panel. “Final boss unlocked,” his voice booms. “Congratulations, Liora. You made it to the climax!”
I swallow. The word tastes like ash. The walls flicker behind him. Then he steps out—Dirk himself, in silhouette against the doorways.
He walks forward, boots echoing. The screens flicker. He holds his hands out, palms open. “Welcome to the end game.”
My blood hums with fury and terror. I grip Dravven’s arm. He tenses beside me.
He hisses, “Stay behind me.”
I shake my head. “No. Not this time.”
I stagger forward—pain in every limb. Grit my teeth. My vision blurs. The Maze warps. Panels shift. Dirk strides across the chamber, light fracturing around him. He seems unreal and too real all at once.
He stops a few feet from me. His grin is wide. His eyes hollow. “You’ve been such a delightful puppet, Liora. But now we cut the strings.”
I spit on the floor. “You don’t get me. You don’t own me.”
He laughs—low, rich. The sound bounces off the walls. “Oh, but I did. In every version. In every code line. I wrote your fears. I watched them bloom.”
Dravven steps behind me. “You’ll die.”
Dirk shrugs. “Maybe. But not before the show ends.”
My compad hums in my pocket. It pulses red. I fish it out. It’s stuck. Overtaken. The override I planted earlier flickers off.
Dirk’s face leans close on the wall screens. “No backups. No patches. Final version only.”
The walls begin to close in—panels sliding. Floor segments shift upward. The cube chamber is reassembling, collapsing inward.
I feel walls pressing, heat rising. I look at Gyon—far away, bleeding, fiercely distant—and panic claws at my chest.
I scream his name. “Gyon!”
The Maze pulses. Dirk’s laughter crescendos. The room starts folding in layers.
I press my palms to the walls, nails digging, trying to hold them apart.
Dravven grips me tight.
I hear the molten mixed hiss beneath glass floor.
Dirk’s voice rings, “Finish the story, Liora. Walk forward. Accept your fate.”
My legs shake. My vision narrows. The walls bend. They sweep closer.
I step forward because it’s all I can do.
One foot. Then another.
The floor cracks beneath me. Molten light leaks.
Dirk’s smile widens.
My mind echoes a plea: Gyon, I’m coming for you.
The final wall segment slides back with a roar.
Dirk steps aside. The chamber beyond opens—blinding light. Silence, at last.
He gifts me that moment. A doorway. The promise of motion.
I don’t hesitate. I move.