Chapter 12 The Labyrinth #2
“How far does it go?” I asked after a while, though I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.
“If the walls don’t change, it should only be an hour or two,” he answered before looking down at me with a grin.
“Earth time, not The?kós time,” he added, teasing me, and he was right, only the time we wasted here now mattered.
“And if the walls do move again?” I asked.
“We might never leave,” Aster said, making me snort a laugh, but then I saw his face and knew he wasn’t joking as I hoped.
“You’re kidding, right?” His serious expression gave me my answer. “That’s reassuring,” I groaned, and he looked down at me with a raised brow.
We kept walking in amicable silence, my chest easing as we continued through without incident.
Our path was lit only by the faint red glow bleeding from the walls, and from time to time, Aster stroked them, bringing the shimmer back to enjoy his touch once more.
I made a note to myself that once this was all over, I was going to get Aster a dog.
I held back a laugh as I imagined him, a big, burly minotaur with a tiny Chihuahua in hand, or tucked lovingly under his arm.
But then I could also see him playing fetch with a Golden Labrador.
We rounded a corner, and for once, there was more than just the dull red glow bleeding from the walls. A faint green light shimmered near the floor, soft and hazy. I narrowed my eyes, trying to make sense of it, until we moved closer and the source revealed itself.
The second Aster realized what I was looking at, he spoke, sharp and immediate.
“Don’t touch it. Whatever you do.” The severity in his voice was enough to stop me short, without arguing, my hands lifting instinctively away from my sides.
“Why?” I asked. “What does it do?”
I followed his gaze to the plant. It was unlike anything I had ever seen, a strange fusion of growths, somewhere between a low flowering plant and a cluster of mushrooms. Pale green stems curled upward from the stone floor, each one crowned with delicate, translucent caps that unfurled like petals.
Fine veins glowed faintly beneath the surface, pulsing slowly, as if the plant were breathing.
What unsettled me most was the dust.
A soft, powdery substance clung to the edges of the caps, shimmering in the air. It was so fine it looked almost like mist. With the slightest disturbance, it drifted loose, hanging in the air like pollen, catching the green light as it floated.
Aster shifted subtly, placing himself just a fraction closer to me.
“It’s called Hypnóphyllon,” he said. “In your tongue, it means, Eternal Sleep.”
That name alone was enough to make me straighten.
“Our healers use it,” he continued. “In controlled doses, of course.”
“Why, what does it do?” I asked, not willing to get too close and with a name like that, for good reason too.
“It renders a patient unconscious before a procedure.”
“So, like chloroform or when doctors use anesthesia?” I asked, looking up at him.
“Yes. But much quicker.” He nodded before his eyes flicked back to the plant. “That green glow you see is the powder. If it’s disturbed and inhaled, even for a breath or two, it can knock someone unconscious within seconds.”
My brows shot up. “Seconds?”
“There are stories,” he went on, his voice lowering, “Tales of people unknowingly walking into fields of it. All it takes is a windy day and…” He didn’t finish the thought, but I did for him.
“Nighty night.”
“Exactly,” he said grimly. “And unfortunately, help is often needed, because once someone falls, they continue to inhale it and then, well, they never wake up and simply drift away, locked in their own unconsciousness.”
A shudder rippled down my body at the thought. “That’s… horrifying,” I said, eyeing the plant warily.
“It is taught to children as a cautionary tale,” Aster said. “A way to survive. They grow up learning to recognize it, to avoid it. It’s called a fable, but there’s nothing fairy-tale about it.”
I swallowed hard as we passed it, giving it a wide berth as I also held my breath.
“If it’s that dangerous,” I asked after passing it, “why not destroy it?”
His jaw tightened slightly. “If it weren’t so essential to medical care, the King would have had more than enough reason to do exactly that. The fields are usually protected and regulated, so accidents like that no longer happen.”
“Then why does it grow here?” I asked.
“In the Labyrinth.” Aster exhaled slowly once we were clear of the patch of it growing in the cracks of the stone.
“It’s a type of fungus. It thrives in damp places. There are different strains, and this one is particularly potent. It feeds on moisture in the air, and it doesn’t need sunlight.”
I glanced around the narrow corridor, the walls gleaming like wet stone, the air heavy and thick.
“So, just one more way this place wants us dead,” I muttered.
“Yes,” he agreed flatly.
“I won’t lie,” I said, stepping carefully around the next glowing cluster, “I don’t particularly fancy falling asleep down here.”
“No,” Aster replied, “especially not when the Labyrinth would be able to feed on your dreams.” Jesus, it just kept getting worse!
“Or my nightmares.” I grimaced.
“It would,” he said in a dire tone, before continuing with his harrowing warning. “A person is most vulnerable when they sleep. You don’t choose your nightmares, but your mind manifests them anyway.”
“Well, I can safely say that I will most definitely be staying very far away from the glowing death flowers.”
“As you should,” he said.
I stopped walking after we had seemed to have passed the last of it, now that I was safe to do so.
“Although… it does make me curious.”
His head tilted, causing his horns to cast long shadows along the floor and up the wall.
“What does?”
“Whether it would affect me the same way,” I said. “I mean, I’m human. Different genetic makeup.”
His expression looked thoughtful before it sharpened with understanding. “Maybe, some of those plants were engineered.”
“Engineered?” I repeated. “You mean… created?”
“Reinforced,” he corrected. “Made more potent. Different strains were developed. Some mixed with others to render patients unconscious for longer procedures.” He looked at me pointedly. “But all of that was designed for our kind.”
I snorted softly. “So what you’re saying is that if I accidentally inhaled it, it would be like giving a horse tranquilizer to a cat.”
“And then bye-bye, kitty,” he said without hesitation.
“Right,” I said. “So it could potentially kill me.”
“Yes,” he replied. “Which is why we must be careful. There are things in my world that are far more dangerous to you than they would ever be to one of my own kind. And there may be things that may affect you but not me.”
“Sucks to be me then, I guess,” I muttered dryly before spinning it a different way, offering a different perspective.
“Or there are some things that wouldn’t affect me at all but may kill you guys.” His look of confusion made me shrug my shoulders and argue, “What? You said it yourself. Different strains and all. So just because it knocks you on your ass doesn’t mean it’ll do the same to me.”
He huffed quietly. “Either way, I have no desire to test the theory.”
“Good,” I said quickly. “Because neither do I.”
“Then we are in agreement,” he replied as if he were stating a law more than a suggestion. A very logical and wise suggestion at that, and not one I was ever going to disagree with.
It felt good that there didn’t seem to be any more plants as we continued. Although it also seemed as if the weird glowing plants were the least of our problems, because I heard my name being called.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, what?” Aster replied, making me frown at him.
“I don’t know, you tell me, you were the one who just called my name.”
I suddenly felt resistance on my arm to find his meaty hand wrapped around it, pulling me to a stop. Then he filled me with dread when he told me,
“No, Alex…”
“I didn’t.”