XIV
Corin awoke slowly, peacefully, the way one did after a sleep that hadn’t quite been earned but much appreciated.
The light above the chamber had shifted—still bright, still impossibly blue, but angled differently now. It was softer at the edges. More welcoming. He couldn’t quite see the fields anymore, but he did see the branches of a large tree.
His body felt lighter than it had before he’d closed his eyes, the deep ache in his muscles dulled to a distant memory. He pushed himself upright, blinking.
Ariadne was kneeling beside him.
He startled despite himself, then relaxed when he saw what she held. A small, shallow cup, no larger than a thimble. Within it gleamed a stop of liquid so luminous it seemed to gather on the light rather than reflect it. He recognized it instantly, and his mouth watered.
“Ambrosia,” she said. “Only a drop, though.”
“Again?” He gulped.
She nodded slowly. “Just a bit more. Drink it. It will keep you from hunger and thirst for the rest of your time here. Any more would surely unmake you.”
“And you’re sure I should–”
“Yes,” she interrupted.
He hesitated only a moment before taking the cup.
In truth, he hadn’t been hungry or thirsty his entire time in the maze.
He didn’t fully understand being in the Labyrinth, but with the curing liquid taunting him in her hands, he could feel his body thinking it would shut down soon without sustenance.
He downed the ambrosia quicker than he had intended. It touched his tongue like warmth rather than any sort of taste, somehow feeling like how sunlight felt on his skin after a particularly rough winter. It slid down his throat and settled in his chest, spreading outward in a slow, steady bloom.
He exhaled, startled by the sudden clarity that followed. The dull edge of fatigue he didn’t even know he had been feeling vanished entirely.
“That’s… unsettling,” he admitted.
Ariadne smiled faintly. “You will get used to it.”
Corin didn’t want to admit that he wished he never would.
She rose then, brushing invisible dust from her hands. “If you are willing, I can help you figure out what this place wants from you.”
His eyes widened. “You will?”
“Yes.”
Corin stood to see her face more clearly. There was no guile there. No calculation. Only resolve. And something like hope that she didn’t quite allow herself to acknowledge.
“You haven’t done that before,” he whispered.
“I am aware.”
He pursed his lips. “I don’t want to use you.”
Her brows knit together at that. “Use me?”
“I won’t be another—” he stopped himself before the name Theseus could form. “An heir who takes what he needs and leaves you behind.”
Her expression softened before steadying. “I am choosing this,” she told him. “I want to help you.”
The words landed heavier on Corin than he expected. But he spoke before it could settle too deep inside him. “How do we get out?”
She tilted her head, considering him. “We do not.”
His jaw tightened.
“You cannot. Yet,” she amended. “You must sacrifice something to the Labyrinth. It always takes. Once you make your sacrifice, then you will be free to leave.”
Corin nodded slowly, though the words offered no comfort. “You said that before. But how do I figure out my sacrifice?”
“The Labyrinth knows.”
“That doesn’t help me.”
“No.”
Corin groaned and shook his head in frustration. “Well, we have to get out of this chamber first, I assume.”
She gestured toward the nearest doorway. Corin had tried it early on in his escape attempts. He knew it led nowhere except right back to the chamber after twenty steps.
He frowned. “That one won’t–”
“Walk with me,” she said simply.
He hesitated but fell into step beside her.
The moment they crossed the threshold, the air shifted. It was different than he remembered it being when he had been endlessly turned around, more solid. Approving.
The corridor beyond stretched longer than it had before as well. Its walls were less oppressive, the stone warmer beneath his palm. The sense of resistance he’d felt earlier was gone.
When he glanced back to the chamber, it remained behind them, open and unchanged, not covered in new stone as the Labyrinth had done numerous times before.
Corin wondered if that was the Labyrinth accepting his choices or if that was simply the effect of Ariadne.
“Well,” he muttered, “that’s new.”
Ariadne allowed herself the smallest smile that Corin could just make out through the faded golden lights.
The Labyrinth did not protest their passage as they moved steadily through the hall. It did not groan or shudder or redirect them. Instead, it seemed to yield. It seemed to open and welcome the pair as they walked, and he had a feeling that was all because of the woman he was with.
Still, Corin tightened his grip on the blade at his side.
He matched Ariadne’s solid pace as they moved deeper together. The maze continued to unfold in front of them, not as a prison, but as a path that had finally decided to be walked.
It reminded Corin of when he had first entered the Labyrinth. It felt like so long ago, but it had only been some hours—a day and a half at most. So much had happened since he entered, and he wasn’t sure how he felt about any of it.
They hadn’t gone far before the corridor widened for them. The air grew colder, heavier, as the stone ahead echoed a history it did not wish to forget. Corin slowed instinctively, his steps softening and his grip tightening on his new blade.
The golden veins pulsed around him, brightening to the point he could see laid at his feet: Taleon.
Taleon’s skeleton lay in the same position it had been in before, half slumped against the wall with his cloak in tatters and bones bleached pale against the dark stone.
While the remains had not seemed to shift at all, Corin was sure this wasn’t the same path where he had originally seen his kin’s body.
Corin stopped, drawing Ariadne’s attention to him. In all the chaos that had brought him to her chamber again, he had forgotten all about his dead kin, and the thought settled heavy in his chest.
“That’s him,” Corin said softly. “Ta–”
“Yes,” she cut in before he could say the name.
“I didn’t… he’s been dead for a long time,” he muttered. His gaze shifted to her. “Right?”
She inclined her head, acknowledging it without ceremony.
“But I met him,” he insisted.
“You did.”
“When the chamber collapsed,” Corin went on, “I tried to go back for him. For… Bristle.” He frowned. “You stopped me.”
“I did.”
“Because you knew,” Corin pressed. “You knew he wouldn’t–” He stopped himself, unsure how to finish the thought.
“Yes, I knew.”
“That he wasn’t really there.”
“He was there, heir.” She turned to face him fully then, her expression gentle and sad.
Corin scoffed. “How could he? How could he be there with me but be long dead at the same time?”
She placed a tentative hand on his shoulder. “I cannot explain it fully. But it was why I was not worried when the chamber collapsed.”
Corin shook his head slowly. “I don’t understand how that works. You have to give me something more than that. How could he be there and not? How does that maze allow that to happen?”
Ariadne considered him for a moment, weighing how much truth the stone would tolerate. “The dead do not always leave cleanly,” she settled on. “Especially here. Some parts of a person linger—it may be a memory, a fear, or a habit. The psyche remembers what the body cannot finish.”
“That’s not an answer,” Corin bit back.
“It is an answer,” she argued. “It is the closest to the answer I can give you. It is just not one easy to swallow, heir.”
Corin looked back at Taleon’s remains, a heaviness settling in his chest. “It’s unsettling.”
Her voice softened. “I would say you get used to it.”
Corin shifted his gaze back to her.
“But I hope you never have to,” she finished.
The words struck deeper than he expected. Not because they explained anything, but because they carried something like care. Something he knew she couldn’t possibly feel for an heir.
“What about Bristle?” The words were out of his mouth before he could think of them. “Did he die? Or was that his psyche?”
“He is around,” she answered.
A breath of relief released from his chest. “Will I see him?”
She pursed her lips. “Perhaps. Though I do not believe he will be up for a journey for some time.”
Corin didn’t want to ask for more details despite the fact he was still so confused. What he knew already was uncomfortable. He straightened and took a breath.
“He helped me. Even knowing what he was. Or… what he wasn’t.” He sighed in defeat. “Did he know?”
“What he was?” she questioned. When Corin nodded, she shrugged. “I believe so. As much as I could tell.”
He pursed his lips. “He led me to you.”
Ariadne nodded, the words appearing caught in her throat.
They stood there for a moment longer, the past laid bare in bone and silence, before Ariadne turned and continued down the corridor. Corin followed, casting one last look over his shoulder, and sent out a mental prayer for well wishes for his kin.
It didn’t take much longer for the corridor to narrow again, funneling the two forward until the walls pressed close on either side, the faint golden veins illuminating their skin.
The air continued to grow colder with every step, the warmth in the chamber behind them fading into something sharp and metallic.
Then the floor simply vanished.