XVIII #2
“What about my uncle?” he asked.
“Who?”
“Ther–” Corin stopped himself. It would be of no use to use his name now, not with what the Labyrinth would cause afterwards. Besides, it was unlikely that Ariadne even knew his uncle’s name. “The man before me. It would have been about twenty years prior. He told me he killed the Minotaur.”
Ariadne thought for a moment, and then her posture shifted. Her shoulder stiffened, and her gaze slid away from him.
Corin noticed immediately, and a wave of heat rushed over him. “What?” he pressed. “Did he–did he hurt you?” Corin wasn’t sure what he would do if that were the case, but the rage that immediately filled him would surely make certain his uncle was dealt with properly.
Slowly.
Painfully.
She looked back at him sharply. “No.”
The speed of her answer only confused him more, but his shoulder softened in relief. “Then can you tell me what happened with his trial?”
“I–I…” she trailed off.
“Why won’t you tell me?”
Ariadne exhaled, slow and measured. “Because, to some, what he did is worse. In its own way.”
Corin waited.
“He hid,” she muttered at last.
“Hid?”
She bobbed her head. “From the beginning. He found a place where the walls folded inward, where the Labyrinth did not want to bother him too much, and he stayed there.”
Corin stared at her. “That’s… that’s not possible. He came back. He passed.”
“Yes,” she replied. “He passed.”
“How?” Corin demanded, frustration creeping into his voice against his wishes. “How could he if he never moved?!”
Ariadne turned to face him straight on. Her expression wasn’t that of cruelty but it wasn’t exactly gentle either. “That was his sacrifice,” she explained. “Not blood. Not bone. Not love.”
Corin could have sworn his throat tightened when she mentioned love.
She paused as she let the weight of her words settle. Then, “Pride.”
At that, something twisted in Corin’s chest.
“He gave it up completely,” she continued.
“He let go of the idea that he was brave. Or clever. Or worthy of the crown he would later wear. He lived in fear every moment he was here. And after three days, the Labyrinth opened.” Her voice softened then.
“The Labyrinth made sure he always remembered that, I am sure.”
Corin swallowed.
He pictured his uncle’s careful smile, his rigid posture.
The way he never spoke of his own trial unless pressed—and at that point, he was more than likely intoxicated as he bragged on and on about boisterous fighting and dominating the Labyrinth.
The other half of the time he spoke of it, he spoke in half-truths and omissions.
Corin thought of the times his uncle would avoid even walking past the Hall of Due as they spoke, instead taking the long way around the castle. Corin never paid it any mind, just the man attempting to walk a bit more.
But now? Now, Corin was doubting everything about his uncle.
“So he lives,” Corin said slowly, “knowing that when it mattered most… he was a coward.”
Ariadne shrugged. “Yes.”
The silence that followed was heavier than before.
“I did not realize he was your uncle,” Ariadne muttered.
“That or my father.”
She shrugged once again. “Time, as you have encountered surely, moves strangely here. I cannot always say who came last.” She paused for a moment, picking at one of her nails. “Though it would not be the first time a new line was selected either.”
Corin leaned back against the stone, staring into the dark. He wasn’t sure what frightened him more at that moment: the thought of dying in the Labyrinth like Taleon or the thought of leaving it carrying a truth like his uncle.
Or, his mind growled at him, leaving her.
They sat there
longer than they likely should have. An opening came just to the right of Ariadne fairly quickly after their discussion turned to silence, yet they stayed sitting for a while after that.
There was no sign of Bristle coming back.
It had bounded off into nothing without so much as a goodbye, and the thought tugged at something in Corin’s chest. Still, he supposed the beast knew these halls much better than Corin ever would.
It had survived for a long time down here, and it would survive much longer.
Corin knew his three days must be almost over. He wasn’t sure how much time had truly passed, and he was sure asking Ariadne would get him another vague response. The Labyrinth had to open for him soon, but only if he figured out what his sacrifice needed to be.
He had no idea what it could be, and that thought frustrated him deeply.
The silence around them had weight to it, the kind that settled into the bones and made thinking too loud.
Corin was fully lost in his frustrated thoughts when a low sound rolled through the corridors, interrupting their quiet.
The growl was so distant but infinitely deep, like stone grinding against stone.
Ariadne’s head snapped up.
It came again, closer this time.
“We should move,” she whispered quietly. “Now.”
Corin nodded as they pushed themselves to their feet, though his thoughts lagged far behind his body. The two started down the new opening granted to them at a brisk walk that edged toward a run as the sound seemed to follow them.
As they moved, Corin’s mind refused to let go of what she’d said earlier. Pride. Cowardice. Sacrifice. The maze didn’t just want to take flesh; it took truths people didn’t want to carry.
And threaded through all of that was something else. A pull. Unwanted, unwise, and growing stronger by the moment.
He didn’t want to leave her.
The realization startled him more than the growl ever could. This place was killing him slowly—physically and mentally—and still, the thought of reaching the exit without Ariadne beside him felt… wrong. Hollow. Like winning by amputating something vital.
Like his heart.
And that thought terrified him.
Eventually, the growling sound faded away. It was slow, but after a while, Corin was positive the monster, whatever it was, had stopped chasing after them. They could slow down back to a purposeful walk.
A thought plagued him. Knowing her answer previously was not satisfactory enough, and it bothered him greatly.
“Did you…” he started as they turned a corner, stone scraping beneath their boots. “Why didn’t you ever try to leave?”
She sighed as if annoyed. “I told you before.”
“I just don’t understand it.”
“I had to stay. To protect my family. To keep it together.”
“I know that, but…” he replied. “But did you try?”
Her steps slowed to the point Corin almost ran into her.
“Not really,” she admitted. Her voice was small, and he noticed her fingers pulling at each other softly.
Corin frowned. “Why not?”
She stopped then, fully, and he once again nearly walked into her back. When she turned to face him, there was no anger in her expression—only a tired, ancient honesty that made his chest ache. “Because no one ever asked.”
The words hit hard, just as he expected them to, but that wasn’t enough. “You could have tried. Followed them out or something.”
She tilted her head. “I could have. But the heirs…” She shook her head slowly as if remembering something painful “The heirs came to me desperate. Afraid. Furious. Hopeful.” She scoffed and flattened her hands at her sides.
“They begged me to show them paths, doors, secrets. They asked how to survive. How to win.” Her gaze flicked away.
“None of them asked if I wanted to leave, and it felt rude to take advantage.”
Something twisted uncomfortably in Corin’s chest. Rude, she felt. Escaping the maze with the help of an heir felt rude to her. And instead, she stayed trapped in an endless maze for centuries.
“I didn’t know what I was to them,” she admitted softly. “An extension of the maze. A willing part of it. A tool.” She paused. “Or simply something to use.”
Corin couldn’t stop his heart from beating rapidly when he heard the break in her voice. His hands itched to touch her, to grab her and pull her into his chest. To protect her.
The growl echoed again, breaking through the deep silence between them. Corin nearly swore, wishing the maze would have given them the time he needed to reassure her, help her.
Corin stepped closer to her without thinking. “I don’t see you that way. Please know that.”
Her eyes lifted to his, searching. Measuring. His heart pounded in his chest as he waited for her to understand. He hoped she would.
“I know,” she said after a few moments. And there was something in her voice—uncertain, almost fragile—that made his pulse quicken. “That is why you are dangerous in here.”
“I’m dangerous?” He almost had to laugh at that.
“You are possibly the most dangerous being in the Labyrinth.”
His brows raised. “Because I’m different from those who have harmed you in the past?”
Ariadne studied him for a moment. “No,” she admitted. “Because you’re not.”
Another groan rolled through the corridor, unmistakably near now. Ariadne turned and started moving again, faster this time. She mumbled something about hoping to avoid monsters. Corin followed close behind, his thoughts tangled and racing.
He didn’t know what the Labyrinth wanted from him yet, but he was beginning to understand what he wanted.
And that, somehow, felt just as perilous.