Chapter 16
Alette
The labyrinth looms before us, a silent, living monolith.
The towering hedges stretch impossibly high, their tops vanishing into the misty sky.
Each branch and leaf is so dense and entwined that they appear to be one impenetrable mass, as if they’ve grown together deliberately to keep the outside world at bay.
The entrance is nothing more than a black void carved into the greenery and surrounded by large rocks with a simple stone archway.
It’s wide enough for all of us to walk through shoulder to shoulder, but it looks like the kind of darkness you don’t return from.
Standing here, staring into it, I feel the weight of it pressing against me.
“So…” My voice rises just enough to draw the kings’ attention. “We just need to get to the other side of this labyrinth, right? It’s just a maze? A puzzle we have to work out?”
There’s hope in my voice. Maybe desperation. Because I’m getting the feeling there’s a lot more to this quest of ours than the kings have led me to believe.
King Oberon lets out a sharp laugh, the sound cutting through the heavy air like a blade. He crosses his arms, the lines of his face shadowed by the labyrinth’s towering walls. “Just get to the other side? Do you think the goddess made this for a pleasant afternoon stroll?”
I frown. “Well, if you knew it was so bad, couldn’t you have spent more time telling me what to expect and less time at balls?”
Wincing, I realize what I’ve said, but I also know I’m not wrong.
King Oberon looks surprised, but quickly recovers. “This isn’t just a hedge maze. It’s a test. A trial. The goddess isn’t going to let us walk through unscathed. There will be traps. Challenges. Awful things waiting to tear us apart.”
Each word feels like a hammer’s blow. I can’t stop the mental images of what those “awful things” might be: fanged monsters lurking in the shadows, traps snapping shut on unsuspecting limbs, and… no. I shake my head, forcing the thoughts away.
“You’re scaring her,” King Sylvian cuts in, his voice gentle but firm. He steps between us, his green eyes locking onto King Oberon’s with surprising authority. “You're not helping.”
King Oberon arches an eyebrow, clearly surprised by King Sylvian’s boldness.
“I’m not scared,” I interject quickly, though the words feel hollow. I force a small laugh, adjusting the straps on my pack to keep my hands busy. “It’s fine. Really.”
King Sylvian doesn’t call me out, but I catch the faint curve of his lips, a knowing smile that makes my cheeks heat.
“We don’t have all day to stand around,” King Oberon says, a bite to his words.
The others exchange wary glances, but they follow King Oberon’s lead.
The moment we cross into the labyrinth, the air shifts so noticeably that I actually gasp.
It’s colder here, an unforgiving cold that sinks into your skin and makes your muscles tense.
The silence is suffocating, broken only by the sound of the wind racing through the maze.
And it’s darker, as if the light has to filter through something to reach us.
“It feels like we stepped into another world,” I whisper.
“Maybe we did,” King Sylvian responds.
“It’s like moving between the human world and the fae world,” King Cassius explains, looking thoughtful. “Maybe we’ve been pulled into the world of the gods.”
“We’ll never know what the goddess made here,” King Oberon says, “so we should just keep going.”
I glance over my shoulder at the entrance. It already looks farther away than it should be, swallowed up by the walls of the maze like we’ve been walking for several minutes instead of just having stepped foot in this strange new world.
What’s wrong with this place? Could it truly be the realm of the gods?
We keep going. Our footsteps are loud in the quiet hedges.
I notice, with unease, that there aren’t any sounds of birds or bugs.
There’s no sign of anything living, other than us.
The shadows press in from all sides, thick and heavy, as if the hedges are alive and watching us.
The sunlight filtering down grows softer with each step, fading from bright day into the muted glow of early evening.
I rest my hand on the hilt of my dagger, seeking comfort in its presence. The warmth of the blade against my palm is oddly reassuring, but then it begins to glow.
“Whoa,” I whisper, drawing the blade from its sheath.
The light is faint at first, a soft bluish hue that grows brighter as I hold it up. It illuminates the path ahead, casting strange, dancing shapes along the walls.
“Why the hell is it glowing?” King Oberon asks, his tone equal parts suspicion and curiosity.
“I… don’t know,” I admit, though I grip the hilt tighter. The glow feels natural, as if the dagger is responding to the labyrinth itself.
“Maybe it’s supposed to do this,” I add, more to convince myself than anyone else.
“Or maybe it’s reacting to something in here,” King Oberon mutters darkly, expressing my own thought aloud.
We walk in silence. The labyrinth is straight for a while before we start finding twists, splits in direction, and dead ends.
It’s not that we need the glow of the dagger to keep the darkness at bay, but something about this place makes me feel like we need the light, like the light can chase away the evil entrapped within the hedges, and even then, it doesn’t feel like enough. This place is dangerous. I can feel it.
King Oberon asks, “Should I make a torch?”
The warm light of a torch sounds good, but, again, I don’t know if we need it, or if we just want it. Shadows are darker here. Deeper. And yet, we can clearly see where we’re going.
“Maybe save it for when the sun goes down,” King Cassius suggests. The others echo their agreement, even though I think I would’ve liked for him to make a torch.
Then, an earth-shattering scream echoes from all around us.
“What the heck is that?” I ask, alert for danger, but nothing comes.
King Cassius answers easily. “My guess? Something being tortured. Something like one of the fae warriors who came here before us.”
“That’s comforting,” I whisper.
King Sylvian squeezes my shoulder, giving me a gentle smile. “Not to worry, you’re here with one of the top warriors in the fae lands… oh, and those three.”
The fire fae snorts and keeps walking.
King Cassius shakes his head and follows the fire fae.
“He means I’m the great warrior,” King Ashton argues, “and he’s here along with me.”
I smile a little and keep walking. These fae and their bickering are starting to become more amusing than frightening, which is nice. Being with them when they’re like this is like being around small children who are fighting.
As we continue deeper into the maze, we hear more screams. Cries of pain echo through the labyrinth, drifting from nowhere and everywhere at once, erasing all traces of my amusement.
They rise and fall without pattern, sometimes distant, sometimes close enough to feel like breath against my neck.
There is no source. No bodies. Only suffering, suspended in the shadows.
Every time it happens, I freeze, gripping the dagger like a lifeline. The others tense, too, but no one speaks. There’s nothing to say.
The further we go, winding through paths that split and curve, the more treacherous the labyrinth becomes.
Vines snake across the ground, thick and gnarled, some as thin as thread and others as wide as my arm.
They look harmless enough, but there’s a subtle movement to them, a slow, almost imperceptible shift that makes my skin crawl.
“Let me try my powers, to see if it might help to clear them out of the way,” King Sylvian says.
He lifts his hand and narrows his eyes as he focuses on the vines. Everyone holds very still, but time passes and nothing happens. There’s not even a memory of the spectacular power he has over plants.
“What’s going on?” King Ashton asks, frowning.
King Sylvian shakes his head, his hand dropping. “These must be magicked by the gods. My powers aren’t working on them.”
“Let me see,” King Oberon says, kneeling down. Flames leap into his hand.
“Stop!” King Cassius shouts.
All eyes turn to him.
“Should we really start by approaching these with violence? Wouldn’t it be smarter to just pass them without trouble?”
“He’s right,” King Ashton says. “We don’t know what will happen if we start burning things. We could light the whole labyrinth on fire, or just piss off a bunch of creepy vines.”
“Fuck,” King Oberson mutters, standing up. “I wonder how much of the labyrinth we won’t be able to use our magic on.”
“Probably too much,” King Cassius says. “We should be prepared for as much, and we should be prepared for these vines to be trouble. Better to be prepared for something that will never happen than not be prepared for something that will.”
“Says the philosopher,” King Ashton comments under his breath.
“Let’s hope for the best,” King Sylvian says quietly, his eyes scanning the ground as he starts forward.
We step over the vines carefully, but they seem to multiply as we move deeper into the labyrinth.
All are moving slightly, like snakes. They’re all a potential risk of tripping…
or something worse. Memories of being bitten by a snake and nearly losing my leg surface, but I try to push them aside. These are vines. Not snakes.
“Where are they coming from?” No matter where I look, I can’t seem to see their source.
“No idea,” King Oberon replies, his tone unusually subdued. His hand hovers near his own weapon, his sharp eyes scanning every shadow.
The tension is suffocating. Every nerve in my body on edge. I glance up at the towering hedges, searching for some clue, but they’re as still and silent as ever.
Then the ground shifts beneath my feet.
At first, it’s subtle, a faint vibration underfoot, like the distant hum of thunder.
I pause mid-step, frowning, the sensation so slight I wonder if I imagined it.
It’s as if the ground itself is breathing, shifting and sighing just below the surface.
But the others feel it too, their movements slowing as we exchange uneasy glances.
“What’s happening, Sylvian?” King Ashton asks.
Again, King Sylvian stretches his hand out. Again, disappointment appears on his face. “I don’t know. Something’s wrong. The earth isn’t responding to me.”
The trembling intensifies. My knees feel unsteady, my balance thrown just slightly off, as though the earth is pulling me in several directions at once. A low groan rises from beneath us, like the mournful creak of wood bending under too much weight.
“Is it safe?” I whisper, my voice barely audible.
King Oberon steps closer, his brows furrowed. “Stay alert,” he says, his tone sharp, but his eyes dart nervously to the ground. “Be prepared for anything.”
The vibration grows into a steady pulse, a rhythmic quaking that feels alive.
It runs up through my boots and into my legs, making my teeth chatter.
I press a hand to my chest, my heart thundering wildly against my ribs.
It’s not just the tremors, it’s the sense that something ancient and malevolent is stirring beneath us, waking from a long slumber.
The ground groans again, louder this time, a deep, resonant sound that makes the walls of the labyrinth shudder. A faint crack splinters through the earth, zigzagging like lightning between my feet. Panic claws at my throat.
“Move!” King Oberon shouts, grabbing my arm, but it’s too late.
The ground beneath us crumbles with a sickening roar. I scream as I fall, reaching blindly for King Oberon, for anything solid, but the darkness swallows me whole.