Page 6 of Minding the Minotaur

“I’ve never seen anyone like you around Sparkle before,” she muses, and I can’t help a snort.

“You wouldn’t. The authorities keep our sort well hidden from your sort.”

“Oh.” Her chin retracts. “That’s kind of—weird.”

“Yeah, it is,” I agree. “There’s more, but I think it would blow your mind.”

“You’ve already blown my mind.”

I glance at her, searching for a deeper meaning in her softly spoken words. As her eyes meet mine, she finallysmiles, her pretty cheeks bunching. Her smile makes my heart bloom with joy.

“You’ve blown mine, too,” I mumble, looking down at my hooves, heat spreading right up to the tips of my ears.

It’s probably foolhardy, but I have this overpowering urge to tell her more. I’m searching for the words to explain about the strange, intertwined history of humans and monsters above and below ground, when I detect voices.

Shit. I really can’t risk being seen. Not by anyone else.

I grab the cape and dive under it, then poke my head out.

“Oh my,” she squeaks. “What is that thing?”

“A portal cape,” I hiss-whisper. “Let me know when they’ve gone, and we’ll talk some more.” I pull the cloak over my head and darkness envelops me.

And then I do a really stupid thing. As I tug the cloak around me, my little finger crooks on one of the runes stitched into the lining. The one that sends me straight back to the Labyrinth.

I feel the whoosh in my ears, the channeling of air from warm to cold, the G-force flattening the skin against my skull.

When everything goes still and I can finally draw breath, I curse out loud.

There’s no way I can reverse this. I’m going to have to pay Brody to let me borrow the cape again. And even then, there’s no guarantee I will ever find her.

I’ve lost the girl with the long golden hair, and the ass and tits a bull could bury himself in.

The feeling of loss and dejection is overpowering.

As I throw off the damn cape and stand up on wobbly hooves, I know I’ve got to find her again.

But how, when I don’t even know her name?

CHAPTER 3

SAMMY

I wait. And wait.

Long after those two folks have walked past, gotten in their cars and driven off, I’m still staring at the spot where the minotaur was.

After a while, I move gingerly over to the place where he disappeared and put out my hand. It slices through thin air.

Nothing.

No-one.

I call out quietly, “Hey there, um, Mister Minotaur.” If anyone heard me, they’d think I was totally crazy.

But then, this whole thing has been totally crazy, right?

Like seriously, I’ve just met a minotaur—aminotaur! What’s more, ahotminotaur. I can’t deny the way my body reacted to this huge bull man appearing from freaking nowhere.