Page 23

Harald and I rose together, his sword raised high as I gripped my axe, its familiar weight grounding me. Side by side, we peered into the darkness, searching for the source of the sound.

“It could be an animal,”

I whispered.

“I haven’t seen a single animal in the labyrinth, have you?”

No, I hadn’t. Why would there be free food roaming the woods when others had to purchase it at the market? This labyrinth didn’t seem intent on keeping us alive.

Something moved, but it was only Clark rising to his feet beside me. His sword scraped along the stone pavers as he picked it up.

Carefully, I reached into my bag to take out my potion and slid it into the pocket of my trousers. Clark eyed the movement but said nothing. A few weeks in the labyrinth and his opinions on poison might have changed.

I returned both hands to my axe. Moonlight bounced from its silver surface, soaking the pavilion in a silver glow, and bathing the three corridors surrounding us in the same light. But a fourth path jutted off from the south, one covered in an arched trellis that seemed determined to keep all moonlight out.

The sound came from that way.

But it’d been a minute, and no further sound came. Perhaps it was nothing. I lowered my axe.

And three figures came barreling toward us.

“Wake up,”

Harald bellowed. The urgency of his words echoed off the stone. The seven who still slept suddenly jumped to their feet. Harald placed himself before a cowering Tove to defend whatever came.

Clark and I charged.

The clash of steel rang out as the first attacker lunged, his blade slicing through the air in a deadly arc. I sidestepped, my boots crunching on the gravel, and brought my weapon up just in time to catch the sword against the thick wooden haft.

With a grunt, I shoved forward, throwing the attacker off balance. I was vaguely aware of the other two attackers moving around me, one engaged with Harald and the other fighting Ivar. Gunnar braced himself nearby Harald, looking ready to help should the need arise but not eager to bloody himself. Astrid was nowhere to be seen. Aiden, Barrett, and Charlotte cowered in a circle.

Clark stepped in to fight the one nearest me. Their swords met in the air, the sheer size of the opponent dwarfing us. Clark struggled against the pressure.

I slid a hand from my axe to the dagger at my waist, and slammed it into the attacker’s thigh.

He let out a cry as he stumbled back into a shed of moonlight.

Bjorn.

He clocked us at the same time that we recognized him.

His groan of pain melted into a sultry laugh.

“The two Seaweeds got in, did they? Good. Now I can kill you without any guards stopping me.”

Bjorn removed my blade from his thigh as if it were nothing and let it clatter to the ground.

“These two Seaweeds are pretty good at staying alive,”

I said back.

I spun the axe in my hands, its heavy blade whistling toward Bjorn’s side. He twisted, narrowly dodging, and countered with a swift jab aimed at my ribs. I parried with the haft, bracing myself with my back foot, then stepped in close. His weapon was too large for finesse and devastating in its weight. It made him slow, and that would be his death.

“Leave. There’s ten of us. You can’t hope to—”

A piercing scream cleaved the air. One of the three, Charlotte, lay with a blade in her stomach. Blood seeped from the wound.

Her two closest friends knelt at her side, half tending to her and half cowering from whoever had thrown the blade.

One of them, Barrett, reached into his pocket. With a single flick, he tossed a stone into the sky.

The pale, white stone looked like a small moon. His sign of surrender.

By the time the stone clattered to the ground, Barrett had disappeared in a mist. He was gone, just like that, taken outside the labyrinth where he’d be safe.

“Aiden, don’t—”

Charlotte muttered.

“I won’t leave you,”

Aiden said. But his fingers curled around a white stone at his side.

Bjorn grinned, pulling my focus back to him.

“There’s nine of you,”

he corrected.

“And fading fast.”

He braced his weight on his good leg, and slashed in a low arch with his sword.

I leapt over it, while Clark had the brains to drive his sword into the ground, stopping Bjorn’s mid-motion.

I slammed my axe down, ripping the sword from Bjorn’s hand. But Bjorn had let go, and instead reached for the long-tipped blade at his waist, his eye glued to Clark.

Everything in me turned to white-hot anger. Forget mercy. Forget preserving his life. If Bjorn lived, Clark and I would never be safe. A growl escaped my throat.

“Don’t touch him.”

I threw myself at Bjorn, barreling into his wide frame to knock us both to the ground. His head slammed against rocks.

His strong arms latched around my body. He stared up at me, a bit dazed, blood dripping from his mouth.

“I’ll settle for killing you then.”

I felt a tear along my side. Pain roared from the spot.

The bastard cut me.

Bjorn’s slice stopped as Clark’s sword came against his neck. The victory in his eyes faded.

His arm fell limp.

Bjorn was dead.

I stood, wincing from the searing throb in my side, and took stock of the other two. Gunnar had joined the fight at last, and him and Harald made quick work of their opponent. Ivar struggled against his.

More than struggled. He was losing.

“We need to help—”

I was too late. I closed my eyes as Ivar fell.

His attacker turned to us with a victorious glint in his beady eyes, just for them to fall to Bjorn. His smile wilted. Then his gaze shifted to Harald and Gunnar who killed his other friend, and his skin blanched.

He tripped over Ivar’s body as he retreated, before scampering away.

“Where’s Tove?”

I staggered forward.

“Is she okay?”

“I’m here,”

her small voice called out. She emerged from a hiding place among rocks, and a deep relief flooded me.

Clark’s arms wrapped around my waist.

“You’re wounded.”

I couldn’t tell if the wetness at my side was mostly blood or sweat. Either way, I wouldn’t die from this.

“Not as badly as Charlotte. Tend to her first.”

It was Tove who scampered to Charlotte’s side first, pulling her small pouch open and riffling through until finding bandages. Her eyes landed on Charlotte’s wound, and she stilled.

Harald hovered behind her shoulder. His mouth flattened into a thin line, and he shoved his sword back into its sheath.

When his gaze slipped to me, he slowly shook his head.

“Why aren’t you doing anything? We must help her.”

Aiden had his arms curled over Charlotte, his blue eyes wild like untamed seas and his breaths shallow.

“Save her, please.”

“We can’t,”

Harald said.

“The wound is too deep.”

Charlotte’s green tunic turned red, her skin turned white, and her breathing wasn’t more than rasps that seemed to take all her energy. Aiden reached for Charlotte’s bag to draw out the white stone.

“Don’t,”

I cried.

“If she surrenders, she’ll be taken to the edge of the maze but still be wounded. Surrendering can’t save her.”

Aiden dropped the stone.

“I can’t watch her die.”

His fingers moved for his own stone.

“Ren is right. Surrendering won’t help. But the wolves can save her,”

Harald said.

We all looked at him.

He moved past Tove to take Charlotte’s hand in his own. Her light blonde hair stuck to her forehead and her eyes glazed over. She would be gone soon.

“Charlotte, if you pledge to the wolves, the Stone Gods will heal you.”

Aiden tightened his hold on Charlotte as if sheer will could keep her alive.

“She’ll be trapped in this labyrinth!”

“For a time. She will serve as a wolf for a period, after which, the Stone God will release her.”

Harald brushed a piece of Charlotte’s hair from where it stuck to her cheek.

“You don’t have much time. You must choose now.”

“Don’t, Charlotte. You’ll be turned into a wolf for a century.”

“Or she could die. It’s her choice.”

Charlotte licked her lips, then whispered the words.

“Silver Queen of the Labyrinth, I pledge myself as your wolf.”

The transformation came instantly, in shades of blue and silver that wafted over Charlotte’s body until the blood disappeared, her shirt mended itself, and her body flushed with warm, rosy color. A thin band of laurel imprinted itself on Charlotte’s forearm, seen just for a moment, until hair began to grow in thick clumps, shining gray fur that wrapped over her body.

Aiden made a noise in his throat as he fell away from her.

Charlotte continued to grow, to change, until she was no longer the girl we recognized.

She rose to four legs to stare down her snout at us. Her body wasn’t that of a normal wolf, this was a beast that only the labyrinth could conjure, one that could swallow a person whole or snap their body with a twitch of their teeth. Her mighty paws stepped forward once, then twice.

“If the Silver Queen asks her to kill us, she will,”

Harald breathed.

Aiden scampered back.

“This was a horrible idea.”

But she did not kill us. She lifted her head as if hearing a call only meant for her, sniffed the air, then darted away.

“We are three less than we were an hour ago,”

Harald spoke with a glance toward Ivar’s body.

“No one would fault any others if they wished to surrender.”

Aiden looked where Charlotte had gone as his fingers curled over his white stone once more. But he didn’t throw it. He slid it back into his bag, picked up the dagger that was in Charlotte’s chest a minute before, and stood.

“Good. Then let’s see to Ren’s wound, and move out.”