“Are you strong enough to pull him up?” Greyson kneels on my other side.
“I don’t know.” I yank at the whip, but he barely budges.
“Can you transport to him and bring him back that way?” Raven frowns.
“Maybe but you guys will have to hold him with the whip.” I glare down at the chasm. “I’m going to have to be fast, but you guys need to be ready for anything.”
“Don’t, Beth. It’s too dangerous.” Jayden’s hand slips.
“Shut up. I’m not letting you die here.” I glance at the others. “Are you ready?”
“We’ve got this.” Raven takes the whip from me. “Go get him. We can’t do this without him.”
I nod and the world spins for only a second before I wrap my arms around Jayden and transport back to solid ground. Jayden wraps his arms around me and presses his nose into my neck.
“You’re okay, you stubborn idiot.” I shake my head. “Why didn’t you just allow her to escape? We would have dealt with it.”
“I’m not making you choose me over the possibility of succeeding in this mission,” he whispers.
“That’s stupid, Jayden.” I grip his shoulders. “You’re not allowed to die.”
“I’m about fifty percent sure that fall wouldn’t have killed me.”
“Stubborn ass,” I grumble.
“Your stubborn ass.” He kisses me hard.
“You guys are disgusting. Keep it PG until we get out of this,” Raven snarks.
“Shut it. I thought he was going to die,” I snap back at her.
“Sorry, B. Yeah, that was insensitive. I would have been the same way, but we need to keep moving.”
“You’re right. Let’s get out of here.” I grip Jayden’s hand and tug him to the next tunnel.
“I guess the left was the correct tunnel if they had someone waiting for us there.” Raven stows her sword.
“Yeah, it appears you were right.” I glance at her over my shoulder.
“Don’t tell her that. She has a big enough ego as it is,” Dax scoffs.
“It’s not ego when it’s true, dear brother.” Raven flips her hair.
“Sure it’s not.” Dax shakes his head.
“Everyone be on alert. The Minotaur is no doubt here somewhere and my guess is he’s waiting just outside the door to the forge. One last line of defense to keep us away from the throne.” I scan the maze ahead of us.
A low bleating noise from deeper in the tunnels reaches my ears. “Shit. He’s not far away now.”
Hooves stamp the closer we get to the Minotaur. It’s obviously antsy waiting for us to show our faces and kill it.
“Stop,” I whisper. “We need to figure out what our next move is from here. Artemis said it will be stronger here, so we need a game plan.”
“We won’t know what the plan will be until we face him.” Jayden shakes his head.
“We’ve faced him before, but I’m afraid that what Artemis said is going to make this harder than the last few times.” I lean back against the craggy stone.
“We’re stronger now too, though. Maybe it won’t be as hard as we are making it out to be. It’s the Minotaur. It can’t be that bad.” Raven pats my shoulder.
