Page 90 of Dancing for the Minotaur

Terra nodded. His penthouse might be luxurious, but this place had roots—both literally and figuratively.

“Your sleeping chamber is next on our tour,” Taurex told her.

“My sleeping chamber?” Terra repeated.

“You prefer the term ‘bedroom?’”

She smiled.

“Yes. It sounds less like I’m being kept in a medieval castle.”

Taurex frowned.

“I do not know what⁠—”

“I know. Earth reference. Never mind.” She waved a hand.

Her room was smaller than his but still far more spacious than anything Terra had expected. The living bed was easily king-sized by Earth standards, with thick blankets woven from soft plant fibers folded neatly at the foot, and a curved couch grew along one wall beneath an oval window.

Terra immediately crossed to the window to look out.

“Oh, wow,” she breathed.

The room overlooked the back of Taurex’s property, where the forest opened into a private clearing surrounded by tall, glowing plants. In the center was a large oval pool filled with deep blue-green water. Steam curled lazily from its surface, drifting through the trailing vines that hung from the surrounding trees.

Terra pressed closer to the window which seemed to open from the inside.

“Is that a hot tub?” she asked eagerly.

Taurex came to stand beside her.

“It is a bathing pool.”

“It’s steaming, though,” she pointed out.

“The water is naturally heated by the domicile’s root system,” he explained.

Terra turned to him with excitement.

“Can we get in it? Please? I love hot tubs.”

Taurex’s eyebrows rose.

“You wish to get into the bathing pool with me?”

She nodded.

“Absolutely! Are you kidding? I haven’t been in a hot tub in years.”

“It is not precisely a hot tub.”

“It has hot water, and you sit in it. Close enough.” Terra looked back through the window at the steaming water.

The pool was beautiful, surrounded by thick cushions of moss and long trailing vines heavy with strange blossoms. Some of the flowers were broad and flat, with creamy white petals arranged around soft pink centers. Others were completely different—long, narrow red blooms that hung downward from the vines, thick at the base and tapering toward rounded tips. These seemed to come in various sizes from the size of her pinky finger all the way up to the size of a girthy zucchini.

Terra frowned as she looked at them.

“Those are some weird-looking flowers.”