Page 20 of The Labyrinth and the Threaded Daughter

He didn’t notice the shaking of the walls around him in anger and warning.

He raised the dagger.

The back of the Minotaur’s skull filled his vision, the perfect place. One strike. One clean thrust. He could feel it already—the rush, the release, the Labyrinth opening its jaws to let him go.

Ariadne’s voice broke. “Please! Please, don’t!”

Those were the words that broke through to him. The pain seeping into her voice shocked Corin into freezing. The emotion, he realized, wasn’t quite fear.

No. It was devastation.

For whatever reason, Corin hesitated. He paused in his strike, the dagger remaining over his head with a clear path to release the Minotaur’s psyche.

He froze for just a heartbeat, but it was enough.

The Minotaur twisted violently, slamming itself into the wall. Corin lost his grip immediately and was thrown hard across the corridor. He hit the ground hard and skidded across the floor, pain detonating through his ribs and bloodied arm as his back spasmed and his dagger clattered from his hand.

The Minotaur staggered, shook its massive head, and looked at Ariadne.

Corin tried to get up, wanting to protect her from this beast, but his body refused to move.

“Go,” she whispered, voice half broken.

Corin groaned, but the words didn’t seem to be directed at him.

The Minotaur huffed.

“Please.”

Something passed between them then—something Corin couldn’t yet name.

Then the beast turned and ran, hooves pounding as it disappeared into the twisting dark, leaving behind blood, broken stone, and a silence that rang louder than any roar.

VIII

Corin lay there gasping, staring at the endlessly dark ceiling, and wondering what in Hades had just happened. His head was ringing, his body ached, and he felt like he couldn’t quite catch his breath.

Ariadne was at his side before the echoes of the Minotaur’s retreat had fully faded. She dropped to her knees beside him, hands hovering for half a breath as if afraid to touch him. Then, they settled—firm and practiced—against his shoulder and ribs. Her fingers were cool and calming, quieting the pain for a moment.

“Don’t move,” she commanded, sharper than he could have imagined her voice going. “You landed badly.”

Corin sucked in a breath that felt like knives. He surely broke a rib or two. “I can feel that,” he ground out.

“You should not talk.”

“I got that,” he grumbled, wincing as she placed a particularly solid hand on his rib.

She sent him a sharp look. “Quiet, I said.”

“You told me to stop,” he rasped. “You were… crying.”

Her jaw tightened. She didn’t look at his face directly, still searching his body for injuries, and her hand reached out to his bloody arm. “You are bleeding.”

But he didn’t pay it any mind. “That thing–” he winced as she shifted him slightly to look over his injuries. “That thing was my way out. You ruined that.”

Ariadne’s hands stilled. “No. It was not.”

Corin laughed once, bitter and breathless. “Everyone knows killing the Minotaur is one of the ways you escape. I could have gotten out of here right then. And you ruined it.”