Page 72 of The Labyrinth and the Threaded Daughter

Corin released a harsh breath, not realizing how much the idea of preparing for yet another task had been weighing on him. Recover, she had told him to do. He wasn’t sure he would be able to. Not until he saw Ariadne again.

And that thought clenched at something in his chest.

As they walked, Corin glanced toward his uncle. “When you entered the maze for your trial,” he asked carefully, “did you see her?”

Theros slowed a fraction. “See whom?”

“Ariadne.”

“The Threaded Daughter.” The king’s jaw tightened. “She was there?” When Corin nodded, his uncle took a deep breath. “I saw… a presence,” he answered after a moment. “The whispers in the walls made me think… but it’s difficult to say.”

Ariadne reduced to a whisper. A story. A myth.

She deserved more.

Corin nodded as if that were answer enough. Then, softly, he said, “The Labyrinth takes what matters the most.”

Theros looked at him sharply, perhaps wondering if Corin knew what the king had done—or hadn’t done—while completing his own trial.

“And sometimes,” Corin continued, gaze pressed forward. His voice was calm in a way that surprised even himself. “It takes something you thought you could never live without.”

Silence stretched between them.

The king’s fingers flexed at his side. “You speak as though you know my trial.”

“I know enough,” Corin confirmed.

For a moment—just a brief pause—fear flickered behind Uncle Theros’s eyes. Then he straightened, schooling his expression into something composed or dismissive. Practiced. “You’re exhausted,” he said. “The Labyrinth leaves echoes. Be careful not to mistake them for truths.”

Corin didn’t respond.

They had reached the Great Hall once again. The doors stood open still, light spilling across the stone floor. The court was still gathered in expectant clusters. Conversations once again hushed as Corin stepped forward, every eye turning to him.

He took a breath.

Tell them, part of him urged. Tell them everything.

And so he lifted his chin, feeling the weight of the disc hidden and heavy against his skin. The promise of it burning like a secret vow.

XXV

A week later, the crown sat heavy on Corin’s brow.

Gold threaded his ceremonial robes, stiff with tradition and weighty with expectation. They felt nothing like the armor he was more used to, but he supposed he would have to wear that less and less now.

He stood at the center of the Great Hall where colorful banners hung motionless in waiting. Where nobles packed shoulder to shoulder. Where the priests watched him as though he were a fault line waiting to split the world.

He was.

He had already told them what he intended to do.

At the announcement of his coronation—when Knossos was alerted he would officially be named king—Corin had announced his plans to open the Labyrinth. Permanently. Perhaps destroying the maze at his actions.

The hall had erupted then. Shouts, disbelief, fury thinly veiled as reference. The priests had spoken of balance and divine order. Of trials ordained by gods older than stone. Of tradition so ancient it had become indistinguishable from law.

Corin had spoken anyway. He spoke in direct argument against them.

He informed the court about the true foundation of the trials. He detailed the story that Ariadne had told him—how her father kept her trapped in the maze and only offered heroes to tell her to keep still. How that slowly morphed through the years to the Labyrinth demanding some sort of sacrifice.