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Ash rubbed his beard. “She thinks the door will lead back to the outside world.”
Ferrier smiled. “The Labyrinth always lies, right? I like Vera’s idea.”
Bless her. I returned her smile.
Edith shrugged. “All right then. I’m willing to look at it. But no promises that I’ll go through.”
“That’s fair.” I looked up at Ash. “You’ll need to show us the way.”
He worried his lip with his teeth. “I don’t know the way. I locked a spell in place to ensure I didn’t go searching for it.”
“Then let me in again,” I whispered. “I’ll find it.”
The blue mist of his magic stilled from its frenzied dance and slowly converged on us. Edith startled, sensing a change in the magic around us, though she couldn’t see it.
The blue mist settled on my skin like a million frozen snowflakes, then sank into me. For a moment, my skin looked foreign in an icy sheen. Then I was in his mind again. I was still aware of myself this time. Briefly, it felt like true madness, seeing myself from his eyes and seeing him from my own, two consciousnesses mixing as one. But my brain quickly adjusted to this duality of input, and it felt like being in a dream, where I could see myself and be myself simultaneously.
I took in the Labyrinth from the mind of its maker.
His fingers, still linked with mine, tightened until my knuckles cracked, as if he were afraid of what I would find buried in the depths of his mind.
I could find any answers I wanted. Answers about her.
It was tempting to dart like a thief through his memories, learning everything I didn’t know about him, answering every question I could think of. But if I was right about the door—about him—I’d have time for that later. So I inhaled and began searching.
The entire Labyrinth was spread before me in Ash’s consciousness. It was much bigger than I imagined, and there were so many people in it. I could feel them all, their minds brushing against my own. Part of my own.
His own. I was in Ash’s mind. I had to remember this or I would lose myself.
I could feel all the walls. I could sense all the monsters, moving, chasing, hungry. But I knew what I was looking for—the place that would contain the door I needed, the door that I alone could open. It would be the very center of this place, the darkest part of Ash, the part that he had buried the deepest.
Because when he was building this place, he’d built it to lie. He built it to lie to all the people who would ever enter it, but he also built it to lie to himself—to cover up what he had done, and to distract him from the pain that had led him here. He might have denied it for a long time, but he still carried that heartache within him every moment of every day. I squeezed his hand.
I took a deep breath and then surged forward, pulling him along with me. Part of me was conscious of the world around me, of Edith and Ferrier following behind. I could feel their minds…and their fear.
There was so much fear here, so much madness. It swirled and lurked. It writhed like snakes. There were so many Nameless and only a small handful of mages who had not yet succumbed to the madness. Some of them were far away, while others were quite close. But I charged onward, taking first a right turn and then another. The walls shifted and moved, opening for me as they had for Ash. Would he allow me to get to the darkest part of him?
My worries were shared with him, and his mind answered me.
Even my darkest secrets are yours, his voice intoned inside my head. I won’t hide myself from you, but you won’t like what you find. It’s a door to death, not life.
I still believed I was right. The Labyrinth lies. You built it that way, I reminded him.
He tugged briefly on my hand, and I spun to stare up into his face as we walked through a narrow, curving section of walls. It’s not a lie you want to test.
Aloud, I answered, “How do you know?”
Edith glanced between us, a confused look on her face, but she said nothing.
Silently, inside my mind, Ash answered, It’s not a lie I want you to test.
My heart pinched painfully in my chest. I offered him a half-smile and pressed onward. Let me at least show it to you. I think you’ll see I’m right.
Until he stopped me, I would keep going. And Ash could stop us anytime he chose. He could set every monster in this place upon us or bind us with vines, as his magic had done once before.
We clambered down a stairwell that looked like ancient stone steps, yet I knew they were only eighty years old. There was nothing truly ancient here, though perhaps the depth of the ache inside of Ash had crafted a world that was already broken when it first came into being. Perhaps there had never been anything but ruins here.
Down. I knew we had to go down. A stone amphitheater opened up before us. This must be part of it, for it descended down to a cracked stage surrounded by crumbling stone benches. I hurried down, no longer holding his hand. I could feel the minds of Edith, Ferrier, and all the others in this place. It was strange to be one with the Labyrinth, the way he had been for so many years. To sense the minds of so many at once and to feel their fears.
