That was another thing about this place: It had a floor. The bare earth they might have expected to find inside a tree had been replaced by a solid floor, inlaid with an intricate mosaic in shades of blue and tan and silver. Blue dolphins swam around the sides of it, which were ringed by near circular swirls that the boy decided must be stylized waves. It was odd, he thought, that sea creatures would be depicted here in the midst of a forest, so far from the ocean. But then he remembered that distance seemed to have become meaningless since he entered the corn maze. Was he still in the corn maze? He didn’t appear to be, but something told him he was. Things on the inside didn’t seem to be what they were on the outside. Take this tree, for instance. It was like a TV show he’d seen once, with a police call box that was actually a machine made for traveling through space and time. It was much bigger on the inside, too...
Ruffus looked up. “What’s that smell?” he said.
Isis meowed. “Aren’t you supposed to tell us that?”
The bloodhound ignored her and went back to sniffing.
Alex turned his attention back to the mosaic floor. At the center of it was something even stranger than the dolphins: A large bull, head lowered as if it were charging, stood between two slender human figures. One seemed to be holding its horns—or perhaps was being gored by the beast; the second stood behind it, arms outstretched toward a third figure, which looked like it was doing a summersault over the back of the creature.
Isis was looking down at it too, from her perch on Alex’s shoulder. “Humans have such poor judgment,” she said calmly.
Ruffus looked up again from his sniffing. His nose had been pressed to the floor, near the bull’s hindquarters.
“I smell bull,” he declared.
“I’m not surprised,” Isis said drily.
Ruffus shook his head, as if trying to dislodge the scent from his nostrils. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
“Scaredy dog,” Isis mocked.
“I don’t think so,” the boy said. “I’m scared, too. Something doesn’t feel right.”
“I think we should go back the way we came,” Ruffus said, his tone suddenly anxious.
“Oh, whatever,” said Isis, but she had stopped grooming herself and her lazy-sleepy eyes were all the way open.
Alex turned around. “Yes,” he said. “Let’s go.”
But as he looked back in the direction from which they’d come, the boy saw only darkness. The torchlight stopped abruptly at a certain place, beyond which there seemed to be a solid wall of black. There was no sign of the door through which they’d entered, which should have been just a few steps behind them.
“Uh oh,” said Isis.
Alex heard the bloodhound gulp as he stepped back toward the blackness.
“The scent... just stops,” he said.
“Which scent?” the boy asked.
“All of them.”
Alex stepped forward, past Ruffus—and bumped headlong into a solid wall.
“Ouch!”
The wall should have been visible in the torchlight, but somehow it wasn’t. It didn’t reflect any of the light that should have bounced off of it, but instead seemed to be absorbing it.
Alex put both hands up and started feeling his way along it. It was solid, with no breaks, in both directions. Where was the door?
“You can’t get out. Believe me, I’ve tried.”
The voice didn’t belong to Isis or Ruffus.
Alex turned back to see an odd-looking figure standing before them—and towering over them. Dressed in a blue suit with a purple tie, the giant looked like any other businessman ready for a day at the office. Except for one thing: He had the head of a bull, not unlike the one depicted in the mosaic. Two long horns twisted outward from his head, making him look not unlike a demon.
“Welcome to the Minute-Hour Hotel,” he said. “You can check out anytime you like, but I’m afraid you can never leave.”
“Who are you?” said Alex, forgetting his manners.
“My name is Asterion,” said the bull-headed man. “I’m afraid you’ve stumbled into my prison. At least I have some company now—for the time being.”
“What do you mean, ‘for the time being’?” the boy asked.
“He means that, eventually, he’ll get hungry and he’ll have to eat us,” Isis said. “That’s how it works.”
The bull-headed man nodded slowly. “I’m afraid she’s right,” he allowed. “It’s nothing personal. I have to eat.”
Alex was suddenly worried. “Why don’t you eat berries or something,” he suggested, forgetting that few such edible options existed in Likho’s realm. “Find something in the forest. Besides, I didn’t think bulls ate meat. Shouldn’t you be eating grass or something?”
Asterion laughed sardonically. “I’m not a bull. I’m a man. I just happen to have a bull’s head,” he said, as if that explained everything. “I prefer bacon to berries, but even if I liked them, they wouldn’t do me any good. In case you haven’t noticed, I can’t get to the forest. I’m stuck in here. Now, so are you.”
He stepped back from them toward a kettle on a woodstove. Oddly, there didn’t seem to be any wood in the stove, but a fire burned there, nonetheless. No smoke rose from it, and Alex noticed for the first time that the torches didn’t give off any smoke, either. “The least I can do is offer you a hot beverage to comfort you,” he said. “Do you fancy some tea?”
“Why a hot beverage?” asked Alex.
Asterion shrugged. “It’s the cultural convention.”
“All right,” said Alex.
“Good,” said Asterion. “The ginger and honey will season you for when it comes time for me to eat you.”
“I think I’ll pass on the tea,” said Isis.
“Me too,” said Ruffus.
The bull-man shrugged. “Suit yourself. I don’t eat dog or cat meat, anyway.” He gestured toward a large, circular table, where he sat and bade Alex join him.
Ruffus resumed sniffing around the edges of the room.
“Go ahead,” said Asterion. “You won’t find a way out. My father instructed his friend Daedalus to make this place impregnable, and Daedalus is the finest craftsman in all of Crete. He even made wings for his son to fly, but that didn’t turn out as well as he had hoped.”
“Crete?” said Alex.
“Yes, the island. In the Middle-Earth Sea. The height of civilization—except when it comes to the whole vengeance thing. Not very civilized, that.”
The answer only confused Alex all the more. He had started out in Iowa, had been transported somehow to Germany’s Black Forest, and now he was on an island in Middle Earth?
“Are there hobbits here?” he asked, chagrined.
“Not that Middle Earth,” said Isis. “He means the Mediterranean Sea. ‘Mediterranean’ means ‘Middle Earth.’”
“Oh,” said Alex.
That explained the name, but it didn’t explain how he’d gotten here. He decided it wouldn’t do him any good to pursue that line of inquiry. He didn’t want to feel even more bewildered than he already was. Besides, he had other questions.
“I don’t mean to be rude,” he said. “But why do you have a bull’s head?”
“Haven’t you ever heard the story of the Minute-Hour?” said Asterion.
Isis meowed. “I always thought it was pronounced ‘Minotaur.’” She never missed an opportunity to look superior, but this time, the effort backfired.
“Translations tend to get garbled with the passage of centuries,” Asterion explained.
Isis, who didn’t like to be corrected about correcting someone else, set about feverishly grooming the spot right under her chin that was most difficult to reach.
Alex had heard the story, now that he thought about it. But it had taken place uncounted centuries ago, in a time of legend. How was it that the bull-man was still alive? It wasn’t just space, but time that operated strangely in this place.
“To answer your question about m
y... appearance,” Asterion said, “I was born like this. My father, the king, was ashamed of me, so he had me imprisoned at the center of this labyrinth so no one would ever see my face. He cursed my poor mother and blamed her for my deformity. He disowned me and said I was no son of his, but the child of a beast. He blamed Poseidon, the god of the sea, because he—my father—had failed to sacrifice a bull to him. So he said I had become the bull that he must sacrifice.”
“How primitive,” said Isis.
Alex ignored her. He had heard something that made him set down his teacup and listen more carefully. “What did you mean,” he asked, “when you said that you are at the center of a labyrinth? Like a maze?”
“A maze and a labyrinth are slightly different,” Isis observed.
“Close enough,” said Ruffus.
Alex remembered what the scarecrow had said at the beginning of his journey. The kobold had said it, too: He would have to reach the center of the maze before he could find his way home. If this was the center of the maze, he was halfway to his destination. All he had to do now was find a way out.
“Daedalus sealed me in and left me here. Every now and then, my father sends children my way so I can eat them.”
“Lovely,” said Isis.
“Wait,” said Alex. “Did Daedalus come in here with you, then leave?”
“Yes.”
“Then there must be a way out! How did he escape?”
The Minute-Hour shrugged. “Who knows?” he said. “Daedalus might be able to tell you, if you could find him. But the last anyone saw of him, he had gone into hiding, mourning for his son, Icarus. Those wings Daedalus created for him? They worked too well. Icarus ended up flying too close to the sun and... well, you’ve heard the expression ‘it’s better to burn out than fade away’? That isn’t always true.”
“That’s too bad,” said Alex, but he was more concerned about himself at this point. “If Daedalus found a way out of this maze... er... labyrinth, there must be a way out for us to find, too!”
“Stands to reason,” said Isis.
But Ruffus huffed, “If there is, I can’t find it. And I can find anything.”
“Just like a dog. Such blind conceit.”
“Look who’s talking.”
“Please!” said the boy. “Stop arguing! If you keep going, I’ll be glad to have Asterion eat me, just so I can stop listening to the two of you bicker!”
Cat and dog both fell silent, but neither one apologized. Instead, they set about glaring at one another.
“More tea?” asked the Minute-Hour.
Alex waved his hand and stood; walking over to where Ruffus was, he started exploring again along the wall.
“Suit yourself.” Asterion poured himself another cup and sat back, sipping away as he watched them.
When he had finished, he reached into the top drawer of a chest beside him and pulled out a golden flute.
He began playing it, and the music filled the room.
...
Chapter Fifteen
Up in the Air
The compass was going crazy. Its needle spun in circles clockwise, then back the opposite direction. It was either broken or indecisive. Or both.
Without the compass, the map was of no help.
“If we turn west, it says to go north. If we turn north, it tells us to go east!” the girl said. “Where on earth could they be?”
“What if they are not on earth?” said Dreqnir.
“What do you mean?”
“Try pointing the compass on its side.”
Elizabeth was unclear about what this might accomplish, but she did as the dragon suggested, nonetheless. It couldn’t hurt.
The circular compass, with its rounded edge, wouldn’t stay upright when placed on its side, so Elizabeth had to keep hold of it. As she did, she watched—and marveled as the needle settled into place and held steady.
It was pointing straight up, at the sky.
“How convenient,” Dreqnir said, a hint of self-satisfaction apparent in his tone. He extended his wings. “Climb aboard!”
He lowered his body to the ground, allowing Elizabeth to climb onto his back and into the specially fitted sleigh the Alfur had crafted for her. When she was securely fastened in, Dreqnir crouched on his hind legs and sprang upward like an arrow, heading toward the opening overhead faster than the girl had ever seen him fly. It was clear he was worried about his mother. She could feel the heart-gem pumping against her chest, fear about the queen’s fate mixed with anger toward Nigel, pulsating out from it in nearly equal measure.
Within moments, they were clear of the Dragehjem cavern and soaring up into the black-night sky that covered all the land. The girl could feel the heaviness of it upon her; she missed the sun on her face and the blue sky overhead. Like most things humans take for granted, she didn’t realize how much she missed it until it was taken from her. The Northern Lights off to her left offered some small comfort, and she wondered whether dragons like Dreqnir were breathing their fiery breath to help guide their way.
As Dreqnir leveled the course of his flight, Elizabeth glanced down at the compass and saw that it was pointing off slightly to her right. She relayed this information to Dreqnir, who adjusted his path accordingly. He rose slightly as he flew parallel to the Scandes, the mountain range that formed the spine of the Scandinavian Peninsula in Norway. Glaciers stretched out beneath them, like white rivers literally frozen in time. She saw the names of individual peaks appear magically on the Map of Gildersleeve as they grew closer: names like Galdhøpiggen and Glittertind, Surtningssue and Skarstind. She could not even pronounce some of them; the letters in fine calligraphy writing themselves across the parchment as they approached, then faded gradually as they moved away from the landmarks below. She had never seen anything like it.
Each time the compass needle moved, she alerted Dreqnir, who changed his course to match it. Beneath them, deep gorges and canyons cut between the peaks of snowcapped mountains. The needle started quivering, as if in excitement, just before Dreqnir suddenly came to a stop and began circling in midair.
“What’s wrong?” asked Elizabeth.
“There’s a barrier here,” Dreqnir said through the heart-stone. “I can feel the energy of it just ahead.”
“I can’t see anything.”
“It’s invisible, held in place by magic. I’ve come across it before, and I always simply went around it. It never occurred to me to ask why it was here. I always assumed some wizard valued his privacy—the way we dragons do.”
“Is there a barrier around your Dragon Home?”
“Yes,” said Dreqnir. “You were only able to pass it because I accompanied you. I don’t know how Nigel was able to thwart its magic, much less kidnap my mother undetected. But his magic is powerful, and he is not only a Time Wielder, but a Shape Changer—a master of disguise, as you have seen.”
“Do you think he’s here, beyond this barrier?”
“Is that where the compass is pointing?” Dreqnir asked.
“Yes.”
“Then he is here. It will be a challenge to surprise him before he can disappear again—if, that is, we even find a way through his barrier.”
“What if we just tried to fly through it?”
Dreqnir looked back over his shoulder at her, as though he thought she was crazy.
“The longer we stay here, the more the needle on the compass jumps around. It’s as if it wants us to keep going.”
Dreqnir raised an eye ridge—where the brow would have been on a human—intrigued. “Perhaps there is magic in the compass that will take us through,” he mused. “I suppose it is worth a try. But if we bump headlong into the barrier, I’ll put the blame on you!”
Elizabeth laughed a nervous laugh. “Go slow then,” she said.
Dreqnir eased forward, flapping his wings down, then forward to slow his progress. Elizabeth could tell from the feeling in his heart-gem that he was nervous. She could also feel the energy of the barrier
now, buzzing and humming a low, steady buzz-hum that was more a feeling than a sound, burrowing its way beneath her skin. It itched and tickled her all over, and she shivered involuntarily. The feeling grew stronger as they moved forward, and the girl imagined the dragon must feel it all the more outside the invisible bubble that shielded her.
A few moments later, the buzz-hum seemed to almost envelop her. Then she felt a sudden POP! like a rubber band snapping, propelling them forward with a jerk.
“We’re through!” said Dreqnir, gliding down low and shadowing the peaks beneath him. “We need to maintain the element of surprise.”
“Do we know what we’re looking for?” the girl asked.
“I have no idea.”
But just as Dreqnir was communicating this, they rounded a jagged outcropping and came in sight of a floating city. Dozens of colorful balloons, in reds and tans, yellows and oranges, hovered just below the mountain peaks, anchored to the valley below by sturdy ropes. The balloons themselves were so massive they held up wooden structures the size of houses or even larger. They were connected by gangways and rope ladders, making them look very much like galleons and schooners of the air.
Dreqnir landed on the outcropping and pulled back, just out of sight, then peered around the corner of the mountain.
“I’ve heard of this place,” he said, “but have never seen it. I doubt many people have.”
“What is it?” the girl asked.
“A moving marketplace called Airborne. It’s run by illicit traders, who move from place to place and ply their wares among the less savory elements: bandits, slavers and opportunists. What does the compass say? Does it still point in that direction?”
“It does. What does it mean?”
“Either Nigel is trying to mask his presence by taking refuge here, or he has some sort of business. I only hope he does not seek to sell my mother into slavery and force a bond upon her.”
Elizabeth gasped. “Can he do that?”
“I do not know. But perhaps we can find her. It you adjust your spectacles to magnify things at a distance, perhaps you can tell where they may be holding her.”
The spectacles! Elizabeth had almost forgotten she was wearing them. She felt a pang of guilt: If she’d even suspected the so-called dragon queen was really Lord Nigel in disguise, she would have adjusted them to their most helpful setting: to see things “as they truly are.” But she’d had no reason to suspect someone might have infiltrated the Dragon Home. Lord Nigel had even fooled Dreqnir for some time. How could she possibly have known?
The Talismans of Time (Academy of the Lost Labyrinth Book 1) Page 13