by Jaclyn Roche
Kali bolted away from the thundering hooves. She ducked down behind a statue of a bull and sent a small prayer up to whoever would listen. The minotaur flew by, its head thrashing back and forth. Onlookers yelled, the sound deafening and overwhelming to her senses. She couldn’t imagine what it was doing to the minotaur’s senses if it heightened them beyond the range of a normal human.
Kali raised her hands to her ears. She stood. Slow and steady. Kali saw a new passageway opening between the hedges out of the corner of her eye. She turned, watching as the greenery slid aside. This was new. Was it a trick, or was it going to help her on her quest?
The minotaur skidded to a stop along its pathway and turned around. He sniffed at the air, creeping along back to her. Kali had no choice but to hurry over to the unfamiliar path behind her. The decades of nightmares and dreams didn’t prepare her for the reality of the labyrinth or beast contained within. She continued down the path, unable to hear or feel the beast’s gallop. Taking deep breaths, she remembered to ignore the incessant chanting of the crowd. Just plebeians at a gladiator competition, she reminded herself. Don’t take it personally. Though the last statement was hard to swallow. It was personal to her.
“Kill her.”
“Save her.”
“Kill the beast.”
“Kill the girl.”
Kali reached a dead end and groaned. She didn’t know where she was. She thought she knew this maze like the back of her hand, but her dreams weren’t the reality she faced. Retracing her steps, the hoof fall came closer. Steady thud on the ground. She walked toward him. Her heart kept tune with the hooves. The thick hedges loomed to each side of her and the dead end a few hundred feet behind her. There was nowhere to go. She held her breath. Just one more turn, and she would collide with the minotaur. The crowd cheered. They wanted her death.
Kali was out of time and options. Nowhere to go, she crouched low holding onto the two stones in her palm. The minotaur turned the corner and Kali rushed forward, sprinting wide, going for the outer angle of the turn. The beast roared, stunned momentarily with her motion toward him instead of running away. He swung his cannon of an arm, trying to clothesline her, and she ducked sliding under as if she dove for a base, all her years on the softball team paying off. The minotaur howled; its about-face turn was unsuccessful, and it crashed through hedges forging a new path. The beast’s wail followed her while it righted itself to continue the chase.
Kali passed by the statue of the bull confronted with a five-path fork. She hesitated. A wrong turn here would mean death. Kali broke branches off the hedge to the right and bit the fleshy part of her palm. She stroked the fresh blood over the greenery. Pulling hair from her head, she threw it on another hedge and covered it with her blood too. Pressing her palm to her side, she ran in the opposite direction, the one that the bull’s paw indicated. Her feet flew along the path. Kali’s hair trailed in the breeze behind her. She paused. Listened. Breath held. The beast’s hooves did not follow. Breath exhaled. Her heart racing, Kali trembled, pulling the branches aside trying to peek at the parallel path. A smile crept across her face. She fell to the dirt path and poked through the hedge, scraping and cutting at her face. She crawled through and emerged on the other side.
9
Before her stood a large oak tree. The largest she had ever seen in her life. The one from her dream last night. Kali looked around, searching for clues. An oak tree in the tropics was unusual. It had to be a clue, but what? How? She sucked in her lower lip and strode forward to investigate further. The tree rose out of an altar made of the blackest stone. The oak’s branches spread out like fingers clawing their way to the sky.
Was this the altar Viktor had used for his ritual? Kali hadn’t seen or heard a wraith in the maze. Did Seth tell the truth, or did he want to lead her astray that night? Kali shook her head clear. She had to focus on what was ahead. Not on the past. Not now, anyway.
Kali covered her eyes and twirled in place. Here she could not see or hear the crowds. Nothing but an oak tree with the walkways cut around the tree. People scarcely above, save a guard here and there. Better that way. No one could see her fail. Or... She couldn’t let herself hope for more. She just needed to survive this run through the maze and save Viktor. Viktor would make everything right. She knew it. She had seen a better world with Viktor at the helm of the Minotaur Corporation. Well, at least, what Viktor had shown her.
All paths lead here as if they were the tree’s root system feeding it information. That was silly, though. Kali shook the thoughts away. A tree couldn’t be alive quite that way. The branches unfurled from the trunk and stretched out in all directions, gnarled and twisted, devoid of leaves. She shivered, despite the humidity. Kali moved forward to examine the altar and tree further, tripping over a root. Her hand outstretched, landing on the trunk of the tree on an engraving. Blood from her wound seeped into the tree giving it new life.
The tree heaved, its branches moving about and the roots shifting. Kali removed her hand from the minotaur symbol, stained crimson with blood. She stepped backward into the hand of the tree that guided her forward. The ground rumbled as if a great explosion took place. The earth crumbled before her to reveal an obsidian path downward to awaiting crypt doors with giant knockers strung through the nose of mini-minotaur heads. No other choice but to move forward, her backward path blocked by the gnarled oak. Kali reached for the doors.
“Only the cursed,” the knocker spoke.
Kali’s eyes went wide. Things like this only happened in movies with goblin kings, not to her. This couldn’t be real.
“Only the ancient,” the other knocker said.
Kali’s head turned. If she was an ancient goddess reborn, then maybe this could be real, too. Right?
The two knockers continued, “The damned.”
“The descended.”
“The blooded.”
“May.”
“Enter.”
Kali stood wide-eyed, pondering their words. Another call for blood? She reached forward with her hand.
“Halt.”
“Cease.” Again, in turn their eyes widening.
“What do you require then?” Kali asked.
“Are you the—”
“—holder of the key?” The statues shifted their heads to the right.
“What key?” Kali’s thumbnail pressed into her index finger, keeping her panic at bay. She needed clear thoughts. Not ones that would muddle her objective. A key. She remembered nothing that looked like a key. Kali turned to the path, still blocked by the oak. Nowhere to go but forward. She had to gain entry.
The minotaur heads repeated their question.
Kali patted herself and shrugged. “I seem to have left the key.” Smiling and batting her eyes, she said, “Please let me in.”
“No key.”
“No key.”
“The keeper—”
“—has no key?” The heads sliding into the stone doorway, disappearing. Roots growing up from the ground encasing the entryway.
Kali’s mind raced. A key. What could she... wait? She removed the orange stone from the hiding place on her hip.
“Wait! Don’t go!” Kali called.
The entombment stalled, and the head reappeared.
“Are you the—”
“Holder of the key?” The statues shifted their heads to the right again.
She held the stone forth for them to see.
“The key.”
“The key.” Their voices almost shrill with excitement.
A lock appeared within the stone. Kali frowned. The orange gem jagged but not at all like a skeleton key needed to gain entry. She groaned. It wouldn’t fit. A roar split the air and made her jump. He was closer than she thought. Fear coursed through her. Not yet. He couldn’t find her yet. She wasn’t ready. Kali clenched her fists together not knowing what to do.
Heat flowed to her palms. Her fear fueling her need. The gem glowed between the cracks in her fingers like it
had the night prior. Her hand so hot it almost burned her. It shifted. The shape molded itself. Changed. Became something. Something else. A key. Kali could have cried with relief. She fit the key into the lock and turned. The massive doors creaked open. Kali stepped into the darkness, and the doors shut, closing with a thud of finality, sealing her within the tomb.
10
She turned and tried to pry the doors open. When that didn’t work, she banged on them. Nothing. Kali faced the dark and inched forward, her hands outstretched, and her foot stretched out on the path before her dragging along to feel for anything she might stumble upon. Her breath loud and echoing. A torch beside her sprung to life, causing her to startle and laugh at herself. She slid the key back into its hiding spot and grasped the torch. Renewed, she went deeper into the tunnel. Descending into the earth. Trickles of water bounced off the solid walls. Her gut turned. The ground shook from the minotaur’s hooves scratching at the dirt of the path on the other side.
Kali held her breath and inched away from the doors. Her hands shook lifting the torch from the wall holder. She held the firelight toward the doors watching, waiting. The steps drew closer, pawing at the ground. Sniffing its way to her. Bull’s horns scratched at the stone door. A hoof pressed against it. Testing. Waiting. The doors rattled. Kali dropped the torch and let out a yelp as a thunderous sound reverberated within the enclosed hall. The minotaur—Viktor—was smashing at the doors trying to break them in. Her ears rang as he pounded into the doors. It held. Kali released her breath into a sigh. She crouched down, picking up the torch. It was a wonder it didn’t extinguish. She thanked the goddess for her protection. Kali turned and moved into the darkness with the beast ramming the doors behind her.
“What’s next?” Kali whispered aloud, her voice trailing through the downward sloped pathway. She regretted the dare.
“That depends on you,” the voice called to her.
She recognized that voice. Dozens of questions popped into her head. So many thoughts and what-ifs had Kali hesitating before she descended the stone stairway to the light below from where he called to her.
Kali had no plan and no idea what she was walking toward. Her only weapon was the torch she held. That would have to be enough if it came to that. She was not the same girl who froze up on the streets of Brooklyn and allowed Seth’s henchmen to take her. Kali could call her light forth as she just had to change the key, she hoped. She would fight back. She was sure of it. But, still, Kali pressed on with caution, taking each stair slow moving down step by step. Down. Down to the last stair.
Kali sucked in a breath of surprise. The stairway lead to a crypt. A wide-open chamber at least fifteen feet tall, lit with hundreds of torches. In the center stood a reflecting pool fed by a small stream trickling by to the right. It dominated the room with a statue of the God Amun-Ra and the Goddess Amunet in the middle of the fountain. Moonlight glittered in from a domed stained-glass skylight above depicting the death of Osiris with a sword plunged into his heart.
“How did you get in here?” The question more of a demand rather than subtle inquiry as she had planned on. She set her shoulders back, puffing her chest out with a false bravado. The damage already done. “And why? Why are you down here?”
Her questions were punctuated by the ramming of the doors by Viktor. Kali wrinkled her nose. She needed to be more careful. Seth might see her as more of a threat should she press too hard. But she needed him. He was more valuable to her than she was to him. That was a concern. Her disregard to his advances put her in a precarious position.
Seth smiled, reclining against a statue of a woman bent over in prayer, the torches flickering and casting shadows. His recline like that of a large cat. Coiled and ready to spring despite the pretense. “Do you not know where you stand, Kalissandra Doe?”
“I wouldn’t ask if I did.” He toyed with her, and she didn’t like it one bit. Her free hand clenched tight against her side. She hovered near the entryway even though the doors hadn’t allowed her out. The entrance stood a dead end.
“Look around.” Seth’s hands waved about the chamber, moving off the statue, walking towards her. “Come, Kalissandra. Look.”
Seth swiped the torch from her hand. “This is unnecessary here now, isn’t it?”
She raised her head to meet his gaze. Seth’s smile was predatory. His body rigid. Tense. She reached for the torch, and he moved it away like a schoolboy playing keep away. Kali dropped her hand to her side, refusing to play his game.
Seth stepped aside, allowing her to pass. The torch hissed; the flame put out in the small stream trickling near the entryway.
Kali moved to the statue, reading the tomb.
“Your beautiful face hides nothing, Kalissandra. Your questions now answered,” Seth spoke from behind her.
“Your family crypt.” Kali’s voice barely audible.
“Only the blooded descendants of the ancients may enter this sacred or, as one would say, Hallowed, place.”
Her brows knit together, and her lips pressed together. “No other Hallowed has entered.” They couldn’t have. She had the key.
“No, they haven’t. All Hallowed possess the potential, but only one is the true queen.” This time his bow was deep, and he stayed there, looking up at her, eyes dancing with mischief. “All hail, Queen Kalissandra, the Goddess Isis, who is about to be reborn.” He straightened and clapped his hands together.
“I don’t feel like a goddess,” Kali admitted.
“But you will be. And once you assemble the stones, you can be reborn.” Seth approached his steps calculated.
“And save Viktor.” She realized that the minotaur no longer tried to enter the crypt, his forced entry efforts abandoned. She was alone in a crypt with Seth and with powers she did not understand how to use. A shiver ran up her spine.
“Or rule at my side,” he countered. “I will help you find the stones.”
“At what price?”
“As I said. You agree to be mine.” Seth stood before her, clasping her shoulders.
One hand cupped her chin and brought her green-eyed gaze to meet his nearly identical one. They stood for what felt like eternity looking into each other’s eyes. Neither wishing to give in first.
“Agree, and I will give the next stone.” Seth was the first to break the silence.
Kali couldn’t fathom betraying Viktor. At least not again. The kiss, a mistake, a moment when she was weak and overwhelmed with emotions. She didn’t know what to say.
Kali would have to consider his offer, or at least pretend to so she could buy time. She knew nothing about how to get the stones. Much less about how to save Viktor with them.
A dark shadow moved through the room. Kali squinted and raised her head. Above the fountain, a shadow danced around the dome trying to peer into the caverns, its horns creating shadows in the pool of water.
“Then we have a deal?” he demanded stepping forward to her, his eyes locked on hers, a grin spreading wide on his face.
Kali sucked in her bottom lip, stepping away from Seth. She wanted to be that brazen, rash girl who had told him no. She wouldn’t dine with him yesterday, but she knew better than that. He had sent her here without the assistance afforded to the prior Hallowed that came before her as punishment. He wanted her to fail. Seth didn’t want his brother saved. He liked the power that came from running the Minotaur Corporation. How long until he turned on her? But she had no training or prior knowledge of where she could locate the rest of the Osiris stones. Her brows knit together.
“I...” She hesitated, fumbling for the right words. Drawing in a deep breath and courage, Kali looked to the statue of Amun-Ra for strength. Feeling comfort that the statues were here at all. She would find a way. She was a goddess. Well. She would be a goddess. How? She didn’t know, but she had to have faith. Vassily had told her so earlier that day.
“Time is running out, Kalissandra. Once a Hallowed one starts the journey, she has until dawn to complete it.”
“Tick Tock...”
11
Kali swallowed hard. “I have to release Viktor from his bondage. It’s my destiny.”
“Destiny?” Seth sneered with a chuckle. “Is there such a thing? Have you not seen what the Minotaur Corporation has created here? We are the puppeteers of the world. We control fate and destiny. It does not control us.”
“It’s my duty, Seth, as his destined.”
Laughter poured from Seth. “Destined? Oh, my dear.” His body still shook. “You’ve never met Viktor. You’re just a curse breaker. Nothing more. Do you forget the others who tried and failed?”
“How could I be the Goddess Isis? How could any of this be possible? Do you see how that works?” Determined, her spine straightened, and she locked eyes with him. “I am the Goddess Isis, the giver and breaker of the curse of Osiris. I have dreamed of us since I can remember. It is my duty—no, it is my pleasure to release Osiris from his curse to be at my side for the rest of eternity.”
Laughter faded. Seth growled. “You won’t be releasing anyone.” Seth lunged for her.
Her collision into the rough stone wall of the crypt sent sparks of pain into her limbs. She threw her palms out in front of her, expecting light to fly forth, but none did. A deep rumble came from Seth. Laughter. She had never heard him laugh, and here he was, laughing—at her. The bastard.
She realized her power wouldn’t save her. Kali flailed her hand out to the side, keeping her eyes on Seth, searching for the torch set in the stone. Her fingertips brushed against the bottom, jiggling the cone of the torch. Kali inched over; her heart racing, arm shaking. She turned her body and reached again with her dominant hand only to have Seth press her against the wall and grasp both her arms, pinning them above her.