When the darkness began to fade and a filmy, almost burgundy and violet vapor lit the labyrinth around her, her endurance suddenly vanished. The wounds that had been inflicted upon her drained what was left inside, and she could still feel blood trickling from the backs of her wrists where the clots had reopened. Aldora could no longer pick her feet up, and she had given in to lean against her captor, pressing her cheek, sometimes her forehead to his spine. There was a line of hair that traveled it that tickled her nose.
She wasn’t aware that she could see until he stopped and lifted her into his arms. It wasn’t comfortable—his body was too hard—but she had no complaints; nothing left her mouth but a short gasp for fresh air as she found his face. Aldora inhaled.
Their eyes caught, but only briefly.
Her heart threatened to burst from her chest.
He was no longer a horned shadow but a flesh and blood being that appeared human, but not. His features were animalistic and blunted, as if he’d been born malformed, part beast, part man.Like a centaur but with features that blended rather than split right down the middle.
His ears stuck out under where his horns met his scalp, jutting out from the sides of his temple. They rose up slightly until they tapered into points. One flicked under her perusal.
He watched her as she studied him, too shocked to do anything else. If she cared for stealth it would’ve made her uneasy, but they were way beyond that now. Her booted feet swung with each of his tumultuous steps. No, the time for stealth had vanished with the dawn.
His forehead was large and wide to fit his horns and his nose swept down between two very human eyes. His nostrils flared and small puffs of steam released.
She’d felt it last night but now she knew where it came from.His face.Her insides squirmed. She was suddenly aware of how he clutched her to his chest.
Aldora tore her eyes from his face and moved to his shoulders, where their differences only grew. He had no real neck, or what there was of one was less defined. She blinked out the blurring in her eyes. It was either too thick and sinewed to be mistaken as part of his shoulders or his shoulders started from the back of his head and swept into a bulging, rippling cord of overlapping muscle.
What is he, if not a demon?
There was no way her hands would ever wrap around his throat, not that she would ever try. If she had to kill him, she’d go about it in a more effective manner. The straight, sharp edge of the dagger she had looted came to mind, solid within the side of her boot.
“Your eyes match your hair.”
Aldora stiffened, thought his words over, and then nodded. “Yes.”
His were black.
“Not all humans share the same features,” he continued, his thick lips straightening. She waited for him to say more, but he didn’t.
“No. We’re all different,” she whispered.
“Why?”
“I-I don’t know. We get our looks from our parents and their lineage.” She reached up to cup her neck, still stuck on his lack of one. “Both my parents have brown hair and eyes, so it would make sense for me to be born with brown hair and eyes.”
“I’ve seen a human with blue eyes.”
Another human?“You have? There are others alive, here in the labyrinth?”
He grunted. “Killing you is detrimental. There are others, but far away and far from us.”
“And what about the one with blue eyes?” she asked, hopeful. “If you’ve seen them once, surely you can see them again. You killed countless last night...”
His nostrils flared for an instant then receded. “No.”
Please.“No?” Her brow furrowed.
“They’re dead,” he snapped. Her gaze drifted back to his face.
“I’m sorry.”
He snorted, and a sliver of sunlight pierced the mist to glint off one of his horns. “You’re not sorry, and if you are, your sorrow is best deserved elsewhere. Those who were here before have nothing to do with you. If you want to survive in this place and to survive well, it’s best to keep your emotions close.” He looked away. “Nothing of mine can be weak.”
Aldora lowered her eyes and rested her head against his iron-honed bicep. She would take his sentiment to heart.
Lost in her thoughts, it wasn’t until they circled around a clearing for a second time before she realized they were off the winding paths. Her gaze lifted to a copse of trees so close together that they had tangled to become one long, strangely-shaped knot. The bark appeared wet, and as the beast walked past them for a third time, she discovered the wetness wasn’t condensation but was coming from a seepage from within.
