He turned, stared into the corridor—the center of the maze, now snarling and writhing with motion. We didn’t have a choice; it was this or nothing.
“Eury,run.”
Dorian sheathedhis sword and grabbed my hand, his fingers threading tight through mine. Warm. Solid. Urgent.
Together, we ran straight into the heart of the Eldermaze.
His strides were twice mine, but I pushed myself to match them. It still didn’t feel fast enough. Not for him, not to outrunthem.Soon he was pulling me along, his grip steel, and the world blurred around me—brambles and wind and all those feral noises. It felt like death had come alive.
“Whatever happens,” Dorian rasped, breath sharp and juddering, “just keep running. Don’t stop.”
I couldn’t speak. I just nodded, ran harder.
Around us, the maze roiled. Above us, the sky pressed in with dark clouds.
A thornstalker lunged from the hedge on my right. I braced to stop and dodge, but the hedge reached out first. A bramble lashed around the creature’s hind leg and yanked it backward, claws dragging lines in the dirt as it shrieked.
I stared over my shoulder as the thing disappeared into the hedge.What the fuck was that?
Dorian’s grip crushed mine, and I forced my face back around.
Another creature leapt at us from the left. A gust of wind barreled in from nowhere and slammed it to the ground so hard, the thing’s tongue lolled as its head hit the dirt.
I couldn’t understand. It felt like the maze itself was alive, fighting, protecting us.
I didn’t have time to question it. Dorian pulled me left, then right, dodging another swipe. A thornstalker screamed as it was dragged into the hedge.
And I realized I was running faster. Effortlessly. The wind was behind us now, pushing me forward.
Thalassa’s words returned to me:He has a great well of power… flora, yes—but I think air, too.
The vines. The tailwind. The sudden burst of speed, the gust that deflected the thornstalker.
Not the maze.
Him.
Hewas doing this.
Dorian was doing it.
But hadn’t Thalassa said a male fae could only make a breeze? I hadn’t thought, hadn’t expected…
The maze parted before us, the winds clearing a path. We were unstoppable—too fast for the creatures to aim, too wild to catch. As we ran, something else Thalassa had said in her hedge home threaded back into my mind, but?—
I stumbled on a root and staggered sideways. A creature shot from the hedge, and I wrenched free of Dorian’s grip to dodge. The tailwind vanished, the world suddenly heavier. The thornstalker skidded behind me, claws raking the earth, and I sprinted forward again, rejoining Dorian.
That was when I saw it.
Each time the maze acted—with each wind gust or bramble strike—Dorian’s fist clenched hard, white-knuckled. And under his collar, dark lines now climbed his neck like slender veins drawn in ink. Just like the ones I’d seen tattooing Thalassa’s slender neck.
Thalassa had warned me: Unseelie magic had a cost.
Dorian wasn’t just manipulating the maze. He was pouring his lifeinto it.
“Faster, Eury,” Dorian barked, his voice rough, his skin pale. “Faster, godsdamnit.”
Then—there. Ahead. An opening in the hedge, wide and golden with light.
