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The further Lettie walked, the more she felt as if she was being drawn into a trap, the winding tunnels branching and branching again.
I’ll never find my way out. Unless...I leave a trail. That’s what you’re supposed to do in a maze.
Lettie had no handy balls of string. No breadcrumbs. Just her dress...spun from the finest spider silk. She picked at an edge, smiling now. Now I can find my way out, I’ll only have to bring Queen Persephone the silver axe she so desperately wants...or survive her wrath. Surely, surely, she’ll realise I’m no traitor.
Will looked sideways at her. “Wouldn’t bother,” he said. “Almost everyone has already done it. See?”
Lettie peered closer in the dim light. Sure enough, the floor under her slippered feet was a tangle of string and other markers.
“I mean, nobody is going to stop you leaving a trail. And so long as it’s not food it’ll stay right where it is—nobody will touch it. Believe me, food disappears here, sure as eggs are eggs and mushrooms are mushrooms. Talking of food, I’m starving. Do you have anything on you?”
“Sorry.” Lettie shook her head. “I gave my emergency supply to the child.”
“It’s hungry work waiting for victims,” the creature said. “But sometimes they’re already dead, so that’s why I do it. For the just in case.”
“Ew,” Lettie held a hand over her mouth. “You eat dead bodies?”
“Can’t waste good food. There’s not a lot to eat down here except ant food and fungi. But I guess you’ll find that out soon enough. And the only way out is... Anyway. Time you met the boss, Asterius.”
“A star what?” Lettie blurted.
“Yes, bit of a terrible joke. He hasn’t seen the stars for years. But he says the glow worms are his stars, so maybe that’s good enough.”
He was wittering about the minotaur as if it wasn’t a dangerous beast. A beast I need to avoid.
She shook her head. If only Will Burr would stop wittering and tell me how to escape. “Er, how do I get out of here?”
“Ask Asterius. Everyone who comes in must be brought to him. It’s kinda a big deal. You know what he did with the last fae who came here? The gardener?
Lettie patted her head, remembering the old gardener and his daisies. A hundred years ago, he’d made daisy chains for her and made her feel special. And he’d always had a kind word. “No! Asterius didn’t kill the gardener, did he?”
“Not at all. The boss gave faer a position making the official labyrinth garden pretty as a picture. He’s decided on getting everything looking just so. Like a palace garden. Wait until we get there, then you’ll see what all us feyr-folk are made of.” He said the word feyr, a little like fire, and not like fair or faer.
After hours of walking around and around the wickedly complex maze, a bright light beckoned. They walked toward it for a time. As they approached the dazzling cavern, Lettie squinted into the brilliance, to find it not as bright as she first thought. Indirect light flooded in from above, reflecting off a silver trove of jewels and other treasures. Shining daisies studded the ground all around like living gems.
“Where are we?”
“Under the island of the fairy godmothers.”
The minotaur—half man, half bull—sat on a throne of silver faery bones dripping with gold as if in mockery of the fae belief that gold was the literal tears of the sun.
Seated in a semicircle around the throne, like they were in a stadium, were creatures of the night and of the forest. The creatures Queen Persephone deemed too ugly for her court. Terrifying spines and googly eyes were everywhere, along with all manner of creatures. Gnomes, cave dragons, golems, boggarts, goblins, leprechauns and satyr, trows, mole people and more. Big furry monsters she didn’t recognise and a handful of sturdy no-nonsense trolls. They crowded themselves into the seating up in the stands around a roped-off dirt pit. Creatures that were rarely seen and deeply feared, but were sharing drinks and food and having a ball–well, not precisely a ball, but they appeared happier than the queen’s courtiers at an all-summer party. And not nearly as scary as they first looked with their dark clothes, piercing eyes and shaggy hair.
Asterius, the famously dangerous minotaur, sat on his sparkling throne, gems and silver treasure gathered at his feet and a gold crown on his broad head. The axe was lying on the ground in front of him—like a challenge.
Lettie shook her head. He didn’t seem as scary as she’d imagined. Although he did smell bad. She wrinkled her nose at the wet-hair and sweat aroma emanating from his body.
There was a rumble about how Queen Persephone needed to look after her own. Shrill voices rose over the ruckus.
“Persephone has broken the overland pact twice this year! That’s two times too many.”
“We should teach Persephone and Hades a lesson.”
Lettie quailed, shuffling back in an attempt to hide in the dark shadows behind them.
“Don’t worry. It’s all talk,” Will said. “They’ll never do a thing. Been ranting about King Hades and Queen Persephone since I was a nipper. But all we’ve ever done is hide and talk about the overland pact, even though Queen Persephone breaks it every time she throws someone down here.”
“How can you all hide down here?” Lettie asked, finding her nerve. “Queen Persephone has stolen my child. She’s stolen a human child and broken Myrddin’s pact. What makes you think she’ll keep any of your other agreements?”
“We will revolt,” Will said. “We are revolting.” He paused. “Come on. That was funny.”
“It...was...not...funny,” Asterius growled. “Fae. Have you come to offer your fealty to me?”
“Not really,” Lettie said, digging her fingernails into her palms to stop herself from shaking. “Well, it wasn’t the plan.”
Asterius stomped a cloven hoof. “You. Make it your plan.”
Lettie glanced at the silver axe. “I have to escape.”
“You’ve come for the cursed axe, haven’t you? You know the queen only wants it so she can chop people’s heads off.”
“And what do you use it for?”
Asterius grinned, picking up the wickedly sharp axe and tossing it from heavily muscled arm to heavily muscled arm. “Why don’t you come here, little fae, and find out?”
A winged pegasus flew in through an opening high in the ceiling, trailing a silver-birch-wood carriage. It was decorated with ornate protective silver spells, not so different from the scrollwork on Keera’s swords. “Thank goodness you’re here,” a flutter-form fairy in a blue ball dress called through the open window. “Lettie, you have to go back, or both Rubys will die.”
