by Troy Denning
"This is no time for your dreams!" growled Karfhud's angry voice. "Wake yourself, or I swear I'll leave you to drown!"
The threat did not move Theseus, who was beginning to feel the cold serpent of guilt writhing in his stomach. No matter what Dionysus threatened, he could not have abandoned his beloved on that lonely shore! He was a man of renown, and men of renown always found the clever way to evade the dire choice. Surely, he had swum back ashore after dark, or bested the god in a drinking contest, or tried something to win her back!
"How will you ever know, Theseus?" The wine continued to pour, not from Dionysus's silver ewer, but from Karfhud's filthy wineskin. "If you will stop feeling guilty and rise, we can still recover the amphora. Sheba is on the run, and we have but to catch her."
"And then what?" Theseus pushed the wineskin away. He was lying upon the fiend's dismembered wing, which was still floating in the junction where they had fought Sheba. The manstile had been pushed shut, creating a single angled passage where there had been a four-way intersection before. "If we couldn't kill her-"
"Kill her?" Karfhud stood, wincing in pain. His body was laced with gashes and covered in golden ichor, but several small husks of pain had somehow survived the battle without bursting; with each pulse of the fiend's heart, they grew a little larger. "How can we kill her? It would be easier to flatten the mazes themselves!"
Theseus scowled. If the fiend did not want to slay the monster, then why was he chasing her?
"I have my reasons, and so do you-or are you afraid to recall what you did on that island?" The fiend pulled Theseus to his feet, then thrust the Thrasson's star-forged sword into his hands. "Now help me with the gate. If we hurry, we will catch Sheba and end this thing."
As the tanar'ri turned toward the ironclad manstile, Theseus recalled Sheba's decoy. He had a sinking feeling, then turned and saw the matted pelt lying in the shallow water at the far end of the gate. It was no longer squirming.
"Karfhud, we've forgotten about Silverwind."
The fiend glanced down the length of the gate. "We have no time to waste on the dead. Minutes have passed already since she escaped^"
"If Sllverwind is truly dead, this won't take long." Theseus wetted his sword with the fiend's blood, then sloshed over to the sticky pelt and stuck the tip into the empty mouth hole. "Silverwind? Are you in there?"
When he teceived no answer and the pelt did not move, he carefully sliced it open. Inside, eyes closed and curled into a tight fetal ball, lay the old bariaur. His brief captivity had left him covered with slime and filth, but his chest was rising at regular intervals, his hooves were twitching as in a dream, and he was still covered with throbbing husks of pain.
"Silverwind, wake up." Theseus reached down and gently shook him. "We've got to hurry."
Silverwind's eyes snapped open, and he gave a start of surprise. "Theseus?" The old bariaur raised his head and took in his surroundings. "I thought I had imploded! Can you imagine? I would have had to imagine it all again – the whole thing!"
"You may yet," growled Karfhud, waiting at the far end of the gate. The fiend shifted his gaze to Theseus. "Have you done with this stalling?"
Theseus helped Silverwind out of the monster's empty hide, then the two of them joined Karfhud. Sometime earlier, no doubt before deciding that he still had need of the Thrasson's help, the fiend had tried to push aside the heavy gate and managed only to crack it open – this despite the fact that Sheba, sorely wounded and in a huny, had closed the thing with only one arm. Theseus began to wonder who was hunting whom.
"Does it matter?" Karfhud laid his hands on the iron sheathing and leaned into the stile. "She has your amphora."
Theseus pressed his shoulder to the gate. "And what do you want from her, if you cannot hope to slay her?"
Karfhud gave him a sidelong glance. "I am surprised you have not guessed that by now, Thrasson."
From the gate's center pivot rose a loud grating noise. The heavy stile slowly started to open. A moment later, Silverwind butted into it at a full sprint; there was a loud bang, and Theseus and Karfhud nearly fell as the gate bucked forward. They pumped their legs to catch up, then smoothly pushed the stile back to its original position.
In the adjacent passage stood Tessali, Jayk's limp body resting across his handless arms. Theseus's heart jumped; for a moment, he thought she might still be alive – then he noticed how her spine bent in the wrong direction, and how the ends of her broken ribs formed a ring around the sunken hollow in the center of her chest The Thrasson saw no ichor on her body; at least her pain was gone.
"Theseus, she died with your name on her lips." Tessali shuffled forward, his accusing gaze fixed on the Thrasson. "She asked that you bum her body and cany the ashes with you."
Theseus moved forward to take the corpse, but Karfhud shoved in front of him.
"We have no time for pyres, Thrasson. If we let Sheba put herself back together, more of us will die."
Theseus glared into the fiend's fiery eyes, knowing that he spoke the truth and silently cursing him for it.
"I am not to blame. You are the hero, Theseus; you must bear the burden: will you risk the lives of four to grant the wish of one?" Karfhud paused, gently scratching his broken talons along his chin. "It occurs to me that your choice is similar to the one Dionysus presented you; either way, you betray someone. How unfortunate that you cannot recall how you resolved that dilemma."
"Damn you, Karfhud!"
The fiend cocked a wrinkled brow and gazed around the narrow passage. "This? Hardly." He chuckled and shook his head. "The mazes are as nothing to the Abyss."
Theseus scowled at the tanar'ri's mocking snicker, but motioned to Tessali. "Come with me. We can wrap her in Karfhud's wing until after the battle."
The elf glanced at the dark wound where the fiend's wing had been ripped from his shoulder blade, then grimaced and looked back to the Thrasson.
"What if we don't-"
"Then we will rot with her!" Theseus snapped. "I don't suppose she could blame us for that."
The Thrasson paused just long enough to scan the area and make certain the monster had taken the amphora – she had – before leading the way back around the stile. He pulled Karfhud's tattered wing from the water and swaddled Jayk's body inside, then laid the bundle back in Tessali's arms and went to cut some long mats from Sheba's discarded pelt. The elf followed close behind, holding the cocoon as Theseus wrapped it in gummy tangles of fur.
"I would have cured her, you know," Tessali said. "Even without my hands and my spells, I was beginning to make her understand. I don't think she wanted to die, there at the last"
Theseus suspected that Jayk's change of heart had more to do with her dose call with Karfhud than any Bleaker wisdom Tessali had imparted to her, but he held his tongue. The elf had lost enough already; if he found comfort in such delusions, it was not the Thrasson's place to disabuse him.
After encasing Jayk's cocoon in the monster's gummy fur, Theseus took the bundle and stuck it to the stile, affixing it as high as he could reach. Though he had seen no scavengers in the mazes, neither had he seen any untended carcasses or skeletons, and the dead bodies had to be going somewhere.
By the time Theseus and Tessali returned to the others, Karfhud had already taken a mapping parchment from his battered back-satchel and marked the locations of the adjoining passages. He motioned the Thrasson to follow close behind, then set off down the opposite corridor without a word. Despite Karfhud's condition-he was limping badly and hunched over a broken rib-he moved through the crooked, narrow passages in near silence, sketching in junctions and side-corridors as he went. There was no fog, so they could see that the walls were lined by arrow loops and murder holes, all located well above the reach of even Karfhud. Every so often, they would glimpse a heavy wooden shutter or an oaken door guarding some portal far above their heads, but there were never any such entryways down in the bottom of the labyrinth.
As before, they had little troubl
e following the monster. Although there were ankle-deep streams in all the corridors, the currents were gentle and slow. Sheba's black blood marked her path as clearly as it had in the swamp; the companions found beads of the gummy stuff everywhere: clinging to the walls, bobbing in the comers, stuck on the jagged stones that littered the passage floors.
Sheba also seemed to be having trouble containing the contents of the broken amphora. Every now and then, they ran across strands of golden hair hovering in the damp air, and twice they met scraps of black sail cloth wafting up the passage. The first ribbon circled Theseus three times: he saw himself running a golden comb – the same one he had with him when he washed ashore near Thrassos-through the auburn hair of his dead wife Antiope, who had perished at the hands of her own people for loving him.
When the second ribbon circled him, the Thrasson saw himself, much older, holding a silver palm mirror – the same one that had been in his satchel with the golden comb-over the mouth and nose of another dead wife, Phaedra. This memory troubled him more than the first, for Phaedra was sister to… even now, Theseus could not remember the name of his beloved princess, only Dionysus's voice urging him to abandon her.
Theseus tried to calm himself, noting how much older he had been in that second memory than when the god had spoken to him. Many years had passed between the two events; because he had married Phaedra, it did not necessarily follow that he had abandoned her sister.
As they followed Sheba's dark trail deeper into the palace, a soft slurping sound, muffled by distance and the crooked passages of the labyrinth, began to echo off the stone walls. Karfhud cocked his head and waved Theseus into the lead, but the fiend continued to dip his talon into his own dark blood and trace the maze on his parchment. High up on the walls, they started to see more doors and shutters, many of them hanging half open and askew. The water began to flow more rapidly, making it more difficult to follow the monster. Several times, they had to stop at intersections while the Thrasson searched the side corridors for her blood trail. At least they were catching up; each dark bead seemed a little wanner and stickier.
The echoes of the slurping sound grew steadily louder, and the water flowed ever faster. Soon, the current was swirling around their ankles, tugging at their feet and making a hazard of each step over the rubble-strewn floor. Sheba's blood trail vanished, though it hardly mattered. Theseus had already realized that the monster was traveling with the water, which had become a gurgling stream gushing along a single course through the labyrinth.
After a time, they rounded a comer and entered a small vestibule where half a dozen smaller corridors came together. At one end of the enclosure, a pair of huge oaken gates hung cockeyed and half-open beneath a great stone arch. The bottom third of each gate had long since rotted away, allowing the waters to rush unimpeded into a large courtyard beyond. The slurping sound had ceased to be an echo; it was now a steady, half-muffled sucking noise just loud enough to drown out the purling of the stream. Karfhud slipped into the vestibule beside Theseus, and together they crept forward to peer past the oaken gates.
They found themselves looking across a flooded courtyard at an immense, dark-windowed palace with a flat roof and the vestiges of elaborate, brightly painted patterns flaking off the pale limestone walls. The courtyard itself had probably once been a magnificent sunken garden, for the surface of the water was broken everywhere by the heads of ancient statues and the spandrels of decorative arches. Near the center of the square pond swirled the cause of the slurping sound, a silvery whirlpool nearly as broad as the span of Karfhud's wings-had the fiend still had both of them to stretch.
It took Theseus a moment to notice Sheba, not far from the whirlpool's edge. She was lurking beneath the spandrel of a sunken arch, up to her neck in water and surrounded by a stringy slick of her black blood. Her red, sinewy head, laced with black veins and still gleaming with mucous slime, remained as motionless as that of a statue. The Thrasson groaned inwardly. The water would be above his head, and he truly hated having to swim while he fought.
Sheba backed out from beneath the arch. Then, keeping her dark eyes fixed on the gate where her hunters were hiding, she began to float on her back. She held the amphora in the crook of her arm, her massive hand covering both holes Theseus had made. For a moment, the Thrasson thought she was merely taunting them, then she began to kick her legs, pushing herself toward the whirlpool.
"I cannot believe what I am imagining!" gasped Silverwind.
"She knows she is defeated," said Tessali. "She's drowning herself."
"I should be so fortunate as you are foolish, elf." Karfhud rolled the parchment he had been working on. "She is escaping into another maze-and I am out of mapping skins."
The fiend bent his arm back to stuff his furled map into his satchel, at the same time running a sidelong glance over the elf's pale skin.
"Karfhud, you know better," Theseus warned.
"So now you too can read minds?"
Out in the pond, Sheba began to move in a circle as the currents at the edge of the whirlpool caught her. Karfhud stepped through the arch and began to wade down the submerged stairs. Theseus started to follow, then stopped and looked up at the heavy oaken gates. He rapped on the wood. It sounded solid enough, at least near the height of his chest "Karfhud, can you take one of these gates off?" The fiend turned to glare at the rusty hinges, then bared his yellow fangs and came back up the stairs. He took hold of the one on the right, which was hanging by a single strap of twisted metal, and braced his foot against the wall.
"You're not thinking of riding that thing down the whirlpool!" Tessali gasped.
Theseus nodded. "I am." He backed away from Karfhud, who was struggling to pull the gate free and shaking the entire vestibule with his rumbling grunts. "In the past, I've found it easier than swimming."
"Don't you think we'll drown?" Silverwind's question was more of an inquiry than an objection.
Theseus glanced toward the center of the pond, where Sheba was disappearing into the heart of the whirlpool. "Only if the monster drowns first."
Karfhud gave a final sonorous groan, and, amidst a great crackling of wood, the gate came free. The fiend staggered under its weight, barely managing to face the pond before his heavy toad began to tip away. He let go and stepped back, allowing the gate to splash down with a loud, cracking slap. Their new raft instantly started to drift away, so Theseus sheathed his sword and clambered down the submerged stairs to grab hold.
So heavy was the gate that it began to pull the Thrasson away from the shore. He managed to slow the raft by digging his fingernails into its ancient wood and jamming the fingers of his improvised foot into a silty crack in the step. Even then, he found himself inexorably drawn toward the center of the pond, until he was half-floating in the water, his pain pods bobbing around him like a swarm of spiny black sponges.
Theseus heard a sharp crackling behind him, then craned his neck around to see Karfhud ripping a long plank from the edge of the other gate. Silverwind and Tessali were standing a short distance up the passage, their eyes gaping at this demonstration of the fiend's strength.
"Perhaps a little help would not be too much to ask for?" the Thrasson called.
All three of Theseus's companions swung their heads around. Tessali" stepped to the edge of the stairs, but seemed at a loss as to what he could do, while Silverwind galloped forward and jumped onto the gate – nearly dislodging the Thrasson as he landed. Karfhud simply jerked his plank the rest of the way off the gate, then tossed it onto the raft and waded into the water.
"Perhaps we should change places." The fiend reached past Theseus and sank his talons into the gate, then pulled it back toward shore. "You help the elf."
Tessali backed away. "You can't be serious. Riding a raft down a whirlpool is madness!"
"It's a small whirlpool." Theseus climbed out of the water, but did not reach for the elf's arm. "Still, you can wait here if you like."
"Of course!" Karfhud's voice c
ontained only a hint of mockery. "We'll fetch you when we come back to burn the tiefling."
Tessali shot the fiend a look as sharp as an arrow, but shrugged and reluctantly stepped to the edge of the stairs. Theseus helped the elf leap onto the raft, then picked up the long plank Karfhud had tossed aboard and thrust the end into the water, holding the vessel in place while the fiend boarded. They arranged themselves to distribute tile weight evenly – the massive tanar'ri had the front of the gate all to himself – and Theseus shoved off.
Karfhud pulled off his back satchel and busied himself cinching it tightly dosed. The others simply waited, listening to the slurp of the whirlpool grow increasingly louder. Their wait was not a long one. The current caught the cumbersome raft and whisked it toward the center of the pond. When it became apparent that he would not need to do much pushing, Theseus laid the plank down on the back edge of the raft – where he could kick it away if need be – and drew his sword. Though he had no idea where the whirlpool would come out, he felt certain Sheba would be Waiting for them on the other side. She wanted them to follow, or she would not have waited before going down the whirlpool.
The raft slid past the spandrel where the monster had been lurking, then picked up speed. It began to curve toward the whirlpool, and that was when, barely audible above the slurping din ahead, Theseus heard a faint, familiar cry from behind.
"Theseus, my love!" As muted as it was, he recognized the voice as that of his beloved wine woman. "Have you forgotten me?"
The Thrasson spun and looked toward the great entry arch. There, standing upon the submerged stairs, hip-deep in water, was the white-cloaked figure of his wine woman. Her dark hair hung loose about her shoulders, and, beneath her emerald eyes, he could just make out the tear-trails glistening down her cheeks.
Theseus sheathed his sword. "We must go back!"
"Good thought," gasped Tessali. "Blessed be the Great Meaninglessness!"
Theseus stooped down to reach for the plank, then felt the raft pitching as Karfhud started toward him.
