Vendors ran along the street as we walked through the various hills of the city, the streets paved in glistening white rock. They sold everything, even things I had never heard of before. Silk traders, roasted ducks and chickens on a spit, candied fruit, jewelry, dyes, thousands of olives, rich bathing oils and soaps. Every vendor a unique item, miles and miles of them.
Every person we came across gave Alder a deep bow, smiles on their faces, gratitude on their lips. They would then raise and go about their days. It was clearly common for the King to walk among his people.
I saw a fig stand and my mouth watered. Alder seemed to notice. He stopped and bought an entire bushel. The vendor thanked him and sang his praises as he handed over the figs. He tossed me one as we kept walking, giving the basket to Minka to hold as we strolled. She and Jubilee dug in to the figs as well, their sweet flesh filling our bellies with delight.
We kept sauntering, perusing the stands. I stopped at one particularly gorgeous jewelry stand. The emeralds and rubies gleamed against the velvet blanket holding them. Sapphires as large as my thumb and diamonds giving off multicolors as the sun hit them.
There was one ring, in the shape of a snake, its mouth open and fangs holding a large pink stone.
“What type of stone is this?” I asked the vendor.
“A pink diamond, of course,” she said confidently, her smile wide. I could feel my power rising. It liked the stone, seemed to call to it.
“Would you like me to buy it for you?” Alder said, having snuck up behind me.
His arm wrapped around my waist, his torso against my back, so close it made my heart skip a beat. Our powers sung together in satisfaction.
“How much is it?” I asked the vendor, not answering Alder.
“16,000 silvers,” she said with a smile, “but for you, my King, I would consider it an honor for you to have it at no charge.”
“There is no need. I will see you are paid,” he replied, taking the gorgeous ring from her and slipping it onto my right ring finger.
My power reached out its pink tendrils, caressing the stone with a heady touch. She purred internally, enamored with shiny things.
“This doesn’t get you out of our conversation,” I said to Alder, trying to hide my grin but failing. My eyes stayed on the ring as I spoke, taking in the facets sparkling in the sunlight.
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” he replied, pecking me on the cheek before continuing his walk.
We finally met a long staircase leading up to the grand palace at the top. There had to be over a thousand steps. My body began to sweat at the sheer thought of climbing each one.
But Alder stopped when he reached the first step. He reached out for Minka, who took his hand. She intertwined hers with Jubilee, who bent down to pick up Jinx. I was surprised she was able to carry her, being so large and fluffy. Jinx seemed comfortable though, looking over Jubilee’s shoulder at me with her tongue lopping out.
Alder reached his other hand out for me, beckoning me to him. This seemed a very odd gesture, but I took his hand, anyway.
Suddenly I was whipped through the air, my hair tangling across my face, and then it stopped.
We were inside a grand room. Alder must have whirled us. I let go of his hand, shaking at the sudden change. I felt a bit nauseous, but it gradually resolved as I took in the room.
Its ceilings were high above, with large arches. On its sides were tall walls that contained multicolor glass. At the end of the room sat a large throne, it appeared carved of the same obsidian as the Labyrinth walls. As we walked closer, I saw how intricate the throne really was. It had thorns and snakes carved into it, matching Alder’s tattoos.
Jinx bounded across the room and jumped into the throne’s seat. She laid her head down and sprawled herself across it.
Jubilee laughed and walked to her, rubbing her belly.
Alder didn’t seem to care, he just smiled at the dog. He looked lighter here, in his home.
“We need to talk now,” I said to him.
“Yes, let’s go,” he said, reaching his hand back out to mine. I took it, expecting the whirl again, but he walked forward, pulling me along with him.
We went down a few hallways, each with large stained glass windows on one side and the other side open, revealing the teal sea below.
Finally, we came to a massive double door. Alder gave me a wink as he placed both hands on the door. He pushed them open with a shove and walked in.
The room could have fit Leo’s entire house inside of it. There were lounger chairs and dressers, several resting cushions, wide-open windows that looked down on the sea. White gossamer curtains hung around the open panes, flowing in the breeze.
Against the back wall sat a bed. But bed seemed too demure a word for what it really was. Four tall posters with silk curtains. It was the size of six beds. Rich blue satin sheets wrapped around it. It looked like an ocean, a decadent ocean for sleep and, well, other things.
Alder seemed to pause, considering his options. My face turned to stone. I could not let him think of things like the bed at a time such as this. I needed answers from him, not distractions.
I tossed my knapsack on the nearest chair and walked past him, past the bed, and out onto the open balcony. It, too, was large enough to hold an entire house. Several more loungers and cushions sat across it. I wondered how many people were usually inhabiting this space. Was I to believe Alder had been here for a hundred years all by himself? I laughed at the thought.
“I don’t know where to even start with you,” I said, keeping my eyes ahead on the seas as it glistened beneath.
“How dare you lie to me all this time? How dare you let me believe you were just a conduit of power, that someone had sent you, when it was you this entire time?” I hissed, and continued, “and then to sit there and introduce me as a Queen? That’s a mighty big assumption,” I said, the power inside me surfacing and glowing around me in a dark pink.
“Valeria, did you really think someone as powerful as me, someone whose power matched yours so perfectly, was just another pawn in this game?” he asked sincerely.
He had a point. I should have figured it out sooner. It felt silly now that I hadn’t seen it.
“But you had plenty of chances to tell me and yet you didn’t. Why?” I asked, changing the blame from me.
“Darling, if I had told you before you saw this place, would you have assumed I was some evil entity? Some cruel king of a barren land?” he said, his voice almost purring.
I began to speak, to throw something back at him, but I stopped. He was right. I had thought the Labyrinth King cruel. He took our taxes each year. He had killed that family two years ago for not paying. And his land, his Labyrinth, had seemed mostly empty, a waste of space, a cursed land. Sparse villages throughout, but still mostly filled with treachery.
But now, this city. This beautiful rich city that he ruled. He claimed this is how he had wanted it all to be. What did that mean?
“When you said you wanted the world to be this way, like this city,” I said, spreading my hand out over the sprawling houses below, “what exactly did that mean?”
“Tell me what you’ve been told of the curse,” Alder said, his eyes searching my face.
“There are many stories, but mostly I heard that there was a great warlock who wanted to rule the four cities. But his curse trapped him inside instead. The Labyrinth King, he was that ruler,” I said, turning and evaluating his face.
“That’s not exactly what happened. Let me show you,” he said, placing his hand out in front of me.
I hesitated for just a moment, but then I took it in mine and suddenly we were whirling, tumbling through the air.
Chapter 29
We landed, and I opened my eyes. We were on a cliff overlooking a grand marketplace. It stretched on for dozens of miles, the size of the Labyrinth. I could somehow see the four cities at its borders. A massive square. The surrounding world was dark. I felt Alder’s power all around me. I g
asped.
“What is this, is this— are we inside your mind?” I stuttered.
He gave me a cynical look. “Just watch.”
How high up were we to see this much of it before us? I looked down but only saw black beneath my feet. I felt queasy.
“This was the marketplace. It connected each of the four towns: Mare, Villam, Sericum, and Cognitonis. It was here that they traded and bartered. A mecca of riches and success. But it had a sickness. There was no leadership, no rules within its borders, and no enforcer. The leaders of the cities fought over who should have control of the marketplace, but they could never agree. A war between the four cities loomed on the horizon. A war that would destroy peace and trade, a war that would decimate them all.”
As he spoke, the image whirled and changed, showing me a closer look. I saw the rich traders, the tranquility within the marketplace. Happy smiling faces as people laughed and gathered. He continued.
“Day by day the marketplace turned darker. Soon there were gangs of thieves. They began with simple petty theft but quickly turned to worse crimes. Murder, rape, whatever they wanted. There were no consequences, no limits to their wickedness. No one to stop them.”
The scene changed. I watched men attack women. I watched them steal from the shops and leave the owner for dead. Rival gangs fought in the streets, leaving dozens bleeding out in the square. The ground became soaked with their blood. It was terrifying.
“It was becoming so dangerous a place, the towns could no longer wait to decide a ruler. It was either war or shutting the doors to the marketplace forever. Both options terrible, both options would cost them greatly.”
“I was traveling by myself when I came across this place. I saw the horrors it held, saw the tensions rising in the towns. I knew I could stop it, to make it better. I hoped it could be a redemption for myself after years spent sewing darkness. I could make it beautiful, could be the enforcer to keep it safe for the cities to continue their trades and success.”
I saw a version of Alder walking through the marketplace, though he was still standing by my side. He looked around, his eyes shone with sadness as he took in the marketplace and as he spoke to the people. Then his eyes changed, his face changed, as if realizing the potential.
“So I did.”
I saw Alder then, standing in the very middle as his hands became illuminated with his power. He glowed a vivid green as his power grew. His power lifted him from the ground, his eyes becoming the same vivid green as his power shot out from him. The people nearby began running, trying to escape.
The power spread out, and the area turned green with grass and rolling hills. A river, lazy trees, flowers, birds chirping through the air, and then a great city. The Labyrinth City.
He had transformed the landscape everywhere to a beautiful haven. The perfect land, a place to rebuild the marketplace, a place for peace and prosperity.
My heart leapt as I realized I had seen this place before. It was what I had been shown that day in the Labyrinth. The heaven I had visited. It was this very place, without the curse.
Alder finally let go of the power, his creation finished and perfect. He floated above it all as the people around were taking in their new surroundings, and realizing that they were safe, began to rejoice. The evil men shook with the fear of him.
Then Daemion stepped into the scene. He looked as devastatingly handsome as he had in my dreams, though maybe less pale. He wore the same black fur coat with a black suit underneath. The cloak whipped behind him in the wind, revealing a taught physique that made me salivate. I stopped myself before I blushed. Thankfully, Alder hadn’t seemed to notice.
“Daemion felt my power surge, he came immediately. He saw what I had created and wanted to take it from me, as revenge for me abandoning him all those years ago. He placed a curse on the haven, my beautiful creation. The curse twisted it into the Labyrinth, as it is today. I saw his intention. He would spiral the curse further out, to encompass all four cities. He was power hungry, he didn’t just want to hurt me, he felt the city’s weaknesses and wanted to rule them all. He placed infinite barriers on the backs of each city, to keep them from running, to trap them in as his curse overtook them.”
I watched Daemion cast his curse. It spread out over the land like a disease, twisting and turning every beautiful thing in its path into a dark maze. A massive tower sprouted up out of the ground in the center where he had cast the curse. The large black forest formed behind Villam, sealing it in. I saw miles of sand dunes form and seal Sericum. The ocean grew infinite and trapped Mare. Tall impassible mountains formed behind Cognitonis. His power consumed him and transformed him into that massive black and white scaled dragon.
“I fought against him and was able to place the borders around his Labyrinth curse before it overtook them. I bound him inside the Labyrinth where he still stays imprisoned. I hid him as deep as I could inside of it.”
My eyes were glued to the scene as Daemion in his great dragon form flew up to meet Alder in battle. I watched above me as they fought, their beautiful faces gleaming with their powers as they rose above the city and into the air. Alder’s was a vivid green while Daemion’s was the darkest black coming out of his great dragon mouth like flames. They cast their powers out toward each other. Their powers met in the middle, crashing into each other’s like massive waves, tsunamis of pure energy. They sparred until a final green wave came crashing down, hitting Daemion hard and causing him to spiral back down towards the earth.
Alder reached his hands out wide and pulled against Daemion’s curse, pulling it back, containing it just in time to keep it from hitting the cities. He raised his hands in fury, his green eyes glowing so brightly they looked like emerald flames. He threw back his head in anguish as his power held. The curse was contained.
He turned his gaze down to where Daemion had fallen. He cast his remaining power down upon him. The ground came up and surrounded Daemion, who opened his eyes in time to see his prison forming. He was unable to escape. His roars and screams echoing through the vision, vibrating into my chest. Alder pushed harder and harder until the prison was completely formed. The last of his power left him as he fell from the sky, crashing into the ground.
I held my breath in suspense, watching sweet Alder as he crashed. The amount of power he had spent. I could barely comprehend it.
“When I recovered a few days later, I was able to put a few holes into his curse, reforming the Labyrinth City and several towns. Safe places to hold the thousands of people who had been trapped in the Labyrinth when I put up the walls.”
I saw him working, only smaller flickers of his magic remaining in him. He built the city and the towns. I saw him searching the Labyrinth, finding the people and whirling them into his cities and towns to be safe. It must have taken months.
“Why didn’t you just lower the walls and let the people out?” I asked him.
“Because, if the walls fell now, the curse would continue its path. Spreading out everywhere. It has to be broken first.”
I considered his words.
“So how do we break his curse?” I asked.
“Daemion was powerful, so powerful when he placed the curse. The tower in the center holds the answers. The only place the curse could be broken. But I have been unable to find it, he hid it from me intentionally. I have had to wait, wait for you. Every curse has a counter, as I told you, and you are that counter. You are the only one who can reach the center. The only one who can even find the center.”
I looked up at him and waited for him to continue. His eyes seemed far away.
“But his curse and my magic are intertwined now. When it created you, it didn’t just create a cursebreaker, it created the perfect compliment to my powers. Once we are there, we can combine our powers and break the curse. The Labyrinth would be restored to my original plan for it, a haven for the cities. The walls would come down and people could come and go as they please.”
I felt a pull. We were whirlin
g back down to the patio. The colors faded, and I saw the surrounding sea again. I realized we hadn’t actually moved at all, just that he had placed the scenes around us.
My head spun at the intake of so much information.
“Why can people come in then? In but not out?” I asked.
“Well, my spell was a containment spell. It keeps things in but does not keep them out. Those are different spells. But because it is my spell, I can come and go as I please,” he replied casually.
I nodded, more questions forming.
“And the pull, the pull I felt towards the Labyrinth when I was outside and then the pull I felt inside? Was that you?” I asked him.
“Yes, it was my power calling to you. My power within the Labyrinth and my power within me. Drawing you in. Our powers long to be together, as we have seen,” he mused, the corner of his mouth turning up into a sinful smile.
I ignored him and continued my questioning.
“The Brotherhood, were they formed by those men? The ones who were using the marketplace for their own pleasure?” I asked, trying to fit it all together.
“Yes, Daemion sensed them, sensed their thoughts and desires. They didn’t want to be ruled by me, they didn’t want to live in the safe places I had created because that meant they had to stop their own evil cravings. He spoke to them, promised them to let them do as they wished once he was free. Created holes for them to live and build their citadels. They wish to break the walls I have placed and set him free. I have tried to fight against them but they are sneaky, it is hard to find their citadels.”
What terrible things would be unleashed if that happened, if he was free to expand his curse? I shuddered at the thought.
“The taxes that we have been giving. You said they weren’t for you? Then who were they for?” I asked, sensing the answer before he spoke.
“The Brotherhood, they started the taxes pretending to be me to keep their secrecy. It’s what keeps them alive, they enforce it strictly. I have been unable to stop them. I have tried many times in the past but it seems they exist not only inside here, but in each of the four cities as well.”
The Labyrinth King (The Labyrinth Series Book 1) Page 16
