Page 67 of A Touch of Chaos

“What comes next?” she asked.

She hadn’t started moving again. She did not trust herself to navigate the thorns and talk at the same time.

“It depends on how we leave these thorns,” Ariadne said.

Persephone said nothing for a moment as shegingerly stepped over another branch while ducking to miss another and unwound her thread.

“How did you become familiar with the labyrinth?” she asked when she could breathe again, resting in a thorn-free pocket.

“The first time Theseus introduced me, it was because he sent in a man who I had wanted to arrest for a long time. I think he thought I’d be grateful to him for dealing out the justice I had sought, but instead, I was horrified.”

They were quiet after that, concentrating on making progress through the bramble path. One small mercy was that Persephone’s bones were no longer shaking with cold. Now she was sweating and her back ached. She was tired of bending, tired of moving at this pace, which only made her muscles burn.

She thought that perhaps the worst thing about this was that it seemed endless.

Galanthis meowed, and when Persephone looked up, she could see the cat’s eyes gleaming. She took that as a sign they were close to the end.

She tried not to rush. She’d made it this far without a scratch and did not want to fuck up now. Carefully, she turned her head to look at Ariadne, who had slowed considerably.

Persephone’s heart dropped into her stomach.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Ariadne said, though Persephone could tell something was wrong. She sounded weak and breathless.

“Just a little farther, Ari,” she said, trying to be encouraging, but then a strange sound echoed within the narrow passage, vibrating the air.

It made Persephone’s blood run cold.

“What was that?” she whispered, peering into the darkness.

Galanthis hissed.

The growl came again, deep and closer this time. It was followed by a succession of squeals and the pounding of hooves, and then there was the distinct sound of splintering wood.

All Persephone could see was a flash of white in the distance—perhaps teeth?

“Oh, fuck,” Ariadne said. “It’s a boar. Run!”

But running was impossible trapped within the vines. All Persephone could do was move faster and keep a hold on the thread.

At first, she tried to continue carefully, but the closer the boar drew, the less she cared about the poisonous thorns. She would take a scratch over being mauled to death by a boar, but as the thorns scraped along her arms and dug into her back, she realized how unprepared she’d been for the pain. It was sharp and biting. It made her mouth water and her stomach sour.

She wanted to vomit, but she forced the nausea down and kept going, her hands shaking as she unraveled the thread, her heart racing as the boar’s cries grew louder, nearly unbearable in their terrible pitch as the creature effortlessly tore through the thicket she and Ariadne had spent so long navigating.

She cried out as she slid beneath a branch, a thorn cutting along her back, but she did not care because as she stumbled, she found that she was free—surrounded only by cold air and darkness.

“I’m out, Ari!” she cried. “I’m out—”

She turned to find Ariadne still struggling as the boar drew closer. Persephone could see it better now—a huge creature with shaggy hair and large tusks that it used to tear at the thorns.

“Go!” Ariadne yelled.

But Persephone couldn’t leave her. She looked down at Galanthis, who meowed, and set the spool of thread at her feet.

“Watch this,” she said and drew the knife Ian had forged and entered the tangle again.

“What are you doing?” Ariadne demanded. “I said go!”

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