Page 21 of Taurus's Quest
A claim that raised Aries’ brows. “Andreas has associates. Do you know where they are?”
The little girl shook her head. “No. The rock won’t let me see.”
Sage’s turn to mutter, “An object of power, obviously.”
At that claim, Olivia nodded. “You have to find the rock. It’s the most important part of the machine.” The girl then cocked her head and a smile brightened her face as she exclaimed, “Ooh, I smell cookies.”
With that, she ran off, with Leo and Ruth following, leaving a perplexed Circe—who most definitely didn’t smell anything other than bullshit. They wouldn’t seriously put credence into anything that child said.
Wrong.
“Looks like I better let Aquarius know Andreas wasn’t working alone.” Aries bent down to kiss his wife and child before he headed for the door.
“You’re leaving? What about me?” Circe cried out.
“Sage will take care of you.”
To which his wife snorted. “Don’t you mean Tower?”
As the man left, Circe glanced at the other woman. “What’s going to happen to me?”
“For now, how about accommodations and a meal?”
Sounded divine but… “And after?”
Sage looked at her, and her eyes went from normal to suddenly swirling with colors, and the voice that emerged sent shivers up Circe’s spine.
“Beware the perils within the labyrinth. Its guardian is not dead.”
Chapter 7
The healing took just under three hours, although, by the time Taurus recovered enough to move off the table and get his ass in a shower, the meeting in Aries’ office had completed. He entered to find Sage sitting with the baby in the rocking chair.
“How’d it go? What’d I miss?” He bit his tongue rather than blurt out his first query; Where’s Circe?
The knowing Sage answered anyhow. “Circe is in the room across from yours refreshing herself. As to the discussion, it would appear you’ve stumbled across a grave peril that goes beyond the impending meteor.”
“How so?”
“The man who injured you might have been infected by an alien species.”
“Parasite?” An itch developed between his recently healed shoulder blades in response.
“That remains to be determined. Olivia made an appearance and spoke of you and Circe having to go on a quest. Apparently, a new Antikythera mechanism needs to be built, but not from the hypothetical versions currently available. The plans for it are hidden, and knowing you, you’ll like to know where. The Labyrinth.”
His brows rose. “The one mentioned in Greek legends?”
Sage nodded. “Yes. I had a vision, a brief one, showing you and Circe entering it.”
“And you saw us coming out?”
The query twisted Sage’s lips. “That remains to be determined, but I have faith in your abilities. Along with the proper blueprints, a special stone needs to be retrieved, as it is part of the device. While I am unsure how that will work, it appears to be the key to countering the threat.”
“What’s a machine with a rock going to do against an asteroid?” He couldn’t hide a skeptical note. “Wouldn’t it be better for us to link our star power and shatter it?” It had been done a few times in the past to prevent potential impacts with Earth.
“The stars cannot see the threat.”
“What do you mean can’t see? The Astraeus see everything.” The beings, for lack of a better term, had almost omnipotent powers. Or so he’d been led to believe. No one ever actually met or spoke to them, except for Zora. Before she’d become the Thirteenth Zodiac, she’d conversed with the Astraeus imprisoned in the void.
