The Centaur Queen (The Dark Queens #7)(43)

But the terror of trying to find our way out kept my mind focused on something other than my own pain. Several times, we ran into our marks, but now we knew to turn down the other fork in the tunnel. Slowly but surely, we moved away from the dangerous heart of the maze and back toward where we’d started.

Sweat coated my human legs and back. My steps were faltering, and I was covered in my own blood. I hadn’t realized the Minotaur had cut me open until just now. All I needed to do was coat my hand in my healing salve and wrap it in bandages, and I’d be healed come morning. But right now, I felt sick to my stomach and wanted to retch.

We’d been running close to an hour, and I had just about reached my level of tolerance. We ran into another one of our marks, and this time, not one, but both of the branches bore our mark too.

I gasped, crying out as my knees trembled.

“Tymanon!” Petra roared right before I tripped and fell. He grabbed me up, holding me tight.

I clutched at his smooth, sweat-slickened shoulders and heaved for air as I leaned upon his chest. “I don’t... I don’t know how—”

He rubbed his hand down my head. “It’s okay, my love. It’s okay. You’ve done brilliantly.”

“This should have worked. I don’t know—”

A loud roar caused all the fine hairs on my body to stand on end. When I looked up, the Minotaur was charging straight at us, all seven feet and five hundred pounds of solid male muscle.

He was breathtakingly fast. I tried to grab for one of my arrows, but my hand refused to obey. I cried out as Petra shoved me behind him, twirled and, holding only his small dagger in hand, faced off with the beast.

“Petra, no!” I screamed as the mad creature with burning red eyes bore down on my male with the single-minded determination of a killer.

But in a move I recognized as one of my own, Petra took a running start, dropped to his knees, and slid behind the Minotaur before flicking his wrist.

When I’d performed that maneuver in the games, I’d not used a blade but a stone to bruise the Piper’s Achilles tendon, dropping her like a stone and rendering her useless for the rest of the match.

I’d not wanted to kill her, only stop her. But I knew, as well as Petra, that the only way to stop this beast was to give him no chance at all.

There was a roaring bellow that shook the stalactites dangling like sharp spires above our heads. The Minotaur fell like a massive tree, causing me to stumble and fall to my face. I held out my hands to brace myself and suffered for it, screaming out as the bones of my shattered hand sifted like sand between my fingers.

Lightheaded and dizzy, I crawled to my feet and, gasping and heaving, was instantly sick.

“álogo, come. Come.” Petra was tugging on my elbow, forcing me to stand. I felt drunk and unsteady, but he held me close, and we ran through an opening neither of us had seen since it’d been hidden behind the Minotaur.

The second we stumbled through it, a wall sealed shut behind us, and I knew we were out. I fell to my knees with a moan as my head filled with darkness and stars.

“My darling. My love,” he murmured, gripping my face in his strong hands. “Do not close your eyes. We need to leave this hell. Stay awake, Tymanon. Please stay awake.”

Shaking the darkness from my head, I fought through the pervasive need to sink into the abyss and forced myself to focus on placing one foot before the other.

Neither of us spoke as he walked us both out of the labyrinth, back up that winding, spiraling tunnel, and back to where it had all started. The scent of flowers permeated my head, and I listed back and forth.

“Petra.” I said his name like a prayer. He’d saved me, but we were far from done with this challenge. We’d not outwitted the Minotaur’s labyrinth. We’d gotten lucky. To leave this place, we’d have to defeat either the Minotaur or the Gorgon.

“Tymanon.” He kissed my forehead. “You’re so pale. You need rest. You need—”

I shook my head, knowing that if I stopped now, I might never wake up again. The darkness called to me, beckoned to me with its promise of freedom from the pain. I’d been useless back there, but here I could help him.

“Reach into my pouch,” I gasped, words sounded slurred to my ears. “Take out Wulfric’s finger.”

I’d not wanted Petra to face the Gorgon’s wrath, but we had no choice now.

He frowned, but said nothing, doing as I’d asked. “This?” He held up the tiny, bandaged parcel.

I nodded, leaning more of my weight on him. My stomach heaved again. I was going to be sick.

Sucking in a shaky breath, I forced myself to say, “Now sing. Walk us forward and sing.”

He blinked, confused for only a moment before he finally understood. “Thrall her? She will not like it, beloved. To abuse her in that way would be anathema to her.”

I nodded because he was right. There were few monsters in the ancient world more tragic than the Gorgon. Raped by a village of men and turned into a monster by a god because of it, she had not deserved her fate and raged against one and all who crossed her path.

But if we didn’t leave here soon, I would be no good to him anymore. I needed to heal, and to do that, I needed time without the threat of monsters breathing down our necks.

“I know.” I shook my head. “I know.”

Closing his eyes, he kissed my cheek. Then turning, he opened his mouth and sang.