the sort! I had a light. There were extenuating circumstances.” Claire took a step back. Walter might be Death, but she couldn’t quite believe that the Walter she knew would attack her—in any realm. But he appeared to be preparing to do just that. “Can you at least tell me what is supposed to happen here?”
“Well. Screamin’ and bleedin’ mostly.” Walter paused. “I try to eat you, you try to fight, and then you try to run. It don’t work out. Your soul gets swallowed and feeds the realm.”
“This place has a rather concerning preoccupation with devouring souls,” Claire grumbled, rather than feel the flutter of nerves at the way Walter stretched. “Your realm’s god dies, and you all turn carrion? No, I suppose it’d be cannibals, since you don’t wait until a lady is done with her own soul first.”
Walter had the grace to look abashed. “I didnae exactly write the rules, ma’am. I hope ye know this is rather off-putting for me too.”
“Yes. Well, eating your colleague is a bit of a faux pas.”
“Yeh could just turn around and go back into the labyrinth.”
“I’m afraid not. There are pressing matters elsewhere,” Claire said. “Besides, it’s dull, and I didn’t bring a thing to read.”
Walter’s shoulders dropped. “Then I’m afraid I gotta eat you.”
Claire reached for any question to make Walter pause in his warm-up. “What happens if I win?”
“Huh. Well, no one does that.”
“But if I did?”
“If you did . . . well, you get to claim a boon, I suppose. In the old days, yeh got to reincarnate on Earth as a kitty cat. But I don’t think I got the mojo to do that anymore.”
“Good. I rather mistrust cats.” Claire considered. “What’s your secret?”
“Ma’am?”
“Oh, come, now. I’m an unwritten author, and this whole blighted thing feels like a tale. I know how stories go. Every monster at the center of the labyrinth has a hidden weakness. A trick for the hero to find.”
“Oh.” Walter was flummoxed. “No one’s just come out and asked that before.”
“But you do have one?”
“Well. Yes.” Walter mulled it over. “I’m not sure I can just tell you like that.”
Claire tilted her head. “Is there a rule against it?”
“Well . . . no.” Walter’s face lit up, pleased, as he gave his full attention to it. “My eye.”
Claire inspected both the brown eye fixed on her and the milky white orb opposite it. “Your eye? What? I am supposed to hit you there?”
“Not exactly. I . . . probably can’t say any more.”
“I see.” Claire sighed, skittering back toward a pillar as Walter appeared to square up. “But knowing that, a hero could escape this place?”
“You’re no hero, ma’am.” Walter was mournful as he said it.
“As this realm keeps on reminding me.”
“I’m awfully sorry about this, Miss Claire.” His clear eye was watery, even as he stamped his hooved feet and angled his horns down.
Claire reached a pillar and felt for the curve of it behind her. “Apology accepted, Walter. These things do happen.”
Walter opened his mouth and the booming howl that came out was much less mournful and much more horrifying than it had been from a distance. He charged.
Claire spun behind the pillar and stumbled back as Walter’s impact sent several man-sized stones tumbling from the top. She regained her footing, turned, and ran.
Hurtling headfirst into stone did not slow a minotaur much. Walter shook his head once, then charged after her. Sharp red claws that had not been evident a moment before gouged the wall as he went. Claire ran for the exit, but the junction where she’d entered the courtyard was nowhere to be seen.
The Greeks always loved their tragedies. She shoved the grim thought from her mind as she caught sight of a flash of yellow. One of the pillars’ ragged flags hung lower than the other. At Walter’s next charge, Claire took the moment of disorientation as he hit the wall to run toward the pillar. She grabbed it and scrambled her feet against the stone. Bare feet worked to her advantage for once. Her toes found the small holds between blocks, and she hauled herself to the top.
Walter circled the wall with a snarl but paused as he looked up. “Don’t be a silly wiggins, ma’am. This will go faster if you come down here.”
“I prefer not to.” Claire ran her hands over the top of the pillar, looking for something, anything, to slow down the minotaur. She shoved a hand in her pocket, and