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I 023. I
𝑪𝒖𝒓𝒔𝒆𝒔 𝒂𝒏𝒅 𝑪𝒐𝒓𝒓𝒊𝒅𝒐𝒓𝒔
❝ sister ❞
ARIADNE HAD STRUGGLED TO SLEEP. Chiron has insisted they talk in the morning, which she didn't understand, but one look from Annabeth and a hand squeeze from Percy and she knew she had no choice but to listen.
The girl had tossed and turned for an hour before staring at the amethyst ring on her bedside table. She picked it up and held it tightly, and drifted off to sleep in Percy's sweatshirt.
She dreamed of a prison. She saw a boy in a Greek tunic and sandals crouching alone in a massive stone room. The ceiling was open to show the night sky, but the walls were twenty feet high and polished marble, completely smooth. There were wooden crates scattered around the room. Some were cracked and tipped over, as if they had been flung in there.
Bronze tools spilled out of one—a compass, a saw, and a bunch of other items she couldn't recognize. The boy huddled in the corner, shivering from the cold, and possibly fear. He was spattered in mud. His legs, arms, and face, were scraped up as if he'd been dragged there along with the boxes.
Then the double oak doors moaned open. Two guards in bronze armor marched in, holding an old man between them. They flung him to the floor in a battered heap.
"Father!" The boy ran to him. The man's robes were in tatters. His hair was streaked with gray, and his beard was long and curly. His nose had been broken. His lips were bloody.
The boy took the old man's head in his arms. "What did they do to you?" then he yelled at the guards. "I'll kill you!"
"There will be no killing today," a voice said.
The guards moved aside. Behind them stood a tall man in white robes. He wore a thin circlet of gold in his head. His beard was pointed like a spear blade. His eyes glittered cruelly. "You helped the Athenian kill my Minotaur, Daedalus. You turned my own daughter against me."
And with a shiver, Ariadne could only guess who they were speaking about.
"You did that yourself, Your Majesty," the old man croaked.
A guard planted a kick in the old man's ribs. He groaned in agony. The young boy cried, "Stop!"
"You love your maze so much," the king said, "I have decided to let you stay here. This will be your workshop. Make me new wonders. Amaze me. Every maze needs a monster. You will be mine!"
"I don't fear you," the old man groaned.
The king smiled coldly. He locked his eyes on the boy. "But a man cares about his son, eh? Displease next, old man, and the next time my guards inflict a punishment, it will be on him!"
