Fowlhunter [GL]

Asha followed the black-haired human woman… or whatever she was… down the halls. She didn’t know if it was because of what Ariadne said, about time being different here, but her body felt strange and out-of-place… like she was in a dream. Or like the first time she had spent extended periods of time out of water, in her anthropine form. The persistent, niggling feeling of being somewhere she wasn’t supposed to be—a place that she needed to get out of, and soon.

Except they were far beyond fifty turns at this point. Asha’s brain latched on firmly to the directions she had memorised when they had started running from the spiders. But those directions were useless now.

The corridors they were currently in were different to the oppressive black walls of the maze they had traversed initially. This place was still twisting and turning walls, but these were broad hallways, with grand arching walls. The occasional spider scuttled past. The paths were lit at intervals by torches. These weren’t fastened to the walls, but rather taped to them by shimmering lattices of spider silk. Asha squinted closer at the torches themselves, which also looked weird, and realised that the bases of the torches were also constructed entirely from a dense mesh of silk, while a flame burned the silk from the top down.

“I do hope you like the interior design. It’s my own,” Ariadne said when she saw Asha staring at the torch. “I didn’t have a lot of resources down here, so I had to get creative. Spidersilk itself isn’t flammable, but I found out cobwebs are, once they get enough dust in them. Isn’t it fascinating? I had my critters spit out a bunch of orbwebs and let them sit out for a week, tops. Then, I have a hundred spiders rub the bundles of cobwebs like cavemen rubbing sticks, and voila. Flame. It’s so dusty down here that it’s not hard, really. Just like baking cupcakes. Mm… Prometheus I miss those things. Cobweb cakes really don’t taste the same.”

Maybe if Asha wandered around for centuries, she’d be lucky enough to find an exit to this maze. Except that now there was someone else. Someone that could control hallucinogenic, memory-ripping, suicide-inducing spiders, and that someone didn’t seem interested in letting her stray too far.

Perhaps time couldn’t kill her here… but other things could. Asha remembered the cyanotic, twitching face of the other pixiu too clearly. Ying’s face flashed across her memory. She shivered, but forced herself to stay calm so she could think. It was her only asset at the moment.

“Is this the heart of the Cretan Labryinth?” Asha tested.

“This?” Ariadne said, glancing at the web-covered walls around them. “This is my home.”

“According to legend, the Cretan Labryinth was created on the orders of the then king of Archizoun, King Minos, to house his illegitimate son the Minotaur,” Asha voiced aloud. “A monster created from his wife’s adultery, a bull from the head up, and a man from the neck down. The Minotaur was too dangerous to be left outside, and no ordinary walls would hold its strength, so it was placed in the Labryinth so it could not escape and rampage.”

Ariadne was quiet, studying her.

“The Minotaur was finally contained. However, years later, a new species of extremely deadly spider was discovered in the towns nearby. Travellers traced these waves of spiders back to the Labryinth. The new King Aegeus suspected it was the Minotaur’s revenge, and sent heroes in there to slay it. Eventually, his son Theseus succeeded, but the spiders have never ceased. They call it the Minotaur’s Spider.”

“You know myths well, makara.”

“Yeah, well, we the Beasts take the form of the mythological creatures found in human undercloud legends. We have minotaurs too. We do get curious about the creatures we are supposed to mimic, so we read the myths,” Asha said. “But they’re meant to be just stories, not true happenings. The Cretan Labryinth was supposed to be a natural rock formation made by underground water, while the Minotaur’s Spider is a newly-evolved species of spider no different from any venomous spider. Only the superstitious believed in these tales.”

“Do you believe in them, then?”

“I don’t choose to believe or not believe in something until I have proof,” Asha said. “Right now, if you’re telling the truth about being in the heart of the Labryinth, I sure as hell can’t see any bull-headed man.” She glanced at Ariadne. “Were you an adventurer who got lost in the maze? Did you run into the Minotaur anywhere? Or did Theseus kill him before you got here?”

Ariadne’s clicking footsteps stalled. She tossed her hair over her shoulder with a icy, haughty laugh. “Oh, that weak little boy couldn’t kill the Minotaur.”

Asha furrowed her brow. “You know Theseus?”

“Is all you ever do ask questions?” Ariadne asked back, marching on.

“Hey, there’s not much else for me to do here,” Asha shrugged, following behind her. “Look, you’ve been trapped here a long time, right? I can give you information about the outside if you give me some.”

“I already have information on the outside,” Ariadne said. “My bugs have many, many eyes.”

“You can talk to the spiders…” Asha murmured. “Just like Jemi.”

“-Just like who?”

That seemed to have gotten the woman’s attention. Asha twisted her braids and said, “My friend. She’s an animal whisperer. She can talk to animals, listen to them, and convince them to a certain extent to do things.”

“Is it Lunaki?”

“No. It’s a skill unique to her,” Asha said. “I think she was born with it.”

“No…” Ariadne said, staring at the arachnids crawling through the passageway. “You can't be born with it. It’s something you develop.” She did not elaborate any further. “Is this the same powerful friend you threatened me with?”

“......”

“I’d love to be able to meet her,” Ariadne smiled dangerously. “She sounds like a fascinating person. I’ll have my darlings look out for her. What was her name? Jemi?”

Asha’s eyes darkened. She had accidentally given her friend away. But at the same time… she knew that the Cockatrice would be able to handle herself. It would also work out for Asha and Ying if Jemi came to rescue them. Yet, another memory surfaced.

Some ten years ago, Jemi had been captured and locked up in the sunprisons of Mount Casca. The Beasts’ den had hemmed and hawed, but ultimately decided against trying to rescue her. The reasoning was that the Beasts had never managed to reach the sixth peak with the Cockatrice to lead them; how could they ever make it to the sunprisons leaderless? In the end, it was Jemi’s jailer who had released her. Still, a sense of guilt pervaded Asha now—should they have tried harder? They were supposed to be her friends.

And in the end, it was some random angel they still didn't know the name of, that had saved her.

Asha had no shadow of doubt that Jemi was, right now, doing everything in her power to find them. While Asha had always been a coward—one who only dreamt of going back to being an apex predator.

But while she was here, at least, she would gather as much intel as she could to help them. First things first… there were a few things that didn’t make sense.

“If your spiders know the way out, why can’t you just follow them out of the maze?” Asha said.

“The spiders listen to me for some things,” Ariadne said, “but they refuse to show me the way out. In the end, these spiders belong to the Labryinth. Something much older. That myth of yours is not entirely true, young Beast. Even though King Minos did put his son in here, the Labryinth was much older than him. Older than the moon, older than the sun. As old as the world itself.”

“You said that I could stand to learn from this Labryinth,” Asha pressed on. “Does it know anything about the Kraken?”

“The Kraken?” echoed the woman. “Now that’s an interesting question. Follow me.”