The whole situation was hopeless. Perhaps she should run away—go somewhere where she would not be reminded of the Society and all that she was now shut off from. But what about her parents working in the Philippines, and Great-Uncle Hugh, Evelyn, and her friends at home? No, she couldn’t do that to them, particularly not when she knew how much they had suffered when she had disappeared for a week last year. But things couldn’t go on like this. She’d end up killing someone. Something had to be done about her—but with no help from the Society, and no one else to turn to, she couldn’t think what to do. It seemed no one understood her—least of all herself.
Argand snuffed the air and lifted her head on her long neck to look down the track. Connie peered over the top of a clump of brambles and saw Col and Rat climbing quickly toward them.
“I can’t meet them. They mustn’t see me!” she told Argand as she scrambled to her feet. It was difficult to hide up here; few places offered more shelter than the patch of brambles she had been concealed behind. Intuitively understanding Connie’s desire to avoid everyone, Argand launched into the air, leading Connie farther west and away from the boys, dancing in front like a golden torch.
Connie heard a shout behind her. They had spotted the light. Panic seized her. She was desperate to disappear.
Argand led Connie down a steep bank into a dry river valley. As she slid down the slope, Connie saw the lopsided sign warning of deep shafts ahead; they were approaching the old mines, long since abandoned when the seam of tin proved unprofitable. Her great-uncle had forbidden her to go anywhere near the workings, but Connie told herself that she would only go as far as the entrance and hide there. No harm could come to her while she was with Argand.
The entrance to the mines yawned ahead—a blacker shape in the gathering gloom. Mr. Masterson had fenced it off to stop his sheep or unwary walkers from stumbling inside, but the barrier was insufficient to stop a determined person from climbing it. Connie struggled over and crouched inside. The only sounds were her own breath, the rustle of Argand’s wings against her jeans, and the tinkling of water in the darkness beyond. Just as she thought she had given Rat and Col the slip, she heard someone crashing through the undergrowth, heading in her direction. She crawled in deeper, hoping that they would glance inside and conclude that she had gone another way.
“Connie!” called Col, his voice echoing off the tunnel walls. “We know you’re in there. We want to talk to you.”
Connie crouched as quietly as she could, holding her breath.
“Don’t be an idiot!” Col shouted again. “We don’t care what Coddrington says. We’re going to talk to you whether you like it or not!”
Connie heard two thumps as the boys clambered over the barrier. She got to her feet and began to edge a little farther in.
“Stay back!” she shouted. “You can’t come near me. I’m not safe.”
“’Course you’re not,” said Rat cheerfully, “but we can handle that. And the Society can shove their ban!”
“No, no, get back!”
Suddenly, she heard pounding footsteps behind her—felt a snort of hot breath down her neck—and two powerful arms grasped her around the waist. Connie screamed. Argand let out a jet of flame, which reflected off the wet walls in splinters of blinding light. Col gave a shout and Rat stumbled backward, crashing to the floor. The creature lifted Connie to his shoulder as if she weighed no more than a sheaf of corn and charged off down the tunnel, her screams growing fainter as he galloped sure-footedly away. Argand flew off in pursuit, letting out small blasts of fire at the kidnapper, fearing to unleash her full flame in case she hit Connie.
“What was that?” Rat gasped.
“A minotaur,” Col said, so stunned by what he had just seen that he had not yet moved.
“A what?”
“Bull-headed man. Guardians of labyrinths, underground mazes.” He shook himself. “Come on, we’ve got to go after them.”
“Then we’ll need a flashlight,” said Rat. “I’ll go back and borrow one from home. You stay here in case Argand or Connie return.”
“Okay. But hurry!”
Rat vaulted over the barrier, leaving Col alone, staring into the dark tunnel down which Connie had disappeared.
7
Minotaur
“Put me down!” Connie shrieked. “
Not until you are safe,” grunted the minotaur. He dodged to the left, avoiding a blast of flame from Argand, who was still in pursuit, and squeezed into a narrow passage. Connie heard the dragonet collide against the wall with a sickening thump—her wingspan too broad for this path.
“Argand!” Connie called. The dragonet squealed and hopped a few paces forward, but she could not hope to keep up without flight.
Connie bounced painfully up and down on the minotaur’s shoulder, her arms dangling, wondering when this nightmare would stop. It was pitch black, and she had no idea where he was taking her. Every time he leapt down an unexpected ledge or turned a corner, she was convinced they were going to plunge into one of the old shafts Hugh had warned her about—but so far the creature had pounded on without a stumble, as if he knew the mines perfectly even in the dark. The creature smelled of sweat and of the dusty old sacking he had fashioned into a tunic for himself. His breath came in hot bursts on her legs. Finally, he seemed to decide they had come far enough. He stopped, lifted Connie from his shoulder, and placed her carefully on a pile of old sacks. Afraid to move in the dark with the unseen creature so close, Connie waited.
There was a scrabbling and rasping, then a flash of light as sparks flew up from a flint. With the smell of burning straw strong in the air, the minotaur nurtured a flame in his makeshift hearth and soon had a fierce blaze going. The flickering light shone on the creamy curls of his chest and glanced off the smoother red bristle of his thick-set neck and head. His ears were twitched forward as he bent in concentration over his task. A gold hoop glistened in his wide-set nostrils. Shadows danced on the wall behind him, up to the glittering roof high above, magnifying his curved horns to an immense size. His man’s body, flushed red in the firelight, was strongly built, with arms that looked as if they could wrestle any beast into submission.
“I saved you, Universal,” the minotaur said proudly, poking a stick into the fire.
“Saved me?” Connie asked in bewilderment. She had thought it was him she needed saving from.
“You called, so I rescued you,” he said, turning to her. She saw that one of his large eyes was blinded by a milky white film. The other, dark and sad, looked unflinchingly at her. “I would not have dared touch you unless you had called. I am not worthy.”
“Not worthy!” exclaimed Connie. “You’ve clearly not heard, yet. It’s me that’s not worthy. You’re not even supposed to talk to me. The Society’s thrown me out.” Unaware of what she was doing, she ripped one of the old fertilizer sacks in her clenched hands as she recalled her expulsion.
“The Society doesn’t reach down here,” the minotaur said, not dropping his gaze for an instant. “This is where the outcast—the sick, the shamed—come.”
“Suits me then,” she said, causing the creature to laugh like wheezy bellows. Her fear of him was rapidly vanishing. “So why are you here?”
He sat back on his haunches and sighed. “Wounded in combat. I am no longer fit to fight.” He gestured to his blinded eye. “We minotaurs guard the world’s labyrinths, keeping the secrets of the underworld from the greedy eyes of humans. No one would set me to guard anything these days. That’s why I’ve come here—to this blank darkness, one of the many counterfeit labyrinths made by your kind. I’m no longer fit to be anyone’s companion.”
His despair and self-hatred were so palpable that Connie could not help herself—she had to comfort him. “That’s not true.” She threw off the sacks covering her legs and reached out to him. He backed away, his skin quivering, his eyes rolling, his good eye showing its white in fear, like a beast scenting the slaughterhouse. Determined to prove to thi
s creature that he did not need to shrink from her, Connie took his powerful fist in her hand. Closing her eyes, she sought out his mind, entering the passageways of his thought, calling for him in the torch-lit darkness. She sensed that he was hiding from her, keeping a few steps ahead, leaving only a glimpse of his tail whisking away around a corner or the echo of hooves pounding down distant corridors. She wondered if she should give up; there was no sense in blundering on unwelcome if he did not wish for this encounter.
Just as she was about to release his hand, she saw in her mind’s eye a shining thread lying on the ground. Stooping to pick it up, she gasped—the thread pulsed in her hand like a heartbeat. Following the trail, Connie made swift progress through the mind-maze, light growing stronger with every step. As she turned the final corner, she stepped out into blazing sunshine glancing off the hot sand of an arena. The stands were empty, but in the center a matador and bull were fighting each other—or were they dancing? With light sparkling from his costume, the matador swirled his scarlet cloak over the eyes of the bull as the creature dipped its gilded horns to lunge at the cloth. They whirled and twisted around each other in continual motion, attention only for the other, a dance that united man with bull. Connie sensed the courage in the heart of the minotaur, ready to serve others in the dark places of the earth far from his native element. The fight whirled faster. Wounded by spear and horn; flecks of blood spattered the ground from the bull’s scored hide and the matador’s gashed side. Connie drank in the bloodlust that rippled in a hot stream through the minotaur’s veins, a thirst for death and violence, held in check only by the rules of the dance.
You have that thirst, too, hidden very deep. All humans do, the minotaur told her. Their encounter had been reciprocal: while she explored his mind, he had been sounding hers.
I suppose so, Connie admitted reluctantly, thinking of the storm and the damage some part of her had enjoyed inflicting.
Yes, but there is more to that than you understand. There is something else lying deep down in the labyrinth of your mind, if you dared to seek it out.
Connie dropped her hand from his abruptly.
Let’s not go there, she said.
She opened her eyes to see the creature looking into her face.
“You should not be ashamed of what you are,” he said softly.
“Neither should you.”
He snorted. “I am no longer fully what I once was. You are still whole.”
“You shouldn’t think like that. Your eye—what does it matter?”
“Matter? It is everything—not because of the injury, but because it prevents me from undertaking the tasks I was born to; it denies me my birthright.”
The words were on Connie’s lips to say that she was sure the Society would be able to help him, find him some task that would help him regain his self-respect—then she remembered she was in no position to offer the Society’s aid to another.
“So,” she said, changing the subject from these painful thoughts, “who else is down here besides you? You said the sick, the injured, and the shamed come here. Who are they?”
The minotaur cast another log on the fire, sending a flurry of sparks up to the ceiling.
“Sick water sprites, homeless wood sprites, fractured rock dwarves—there are many creatures in need of a refuge, and they all end up here.”
“Where are they?”
“Waiting for you. They have been waiting for you ever since they learned that you were living nearby. They are waiting for you to make them whole again.”
“But I can’t heal them! I told you, I’m not allowed to be a universal anymore.”
“You will always be a universal: that is what you are, whether you are in the Society or out of it. You know this in your heart. Do you think I do not see the fear in you? You are afraid to use your powers in case something you cannot control happens again, is that not so?”
Connie nodded, recognizing the truth when she heard it spoken aloud.
“Are you going to let fear of what you might become stop you from growing? There are too many stunted lives down here already. We do not need another one to join us.”
As Connie gazed into the shadows at the edge of the pool of light, she noticed for the first time many pairs of eyes blinking back at her. There were hundreds of them—too many for her to distinguish clearly. The minotaur, following her look, spoke to the shadows:
“Come. Show yourselves.”
A trickle of brown water oozed into the light, running to Connie’s feet. When it reached her, a form rose out of the pool: a stooped body, emaciated arms, and blinded eyes, dressed in weedy rags of rippling cloth. Behind the water sprite, a wood sprite hobbled, its tail a broken stick, its coat bald, and the bark skin peeling in raw patches. A third creature stomped into the ring of light: a gray, dully shining rock dwarf with hood thrown back on his shoulders; his skull was split right across his face, giving his features a distressing lopsided imbalance, one eye a hand-width higher than the other. Many others followed, all bearing visible signs of injury or sickness—until Connie was surrounded by a crowd of beings, looking to her with hope gleaming in the depths of their eyes.
“How did they get to be like this?” Connie asked the minotaur, dismayed and shocked by the sight before her.
“Thanks to what your kind have done, thanks to your pollution, your digging and delving.”
“Like the refinery?” Connie guessed, her heart filling with scalding hatred for Mr. Quick and his collaborators.
“Some,” said the minotaur, gesturing to a few creatures huddled at the back. “But others sickened last year when the farmer here used too much fertilizer on his fields.”
“Mr. Masterson?” Connie said incredulously.
The minotaur nodded and pointed with a glowing brand to a group of wood sprites. “Those were displaced from the hedges when the meadows were plowed up for the new road; they were driven down here by the machines. None of them can move on and find new homes until you have healed them. That is the task of the universal.”
“But I don’t know how!”
“Then you should find out.”
Connie felt the pressure of the many eyes looking to her, believing in her. They did not understand how weak the person they trusted was. “But I’ve no access to the Society’s library now. How am I going to find out?”
“The answer lies not in books but in yourself, if you dare to seek it out. Yet, you are too afraid to do so?”
“Yes,” Connie admitted in a whisper. A disturbed rustle ran through the gathered creatures. A tear fell from the water sprite’s unseeing eyes.
“Why has the Society abandoned you all?” she asked desperately. Surely this wasn’t for her to solve on her own?
The minotaur grunted. “The Society has lost its way—it needs a universal at its head again to show how to care for every creature, especially those of us who have fallen by the wayside.”
“But the Society doesn’t want me either, let alone as its leader.”
“Then we, too, are lost.”
“Connie! Connie!” Voices were calling for her in the distance.
The minotaur rose to his feet and lifted his nose to scent the air. “They are pursuing you again. Shall I drive them off?”
“No!” Connie got up hastily. “They’re my friends. I was hiding from them because I felt ashamed.”
The minotaur nodded. “I understand that.”
“I should go back.”
The injured creatures were melting back into the shadows, a whisper of claws and feet on the stone floor as they passed.
“Yes, you should,” the minotaur agreed. “But think about what I have said. We need you. We need you to face your own labyrinth.”
Connie shook her head. “I’m not ready, yet.”
“No, but I will be here to help when you are,” he said gently, guiding her to the door of his cave and handing her a burning torch. “You’ll find your friends if you go straight down this passage. Do not go t
o the left—there is a deep shaft there that even I have never fathomed.”
Connie nodded to show she understood. “Well, goodbye.” She turned back to him. “But I don’t even know your name.”
“I have no name now,” he said, “not unless you can find it for me again. Good-bye, Universal.”
“Good-bye,” she said.
The door to the cave scraped shut behind her.
8
Pack Leader
Connie woke up on Christmas morning feeling more cheerful than she had since the disastrous interview with Mr. Coddrington. She got up, stood for a moment staring at her reflection in the mirror on her dressing table, and smiled. A spot of light had appeared in the darkness that had engulfed her since her expulsion. Col and Rat had stood by her—despite all she had done to them. And she had met the minotaur. Although he had alarmed her with his challenge to help all those creatures, she felt pleased to have a task she could do without the Society’s permission—if only she could find the courage to try. With that last thought, she turned her eyes away from the mirror, no longer liking what she saw there.
Wrapped up in her thickest coat and scarf, Connie slipped her way down the track to the cove. The sea was iron-gray, covered in worried wrinkles under the fretting of the breeze. Seagulls looped overhead. One dropped down to land at her side, a glittering fish in its beak.
“Hello, Mew,” Connie greeted the gull, bobbing a bow in response to hers. “I see you’ve had good fishing.”
Mew sliced the frosty air with her call, the fish dropping limp on the stones at her feet. Connie sat on the pebbles beside her, keeping a companionable silence while the bird breakfasted.