The Flame in the Maze Read Online Free PDF Page A

in the labyrinth. Yes,” she went on, as his mouth-beak fell open, “she is. She disguised herself as an Athenian, and I noticed her too late—as she was leaping through the doorway. Two months ago, Icarus. And in barely two more the mountain will be on fire.”
    He went to Phaidra and hunkered down in front of her. “Phai,” he said quietly. “Is it true? Is Chara inside too?”
    Phaidra nodded. “Though I didn’t,” she began, and cleared her throat, “I didn’t know about Father’s plan.” They gazed at each other, as unblinking as Minos, until Ariadne said, “So, Icarus?”
    He glanced over his shoulder at her. “Your mother will put the fire out.”
    â€œShe will try. But this will be like no other fire. Her power may be no match for his.” She put her lamp on the ground and walked around Daedalus. She set her hand on Icarus’s hair, which was smooth, not matted with filth, as she’d expected it to be.
    â€œIt should not matter why I want in,” she said. “You should not care.” She drew her fingertips down through his hair and felt him shiver. “Four years ago you would have longed to do my bidding.”
    She knelt behind him and wove her arms around his chest. His shoulder blades were sharp against her breasts, and the tips of some of his feathers were sharp too, but she didn’t flinch. She pressed her skin against his and breathed slowly, grateful that for some reason he didn’t stink too terribly; grateful that his own breath shuddered and rasped.
He still wants me—of course he does, probably more than ever, because he’s seen no one but his poor, ruined father, all these years.
    He stood, drawing Ariadne up with him, and turned in the circle of her arms so that he was facing her. “And what will you give me, if I help you?” She did flinch a bit, this time; his twisted lips were very close and she smelled the old, stale air that seeped between them.
    She slipped out of his arms and took two paces back. Undid the clasp of her jacket and pulled it open, and watched his eyes travel from her face to her breasts, and stay there. It didn’t matter that they were lumpy with old burns—nor that her arms and hands were. She saw him drink her in as if he were dying of thirst.
    Phaidra rose and ran for the mouth of the corridor, but Ariadne hardly noticed her, nor Daedalus, who stirred and moaned. She lifted her hands and ran her middle fingers around her nipples, and as they hardened she began to untie the girdle at her waist.
Think only of Theseus. Think only of Icarus leading you to him. Think only of Athens, where you will be queen.
    â€œNo.”
    She barely made out the word, because just then the outer door screeched open and clanged shut.
    â€œNo,” he said again, in a voice that she was sure meant
yes
. His tiny round eyes were still on her breasts, so she cupped them and stepped toward him. Her thumbs made languid circles on her own skin.
    â€œYes, Icarus. You will have me here, now—perhaps again at the mountain, under the open sky? Put your hands on me and—”
    He walked to where she stood and stopped with his thin, feather-splotched chest almost touching her. “No,” he whispered, and smiled, and walked away from her.
    He knelt beside Daedalus. She whirled to look down on them both. There was a pressure in her belly, rising, squeezing her breath away—but her voice rang out anyway. “So your hatred of me is stronger than your desire to help your friends.”
    Icarus shrugged a bony shoulder. “The gods will see to their fates. And yes.”
    Daedalus’s dark eyes watched Ariadne fumble with the clasp of her jacket. “Then your father will help me,” she said, “because I’ll make sure neither of you gets any food; I’ll starve you, and he’ll beg to show me the labyrinth—you will