A new voice in the maze

Every day I woke up in a place simultaneously familiar and foreign to me. I'd spent what seemed like an eternity, or just a moment in this shifting maze, where every corridor and dead end changed.

Somehow I got used to it: never knowing right from left or safety from danger in my unknowable home.

I got used to feeling the world with my hands, it's dark so much more here than light. Almost like the world has been swallowed by a serpent, and I am condemned to navigate its twisting, roiling innards. Alone.

Though I know I wasn't always alone. I remember light; it's the only reason I can name this darkness. And more than that, I remember a more vivid light. My mother, who used to whisper stories of heroes and voyages as she rocked me, as she tried to hide me from a viciously cruel, blinding world.

Murmurs, jeers, curses. The accompaniment to my truncated childhood.

I faintly remembered a sister, sitting nearby and teasing the cats with a ball of string. My father is the only mystery in my idyllic, blistering memories.

But all of that is meaningless. Meaningless compared to the hunger I feel. I'm starved, thirsty, to the point that the water in the air has taste for me.

I could eat the sun right now. Anything to fill the gnawing in me. The memories of food only serve to starve me more, and I growl, scraping at the walls who've changed yet again.

Do I change? Or does this hellish, unrecognizable prison? I've spent years here, but this wall is shockingly new. None of the scuff marks I painstakingly carve into the walls are ever seen again.

No milestones, no marking, no history. Just a feeling of unease, and wrongness.

I run my fingers up and down the wall. There has to be something. Something that reminds me if I've seen this before.

It's stone. Cold, unmoving, and pitiless.

More pitiless than love, my mother would've said, a cunning, shining smile on her face.

Finally, in a burst of anger fuelled by hunger and twisted memories, I slam a hand into the wall.

There's a scream, and I stop, staring in astonishment at the wall. I ignore the blood trickling down my hand, and press an ear to it.

"Is someone there?" I ask, then I ask again, because my voice is little more than a withered rasp.

"Hello?" A shaky voice asks, sounding just as surprised as me.

I huff out an incredulous laugh. "Hello? Are you real?" I'm pressing into the wall now, wanting nothing more than to fall right through it.

There's someone here. Eerily close. There's someone here, and there hasn't been anyone here for...I struggle with the time and forget it, breathless to hear a voice that isn't in my head.

"Who are you?" The other voice asks, worriedly. "Are you one of...them?"

"I don't know who they are. I'm Asterion." I say quickly, wanting this stranger to be unafraid. The name just barely emerged. I remembered it by saying it aloud to myself, over and over. "Who are you? Who are they? Are there-"

"I'm Leon." The other person, a boy replied quickly, sounding pained.

"Are you hurt?" I asked, feeling agonized with worry. I hadn't had so much as a plant here to fret over, just flies. And those became annoying quickly.

This boy. Leon. I had to believe he wasn't a figment of my imagination, not a desperate trick conjured by my deprived mind.

It helped that I'd never heard a name like Leon.

The boy was breathing controlled, deep breaths and I waited anxiously.

"Yes," He finally answered through gritted teeth, and I felt his pain as my own.

I may not know love, or light, or a full stomach anymore. But I know pain.

"I'll find you," I promised immediately, though I had no idea how I would accomplish this.

Possibly centuries down here and I hadn't found myself or a way out, but I needed this more than I had needed anything else.

Fine, I needed food more. But aside from that, this was it in my miserable, half-life.

"Please." The boy hissed, and I nodded to myself, frantic.

"Keep talking to me, did you hear me? Just say something, anything. Tell me a story." All the words I knew were from stories.

"A story? Okay. Once-" Another hiss of pain, but his voice was strong. "Once there were two gods, demanding to be the patron of the greatest city."

That sound was everything to my ears. The only thing I could hear, that I needed to hear. I moved fast, feverishly fast, my skin alight.

The hunger that consumed me, drove me. I drew power from the abyss in my gut, pushing off of walls.

"-the gods battled, both completely different in their manner and realm. There was easily angered Poseidon, lord of horses and the sea. And the Grey-eyed Maiden, Athena."

The boy's voice took on a reverent tone, and I changed directions, sensing a louder sound from the right.

I chased down endless passages, following his story like a dog on a leash.

"Don't stop!" I shouted, my voice echoing, hearing his voice fade a little.

"-oh, sorry. Ahem. Poseidon struck his mighty trident in the ocean, and out of the curling, salty waves came horses, magnificently thundering onto the rocky beach-"

No, no, no! His voice dimmed, and I knew that somewhere I had turned wrong. I was desperate, and I paced, finally hearing his voice more clearly.

"-maiden, who smiled wisely. Instead of summoning-"

I nodded along to his foreign tale, feeling myself get closer. If this damned labyrinth stopped tricking me for just one moment.

"-olive trees. She was the clear winner," Leon said, his voice warm. "And the city was named thus in her honour-"

I didn't hear the last part, and I called out to him, dying for a sip of water, and dying for words. Real words, spoken to me.

"Athens." Leon repeated, and I heard him slide down a wall.

"Is this city a fabled one, of myth?" I panted, letting my blood mark yet another wall so I'd be able to turn back. I'd never heard of this place, so fondly embellished in Leon's words. With olive trees, sun, rocky shores.

Leon laughed a little, sounding wearily amused. "That's funny. You're right, it does feel mythical now. So far away..."

"So is it? Far?" I barely knew what I was asking, my voice cracked, stomach clawing at me with hunger.

The pangs grew louder as I ran more. When was the last time I'd had to run?

"Athens? I suppose so. I had to sit in a boat just to get here."

"A boat?" I questioned, my legs forcing me to collapse against a wall.

He didn't explain like I thought he would. Just kept talking. "By the Gods, my leg hurts so much...how much farther are you?"

"Can you figure out how to get to me?" I asked, then waited anxiously, terrified I had offended him. Accidentally, I straightened up and hit my head on the ceiling.

Leon's short laugh soothed the sting away. "Fair. This place is a...how do you say it?"

Both of us answered in unison, "Labyrinth."

"Yes. I-" Leon stopped then, seemingly struggling with his words.

"What?" I asked, forcing myself to keep moving. One lumbering step after another. One painful stride...then another...

"My father would kill me if I said this in front of him. But I guess he'd already killed me. I-" Leon paused again. "I'm thankful for you. This place is terrifying enough, and the others abandoned me immediately."

Something told me it had taken a lot to share those words. I frowned, unsure of why. "I'm always terrified here. I'm terrified of forgetting. Forgetting who I am, who I was. I'm terrified of dying alone by starvation down here."

Leon was quiet for a while. And I stopped, wondering what had happened to him.

"Leon?" I asked, my voice hoarse.

"Maybe it's a different kind of bravery for a man to admit his fears and keep moving." Leon finally said, sounding like the words were difficult. "I'm terrified of the monster."

"My father was scared of a monster too. But I think mostly, everyone was scared of him. Everyone has fears, Leon, even the monster." I said, words coming from nowhere.

They were familiar, and I wondered if mother taught me these words.

"How far are you now?"

I listened. His voice was frighteningly clear. And I was afraid. Afraid I'd enter the place and he'd be nothing.

That I'd be alone here. Forever. Sisterless, motherless, without a light, with no idea what I looked like anymore.

"How did you get here, Leon?" I asked, pausing. I wasn't there yet, but I was close. Too close.

"I was chosen."

"To suffer?" That made two of us then. Was I chosen?

I pictured my mother's sharp smile, and my sister's intelligent eyes. Did they want me to be here? Alone, cold, and starving?

"Apparently, to honour my city and save it."

"Save from what?" I asked, closing my eyes against the weakness. "Poseidon?"

"No, that got sorted ages ago. To save my city from the wrath of one of Zeus' sons."

"Zeus?" Such a familiar name.

"You say everything like it's a question!" Leon laughingly accused, but his voice wavered. "Yes, Zeus's son. You know that's why we are here-" His voice broke a little and I made up my mind, moving to where he was.

"We're going to die." Leon said, a sob surfacing in his voice. "It's going to kill us."

I was there. I squinted, and saw a bit of light in the distance. The walls looked beige, washed with the light of a very feeble flame.

I saw the edge of an arm around the corner at the end of the corridor. Of course, he'd hidden with the light, it was a human tendency to cling to it.

I had long outgrown these tendencies.

"Leon, the labyrinth kills slowly. You'll be fine. I'm so close, I can smell your blood." I was so hungry, my mouth was overflowing with saliva. I could barely understand a word Leon was saying.

"Yeah, and it can too. That's why they cut it, so it would come for me first. Wait, I can hear you now-" He poked his head out from around the corner.

I saw him narrow his eyes, then scream.

My voice, fragile from talking and eaten up by hunger, was gone. All that emerged was a growl.

My reason was eaten up next, and I charged, the scent of his blood too rich, too close.

He pushed off the ground, trying to run, but I slammed him into the wall. His feeble bones gave away, and I lunged at his throat.

I tore him to shreds, my teeth snapping and tearing. The abyss still screeched for more and I panted, staring into the pool of blood.

It puddled under one dismembered arm. And I saw...

I saw the monster. And it hungered now, because it could smell the other humans running around the labyrinth.

I dropped Leon's head from my mouth, inhaling the scent of fear.

My blood sang with life now, and my once smooth arms became thicker, hairier with coarse brown strands.

I roared and heard shrieks in response. Leon's kind calling out to me.

They called me through the labyrinth and I went, dying to satisfy my hunger.