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♫ (Invisible Calls from the) Soaring Sirens ♫
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I enter the corridor, guided by the red thread. I stumbled across it by chance while wandering through this endless, labyrinthine palace. There must be someone else here! And if this someone is laying a thread, then it will either lead me to them—providing a welcome change in my monotonous diet—or it will lead to the entrance through which they came. And what is an entrance for them is an exit for me!
So I follow the thread through the labyrinth. And sure enough: daylight and the distant roar of the sea. How I have missed the sun during these lonely years! At the end of the corridor, I see blue sky. And a figure. It is a woman. I have to blink. She looks familiar. “Sister!” I say. My voice sounds strange and rusty—I haven’t used it in a long time.
“You have no place out here,” she replies. She has aged. Do I see streaks of gray in her hair?
“I followed the thread.”
“That was Daedalus’s design.” I might have guessed. She sees my gaze fall on her black armband. “Father…” she says, and swallows.
“Then I am king now.”
“Fat chance,” says a new voice behind me. A sharp pain shoots through my back, and I see the gleaming tip of a sword protruding from my chest. I want to say something, but my lungs refuse to fill with air. My legs buckle, and I sink to my knees.
From here, I can see the sun, now blindingly consuming the world that just moments ago stood open to me, until my sister steps toward me, casting her shadow over me as she leans down, and a merciful, all-encompassing darkness embraces me.