Chapter#12

Asterion grabbed Beth by the hand to steer her around part of the passageway that looked no different from the others. The Labyrinth was heavily booby-trapped, and when she looked back, she still couldn't see what he had actually steered her around.

"What would have happened if we had gone through the middle?"

"Crushed. Then drowned." When they neared the other side, he slid in between a couple of stalagmites. She stepped through with him and discovered another side cave. Every time he escorted her through the Labyrinth, it was a different path. She wondered how he kept track of it all.

Asterion barely fit through a narrow gap in the wall, but when he emerged, it was into the bright central chamber of the Labyrinth. Half of the chamber was stacked full of magical items and treasures with long tables dedicated to their organization. The other half of the chamber was neat and tidy with a small oriental temple in the corner. It was only about twenty feet tall and looked like it would fit in perfectly at a golf course, but Beth knew that the temple was actually larger on the inside. Large silken clothes were hung, flapping in the light of the torches that had self-ignited when they arrived.

Up above, a large gemstone gave off light like a tiny sun, warming the cavern. It was held in place by a series of chains hooked to the rocks below.

"I will get her." Asterion sat Beth down at a table with a small tea set and a journal. Oddly enough, a pretty silver necklace with a blue stone hung from a small display stand in the middle. Beth set her backpack down and poured herself some tea. Steam floated up from her cup. She added just a touch of honey from the jar by the tea set, stirring it in with her spoon.

Several minutes passed. Beth had crossed her legs, the one on top bouncing anxiously. She caught movement out of the corner of her eye and turned to look. The blue pendant swung like a tiny pendulum. At first Beth thought she had bumped the table, but realized her legs had been nowhere near it. The necklace did seem quite pretty, however, and she leaned forward to get a better look at it.

The way the gem had been cut, it seemed to be infinitely deep. She couldn't see out of the other side, instead staring into an azure abyss with a tiny light at the end. Puzzled, she lifted it up to get a good look at it from underneath.

"Nice try." Ratu snatched the necklace out of Beth's hands, making her jump. She held the gem between her scaly fingers, gently placing it back on its holder. "You'll have to do better next time."

"Excuse me?"

"I apparently need to remind you that you aren't supposed to be touching anything while you are here."

Beth's cheeks flushed. "I'm so sorry, I don't know what came over me."

Ratu's features softened. She had a slightly oriental look to her, punctuated with patches of snakeskin with long dark hair that Beth would kill for. She wore a pretty red kimono today with a gold band around the middle. "I'm afraid the fault partly lies with me. I wasn't expecting anyone down here today and this thing certainly does grab your attention."

"What is it?"

"Just something I found by the lake. Don't worry, it isn't related to the thing we destroyed out there." She was referring to a powerful otherworldly artifact she had Mike destroy that nearly killed them both beneath the frozen lake. "However, this thing would seem to fairly dangerous in its own right."

"What does it do?"

"Nothing you need to worry about." Ratu waved the long sleeve of her kimono over the necklace and it disappeared. Once gone from sight, Beth felt her interest in it decline exponentially. It was like the necklace had hypnotized her or something. "What brings you here today? More news on our missing artifacts?"

"I wish." Beth opened her backpack and pulled out the bagged rat. She handed it to Ratu who opened the bag and pulled the deceased rodent out by the base of its tail. "What do you know about this?"

"It's a rat." Ratu tossed it on the table. "A very big one. And it stinks."

"It attacked Mike. It's part of a kingdom of rats living between the walls of the house."

"Kingdom?" Ratu lifted an eyebrow. "Is there an actual rat king?"

"Yeah. Mike said he even had on a crown."

"Interesting. So they are capable of communicating and at least sub-human intellect?"

"I guess so. Know anything about them?"

"Not really. A rat king is actually a term for something else, but now I wonder if that's just a misinterpretation. What else do you know about this king of rats?"

"He told Mike that we all had to move out, then dropped him through a trapdoor."

"Fascinating." Ratu stroked her chin, deep in thought. She waved her free hand and the teapot floated in the air to pour another cup of tea. Milk and honey were added before the cup hopped across the table and then into Ratu's hand. "A rat king is supposedly just a mass of rats connected at the tail, but maybe that's a metaphor for something else. However, it is considered a bad omen to see one, which I bet is not a metaphor. It usually signifies famine, plague or something else equally bad."

"You mean like a rat army? I would call that bad enough."

"Indeed." Ratu sipped at her tea. "And you said they had chewed a hole in the house?"

"They live in between the walls, and used their own shit to block off the locks on the new second floor. We assume they are living in all of those rooms butt don't know for sure yet."

"I heard about the clogged locks. So they have claimed a stake in the house and made a further claim on the rest of the home." She shook her head. "I'm afraid that I don't have a quick fix for you. There was a magic item in the missing objects list that would turn the wearer into a cat, but I'm afraid that's the best I have off the top of my head. I don't know that becoming a cat spirit would do any good unless you were willing to catch and kill them all one at a time."