Page 141 of Find My Way Down to You

I jog after him. “Do you know where you’re going?”

“No.”

“Shouldn’t you ask me, then? Being that I’ve been trapped in here since—I don’t know—the dinosaurs were alive?”

Cary spins on his heel, glaring. “And how far didyouget?”

I jut my chin, defiant. “Obviously farther than you’re getting us.”

“You were sitting in that very spot”—he points back the way we came—“when I found you. At the labyrinth’sbeginning.”

“After being in this spot”—I stomp a foot—“multiple times.”

His scowl deepens.

I let out a long-suffering sigh. “I’ve tried this path. It doesn’t go anywhere.” I look around. “Is there even a way out of here?”

“Of course there is,” Cary says confidently. “My brother is cruel, manipulative. But he also sees no fun in watching anyone instantly fail. He wants someone to rise to his challenges. Fight back.”

A small smile twitches against his mouth. Like he’s remembering a different Milos. Maybe the one he ran through the Meadows with. Hid in dark corners with. The brother Cary had before he made a choice that changed them.

Empathy crowds into my chest.

I made a choice too, that changed everything. That leftme alone, even when I was surrounded by people.

We’re not so different, Cary and me.

Idly picking at a vine, he asks, “What should we do?”

I fall back against the wall, rubbing my temples. The leaves shift around me. Flower petals brush my cheek in a gentle kiss.

“August, staying here is not an option.”

“I know,” I snap. In the distance, I hear the whispers, chants. Hollowed voices growing. Cary’s face says he hears them too.

Grimly, he says, “The souls who made a deal with Milos. For a second chance. They will do anything to escape.”

My shoulders quiver. “Can we help them?”

He shakes his head. “They are not who they once were. They have been here too long.”

Anger builds in me. How could anyone be loyal to Milos? All that charm and unnerving beauty is hiding how insidious he really is.

“Come on. We need to keep going.”

I hesitate. Underneath the buzzing, there’s a faint, almost recognizable noise. I close my eyes, concentrating.

Listen carefully.That’s what Henri told me.

I hear a song. The rhythmic sway of waves.

Water.

It was too quiet before. Buried by the blood roaring in my ears while running. My feet pounding the stone floor. Every thought in my head, incessantly loud. But it’s here now. As constant as my heartbeat.

“Down here.”

This time, it’s Cary who has to move fast to keep up. He’s sure-footed behind me. I lead us through a windier path, different from the previous one.