Radley's Labyrinth for Horny Monsters by Annabelle Hawthorne (highly recommended books .txt) 📕

let him know. “And where did all this food come from? It looks like you were ready for a feast.”

“Just because your friends are under my thrall doesn’t mean I was going to give them moldy bread and water. I may be a lot of things, but a bad host I am not.” She picked up a goblet full of wine and swirled it with a twist of her wrist. “And since you want something less formal to call me, you may call me Ratu.”

“Ratu. That’s a pretty name.”

“Thank you.” She smiled over her goblet. “I picked it out just for you.”

Mike finished making his plate, then slid it in front of Tink. “Eat up. You must be hungry.”

Tink threw Ratu a dirty look, then obeyed, grabbing a handful of biscuits while Mike filled up another plate for himself.

“Tell me how you came to be here and what your job is, Ratu,” Mike said. “The more I know about you, the more I think we can understand each other.”

“Okay.” She sipped from her goblet, then set it down. “Let’s start with the Labyrinth. It has been here far longer than I, and Asterion has been here just as long. This room used to be where the most dangerous magical artifacts were stored, but that is no longer the case.”

“I thought that was what the Vault was for?”

Ratu smiled demurely. “The magic items that were stored here were some of the most dangerous objects ever conceived by man or myth. The previous Caretaker, Emily, brought me here for the singular purpose of studying these objects. I am well versed not only in the creation of such things but their destruction as well.”

“Are you a dragon? I hope I’m not being rude, but you have a treasure chamber, and you seem very powerful. The giant snake thing doesn’t hurt either.”

“I am not a dragon, though I was mistaken for one once.” She stretched her neck dramatically, the scale pattern flashing all the way across her skin and face. “I am a naga from Indonesia. I came here because Emily promised me a safe place to live. In some ways, she delivered on that promise, but in others, I have become a prisoner.”

“Tell me more.” Off to his side, he could hear Tink stuffing her face. “How is this a prison for you?”

“Emily brought me here under the guise of dismantling the worst of the worst. Seven artifacts, each one scarier than the last. The more powerful the artifact, the harder it is to destroy.”

“The geas seems super powerful, but that woman up there seems to be making fast progress. Isn’t that the same thing?”

“I wondered about the banging down here. The geas, in a way, is just the shield. Now that you are the Caretaker, you must find a way to wield the sword. Bang on any shield long enough, and it will finally give.” Ratu set down her goblet. “The objects I was working with, however, were like barely contained wildfires.”

“Such as?”

“I would prefer not to say for reasons that will become clear. Another analogy. The Ark of the Covenant. You have heard of this, yes?”

“Indiana Jones?”

Ratu gave him an odd look. “No, it was created by Moses at the instruction of the Hebrew God. A powerful magical talisman that brought grave misfortune to anyone it considered an enemy. Fires, floods, boils. In the hands of the believer, however, it could confer divine blessings.

“Consider this. Magic is like energy. It cannot be destroyed once harnessed. If you were to take apart the covenant, destroy it, what sort of magic could you gather from it?”

Mike pondered this, chewing on a hunk of cheese. “Would it matter who took it apart? An enemy versus a believer?”

“It would. And the intent would matter too. If an enemy were to destroy it, they could end up with magic capable of bringing catastrophic ruin. If done correctly, this magic could also be gathered in such a manner to create a divine object capable of bestowing blessings.”

“Then why bother destroying the ark? If you are going to harvest the magic anyway, then why not keep it the way it is?”

“Because you have destroyed another object and harvested its magic. You are now assembling magical ingredients of the highest quality, potentially building a weapon that has no business existing. So when you destroy a magical item of such a nature, you must find somewhere to put that energy so that it cannot be used in that manner. And this was where my problems began.”

“How so?”

“I come from a race of semidivine beings. Not quite gods, not quite mortals. As such, we can be bound by the rules of both. Emily asked me if I would be willing to dismantle these objects she had acquired in order to rid the world of them. In exchange, I could leave my home, which was rapidly becoming developed and polluted, and come live here.

“It was all in the wording of our agreement. Because the magic needs to be put somewhere else, Emily provided me a vessel to channel the magical energy into, and I got to work, bound to fulfill my promise. What I didn’t understand was that my desire for a more peaceful existence would blind me to a certain inconvenient truth.”

“She wanted those objects broken down for a reason, didn’t she?”

Ratu nodded. “I suspected that something was up when she brought me here through a one-way portal, not the house. The others had no knowledge of me, and I never had visitors. Emily checked on my progress at first, and I realized that the vessel she had given me was built for something far more sinister.”

“What was the vessel?”

Ratu contemplated Mike for a long time, then shrugged. “I suppose it won’t hurt to show you. Once I found out Emily was no longer alive, I siphoned the magic off the artifact to create that tiny sun over our heads. Until a year ago, all I had were the torches.” She