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The air was sharp with the promise of rain when Akira was sentenced to a punishment worse than death.
“For your assault against the King of Minos,” the haggard soldier decreed, unmoved by Akira’s pale face and unshed tears, “It has been decided that redemption can only be gained by slaying the monster who roams the labyrinth.”
The labyrinth whose entrance was nothing more than a yawning pit nestled in a dark copse of trees, an uneven hole of darkness that suffocated any hope or light in it. Akira’s feet were close to the edge, gravity tugging teasingly at the end of his robes as the soldiers held his arms in a bruising grip, keeping him firmly in place. A bird was singing somewhere overheard, a shrill, cheerful sound that was out of place in this strange nightmare.
“I don’t- I don’t have a weapon-” Akira tried, his voice raspy and weak. It didn’t matter, he knew. Even if he had a weapon in hand crafted by Wakaba herself, he was no match for the legendary Monster of Minos. He was a son of a merchant, unimportant and untrained in the ways of monster slaying and heroism. This quest for redemption was just a cruel execution.
“You will find a weapon amongst the dead,” his judge and executioner told him callously, and gestured with a hand.
Akira didn’t get the chance to cry out when his captors’ hands shoved at him. He tumbled down into the black pit, and into the inescapable hell within.
Goro’s life was defined by hallways.
Sometimes they turned right. Others left. Sometimes he caught glimpses of light above, searing bright and twinkling like a dying flame. Sunlight, something in his mind supplied, unknowing of it but his soul yearning for it regardless. Those glimmers of light stayed so far out of reach, glaring down at him and his labyrinth, his hallways that turned left or right, endlessly, for eternity, with no exit in sight.
Sometimes people came. Many of them were evil, the scent of blood and sins and cruelty thick and cloying around their shivering, sweaty bodies. Goro’s hallways were hellish enough without sharing his space with them, so he slew them where they stood, as was in his blood, their soft bodies rupturing from the gentlest of blows from his blade, bones shattering from the weakest of taps from his fists, spines snapping from the lightest of stomps from his hooves. Flimsy, ephemeral creatures, these evil beings were.
Sometimes other people came. They weren’t evil. They were confused, frightened, petty, maybe, crying and screaming when they spotted him. When he approached to ask how they came to be here, they would flee deeper into the labyrinth. Inevitably he would find their corpses later, dessicated and limp, half-eaten by the vermin that shared these hallways with him. They chose a pathetic death over conversing with him, the Monster.
Monster. It’s the Monster! Don’t hurt me! Don’t kill me! Get away from me! Monster! Monster! Monster!
It was hard to remember that he had a name.
Endless hallways. Left, right, left, right, left, right, endless, endless, until-
Goro’s ears perked at a familiar scream - a noise that started faint then crescendoed, accompanied by the solid thumps of a body hitting stone and the breathy whine of pain. It was two lefts away. Goro set off at a languid pace, lifting his snout into the air and inhaling deep.
Fear. Resentment. Indignation. Anger - lots of it. Uncertainty.
No evil. Another innocent.
more and more of them lately, Goro thought, even though he had no concept of time here, in the lonesome dark. The sound of his hooves striking the cracked stone echoed ominously around him, and he heard the scrabble of someone climbing frantically to their feet - just as he rounded the last left, his head held low and eyes narrowed against the gloom.
Standing in a halo of light, a twinkling glimpse of the sun above illuminating the newest prisoner, a pale-faced man stood. There was blood on his brow, his robes - cut and tailored to him, black - were rumpled and scuffed, his hands held up as if caught between surrendering or curling into defensive fists. He was small, as all men were, and his eyes were so bright and silvery, it reminded Goro of the chains that originally bound him into one spot, until he tore and wrenched at them enough that he broke his own limbs but freed himself.
Silver. Metal. Burning. Burning bright with anger.
Goro exhaled, heavily, a loud bull-like snort that made the man jump nervously. He flexed his fingers around the hilt of his sword - a smouldering, enchanted blade that rested wearily on his shoulder, at the dip in his singular pauldron - and took one step forwards. His hoof struck the ground with the finality of a sword to a vulnerable vertebrae.
The man, predictably, scurried back several steps - but he did not run. Curious.
“W-Wait,” the man stuttered, bright silver-metal-chain eyes blinking rapidly. Tears clung to the eyelashes, “Wait, this is a mistake, I’m not- I’m not here to-”
Goro stopped, intrigued. His ears flicked forwards once, to show interest, and he cleared his throat, a low, rumbling noise that echoed like a growl around them. He spoke little, as his voice tended to send his visitors into hysterics, but some days he was so lonely he spoke to himself, to the hallways. The words came out clumsy and unpractised, mimicking the strange accent of the terrified who died here. He recognised that it was a little unhinged, to repeat the crying begs of the past prisoners here, but it was better than the oppressive, persistent silence digging its claws into his eardrums.
“You’re… a prisoner. Here, now. Accept. It,” Goro tried, his voice rusty from disuse - utterly monstrous.
Yet, the man did not flee from him. He gaped, instead. Struck speechless with fear? Frozen with terror?
“You… spoke? You can talk?” the man whispered, a little rudely at that. Inexplicably, he stepped forwards, his eyes bright with something unfamiliar to him. Not anger, not fear, something - light? Unfamiliar. Goro was wary, “You can talk?”
Goro retreated back a step, uncertain. This wasn’t normal.
“No! No, don’t be scared,” the man said, and Goro wondered if maybe this man was unhinged himself, “I was just surprised, I thought…”
The man didn’t finish. The fear had completely vanished from him now, his gaze filled with something more familiar - calculation. Goro recognised it from the King of Minos, many, many years ago, when weighing the worth of this pet monster the gods had saddled him with. What worth did the Monster of Minos have for this prisoner? Quite a lot, if the prisoner wanted to survive. Goro understood that.
“I’m Akira,” the man introduced himself, his tone warm. It was a strange thing to hear, directed at himself, “Do you have a name?”
Goro snorted again, the uncertainty of this situation unnerving him, but the novelty of it making him stay. He was intrigued, so intrigued by this strange, unusual creature…
“Monster. Of Minos,” he replied.
“I’m not calling you Monster,” Akira huffed.
But that is what he was.
Goro shrugged, not motivated to tell him his name. It was getting tiresome, looking down at the man, small as he was, so he squatted down, hooves scraping against the stone as he made himself comfortable, blade nestled in the natural crook of his neck and his head lowered beneath the weight of his horns.
Heavy. Everything was always heavy, yet he had no place to set his burdens except on the cold, unforgiving floor. Goro was tired.
The man, Akira, drew even closer. He was just out of arm’s reach, though if Goro felt energetic enough he could lean forwards and snatch him up by the scruff if he so wished. He observed the human from beneath his forelock hanging over low over his eyes, his nostrils flaring as he snorted again. Akira didn’t even blink at the loud, inhuman noise.
“...you know, the stories say the Monster of Minos is a maneater, and a mindless brute who only cares about killing,” Akira said, “But so far you haven’t eaten me or menaced me.”
“You’re not… an evil man,” Goro explained, his throat already hurting from the strange exertion that was ‘talking’, “Only criminals… punished.”
“How do you know I’m not evil?” Akira asked, something shadowed creeping in his expression, “I was… the King of Minos sentenced me for attacking him. I assaulted a king.”
Goro couldn’t help it. He let out a rasping, guttural laugh, his shoulders heaving from the effort. It succeeded in making the strange human jump back a step, startled from the noise.
“Attacking him,” Goro let the black hatred distort his voice into a snarl, “Is a… virtue. He is. True evil.”
If the King of Minos ever foolishly wandered into his labyrinth, they wouldn’t find enough left of him to fill a fucking thimble. Goro would grind that worm into fine powder and grind that beneath his hooves until nothing remained.
Akira stared at him, his expression unreadable.
“...you’re not a monster at all, are you?” he murmured, mostly to himself, “You’re just… what? A prisoner?”
“Yes. So are you,” Goro cleared his throat again, shaking his heavy head, “Trapped here.”
A strange quiet passed between them. A thin line of blood creeped down along the cut of Akira’s jaw. His head wound was still bleeding, yet the human didn’t seem to notice except to absently swipe his bloodied temple with the back of his hand carelessly.
“S-So…” Akira’s breathing came out unsteadied, “You only kill… criminals?”
“Yes.”
“And you think…” Akira swallowed, his eyes bright with that unfamiliar emotion again, hazed with unshed tears, “I’m not a criminal?”
“I know. You’re not,” Goro corrected. Perhaps it was a gift to go along with this curse the gods had bestowed upon him at birth, but he had a nose for evil. True evil, not the petty sort that all humans dealt in. There was a time where his labyrinth only ever had those foul vermin tossed in here, but in recent times more innocents came, judged ‘evil’ for the crime of speaking out against the King of Minos.
If the gods were just, they would throw the King of Minos down in here to be dealt with.
“Oh,” Akira looked overwhelmed. After a pause, he came closer, sitting down right in front of Goro. He stared at the large hoof within arm’s reach and… actually reached out.
Goro watched, curious, as the human carefully touched his hoof. It was cloven and wide, a dark ebony colour with tufts with soft speckles of grey and white. Slowly, Akira’s exploratory touch reached higher, stroking the soft fur along his ankle. The touch was - strange. Goro felt himself shiver, his fingers flexing uncertainly around the hilt of his blade, but the contact was not painful. It was just… strange.
“Your fur is so soft…” Akira said faintly, “And I’m… touching the Bull of Minos. I’m touching you.”
“You are,” Goro said, warily eyeing the human. What was happening.
The human said nothing else for a long while. They both sat there, Akira stroking the soft fur of Goro’s ankle, and Goro observing this odd, bizarre creature with keen interest. His frame of reference for humans were either the King of Minos or those tossed down here, so Goro couldn’t say if this behaviour was normal. In any case, it was far better than getting screamed at, so he had no complaints.
However…
“There is… water, not far,” Goro broke the silence awkwardly, but it stirred the human from his dazed staring at his hoof, “I can take you?”
“Oh, uh…” Akira briefly looked confused, but then he touched his cheek, still damp with blood, and made an odd expression. It was like a smile but not, eyes narrowed as if in pain - but not. A smile? “Yes, please. That’s kind of you.”
Kind?
Goro said nothing. He snorted uncomfortably, thrown but intrigued, and heaved himself up. His hooves clomped loudly as he stood up, and Akira rose to his feet as well. With Goro slouching slightly beneath the weight of his horns and blade, Akira barely came up to his chest. Humans were so small.
“This way,” Goro said, and he turned away, recalling how many lefts and rights were needed to reach the spring. It was small, but it was one of the very few landmarks Goro knew about. He walked.
And he wasn’t alone. His footsteps all but drowned out beneath the heavy strikes of Goro’s hooves, Akira walked alongside of him. He was silent, but the company was… nice. Strange, but nice. Goro hoped the human wouldn’t die too quickly, but if he stayed with him, then perhaps his survivability would rise.
What did humans need? Water, food and… sunlight? Did they need sunlight? Goro scrounged up a mental map of the labyrinth, the few locations he had memorised for sheer survival, and adjusted his monotonous routine to accommodate his new companion. Warmth, that was what humans needed. The labyrinth was cold, and humans did not have fur like him. Water, food and warmth.
Goro snorted as he nodded, a strange feeling rising in him. Excitement? Yes, excitement. He was excited.
Finally, there was something to focus on other than the endless lefts and rights of his prison.