‘I’m not going to stand here and say that what happened doesn’t suck. It does. But you’re Jack West fucking Jr. You found the Seven Ancient Wonders and the Six Sacred Stones. You’re the fifth greatest warrior, the guy who won the Great Games and you didn’t come this fucking far just to come this fucking far! You never give up, even when you’re hanging by your fingernails with all the odds in the world stacked against you!’

And then Lily’s voice cracked and she couldn’t hold back her own tears.

‘You’ll see her again, Dad. You will. But right now you’re still here. And we got some really bad dudes to stop. Grieve later, but not now. All my life I’ve watched you and wondered what it is that makes you a hero. And I figured it out: it’s trying when nobody else thinks it’s even worth trying, when the odds really are stacked against you or when your friends and family are taken away from you. You’ve done this all your life. And maybe this is the hardest example of that—going on without Zoe—but this is who you are. This is what you do. We still have a job to do and I need you fully focused to do it!’

She stopped speaking.

Jack’s eyes were still downcast.

Then, slowly, he began to nod.

When he looked up at her, there was fire in his eyes.

‘I understand, kiddo,’ he said in a low voice.

Lily hugged him tightly.

‘Oh, Dad, I’m so sorry,’ she said as she gripped him.

Jack just held her.

Then they separated and, together, began walking down the endless tunnel again.

‘Nice speech, by the way,’ he said.

‘Don’t ask me to do it again. It all just kinda came blurting out. Stream of honesty, I guess.’

‘Tell me what you really think next time.’

‘That’s what family is for,’ she said as she took his hand and they walked onward into the darkness.

Most of the time, the tunnel either sloped steadily downward in curving arcs or stretched away in long flat straight sections.

On a few occasions it bent upward, via sets of broad steps that spanned the width of the tunnel.

Eager to catch up to their rivals, Jack, Lily, Easton and Smiley the bronzeman jogged in the descending and flat stretches. They walked when the tunnel ascended.

During one of those long trudges up a set of wide stairs, Easton said, ‘Minotaurs in the Underworld tell story about this Labyrinth. Old story, famous story. About prince named Theseus and minotaur named Asterion.’

Jack nodded as he walked. ‘Sure. That’s a very famous legend outside the Underworld, too.’

Easton’s eyes lit up. ‘Really? The story of the evil prince Theseus and the hero minotaur he left to die in the Labyrinth? Wow.’