Thirty-Four:

The Minotaur's trail was fresh enough that evening for Spot to find and enter the maze. A steady downwind made the maze impossible to backtrack.

"Please," said the Minotaur. "Step forward."

"You have Mademoiselle Princess," said Spot. "You must release her."

"You're in a position to ask me for nothing," said the Minotaur. "In any event, she isn't my prisoner. I found her at a vulnerable moment, and simply gave her a safe place. She'll only stay where she is for as long as she believes leaving risks misfortune."

"You deceive her?" said Spot. "Life is no game in which you play the trump card, sacrifice another, and still call yourself the winner. In which to bluff is a virtue."

"Listen, Your Majesty," said the Minotaur. "Castle-dwellers like you have as much freedom as the attention you get. Your prosperity is an insult to any creature who has to pay attention to anything. And while Ariadne is perfectly safe where she is, I've deceived no one. I am no one's oppressor. I oblige others nothing, unlike the royalty you present yourselves as." Before Spot or the Minotaur spoke further, a voice called into the depths of the maze.

"Hello?" said Brian. "Hello, is anyone there? I hear talking."

"...oh, sacre bleu," said Spot. "Monsieur le Brian, why do you not stay at the castle instead of throwing away your life to follow me as I have caught you now?"

"I haven't thrown away my life. I'm here to accept the Minotaur's dare." Brian waited for the Minotaur's laughter to die down. "This afternoon at the castle, the first thing you said was that you wanted to duel the King's champion. You came to challenge me."

"Well, yes, Human, I did," said the Minotaur. "I did it to goad Its Majesty to instead challenge me and allow me to control the terms of the duel."

"Well that doesn't change that you dared me," said Brian. "I accept."

"Very well, Human," said the Minotaur. "What weapons will we duel with? Axes, pistols, chainsaws?"

"I would like to pick the nature of our duel, as a privilege of accepting your dare," said Brian. "Give us the crown and leave us to escape the maze."

"You can't ask that," said the Minotaur. "You have the privilege to pick weapons. Or to refuse the duel. In which case I don't owe it to you to leave you the crown."

"Our weapons," said Brian, "will be our fidelity to reality."

"What delicious innovation to killing you do you refer?" said the Minotaur.

"We will test our knowledge," said Brian. "Whoever has an account proven more unfaithful to reality is the loser."

"By simply leaving you here," said the Minotaur. "Which I will do anyway. With the stakes your lives for the crown?"

"Yes," said Brian. "Since our lives are part of the stakes in this duel, losing the match if you kill us is only fair."

"If your deaths give me what I want, what's to stop me from simply killing you now?" said the Minotaur. "What if I don't care to win the duel?"

"Because blah-blah-blah, privilege is an insult to freedom," said Brian. "Blah, blah, blah. Say, is this a labyrinth in which the unwary enter, only to be lost forever? Or doesn't this place have a news shop that serves fresh donuts and hot coffee?"

"Monsieur le Brian," said Spot. "Do not forget Mademoiselle Princess."

"And tell us where the princess is," said Brian.

"Why should I do even one kind thing for you?" said the Minotaur.

"Because if you don't," said Brian, "after we win the duel, we will return to the maze and live with you forever."

"Enough, Human," said the Minotaur. "You'll die in the maze faster than you finish the negotiation of our duel. She's in the tower at the southern bay of the island. You are free to leave. Go." The Minotaur left Brian and Spot to the mercy of the labyrinth.

"Alas, we are doomed," said Spot. "Monsieur le Brian, perhaps it is not too late to ask Monsieur le Cow Head to kill us rather than leave us to wander the complex and endless maze."

"—no," said Brian. "Don't call back the Minotaur."

"Oh, and I suppose you have the idea better than ending our lives," said Spot. "To spare us of the unbearable wandering. How will we possibly find our way out of the maze?"

"Mustard?" Brian had left a trail into the maze.

"Monsieur le Brian," said Spot. "How brilliant am I that I enjoy the mustard?"