Christopher Golden - Uncharted - The Fourth Labyrinth

“There are conditions that could explain many of the Minotaur’s legendary features. The chemical composition of the honey might have triggered hypertrichosis, causing the growth of thick, shaggy hair all over their bodies, their faces included. I also suspect they attained their monstrous size through slave labor and the honey’s activation of the pituitary gland’s growth hormones. It’s even possible that one or two grew cutaneous horns, prompting the legend to begin with and leading Daedalus and his inner circle to use fake horns to perpetuate the monstrous image of the Minotaur in order to keep people too terrified to attempt to explore the labyrinth. But the key element is strength and aggression. Savagery. Perhaps an edge of lunacy.”

Jada’s flashlight beam wavered. “What are ‘cutaneous horns’? Is that even something real?”

“They’re not actual horn. In rare cases, people have seemed to grow horns on their heads or faces or hands, but it’s a buildup of keratotic material, like hair or fingernails. Sometimes there’s cancer involved…” Henriksen waved the topic away. “This is not important.”

“Agreed,” Drake said. “And it’s pretty gross. How the hell do they do it? What’s in the honey?”

Henriksen smiled slightly, as if he couldn’t help it. “The white blossoms you’ve seen? Much of what we learned from the fragments discovered at Knossos concerned them. White hellebore.”

Drake turned his flashlight back on the wall painting of the slaves being given honey in a ritual presided over by the Mistress of the Labyrinth. Images of those flowers were mixed amid ancient Chinese characters and portrayals of hellish torture.

“But those flowers aren’t white hellebore,” Jada said. “We’ve established that.”

Henriksen arched an eyebrow. “Tell me what you know about Helleborus. ”

She shrugged. “Only what your research team turned up. The ancients thought there were two species, white and black, both poisonous.”

“In the legends, black hellebore was a cure for madness,” Drake said.

“But the flower they thought was white hellebore back then-” Jada began.

“It’s still called white hellebore-” Drake put in.

“-isn’t white hellebore at all. It’s a different species. Like Nate said, they still call it that, but it’s something else.”

Henriksen nodded. “But what if, in ancient times, true white hellebore did exist? What if the flower they call by that name today, knowing it isn’t the same species, is not the same flower the ancients called white hellebore? What if true white hellebore has been all but extinct for more than two thousand years-except inside this labyrinth, where it had continued to be cultivated all down through the ages?”

Drake stared at him. “You’re telling me this whole thing has been about flowers?”

“More than you can imagine,” Henriksen said.

“Why?” Jada asked. “You want to create an army of Minotaurs or something?”

Henriksen’s expression hardened; whatever camaraderie they had built through their mutual survival was shattered.

“I don’t,” he said. “But I’m sure there are more than a few governments that would love that.”

“Oh, my-” Jada started.

“I don’t think it’s that simple, though,” Henriksen said, forging onward. “Look at that painting. There are six or seven slaves being fed that honey, but not all of them are Minotaurs. What we’ve translated suggests that creating the Minotaurs was a happy accident, a by-product of the intended purpose of the white hellebore and the honey made from it. Daedalus-and later Talos-wanted slaves, and the primary effect of the distilled essence of the white hellebore was to make those who ingested it suggestible. Controllable. In theory it’s not unlike the manner in which Haitian ‘witch doctors’ were once supposed to have used tetrodotoxin from puffer fish and other species to induce a trance state, but without the motor and mental impairment associated with those toxins. In small doses, Daedalus’s honey left his subjects none the wiser, and in larger doses it either turned them into mindless drones or triggered the physiological and psychological changes that created Minotaurs. At Knossos, the honey had another name. In English, it translates as-”

“The hidden word,” Drake interrupted. “The word they all had to obey.”

Henriksen nodded. “Precisely.”

“You’re saying the hooded men aren’t protecting Daedalus’s treasure,” Jada said. “They’re protecting the white hellebore.”

“This is where Olivia and I disagree,” Henriksen replied, his voice echoing off the torture chamber’s walls. “I believe that all references to treasure in the ancient records are really references to the flower. Mr. Drake, if you’re the expert you claim to be, you must know that historically, white hellebore has also been reputed to be one of the key ingredients used-”

“In alchemy,” Drake finished for him. He shook his head, waves of disbelief washing over him. He just had to make sure he didn’t drown in them.

“I don’t think alchemists turned base metals to gold any more than I think you can pull a rabbit out of a hat,” Henriksen said. “I think all the great alchemists did was get their hands on some white hellebore and use it to influence the minds of those around them to control their perceptions and make them believe they had seen something they had not seen.”

“There’s no treasure,” Drake said. “No gold?”

“Oh, I’m sure there must be something, or there was once upon a time,” Henriksen said. “Do I think that Daedalus paid his workers with gold from inside the labyrinths? No. At Knossos, I suspect he paid them in stones or nuts before he realized that it would be much easier to simply take over their minds entirely and enslave them, which is what he likely did while building the labyrinth of Sobek.

“Olivia disagrees. She believes that Daedalus must have accumulated vast wealth, and perhaps she’s right. But we won’t know until we reach the center of the labyrinth. If she cared only for the white hellebore, she’d have turned around the moment we found it as we entered Diyu. But she wants that gold.”

Drake scowled. “While all you want is to sell mind control to whichever government is the highest bidder.”

Henriksen shrugged. “Someone’s going to profit from this. I’d rather it were me.”

Jada took a step backward. “This is what my father wanted to stop,” she said, staring at him.

“I have no doubt,” Henriksen agreed. “But I’m not some James Bond villain, Jada. It’s not as if I’m going to try to take over the world. I’m only a businessman.”

“Do you have any idea what this could be used for?” Jada demanded. “Think of the espionage applications. Dosing world leaders so you could control their decisions. Never mind the military uses. You know that soldiers would be experimented on. And what about dictatorships that want more pliable people?”

“As I said,” Henriksen replied, “someone’s going to do it.”

“Unless we destroy the white hellebore,” Jada said. “Burn it all.”

Henriksen clenched his fists. “I’m afraid I can’t allow that.”

“Whoa!” Drake said, dropping his hand to the gun on his belt. “Let’s all take a breath, okay?” He shone his flashlight at Jada and saw the emotions wracking her features. “Henriksen might not be a world conqueror, but right now, we have no idea what Olivia has in mind.”

“Oh, make no mistake,” Henriksen said. “If whoever she hires for the science can synthesize the chemicals, there’s nothing Olivia would like more than to have presidents and despots as her puppets.”

Drake glanced back and forth between them. “Our goals haven’t changed. I’m here for Sully.”