Laberinto
An impossibly large white owl glides over a large park in the middle of a faraway city. The park is framed by large, looming trees, dark green and monstrous and in the middle is a long stone bridge which arches over a pretty little river, leading to the other side which heads back to common society. The park is strangely familiar, and so is the scene which is happening inside it.
A nineteen year old girl, clothed in a mossy green tunic, moves forward in a determined stride towards an unseen figure, speaking with a hard tone, "Do not be swayed by my pleasure at the sight of you, my lord. For though my father, the Duke, has promised you my hand, I cannot consent to be yours until the evil that stalks our land from highest hill to deepest dale is ..."
Suddenly the girl pauses and looking down she frowns, the creases in her forehead evident, "Hm."
"….Um…"
"Was it…? No. Erm."
Sighing in frustration the girl pulls out a rolled up, dog-eared, booklet out of the belt of her tunic and flips to a page towards the back. When she finally finds her page she sighs again and smacks herself in the forehead with the book, "How could you forget that, stupid, stupid!"
She 'ahems' and gets back into character, rolling up her booklet and replacing it in her belt. She's about to finish her line when suddenly she hears the persistent and panicked yells of her six year old half-brother, Toby.
"Sarah! Sarah!" he cried as he came running out of no where in all his childish glory and barrelled into the girl who revealed herself to be the very Sarah who had performed in this very park only four years ago.
Blonde hair and brown hair clashed as they both went tumbling to the ground and Sarah got the brunt of the fall.
"Toby…get…off," she gasped out in mild annoyance when she found that her airways were sufficiently cut off due to Toby's elbow sticking into her neck. He apologised profusely in a small voice and clambered to his feet unsteadily.
Sarah got up behind him and dusted off her newly constructed costume, sighing audibly when she noticed the grass stains that were darker than the pale green of her tunic. She doubted she'd be able to get it off simply by washing it the normal way; it meant she'd have to make an effort. Ugh.
She noticed that her brother, dressed in a similar outfit to her that she had made for him for this particular outing (he was to play the annoying half brother who screamed a lot. Strangely apt, she thought.), was still panicked and kept looking around as if he expected the boogie-man to jump out at him at any given moment.
"Hey…" she tapped him on the shoulder and he jumped, "What's wrong, kid?"
He turned and immediately, with his eyes wide began his exaggerated story about how he was wandering around in the bushes, waiting for his part in the play (he was to play the very brave brother who was not annoying and was very brave, he told himself.), and a great white beast flew over his head and nearly killed him.
Sarah stared at him dryly, "And just how big was this fearsome beast?"
"MILES AND MILES AND MILES WIDE!" and to reinforce his completely likely statement, he stretched his arms as wide as they could go, which wasn't very far at all and proclaimed, "This big!"
She couldn't help but laugh at the recounting of his tale. It was really adorable and he obviously took after her in the overworking imagination department.
"You believe me?" He asked insecurely, fumbling with his hands and looking down, seeing both the doubtful look in his sister's eyes and hearing the great big laugh that had barked out of her mouth. Maybe she'd been a Labrador in a past life?
In his very short attention span, Toby suddenly felt the need to know if she had formally been a dog. He was cut short when his taller sister bent down and picked him up, then twirled him lovingly.
"Of course I believe you!" she proclaimed bravely, and he laughed as she twirled him again, "And I'll beat the monster down, and he'll have no idea what hit him!"
"Yeah!" he agreed happily, his worries suddenly lost.
Sarah smiled affectionately at Toby and set him back on the ground, taking his hand within her own. It was nearing the time when they were expected at home, she could see by the sun slowly setting and painting the sky an array of colours over the tall, dark trees. They made their way over the bridge and towards their home which was right through the bushes if they cut through them in their own little shortcut.
When they arrived at the old big white house, Karen was standing outside the door, dressed in a lovely deep green dress, her purse clasped in her hands. She looked them over thoughtfully, her eyes pausing over the dirty state of their clothing. She shrugged it off though, and told herself that it wasn't the end of the world and that they could be cleaned. It was a hard thing for the clean queen to accept. But these days she tried to make a conscious effort to meet her step-daughter halfway.
"Are we late?" asked Sarah, looking appropriately apologetic in case it turned out to be so.
"No, actually. You're just in time," Karen smiled and knelt down, opening her arms to Toby who went running into them, telling the exciting tale of the great white bird-beast which had attacked him that day.
Sarah's step mother sighed at the fantastical story and looked up at her, as if she silently blamed her for the stories which had found their way into Toby's head. Sarah raised her eyebrows and shrugged as if to say it wasn't her doing.
Karen opened the door to the brightly lit house and began going through the numbers to ring while she and her husband were out, the number to call pizza, the money on the bench for them to use and what time Toby needed to go to bed.
Sarah nodded throughout the list making mental notes and wished Karen and her father a good night at the front door. She closed it after them and began locking it. Toby suddenly slid into view and grinned mischievously at his older sister, she returned the grin and chased after him.
Two hours later the siblings sat on the couch in the living room, flicking through channels on the television, pizza boxes and ice cream containers were littered around them, forgotten. Sarah was through her 3rd round in the game of "Let's find something decent to watch!" and was losing miserably. She finally settled on some cartoon on the Disney channel and tossed the remote to Toby.
"I'm going to go have a shower, just watch this cartoon. I won't be long."
She needn't have said anything, because throughout her instruction of him to stay put, he'd tuned her out and was watching the cartoon as if it were the most amazing thing in the world. Sarah shrugged and headed upstairs to her room to grab her pyjamas.
Before heading into the bathroom across the hall, she leaned over the ledge looking over the living room and checked on Toby one last time. He was still seated in the same spot, eyes glued to the television. He didn't move a muscle and ignored her presence.
Sarah snorted, "Fanatic," and then walked into the bathroom, flicking on the lights and closing the door behind her.
Toby stared at the screen which had changed about five minutes ago, from the cartoon, to this new strange show. It was so much better than the cartoon. There were goblins, dwarves, fairies and even strange little worms that talked in a funny accent that made him giggle!
They all lived in this weird place called…Labyrinth, was it? It was something like that. And it was about a girl who lost her baby brother and had to find him again or else something bad would happen!
Toby pressed a button on the remote which got rid of the description of the television show and sat watching with his mouth slightly open in awe. He was so drawn into the screen that he didn't notice that the living room lights were flickering on and off and that a strange wind was blowing at his hair.
There was a crash, and he jumped, unable to tell if it was on the screen or in the house, and he looked around, seemingly shaken from a spell. The lights stopped flickering, but Toby felt an overwhelming sense of dread and he climbed out of the couch and moved towards the stairs.
"Halt!" a voice suddenly commanded from the screen, "Move no further!"