It was on days like these I hated my mother. Sarah had gone berserk when she found me reading one of her old books in the attic.

I had been looking through some of Mom's old trunks for a costume to wear to the Halloween Bash, when I stumbled over a small black chest I had never seen before. I crouched down next to it and examined the lock. Of course it was secured tightly, almost everything in this house was locked up. It was a key lock, a really high grade one. Whatever was in this box Mom certainly didn't want me in it, all the more reason to find out.

I pulled my lockpicks out of my pocket, when one lives in a house with over three hundred locked rooms and chests one must learn to pick locks. I inserted them into the lock and twisted the picks, listening intently for the small click that would signify my victory.

Click. The lock popped open revealing, a small red book with one word written in peeling gold lettering on the cover, Labyrinth. So naturally being the bookworm that I was I sat down and read the whole thing cover to cover, twice. On my third rendition my mother found me.

I had just read my favorite line, "You have no power over me." the line enthralled me so because my mother controlled every aspect of my life from what I ate each day to what I had to wear.

Any way my reading was cut short by her sudden fury, "What are you doing with that?" She shreked. Oh yes Mom yell a little louder I'm sure that there is some poor penguin in antarctica who didn't hear you! She stormed over to me.

I frowned slightly and said quite emotionlessly, "Reading it."

I saw the vain pulse in her neck and her green eyes flashed, the telltale signs of hurricane Sarah. "Crystle, how many times have I told you to keep out of my old things? You are seventeen you should understand this basic concept by now."

"Well it's hard not to poke around when nearly everything in this house is locked up tight. What are you trying to hide?"

Her eyes flashed again. " You will not use that tone with me young lady! Go to your room. You are grounded for the foreseeable future."

I slammed the door of my room and locked it. Then I sat down on my bed and tucked my feet up. I pulled the book out of my pocket, she hadn't noticed that the book I had handed her before storming downstairs was actually my old sketchbook covered in the Labyrinth's dust cover. I read the last few lines of the book and flopped back with a sigh. "I wish the goblins would come and take me away right now." Without warning a strong wind entered my room. I shielded my face with my hands and closed my eyes tight. Had I opened my window this morning? I hadn't.