Disclaimer: see parts 1 - 3
Kara was walking slowly, hers arms wrapped around her body. Hunter was walking so close their shoulders were almost touching but she had retreated inside her thoughts. They both had. Something was bothering her to the point of distraction. Namely Hunter. Was there something wrong with her? Did she just have to do the one thing that was going to end up leaving her with a whole new list of 'what ifs' to agonise about at night when she was trying to sleep. She didn't understand it. How could such a short acquaintance make her feel this much? It's just lust, she told herself. Yup, lots of lust. It'll fade with the first attractive man I see back home.
If that was true then why did the thought of going twist something inside her?
Hunter walked in step beside her, his thoughts running almost parallel to her own. He'd already list all the reasons why she should leave, not least of which was Ulrich. Kara would be in immediate danger if she stayed. He repeated that over and over to himself and still he wanted to do the selfish thing and keep her. He wanted to know all there was to know about her. To know what would make her laugh and the subtlest of her expressions and what they meant.
He sighed and struggled for a conversation topic, feeling like a teenager on a first date his friends had set up. "So...uh...what do you do on earth?" he asked, grasping at the first thought to float into his head.
"I'm a student and I work part time in a publishing company."
"That sounds...nice."
Nice? He screamed at himself. What sort of response is nice?
"Family?" he asked, ignoring himself.
"I...don't have any," she answered matter-of-factly, thinking here comes the pity party.
"Why?" was all Hunter said, not sounding at all pitying. He knew plenty of people with no family.
"Well I never knew my father and my mom died when I was five in a car accident, so I don't really remember her I lived with a family friend until I was eighteen and I moved out when I went to college." He voice was still clam but then how could she really feel pain over events she didn't remember? The only sense of her mother she really had was someone warm who smelled of cinnamon and smiled a lot, but the memory was so faded and distant she could have been remembering anyone.
"What about the family friend?" Hunter continued.
Kara shrugged, "She moved to Australia when I was in my second year. I get letters but I never see her." She tucked some hair behind her ear. "Tell me about your life," she said. She wasn't really one for talking about herself.
Hunter laughed a little, "There's not much to tell. I am the only child and heir of the Vampire King, so I more or less lived the life of a privileged, spoiled brat."
"Well at least you're honest about it," she laughed. Looking around she saw they were rising to the top of a hill that seemed to have sprung up out of nowhere. Her legs were beginning to hurt. How long had she been walking anyway? Too long. Thankfully though the hill wasn't that steep and, walking in silence it wasn't long before they reached the top. Kara paused a moment to stretch a little, hoping to relieve the aches and some of the tiredness she was feeling, and to survey what lay before them. The hill was much steeper on this side. It was an almost sheer drop down into a completely different landscape from the one that had surrounded them only moments before, the contrast so vivid it was like two designers had drawn a line and said 'you can do this side and I'll do that one'. The landscape that now lay before them was darker. There were several hill-like structures scattered here and there, composed almost entirely of metal. Kara stared at it. The whole thing looked like some sort of post-apocalyptic, industrial nightmare. Here and there she could see figures moving that she assumed were people of some sort. From their perch it was kind of hard to tell.
"Uh...what is that?" Kara asked.
Hunter shrugged. "I've never had a reason to come this way before. You're guess is as good as mine."
"I thought you knew the Labyrinth," she muttered.
Again Hunter shrugged. "The only one who truly knows the Labyrinth is Jareth. You and I could spend our entire lives here and still never find every twist or hidden corner."
"So what you're saying is that we have to go through there and for all we know it could be the home of ravenous flesh eating bunny rabbits?"
"Flesh eating bunny rabbits?" Hunter raised and eyebrow at her.
"How do you stay so calm?" she muttered, scuffing her toe against the path.
"If it's...killer bunny rabbits, we can deal with it when we get down there," Hunter stated matter-of-factly. As far as he was concerned there was nothing in the Labyrinth they couldn't handle after having dealt with the werewolves.
"Fine," Kara mumbled sullenly. She took a deep breath and stepped forward. Her feet instantly slid on the sloped surface and she fell, making the entire trip down on her backside. She landed in a heap at the bottom of the first metal structure, slamming painfully against it.
"Are you ok?" asked Susan, emerging from her pocket.
"I think I'll live," Kara said dryly. "You?"
"Fine," Susan assured her.
"Hunter?" Kara asked, not moving just yet.
"Still at the top of the hill," Susan answered, scampering over the dry, cracked ground.
Kara got slowly to her feet, checking that her ankles weren't about to give out on her or anything before putting her full weight on them and standing up straight. She brushed the reddish brown dust off her clothes as best she could but there were still violent streaks of it across her shirt. Sighing in defeat she looked back up the hill, watching Hunter make a slower, more cautious descent and satisfied for the moment that he was ok and not deserting her, she looked over her new surroundings. It was hot down here and just breathing the air made her thirsty.
"Where are we?" she said more to herself than anything. She didn't expect an answer.
Something cackled on the other side of the structure.
Kara backed away from it.
The cackling continued and got louder as the thing making it moved closer to them coming into sight. Susan stopped her mini exploration of the ground to run up Kara's leg, and then arm to her perch on Kara's shoulder. The thing was stopped low to the ground but it straightened as it approached Kara.
It was a she and Kara would have thought her human if it weren't for the pointed ears and blue skin. She looked like she had shimmered at one point but now her colour was faded, smeared with dust and dirt. Her hair hung in a long green tangle. At least Kara thought it was green, it was a little hard to tell. She was wearing a dress that had once been silk and was now lucky to be called rags. Kara wondered if the dirt held it together because she couldn't see what else would have. She stopped cackling but her tired green eyes still held a manic gleam. She was looking right at Kara but Kara had the distinct impression she was seeing something else.
"You're in the waste lands," she said, her voice as cracked and dry as the earth they stood on.
"The waste lands?"
The woman nodded solemnly.
"Who are you?" Kara asked.
The woman smiled, or rather bared her teeth in what Kara hoped was a smile. "Malia"
/"Be careful."/
Hunter's voice was so clear and distinct that Kara jumped and turned expecting to find him at her back, but he was only half way down the hill. She frowned, confused.
Malia spoke again and Kara shifted her attention a second time. "Why are you here? Are you useless too?" then she giggled.
"Useless?"
"Oh yes, all the useless things end up here." Malia began nodding her head as if reaffirming the fact for herself, then she stopped abruptly and peered at Kara as if she'd just realised she was there. "Stay," she implored suddenly. "Won't you please stay?"
"I can't, I have to go to the castle," Kara said as gently as she could.
Malia leaned closer into her and Kara couldn't help taking a step backwards. "But it's so lonely here," Malia said as if confiding a great secret, "and if you stay well we can, we can dance until Lord Weevil makes us stop!" She clapped her hands together in delight before spinning round in a small circle. For a moment Kara thought Malia had forgotten about her but a second later she caught Kara in her arms, dragging her across the ground in some long forgotten waltz.
/"I thought I said be careful!"/
Kara jumped again which, for some obscure reason made Milia laugh.
/"I.what? Why are you in my head?"/ Kara screamed silently at Hunter, not fully aware she was doing it.
/"I'll explain later. Why are you dancing?"/
/"To pass the time."/ she answered sarcastically. Hunter didn't reply, but to Kara's relief when Milia spun her round she was able to see the Hunter had at last reached the bottom of the hill and was coming towards them. Milia stopped spinning and sighed.
"The clouds say you aren't one of the Forgotten Ones," she hung her head and looked so lost and abandoned that for a moment Kara almost wished she could stay.
"That's right, we aren't," Hunter said coldly having finally reached them.
Milia's lower lip trembled, but almost as soon as it begun it stopped and she brightened again. "You could stay for dinner," she offered. "The clouds won't mind that." She began rocking back and forth on her heels and seemed to forget them again as she began muttering to herself. "Memory chased me round the garden tree, but memory's slow and can't have me."
"We...uh can't stay for dinner. We have to go. To the castle," Kara tried to explain. Hunter took her arm and started edging her away from Milia.
"Wait!" Milia screeched suddenly, halting them both. "A riddle. A riddle, a riddle, a riddle. The clouds say if you can't get my riddle then you must stay! You must! Even the stars agree." She nodded her head as if everything was suddenly good and right in the world.
Hunter and Kara exchanged a look. Hunter shrugged and Kara sighed.
"Ok, fine. What's the riddle?" Kara asked.
Milia grinned like a pleased child and sat cross legged on the ground. Then she coughed and began to speak.
"I turn my head, and you may go where you want. I turn it again, you will stay till you rot. I have no face, but I live or die By my crooked teeth - who am I?"
Kara stared at the girl on the ground who was smiling serenely back.
"It could be a..."
"Not you," Milia cried out, sounding desperately upset, cutting off what ever Hunter was about to say. "Her!"
Kara bit her bottom lip and frowned. Riddles were never her strong point. It would help if she could have it written down but right now luck obviously wasn't on her side. "Turn once, go where you want...turn again, stay..."
Milia began giggling and drawing pictures in the dust.
Kara's eyes widened as realization dawned on her. She hopped she was right. "Is it a Key?"
Milia stopped drawing pictures and looked at Kara like she'd just killed her puppy. "How'd you guess?"
Kara shrugged.
"I was going to say that," Hunter muttered.
"We can go now, right?" Kara said.
Milia nodded and began to cry. She was still crying when they left.
AN: Hmmm....hope that chapter came off ok. R&R and let me hear your thoughts, opinions, random babble...whatever. Oh, and I got the riddle from Neverwhere by Neil Gaimen.
Kara was walking slowly, hers arms wrapped around her body. Hunter was walking so close their shoulders were almost touching but she had retreated inside her thoughts. They both had. Something was bothering her to the point of distraction. Namely Hunter. Was there something wrong with her? Did she just have to do the one thing that was going to end up leaving her with a whole new list of 'what ifs' to agonise about at night when she was trying to sleep. She didn't understand it. How could such a short acquaintance make her feel this much? It's just lust, she told herself. Yup, lots of lust. It'll fade with the first attractive man I see back home.
If that was true then why did the thought of going twist something inside her?
Hunter walked in step beside her, his thoughts running almost parallel to her own. He'd already list all the reasons why she should leave, not least of which was Ulrich. Kara would be in immediate danger if she stayed. He repeated that over and over to himself and still he wanted to do the selfish thing and keep her. He wanted to know all there was to know about her. To know what would make her laugh and the subtlest of her expressions and what they meant.
He sighed and struggled for a conversation topic, feeling like a teenager on a first date his friends had set up. "So...uh...what do you do on earth?" he asked, grasping at the first thought to float into his head.
"I'm a student and I work part time in a publishing company."
"That sounds...nice."
Nice? He screamed at himself. What sort of response is nice?
"Family?" he asked, ignoring himself.
"I...don't have any," she answered matter-of-factly, thinking here comes the pity party.
"Why?" was all Hunter said, not sounding at all pitying. He knew plenty of people with no family.
"Well I never knew my father and my mom died when I was five in a car accident, so I don't really remember her I lived with a family friend until I was eighteen and I moved out when I went to college." He voice was still clam but then how could she really feel pain over events she didn't remember? The only sense of her mother she really had was someone warm who smelled of cinnamon and smiled a lot, but the memory was so faded and distant she could have been remembering anyone.
"What about the family friend?" Hunter continued.
Kara shrugged, "She moved to Australia when I was in my second year. I get letters but I never see her." She tucked some hair behind her ear. "Tell me about your life," she said. She wasn't really one for talking about herself.
Hunter laughed a little, "There's not much to tell. I am the only child and heir of the Vampire King, so I more or less lived the life of a privileged, spoiled brat."
"Well at least you're honest about it," she laughed. Looking around she saw they were rising to the top of a hill that seemed to have sprung up out of nowhere. Her legs were beginning to hurt. How long had she been walking anyway? Too long. Thankfully though the hill wasn't that steep and, walking in silence it wasn't long before they reached the top. Kara paused a moment to stretch a little, hoping to relieve the aches and some of the tiredness she was feeling, and to survey what lay before them. The hill was much steeper on this side. It was an almost sheer drop down into a completely different landscape from the one that had surrounded them only moments before, the contrast so vivid it was like two designers had drawn a line and said 'you can do this side and I'll do that one'. The landscape that now lay before them was darker. There were several hill-like structures scattered here and there, composed almost entirely of metal. Kara stared at it. The whole thing looked like some sort of post-apocalyptic, industrial nightmare. Here and there she could see figures moving that she assumed were people of some sort. From their perch it was kind of hard to tell.
"Uh...what is that?" Kara asked.
Hunter shrugged. "I've never had a reason to come this way before. You're guess is as good as mine."
"I thought you knew the Labyrinth," she muttered.
Again Hunter shrugged. "The only one who truly knows the Labyrinth is Jareth. You and I could spend our entire lives here and still never find every twist or hidden corner."
"So what you're saying is that we have to go through there and for all we know it could be the home of ravenous flesh eating bunny rabbits?"
"Flesh eating bunny rabbits?" Hunter raised and eyebrow at her.
"How do you stay so calm?" she muttered, scuffing her toe against the path.
"If it's...killer bunny rabbits, we can deal with it when we get down there," Hunter stated matter-of-factly. As far as he was concerned there was nothing in the Labyrinth they couldn't handle after having dealt with the werewolves.
"Fine," Kara mumbled sullenly. She took a deep breath and stepped forward. Her feet instantly slid on the sloped surface and she fell, making the entire trip down on her backside. She landed in a heap at the bottom of the first metal structure, slamming painfully against it.
"Are you ok?" asked Susan, emerging from her pocket.
"I think I'll live," Kara said dryly. "You?"
"Fine," Susan assured her.
"Hunter?" Kara asked, not moving just yet.
"Still at the top of the hill," Susan answered, scampering over the dry, cracked ground.
Kara got slowly to her feet, checking that her ankles weren't about to give out on her or anything before putting her full weight on them and standing up straight. She brushed the reddish brown dust off her clothes as best she could but there were still violent streaks of it across her shirt. Sighing in defeat she looked back up the hill, watching Hunter make a slower, more cautious descent and satisfied for the moment that he was ok and not deserting her, she looked over her new surroundings. It was hot down here and just breathing the air made her thirsty.
"Where are we?" she said more to herself than anything. She didn't expect an answer.
Something cackled on the other side of the structure.
Kara backed away from it.
The cackling continued and got louder as the thing making it moved closer to them coming into sight. Susan stopped her mini exploration of the ground to run up Kara's leg, and then arm to her perch on Kara's shoulder. The thing was stopped low to the ground but it straightened as it approached Kara.
It was a she and Kara would have thought her human if it weren't for the pointed ears and blue skin. She looked like she had shimmered at one point but now her colour was faded, smeared with dust and dirt. Her hair hung in a long green tangle. At least Kara thought it was green, it was a little hard to tell. She was wearing a dress that had once been silk and was now lucky to be called rags. Kara wondered if the dirt held it together because she couldn't see what else would have. She stopped cackling but her tired green eyes still held a manic gleam. She was looking right at Kara but Kara had the distinct impression she was seeing something else.
"You're in the waste lands," she said, her voice as cracked and dry as the earth they stood on.
"The waste lands?"
The woman nodded solemnly.
"Who are you?" Kara asked.
The woman smiled, or rather bared her teeth in what Kara hoped was a smile. "Malia"
/"Be careful."/
Hunter's voice was so clear and distinct that Kara jumped and turned expecting to find him at her back, but he was only half way down the hill. She frowned, confused.
Malia spoke again and Kara shifted her attention a second time. "Why are you here? Are you useless too?" then she giggled.
"Useless?"
"Oh yes, all the useless things end up here." Malia began nodding her head as if reaffirming the fact for herself, then she stopped abruptly and peered at Kara as if she'd just realised she was there. "Stay," she implored suddenly. "Won't you please stay?"
"I can't, I have to go to the castle," Kara said as gently as she could.
Malia leaned closer into her and Kara couldn't help taking a step backwards. "But it's so lonely here," Malia said as if confiding a great secret, "and if you stay well we can, we can dance until Lord Weevil makes us stop!" She clapped her hands together in delight before spinning round in a small circle. For a moment Kara thought Malia had forgotten about her but a second later she caught Kara in her arms, dragging her across the ground in some long forgotten waltz.
/"I thought I said be careful!"/
Kara jumped again which, for some obscure reason made Milia laugh.
/"I.what? Why are you in my head?"/ Kara screamed silently at Hunter, not fully aware she was doing it.
/"I'll explain later. Why are you dancing?"/
/"To pass the time."/ she answered sarcastically. Hunter didn't reply, but to Kara's relief when Milia spun her round she was able to see the Hunter had at last reached the bottom of the hill and was coming towards them. Milia stopped spinning and sighed.
"The clouds say you aren't one of the Forgotten Ones," she hung her head and looked so lost and abandoned that for a moment Kara almost wished she could stay.
"That's right, we aren't," Hunter said coldly having finally reached them.
Milia's lower lip trembled, but almost as soon as it begun it stopped and she brightened again. "You could stay for dinner," she offered. "The clouds won't mind that." She began rocking back and forth on her heels and seemed to forget them again as she began muttering to herself. "Memory chased me round the garden tree, but memory's slow and can't have me."
"We...uh can't stay for dinner. We have to go. To the castle," Kara tried to explain. Hunter took her arm and started edging her away from Milia.
"Wait!" Milia screeched suddenly, halting them both. "A riddle. A riddle, a riddle, a riddle. The clouds say if you can't get my riddle then you must stay! You must! Even the stars agree." She nodded her head as if everything was suddenly good and right in the world.
Hunter and Kara exchanged a look. Hunter shrugged and Kara sighed.
"Ok, fine. What's the riddle?" Kara asked.
Milia grinned like a pleased child and sat cross legged on the ground. Then she coughed and began to speak.
"I turn my head, and you may go where you want. I turn it again, you will stay till you rot. I have no face, but I live or die By my crooked teeth - who am I?"
Kara stared at the girl on the ground who was smiling serenely back.
"It could be a..."
"Not you," Milia cried out, sounding desperately upset, cutting off what ever Hunter was about to say. "Her!"
Kara bit her bottom lip and frowned. Riddles were never her strong point. It would help if she could have it written down but right now luck obviously wasn't on her side. "Turn once, go where you want...turn again, stay..."
Milia began giggling and drawing pictures in the dust.
Kara's eyes widened as realization dawned on her. She hopped she was right. "Is it a Key?"
Milia stopped drawing pictures and looked at Kara like she'd just killed her puppy. "How'd you guess?"
Kara shrugged.
"I was going to say that," Hunter muttered.
"We can go now, right?" Kara said.
Milia nodded and began to cry. She was still crying when they left.
AN: Hmmm....hope that chapter came off ok. R&R and let me hear your thoughts, opinions, random babble...whatever. Oh, and I got the riddle from Neverwhere by Neil Gaimen.