Willow looked around, trying to figure out the best direction to go. Of course, it would help if she could figure out if she actually wanted to go somewhere in particular, like the Castle in the center. Jareth had said a new life, not that he'd send them home. She had an unsettling suspicion that he had a wicked sense of humor, and that the joke was on her and Amy.
To the right, she could see the Castle, a mass of towers and walls and possibly a few arches that seemed to defy all known laws of architecture and some of the laws of gravity and physics. It was an impossible castle for an inhuman king of a magical kingdom. That actually made the sort of sense that didn't bear close inspection. She saw nothing to give her any idea where the brick courtyard had been, or still was. She had the impression that she had been moved, not the bricks. With a sigh, Willow began walking along the wall of hedges, certain that there would be a gap to let her into this hedge maze. Then, if she could get out if it…
There a faint noise, like something with soft footsteps following her.
Willow spun around, seeing nothing behind her, but the edges of the shrub were shaking a bit, as if something had brushed against them. Maybe it wasn't in sight, but that was a sign that either something WAS following her…. Or else the hedges could wiggle. Looking a bit closer at the hedge, Willow noticed the tiny thorns that almost covered the branches. She wouldn't have wanted to stumble and fall against them, but the idea of them moving on their own… of the hedge getting her… She shivered, and started walking again.
The air felt chilly, and thin breezes seemed to tug at her clothing, slipping up sleeves, down her collar to raise goose bumps over her body. Her fingers and toes felt numb, as did her ears. She almost felt like the air was trying to take her clothing away, to leave her shivering and exposed. But… air couldn't do that, could it?
The leaves of the thorny hedge kept rustling, only it sounded almost like they were whispering softly, menacing whispers in some other language. Other voices, higher pitched and a few that were very low, sounded like they were laughing at her, giggling and snickering somewhere out of sight, but close enough that they could watch her. Watch the poor human girl wander around the maze, hopelessly lost and cold…
Hugging her arms around herself, Willow tried to shake herself out of it. She wasn't some helpless teenage loser anymore. She was in college, had helped save the world… brought Buffy back from the dead. She shouldn't be freaked out by whispering hedges and unseen people or things laughing at her. Really. And any minute now, her mental pep talk would start working… any time now.
The thorny hedge continued, twisting and turning. Finally, it opened out into an area that had been paved in dark grey slabs of stone, with two solid walls of similar stones and a third with a large uneven doorway, with a huge, rough door that somehow reminded Willow of old myths, about the houses that man eating ogres lived inside. She tried to smile, certain that the effort was a failure. More laughter rang out from behind her, from the tops of the walls, echoing on the stone.
A quick glance caught just the barest glimpse of ducking creatures, with large ears and long noses, wearing funny caps as they ducked out of sight. Well, he had said that he was the Goblin King, didn't that sort of mean that he had… goblins? Willow swallowed nervously, wishing that she hadn't read so many frightening stories about goblins and monsters, wishing she didn't have such an active imagination.
Her hand shook as she prepared to knock on the door.
In his throne room, Jareth smiled, watching the little red head. Such an easily frightened girl, this Willow. Maybe he'd have to keep her around. Assuming that she survived the Goblin Bakery… He released the shimmering crystal that held her image, plucking another from the air where they spun and sparkled. Now to check on the other one, hadn't her name been Amy?
End part 2.
Amy could feel the panic rising inside of her. The whole place felt wrong… drenched in magic, but not the right sort of power. This didn't feel like home, not at all like the sort of thing you should be able to tap and use. This was like a downpour, like an undertow. It was there, and powerful, and if she tried to touch it things could be very dangerous. Power flowed through everything, a dizzying hum of magic and illusion.
Then HE'd spoken. He had been power, almost too blinding to look at. Power that was old and wild and had never been human. Would never be human. He'd said that he'd brought them here, to his labyrinth. A labyrinth was just a fancy word for a maze… no no no she was human again, not a rat!
Amy bolted, running away from the Goblin King. She could feel her pulse hammering, the air burning cold in her lungs as she sped over bricks, turns and corridors quickly serving to confuse her. She could see the sullen sun, but… Could it move? Did it even rise and set like the one over Earth?
She barely managed to skid to a halt as she realized that she'd just turned down a dead end passage. The bricks were a warm yellow tone, almost like sand at the beach. The air wasn't cold any more either, having somehow grown warm, almost hot. It smelled like sweat, and baked sand, and something else, almost like decay, teased in the distance.
She found herself edging sideways, until her back was pressed against the warm bricks. Now was not the time to panic. She was alone in a maze in some far away magic land….. Nobody but Willow and whoever had made the wish knew where they were. She was a witch… who'd spent the last three years as a rat.
Oh, who did she think she was kidding? Now was the perfect time to panic.
She closed her eyes, trying to control her breathing, to slow or halt the trickle of hot tears that slipped over her face. How had this happened to her? She was human again, had found a way to make everything feel good and right and wonderful again… This wasn't supposed to be happening! She was supposed to be able to make everything better, make her life good again - no, better than before. Instead, she was… here. In a giant maze, the amusement of some inhuman thing that wore a shape almost like a man.
It was terrible. She was trapped all over again, but not in the cage that Willow had brought to take care of her rat-self because Sunnydale was scary, no… She felt almost like her mind was spinning, and twisting. Now was not the time to have a nervous breakdown, not the time to cry so hard that she couldn't see or hear anything.
Amy froze, her whole body wanting to tremble. She'd just heard a noise, like something scraping over brick. There it was again… and sort of a loud whufffing noise, like something very big breathing. It was just on the other side of this wall, whatever 'it' was. Her mind turned to old stories, ancient tales about mazes with terrible monsters trapped inside. The Minotaur of Crete, that was given a sacrifice of people from another Greek city every seven years, to devour them… What city had that been? Sparta? Marathon, no… Athens! Wait, she was in the maze. What if… She had to get out of here!
She started moving again, not rapid panicked flight, but mouse soft creeping… something that she'd had a lot of practice in over the past few years. Mouse soft, rat soft… the difference was so tiny… She bit back a giggle or sob, she wasn't quite certain which. What had Rack done to her? He'd been able to make everything feel so good, but she needed to think now, and that seemed so hard right now. So hard to focus… The sound of another scrape made focusing suddenly easier. She could taste fear in her mouth… it was remarkably like bile.
Carefully, Amy crept through brick corridors, hardly daring to breathe. She was afraid, uncertain what lived in here, uncertain what it would eat, uncertain how her life had become the wreck that it was. Images of things danced in her head, faerie tales and legends, movies and demons…
Looking down a side corridor, she saw what at first she thought were sticks… but they were too straight, too smooth. The ends were too knobbly… a scattering of bones lay over the bricks, bleaching in the sun. Leathery bits still clung to a few of them… In her fear, she couldn't tell if they were real or illusion. She bit back a scream, her body bolting again, running frantically in an effort to get away. Anywhere.
She was aware of something large and dark with big eyes and hot breath before he came to a door, flinging it open, darting through in her fear. She didn't look back, didn't see the strange creature with the long tail and long yellow fur. Amy didn't see the dark eyes full of intelligence and worry.
"Girl run fast." With a heavy sigh, the creature known as Ludo sat down.
Amy ran through what looked almost like a park, the shade of the trees almost painfully cool on her skin. She was sweating, and shaking… was it from the brick maze, her flight, or was it something else? Was it from the desire… the need to go back to Rack? He was back in Sunnydale, a whole separate world from where she was now… Shaking her head, she leaned against a tree, gasping for breath.
Stupid of her to let herself grow so dependant. Stupid to allow someone else that much power over her… Now she was far away, and would have to get over Rack and his… whatever. Cold Turkey… she suppressed a tiny giggle. There was nothing funny about her situation. Nothing funny about her involvement with Rack. She'd been better off in her mother's body…
Well, that was one thing that this trip had got her. If she ever made it back to Sunnydale, she would never go to Rack again, never seek that sort of magical high. If was the question.
But how could she help her chances of going home? How could she… wait, he'd said the only way home was from the castle in the center. If she could reach the castle, then everything would be better. All she had to do was find her way through the largest maze in creation…
End part 3.
