Chapter 6 - Realisation
She couldn't stay where she was. The Labyrinth would not change just because she couldn't handle the desolation and loneliness any more. She had given up on the throwing up and crying. She recalled how many times since that day she had made herself ill thinking about it and automatically looked for the faded scars across her wrists that weren't there any more.
Sarah stood shakily and surveyed her surroundings. They hadn't changed in the hours she had been sat there feeling sorry for herself. She hadn't really expected them to. She stopped and thought about what she was thinking, rolling the vague impression of an idea round in her mind.
"I can't fix myself, but perhaps I can fix you." She told the wasteland. "The Labyrinth is made out of magic, it changes and forms itself around the fears and dreams of those who enter it. So what can I remember of my own journey?" She mused aloud, smiling as she remembered the perfectly trimmed hedge maze. She concentrated on remembering how it looked, the pathways and the texture of the hedges, their smell and the statues.
"There was a large sundial in the centre of a courtyard, and a seat made out of stone books… This is where I want to go next." She said decisively as she crossed her fingers and opened her eyes.
"Damn." Sarah sighed and surveyed the same wasteland. She walked forward hesitantly and noticed that there was a strange quality to the air around her. Like she could almost touch the nothingness. "Just like a crystal." She stepped forward purposefully, choosing the path of least resistance and felt as though she had just dived into a rainstorm as she stepped across a broken wall.
"The wasteland was gone, replaced by the courtyard and its large sundial and book seat. She moved forwards, not caring that she had literally just stepped out of a hedge to look curiously at the bronze dial set in the floor, its shadow firmly pointing to the number 8 in the waning sunlight.
"So little time left."
"Its further than you think, time is short."
"I can't remember where I went next… there was another set of doors… but I can't remember where they went to, or what they looked like." She sat down on the edge of the book seat and took her head in her hands, trying to remember something that had happened 10 years ago.
"My brother. I wished Toby away." She whispered as another memory fought its way to the top of her head. "But why would I have done that… why would I have known that this place existed?" Images of her baby stepbrother flashed through her memory, him at his 5th birthday party, Karen holding him up to the fish tank so he could see the tropical fish. Going to secondary school in his new uniform. Him waving at her as she went away to college… him crying and wailing in the car seat next to her before he died, his small body broken and squashed against her own and the car.
"Oh Toby, I couldn't help you that time. I'm so sorry." She wept, curling up on the stone seat as her energy drained from her. "I don't want to remember these things. I don't want to remember them!" She screamed, slamming her fist against the cold hard stone and wincing as the pain flew up her arm. She had dug the perfect nails into the perfect skin, drawing blood, but she didn't care. "So I am still alive." She sighed. "And I'm also wasting time." She glanced down at the sundial again in dismay as she realised she had just lost another half an hour.
"Sarah, are there really creatures called Salamanders who play in the fire?"
"Of course. And there are Sylphs in the in the air and Naiads in the water and gnomes and pixies and everything." Sarah looked down at Toby who sat poking a stick into their campfire watching the sparks fly up into the air before vanishing.
"Do fairies and elves exist too?"
"Oh yes. They are more real than you know." She told him quietly.
"So much more real than you could have ever imagined, Toby." She stood and stretched out her tired shoulder muscles and legs. Wiping the dried blood away from her hand. She was thinking about those flames in their campfire, and how she had once met creatures that could have been salamanders themselves had it not been for their tendency to pull themselves apart.
"I do NOT want to go back into that forest again, under any circumstances." She sighed. "Perhaps if I imagine something completely different, then it will work as well…" Sarah looked around her and pondered about what to try her imagination out on and recalled a trip to a national park, where the trees were so big you couldn't wrap your arms around their trunks and the forest floor was springy with fallen needles and covered with tiny white flowers. She walked towards the nearest exit back into the hedge maze and closed her eyes, waiting for the dizzy rush and the feel of cold water splashing over her body. It came and went as soon as she stepped forward.
Sarah giggled, then laughed out loud, frightening herself when her voice echoed around her in the deathly silent forest. She could feel the leaves moving, and the plants growing around her as she walked on deeper into the trees, relishing the dappled light and the easy going underfoot.
"There should be a stream further along here… I'm thirsty..." She walked on and within minutes the stream appeared between the trees, its water crisp and cool to taste. She knelt down and drank her fill, washing her face and hands in the water.
"If I thought you were lying to me, I'd be forced to suspend you head first in the Bog of Eternal Stench…"
"Oh no…" She had barely moved when the smell hit her like a brick wall. "No, not here!" She opened her eyes and covered her mouth and nose at the same time, trying not to breath.
"Damn! Think of something else you crazy idiot!" She closed her eyes and remembered the meadows where her grandfather had built a large tree house for her and Toby, whilst the horses grazed below. The coolness swept over her as she stepped forwards again, wiping her eyes to clear them of the stink. A gentle breeze rippled across the expanse of meadow, making the long grass look like water. In the distance she could see the huge Oak tree and the tree house in the midst of its branches.
"Those definitely aren't normal horses though…" She muttered watching the herd move off down the valley, they were all pure white or black, and every single one of them had a horn in the centre of its forehead. "I have to stop this else I'm going to be here for months at this rate, not just a couple of hours." She moaned glancing up at the sun on the edge of the horizon. "Where did I need to get to? Who was I looking for… who took Toby away from me?" She plucked randomly at a stalk of grass and ignored her rumbling belly. The words came unbidden to her mind…
"Through dangers untold, and hardships unnumbered… I have fought my way here to the castle beyond the Goblin city, to take back the child that you have stolen…"
She turned around, searching for the castle on the horizon, and as though a mist had fallen away from her eyes, it appeared, black against the sunset, and strangely ominous. "That's where I need to go." She searched her mind for a glimpse of what it looked like close up, and remembered a large set of iron doors, huge chains fastening them closed. She closed her eyes, held her breath and stepped forwards. There was no cold sensation, just a feeling of movement.
"I'm here." She whispered as she opened her eyes and looked up at the massive doors before her. Just as the doors into the Labyrinth had been broken, so too were these, hanging against their broken hinges in defeat. She walked on into the dusty, empty corridors and eventually came to an empty throne room, with no throne.
The Fae woman turned and watched her with curiosity, the bells and diamonds in her hair and on her dress glittering and tinkling as she moved.
"So, you finally worked it out. I'm impressed. I would never have expected a mere mortal to understand the finer points of magic." She raised her white eyebrow at Sarah as she looked around the empty room, looking for an exit she knew should be there.
"I just wanted to tell you that you will never ever have him, he belongs to me." With that the woman laughed and disappeared.
Sarah stood and watched the empty space where the woman had stood, wracking her brains to think of where she had heard that voice before. She gave up trying and concentrated instead on the task ahead of her. Whoever owned this castle, was the person she was looking for. It all lead here, but where were they. The archway and stairs appeared from a blank wall and she immediately stepped towards them, climbing up to a single room above. On her way she looked out of a large window across the empty city to the labyrinth and gasped, however much she had recreated, there was so much more that still stood as a wasteland, desolate and alone, its walls and broad avenues destroyed.
The room was small and square, and contained only a single marble statue. Sarah looked at the Fae woman in curiosity, noticing that though she was made of stone, her skin glowed, and her clothing seemed to ripple thought there was no breeze.
"Its very rude to stare." The statue said looking down on the girl. Sarah jumped out of her skin.
"I'm sorry, I was just trying to work out if you were real or not. I guess I should have known really." She sighed, trying to stop her heart from hammering its way out of her chest. "Do you know what's wrong with the Labyrinth?" She asked curiously. The statue blinked and continued to look down her nose at her.
"Yes. You have 2 questions left."
"Oh, I didn't realise there was a limit." She turned away from the statue slightly and thought out her next question.
"What do I have to do to make the Labyrinth right again?"
"Remember."
"Well that was rather cryptic. OK, What exactly do I have to remember in order to make the Labyrinth right again?"
"Your dreams, your past, your nightmares, your future, your hopes, your fears, your ambitions, your secrets… and your hearts desire." The statue said in a single breath.
Sarah shook her head in amazement. The statue ignored her.
"Now all I need is a way forwards." She closed her eyes and tried to remember how the doorway looked that she should be walking through. There was a rippling sensation to her right, and as she opened her eyes and looked, the square doorway appeared in the wall.
She walked on into the last room, and remembered the one image she should have always remembered. An Esher picture, a broken room, and a king.
She sat down with a thump on the stairs and watched slowly as all her memories returned to her.
"Forgive me…" She searched for his shadowed form hiding amongst the broken archways but found nothing, she closed her eyes and imagined him standing there before her, glaring at her for her insolence. There was nothing. The room remained the same, and the man she was looking for was nowhere to be seen.
"Where is he!" She screamed into the emptiness. "Where is the Goblin King!"
"Why did you take her memories Lucia?" Jareth asked his sister calmly as they stood waiting in a dark panelled room. Lucia shook her head sadly.
"I had no choice, they made me. Forgive me Jareth. Believe me though when I tell you that I left just enough that if she searched for them, they would return to her." Lucia said turning to her brother and touching his face with her soft fingers so that he could see that she wasn't lying to him. He carefully removed her hand from his face and walked away to listen, and feel what was happening to his Labyrinth. Several times in the hours that past he chuckled to himself, and once Lucia would have sworn that she saw him with tears in his eyes.
"What is happening to her?" She asked at one point, as her brother swore lengthily.
"She is turning my Labyrinth into some kind of children's play park. She has even created somewhere for the unicorns. Doesn't she know that they are the most stupidest animals ever created?"
"Only according to you Jareth. I have always found them to be polite and intelligent." Lucia smiled and sat down again. Time seemed to be non-existent in the small room since it had no windows, and she wondered absently how long the girl had left.
"2 hours and 23 minutes." Jareth told her coldly.
"She has found the castle." He whispered finally. "If she can not remember me now Lucia, I will fade away and the Labyrinth will claim her as its new queen. Tell me you left her with some memories of what happened there, please?"
"I did. I left her with more than enough if she looks for them, and once she remembers you, all the others will return to…"
"What is she doing there!" He snarled clenching his fists. "If that bitch does anything to her I will kill her Lucia."
"Whom are you talking about?"
"Elindah." He said burying one of his clenched fists into the wooden panelling in anger.