Flesh and Blood
Flesh and Blood
By
Lady MoonHawke
I’m not gonna give up the ghost, no, I’m not gonna give it up.
‘Cause I haven’t the strength to hold out too long,
But if we both hold on together we can make each other strong
After all, we’re flesh and blood.
“Flesh ‘N Blood” - Oingo Boingo
Adryanna left her Jeep running in the drive , knowing someone would come around from the garage to put it away. She marched through the front door, not pausing to ring the bell or knock. She shut it after herself, letting it bang hollowly through the open, marble floored entry. She dropped her knapsack on a side table and jogged up the stairs.
“Dad!” she called, trotting down the left-hand hallway. “Dad? Are you up here?” She heard a door shut downstairs, and reversed course, running back down the stairway. She threw herself into his arms as he came into the foyer. “Hi!”, she sang out, wrapping strong arms around his neck. “I missed you!”
Steven lifted her in a quick hug, then let her down and disengaged himself. “Shhhh,” he remonstrated, drawing her away from the south wing. “She’s sleeping.”
His daughter’s face darkened. “How can you marry again? I thought you were devoted to my mother, not that she deserves you. And why do I have to read it on the society page? ‘Multi-billionaire General Landon, to marry former UECS Commander.’ I mean, really Dad, what am I supposed to think?”
He frowned at her. “You’re supposed to think about having some kind of number I can reach you at, other than your fruitcake agent. I left four messages with him, telling you to come home or call in. I’ve been trying to reach you for months. Where have you been?”
“I was in the Labyrinth with Uncle Jareth and Aunt Sarah. Then I went to Avalon to pass a few days, and I guess time got away from me. I’m sorry. We’ve gone years without talking to each other. What difference can it make this time?” she asked.
“The former commander is your mother.”
Adryanna peeked into the study, trying to observe the sleeping woman without waking her. She saw the same curves of her face reflected there, and the river of jet black hair tumbling over the pillow, casting shadows over the ivory skin. Adryanna knew that skin well, although hers was tinted golden-brown from life in the sun. She was tempted to wake the sleeper and look again into the eyes like coffee grounds, flecked from tan to dark brown. She knew her own eyes were the image of her father’s, a blazing blue that ran in his family. It had been an eternity since she had seen those eyes, and eternity since she had felt those arms around her and heard the voice murmuring softly to her, comforting her. She wanted to be wrapped in those arms again, but resisted waking Aurora. Aurora had left, had abandoned her only child to go home, to be with the people she loved, people she loved more than her daughter. And her poor father had been half-crazy with grief, sending his daughter to live in the Labyrinth in the care of his brother and sister-in-law. Adryanna dearly loved her aunt and uncle and their children, but it had not been their responsibility to care for another child, and she blamed her mother for making her be there, and for the invisible distance between her father and her.
The figure on the sofa stirred, and Adryanna slipped softly back out the door, waiting until she closed it to let noisy tears fall from her eyes.
Aurora woke near dusk and peeled her face from the leather sofa. She heard a faint swishing nearby, and propped herself up enough to identify its source. Steven was seated in a chair, reading the paper in the faint light of sunset peeping through the closed blinds. He put it down as the leather creaked, and she smiled. “You don’t need to go ruining your eyesight on my account. Why didn’t you turn on the light?”
He gazed at her fondly, soaking up the sight of her. He had gone eight years without seeing her, and countless years before that, remembering her, and tortured by dreams of her. Now she was back in his life, under his roof, and he would let nothing part them again.
“I enjoyed watching you sleep,” he said, setting the paper aside. “Are you feeling better?”
“Yes. I’m getting a little tired of feeling so run down. When Will said it would take some time to adjust to life on Earth and full demodification, I thought he meant just a couple of days. It didn’t take so long before.”
“Before you only had the internal modules deactivated, not removed,” he reminded her. “You’d been living with quite a bit of hardware for the past few years. It takes more than a couple of days to get over something like that. So are you about ready for dinner?” he asked.
Her stomach growled in response. Aurora laughed. “At least that part still works like it should,” she joked. Then she sobered. “What if it happens to me?” she asked. “Krysten has had one unsuccessful pregnancy after another, and that’s when she can ever get pregnant. What if I sacrificed my future children for my career?”
Steven looked at her, dumbfounded. “Where did you get an idea like that?”
“Well, Krys-” she began.
“You are not Krysten,” he interrupted. “Krysten was the last of the fully modified SilverHawks, and she had a terrible experience with an ectopic pregnancy. You, on the other hand, were the prototype for partial modification, and you have already carried to term a perfectly normal pregnancy. There is no reason to think we won’t have as many more children as we choose. Why are you so concerned?”
“I know you want children,” she said, “and before, I only had Adryanna. Maybe that’s all I’m going to get, and I haven’t seen her in so long. She’s an adult by now, older than me, even.”
“So is that what’s on your mind, then? Adry? I’m sure you’ll see her again.” He helped her to her feet and kissed her. “Why don’t you get ready for dinner? I’ll see you in the dining room.” He smiled as she left the room. “You’ll see her sooner than you expected, my love,” he said after the door had closed.
Aurora reached the dining room a few minutes later than she had planned. There had been doors opening and closing upstairs, and she had tried to track down whomever had been pounding around up there. But she had found nothing, and dinner was getting cold.
She found Steven already seated, and noticed that the table was set for three. Bernard ate with them on occasion, but never without speaking to her first. “Are we expecting someone?” she asked, sitting to Steven’s right.
“We are,” he replied, pouring wine into her glass, then his own. As he set the bottle down, the door from the kitchen opened, and Bernard came through the door, carrying a covered platter.
“Do you need me to stay and serve?” he asked, setting his burden on the table.
Steven shook his head. “No. Go ahead and have your own dinner. After we’re done, I don’t think we’ll need anything for the rest of the night.”
“And the place set for Miss-”
Steven interrupted him. “Leave it. She’ll be here momentarily.”
As Bernard went out, the door at the other end of the room opened, and Adryanna walked in. Aurora was stunned. She had last seen her daughter almost two years ago, and Adryanna had been a child. Now she was obviously a poised and accomplished young lady. She moved down the length of the room and kissed her father before sitting down across from Aurora. Aurora could only stare in amazement at her daughter. Steven’s sapphire eyes looked out of her own face at her.
“Hello,” Adryanna said pleasantly. “I’m Adryanna Landon, and unless I’m mistaken, you must be my mother.” She paused a moment, then a note of iciness crept into her voice. “Of course, I hope you’ll forgive me if I’m wrong, being that I haven’t seen my mother since I was three.” She turned to Steven. “I’m sorry, Daddy. I just can’t do this now.” She stood up. “Please, don’t let me interrupt your plans. I know I didn’t as a baby, so I should be even less in the way now.” With that she stood and quickly left the room.
Aurora rested her elbows on the table and dropped her head into her hands. Steven reached out automatically to stroke her arm reassuringly, staring after his daughter. He was torn between following his daughter to find out what she was trying to do and staying with her mother, who was clearly hurt by Adryanna’s harsh words.
“I’m sorry, honey. I thought when she saw you, she would be glad. I thought the time without you would fade in the face of having time with you now.”
Aurora wiped away the tears pooling in her eyes. “No. I know exactly what she’s feeling. I wish I hadn’t been so hard on my father, now that I’m turning out to be just as lousy at parenting. I always thought if he loved us more, he would have stayed in Montana. Now, she thinks if I’d loved her more, I would have stayed with you.” Steven tried to shush her, but she went on. “I know exactly how she feels because I went through every excruciating minute of it myself, and you know it. I poisoned my soul with hate for my father, and now she’s doing it.” Aurora stood suddenly. “I’m not going to let her do this. I’m not going to wait and let her stew and hate me and decide at some point down the road that she wants to have a relationship with me. I won’t let her waste more years being angry and resentful.” She looked at Steven. “She and I are going to finish this thing tonight.”
Adryanna turned up the volume on her stereo, pouring the music into her headphones. The drums pounded and guitars wailed, and the vocalist cried out about pain and anger. That’s what it was really about. living life by your own rules, not taking handouts from parents, not needing anyone. She sang along, her voice matching tone and pitch flawlessly. Maybe one of these days she’d bother to put together another band, and scratch out another breakthrough hit, get herself back on the charts. But fame was so elusive. Once you were in the race, you had to either lead the pack or get trampled by the thundering herds. And no Goblin Princess, in line to the throne or not, was going to be trampled by anything... or anyone.
She heard nothing but the music in her ears and her own voice, and she leaned back against her pillows, hands behind her head and eyes closed. Then the music stopped suddenly and when her eyes opened, she saw Aurora standing over her, one hand still on the stereo. “I’ve been standing here for 5 minutes,” she said quietly.
“You can keep standing there, for all I care,” Adryanna responded. “Just have the goodness to leave my things alone.” She reached past her mother to turn the power back on.
Aurora stooped and pulled the plug from the outlet. “I can turn off the circuit breaker next, if you really want to continue this game,” she said, letting to cord fall from her fingers.
Adryanna pulled off the over-sized headphones and dropped them negligently on the floor. “Fine. Have it your way. But if you won’t allow me to escape into my own enjoyments, I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to leave.” She rolled over and faced away from Aurora.
Aurora’s heart ached to see Adryanna pushing her away the same way Aurora had pushed away her own father. How long would the hate she had given up continue to pollute her family? She sat down on the side of the bed and stroked her hair. “Honey, I know your upset at me. I had the same feelings toward my father for having to choose his work over me. He didn’t know how long it would be, and I honestly thought I would get back to you and your father. Then they put the program into my hands, and after all the things I’d said to him, and felt about him....” She sighed. “I know I was a lousy mother. I hope it means something that I wanted to be better. The years I spent with you were the best in my life.”
Adryanna rolled back to face her, pain evident in her eyes. “So that’s supposed to make it better? You aren’t even sorry you abandoned me, are you?” she spat.
“Would it make a difference if I said it? Of course I’m sorry. If your grandfather hadn’t died, I would never have left. If the General Council, of which your father was a member at the time, let me remind you, hadn’t promoted me, I would have buried my father and been back, and you wouldn’t even have remembered my absence. But my being sorry and discussing what I would or would not have done changes nothing. I took the responsibility they gave me and I can’t look back from that. We can only go forward, together.”
Adryanna looked at her venomously. “Well, I’m going no where with you. I hope you won’t be so ill-mannered as to remain here when your not wanted. For whatever reason, my father wants you to remain in his home, but this room is still mine, and I’ll thank you to leave and not return.”
Aurora stood slowly. “I’m sorry you feel that way, but like it or not, your my daughter, and you’ll have to come to terms with that sometime.”
“My mother died along time ago,” Adryanna said into her pillow. It was muffled, but clear enough.
Aurora left quietly, before the tears could fall.
She shed her clothes on the way to the master bath, still drained from the confrontation with Adryanna. The child seemed to have inherited her mother’s soul along with her looks. Aurora pulled the pins from her hair then shook it out, letting it fall in a wave down her back. She turned on the water and waited for it to heat, trying to plan her next move. The girl certainly couldn’t stay in her room forever, It stung her pride, the image of standing outside her daughter’s door like a beggar with her hat in her hand, begging for a moment of her time. Well, if that was the way it had to be, then so be, it. She would not bring Steven into unless nothing else worked. It was terribly unfair to make him get between them, especially after he had chided her for having the same feelings ten years ago. She stepped into the shower and let the hot water run over her, trying to put aside her problems for a little while.
Adryanna stared into the mirror, trying to see something more than her mother’s face looking back at her. She could focus on her eyes for a while, but even she couldn’t tolerate the intense blue gaze for long, and that was longer than most others she knew. Maybe her father could. She had never tried to stare him down. And Uncle Jareth could. Jareth and his Labyrinth had been the center of her universe for so much of her life. Her father had been a peripheral figure at best, stopping in every so often. His visits had been frequent at first, then tapering off as her resemblance to her mother became stronger and stronger. At 21, he had given her a huge sum of money, and told her that his door was always open to her. And then he had been gone. Not out of her life entirely, but he had never sought her out, had never asked her to return home. And now, uncounted years later, he wanted her back, because her mother was back. She was an afterthought, an effort to make the family portrait complete. It wasn’t really her he wanted, just her image. She conveniently forgot letters from him that had gone unanswered and unreturned phone calls, and her deliberate efforts to make herself unreachable. She almost lived more in the shadowy realms beyond the edges of conventional reality than in that reality itself. She stared again at the image in the glass, the image that was her greatest adversary.
“I wish the goblins would come and take you away, right now,” she whispered, filling her mind with thoughts of her mother.
Aurora finished wrapping a towel around herself, and grabbed another to dry her hair. She bent over to wrap it up and felt a chill draft.
“Shut the door, honey,” she said, still working on her hair. “You’re letting out all the heat.” When there was no answer, she finished quickly with the towel and stood up, only to find herself somewhere other than the bathroom. Scrutiny brought out familiar details, and she felt a chill over more than her bare legs and feet. “Oh, shit,” she murmured under her breath, then raised her voice.
“Damn you, Jareth! Get me the hell out of here!”
Her brother-in-law walked in, clothing as tight and grooming as flamboyant as ever, and he had the gall to look surprised.
“Aurora? What in the Underground are you doing here? Is something wrong?” He finally noticed her lack of attire. “Why are you running around like that? You look like refugee from a health spa.”
Aurora could only clutch at her towel and seethe, too angry to express a coherent thought.
Jareth recognized the look in her eye, and gestured quickly. “Well, come on,” he said. “Sarah should be able to find something for you to wear.” He took her free hand and led her to the apartment he shared with his wife.
Sarah was equally astonished. “Aurora, why are you running around the Labyrinth in a towel?” she asked.
“I wasn’t,” she managed to get out through gritted teeth. “I think your husband is making a May-Game of me. I was in me shower last thing I knew.”
Sarah cast quick look at Jareth, who shook his head. “Not me,” he said emphatically. “I have no desire to come up against my brother over a prank, especially one that would irritate him to the degree this would.” He saw Aurora start to shiver and withdrew toward the door. “I’ll leave you two to repair your situation, little sister. Maybe one of the goblins knows something about this.” He slipped out, and Sarah handed Aurora a robe.
“Put this on while I find something more substantial for you,” she said.
Aurora slid the robe over her shoulders, then let the towel she was wearing drop. The robe was warm and heavy, and she wrapped it tightly around herself. “Good luck,” she replied, getting her chills under control. “This thing is mighty substantial by itself.” She settled into a soft chair. “Is it always such a shock coming here?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” Sarah replied. “Every time I came, I knew what I was doing, or at least I thought I did. It must be shocking to be suddenly uprooted and dumped here, though. It’s a wonder Toby didn’t wring my neck for wishing him here.”
Aurora’s eyes widened with realization. “Do you think that’s what’s happened to me?”
“Who would wish you here?” Sarah asked. “Steven dotes on you, and it’s usually a childish thing to do, to say the least. Who do you know who is that childish?”
“Adryanna. She hates me, and would dearly love never to see me again.”
“Well, this would be the wrong place to send you, then. She’s in and out of here constantly. You’d always be tripping over each other.” Sarah handed her a pile of clothing. “Bathroom’s over there,” she said gesturing.
Aurora took the clothing. “Thanks,” she said, hurrying away.
Jareth grabbed a goblin running down the hall. “Who’s on word duty?” he asked, picking the creature up off the floor.
The goblin squirmed and struggled, then was still. “S-s-Squark, Y-y-Your Majesty,” it gibbered.
Jareth set him down. “Go about your duties,” he said dismissively, “and tell no one what transpired here.” The feet slapped as they ran away, and Jareth moved toward the word chamber. It was here that goblins waited for heartless parents and siblings to say the words that would allow their charges to be brought to the Underground, And for the few who had regrets about their harsh and hasty words, there was always the Labyrinth. And in truth, Sarah had been the only challenger to defeat him. It was one of the things he loved most about her. that she had both courage and perseverance.
He entered the chamber and found a solitary goblin there. It squeaked when it saw Jareth and looked for a way to escape. Jareth shut the door and waited for Squark to run down. Finally it settled, cowering in a corner. Jareth walked over and crouched in front of it.
“This is not a good sign,” he began, almost conversationally. “Most goblins don’t generally run shrieking until after I deal with them. So. What... have you... done?”
The goblin gibbered and wailed, making absolutely no sense whatsoever.
Jareth waited patiently for the hysteria to die down. “All that is hardly necessary, whatever it means,” he said. “Now, I know you have abducted someone and I am not happy about it at all. What I want to know is, who called you?”
Squark gibbered something, and this time, Jareth was able to catch it. He backhanded the goblin into the wall. “Liar!” he spat.
The goblin repeated it, cowering in a ball in the corner.
Jareth straightened up. “If I find out you are lying, you’ll spend eternity in the Bog of Eternal Stench.”
Adryanna smoothed on eye shadow, drawing it in a line from her lashes to the edge of her brow. She smiled as she blended it into the other colors, feeling like herself again. This was how she had looked ever since Sarah had allowed her to wear make-up, in conscious and painstaking imitation of Jareth. She put down the shadow and picked up her brush, starting in on her hair.
“I wouldn’t bother,” said a familiar voice.
She turned and saw her favorite uncle leaning against a bed post, gazing at her critically. She jumped up and ran to hug him. “How are you?” she asked.
He caught her arms before she could hug him. “Rather miffed, to tell the truth. Your mother is ready to have my hide nailed to a wall, and I picked up the strangest piece of information from Squark. You do remember Squark, I trust? He always set such a great store by you, and I remember chiding you more than once about taking advantage of his, shall we say, less than intelligent nature. Anyway, to the point, he insists that you wished your mother away. Now, before I send him to the Bog for lying about a family member, all you have to do is tell me it’s not true.”
Adryanna looked away, silent.
“Listen to me, Princess. The rules for adults and children wished to the Labyrinth are quite different. Your mother will not simply live in the Labyrinth, or even be turned into a goblin, horrid as that seems. If you don’t try to reclaim her, she will die.”
“Good,” Adryanna spat. “She’s dead to me already. She’s been dead to me since she deserted me. The sooner she’d dead to all of us, the better. She doesn’t love us.”
Jareth pushed her back roughly and she landed on the bed. “Your mother would die for you, you fool. She nearly did. She loves you and your father both beyond the limits of space and time, and you’re ready to throw it away over a little childish hurt.” He pulled her off the bed by the elbow, and propelled her out the door in front of him. “You’re going to tell your father about this.”
“You did WHAT?!”
Steven towered over his daughter, bellowing obscenities and maledictions toward Adryanna. Finally, he calmed a little. “How could you do this to your own mother?!” he asked.
Adryanna curled in a chair, refusing to look at him.
Steven wheeled on Jareth. “So why didn’t you bring her back with you?”
“I can’t. She’s been wished away, and Adryanna will have to challenge the Labyrinth to get her back. I can’t break the rules for anyone, little brother. Not her, and not you, no matter how much I might want to.”
Steven turned back to Adryanna. “Then why are you still here? You need to go and get your mother back right now.”
Adryanna stood up. “No,” she said.
“No?” Steven repeated. “NO?! What do you mean, no? She’s your mother, and you put her in this situation. Go and get her back right now!”
“No. I knew what I was doing when I said the words. I’m not going to grovel and beg Uncle Jareth to let me run through a maze I grew up playing in. Let her get herself out or die. She’s not like us. She’s mortal, and her death was bound to happen some time. I’m not going to invest a lot of time and emotion in a relationship with her only to have her die and leave me again.” She quickly swiped a hand across her eyes, dashing away the tears forming there. “My mother died when I was a baby. It’s better for all of us if that’s how she stays.” She turned and stormed out of the room.
Steven started to go after her, but Jareth stopped him. “It won’t help,” he said. “When she’s like this, there’s no reasoning with her. Just let her cool off, and I think she’ll prove more reasonable.”
“But Aurora-” Steven began.
“Don’t worry,” Jareth interrupted. “Adryanna herself has provided an answer, of sorts.”
“What are you planning, Jareth?” Steven asked warily.
“It depends on your wife. If she has the courage, she can rescue herself. Stay here. If she makes it through, I’ll send her straight back here. There’s nothing you can do to help her once she’s in the walls, anyway. Work on Adryanna, but subtly. Direct confrontation is a waste of time, as you can well imagine.” With that, he vanished.
Aurora stared out the wide window overlooking the Labyrinth. The moon shone down, etching the walls below in stark relief. “Why didn’t Jareth take me back yet?” she asked again.
Sarah heard her but didn’t answer. This had the earmarks of a very familiar, and bad, situation.
“Because I can’t,” said a voice from the door. “At least, not yet.”
Aurora turned and saw Jareth walk into the room. He paused to kiss Sarah briefly, then joined Aurora at the window. “It’s quite spectacular, isn’t it?” he said, taking in the view.
“I’d prefer to see the Rockies outside the window, frankly. When am I going home?” she asked bluntly.
“It depends,” he started. “Adryanna said something after your fight, and has dragged me into the middle of this, something I am not pleased about at all. Now, she refuses to challenge the Labyrinth to save you.”
“So you’re going to turn me into a goblin? I doubt Steven will care much for that,” Aurora quipped.
“No. Children get turned into goblins. Something more... exotic happens to adults.” He waved dismissively. “Anyway, it’s of no concern. Your daughter, oddly enough, has provided you a way out.”
“How?” she asked suspiciously.
“You can enter the Labyrinth.”
Aurora stood with Jareth atop a low hill covered with scrubby trees. The gray, pre-dawn light blurred the edges of the walls. She slept a little in one of the guest rooms, and a goblin had left a breakfast tray, but she hadn’t been very hungry. In her mind, she went over every detail Sarah had told her about facing the puzzles.
“Take nothing for granted. Even if it’s impossible, try anyway. Don’t make statement about how easy it is, or something’s sure to jump up and bite you, Jareth included. He has to at least put up an attempt to stop you, but it should be fairly straight forward. Keep moving toward the castle. It’s the only constant.” She smiled. “And don’t eat the peaches.”
“Did you hear me?” A voice brought her back to reality. She shook her head.
“You have thirteen hours in which to solve the Labyrinth. Good luck, little sister.” With that, Jareth faded slowly from view.
Aurora looked down the hill. The walls stretched out as far as the eye could see in each direction. “Well, here we go,” she murmured, then trotted down the hill.
The doors were relatively little trouble, and once inside, Aurora took a good look around. Branches were on the ground, and lichen, sprouting eyes, clung to the walls. Both directions indeed looked the same, and she considered a moment. Then she decided. “Sorry, Sarah. I’m going out on a limb here.” She turned very deliberately to the left and started to walk along the cluttered path.
Adryanna lounged in the castle garden, resting in the shade of a tree. She hadn’t told anyone she was here, it was better that way. No one wanted to listen to her now. They didn’t want to hear how she felt. It was too much for her to have her mother torn away and handed back again, and her father decide to take interest again. She wanted her old life back, playing with Toby and the other children, being received as the niece of the Goblin King. But she had felt at times like an observer in that life, not a real part of the picture. She had wanted once to have her own picture, her own parents and her own life. Now it was too little, and too late.
She rolled over on the crisp grass, smelling the fresh air and roses. It certainly was peaceful here, or, at least, it would be if the goblins would stop running around and chattering to themselves. She looked over at them boredly, then gestured.
“What’s going on?” she asked the goblin who responded.
“Someone’s in the Labyrinth, but His Majesty ain’t gotten no new kids in ages,” the creature answered.
“Who? Where is this person?” Adryanna asked.
“Made it to the stone maze, so I hear,” it replied.
Adryanna pushed herself up and walked out of the garden. Whomever was wandering around might make for interesting sport.
Aurora move fairly rapidly through the maze, always keeping one eye on the castle, and one hand on the wall. Logically, at that rate, she should eventually find either the way out, or the two door guardians. Sarah hadn’t been able to tell her any path beyond the one from the oubliette to the hedge maze, and not having found Hoggle anywhere, she wasn’t keen on falling into the oubliette and being forgotten. So Aurora didn’t really want to find the guardians that much, although they would be a handy landmark, if nothing else. She made almost U-turn to the left, then a quick right only to encounter a dead end. Sighing, she turned and went back around the corner. Now, it was another dead end. _It’s changing,_ she thought. _I should have been expecting this._ She looked back around the corner. Yep. Still a dead end. She was trapped in a U-shaped corridor going nowhere. She sat down, back to the short wall, staring down first one path then the other. How was she going to get out of here? Steven would just turn into some kind of creature and jump or fly out, as would Jareth. But Sarah...Sarah had been in this situation. What had she done, again? “It’s not fair,” Aurora said hesitantly.
“Well, we were wondering what was taking you so long,” said a voice. Then four voices cackled in chorus.
The wall in the middle was gone, and she was in a square enclosure with two doors leading out, guarded by two peculiar creatures in motley. “Well, you guys aren’t exactly who I wanted to see, but since you’re here, I’ll take it.” She looked at the one on the right. “I know the oubliette is behind you, so I think I’ll go the other way. No offense.”
“How do you know?” he asked,
“I know Sarah,” she said, a touch smugly. Really, this was going much better than she had expected.
The guards shared an awed murmur. “How do you know if she was right or wrong?” the one on the left asked.
“She’s not dead, so she was right, or you have a strange idea of certain death. At any rate, I’ll take my chances.” She stepped up to the left-hand door. The guard moved out of the way, and she went through.
It was dark past the door. She was in some kind of corridor, and the was a little light seeping around the edges of something up ahead, probably another door. Aurora put one hand out in front of her, and tapped the floor carefully with her toe before each step. After about 20 steps, she grew more confident and walked normally. Then it happened. The floor opened up under her feet, and she fell.
Adryanna stood on the top of the castle. From here, the whole Labyrinth sprawled out below her, and she had seen the movement in the stone maze. From there, it had been easy to rearrange the maze elements and move the oubliette. Sometimes, there were significant advantages to being a Goblin Princess. She climbed up to the top of the parapet and spread her arms wide, feeling the breeze whipping at her. She jumped, reveling in the feel of gravity trying to capture her. As she started to fall, she changed, transforming into a falcon, and flew off to survey the home of her childhood.
Aurora slid down through hands lining the shaft. They didn’t stop her fall, but did break it enough to keep her from breaking her ankle as she slid through a trap door and landed on hard-packed dirt. She stood and brushed dirt and grime from her borrowed clothes. Damn Jareth, anyway. He must have moved the damned oubliette into the other path to make her run difficult. She felt along the wall, searching in the dark for the door out. She found nothing on the wall, but after a while, she stepped on something, and bent down to feel it. It was wooden, and maybe four feet long, with one end butted up against the wall. The door. It had to be. She tilted it up against the wall, then opened it, and cringed when things came clattering out. “Sarah wasn’t kidding about the broom closet,” she muttered. She closed the door, then opened it the other way, relieved to see a gap in the solid rock walls. She crept out and stood, finding herself in a long tunnel of carved rock. Aurora had never been keen on small spaces. Not claustrophobic. Just... a child of plains where hills rolled as far as the eye could see. But this was a vast improvement over the oubliette. There was some filtered light here, and she could keep making progress. She moved quickly through the tunnels, ignoring the warnings from carved rock faces.
“Beware,” one called. “For the path you will take will lead to certain destruction.”
Aurora turned and looked back the way she came. “Shut up, all of you!” she hollered, getting a bit frazzled. “I know what I’m doing, and I don’t need a Greek chorus behind me predicting gloom and doom.” She wheeled around and almost walked straight into her daughter. “Well, imagine running into you here,” she remarked, pushing her hair out of her face with one hand.
“You should quit now,” Adryanna said, leaning casually against a wall.
“And die?” Aurora asked. “I have too many plans to accede to your wishes right now. So if that’s all you wanted to say, I’ve got schedule to keep. We can finish our conversation later, though. In fact, I think I’ll have to insist.” She started to go around Adryanna, but she was blocked.
“How do you like the Labyrinth? Uncle Jareth did an excellent job. You know he used it to snare Sarah. Now I can use it to put you out of my life forever,” she boasted.
“I think that’s about enough out of you, young lady,” came a voice behind Aurora. She was relieved to see Jareth saunter along the passageway. “Hello, little sister,” he said to Aurora, pecking her fondly on the head. “Are you ready to take it back?” he asked Adryanna conversationally.
“No,” she replied sweetly. “I want her to die here. She’s nothing to me.” Her expression turned dark, and she stormed away.
“You should have spanked her more,” Aurora observed to Jareth.
“That should be my line,” he replied neutrally. He led her down the corridor.
“Do you hate me, too?” she asked.
“It’s not my place to pass judgment on your perceived needs. You are my brother’s wife, forever. Nothing else is really of consequence,” he said. “Besides, Titania wanders off for millennia at a time. She knows, and Oberon, too, that eventually she will return. So you’re not the only one to go a-wandering.”
Aurora ducked her head. “You didn’t hear the things I said to my father. I had to find some way to make it up to him. They would have dismantled the program he sacrificed everything for, if not for me. I owed it to him.”
“Do you regret it?” Jareth asked softly.
“No,” she whispered.
“Then it’s time to move past the guilt about it and go on with your life.” He stopped in front of a door. “Hedge maze is at the top of the ladder through there. You’re making fairly good time, so don’t rush, but don’t laze around either. You’ve got about 9 hours.”
She moved through the door, then turned back. “Thank... you,” she said.
He was gone.
The hedge maze was a relief. Here there was light and open sky, and she had some idea of where to go next. Aurora could see the castle and aimed for it, paying no attention to right or left. She quickly found her way to the edge of the hedges, and the doors set in the wall. The ugly knockers were still in place, and she studied them carefully. Sarah had chosen the one with the ring in his mouth, and Aurora was beginning to see the folly in trying it her own way. She knocked quickly, not very interested in getting into an extended conversation with the knockers. It swung open, and Aurora walked through into a garden. “This doesn’t look a thing like the forest,” she murmured to herself.
It was a quiet, green place, filled with bright sunshine and deep shade, with a fountain whispering softly in the center. Aurora inhaled and exhaled deeply, feeling a bit of relaxation since the beginning of this nightmare. She dipped a handful of water out of the fountain and drank. It was cool and pure, and she paused for a longer drink. Satisfied, she wandered a bit, touching a flowering tree here and a rosebush there. In a still corner, she found an apple tree, and as she examined it, her stomach growled. She studied the apples with real regret, wanting one badly, but worried about what they might do.
_What could it hurt?_ asked a little voice in her head.
“They might be magicked,” she answered, unaware she was speaking aloud.
_It’s a big tree. They can’t ALL be enspelled,_ the voice whispered.
“I can’t. Sarah...” she said softly.
_Sarah ate a peach. This is no where near the same. You’re not Sarah._
Aurora smiled, unaware of how drowsy she was starting to feel. “No. I’m not Sarah.” She picked an apple and held it to her nose. It smelled so good, and she was hungry, not to mention well ahead of schedule. She sat down on the soft grass, and bit into the apple. It was sweet and juicy, probably the best one she had ever tasted. She finished it quickly, and let her eyes drift close. There was plenty of time. She never heard the throaty feminine chuckle.
Aurora awoke confused and disoriented. She looked around blearily and wracked her brain for some memory of this place. It was a room, with stone walls and heavy wooden furniture. She ran her fingers across the front of an armoire, tracing intricate carvings. It certainly felt familiar.
She opened a door near the bed and moved into the next room. It was furnished as a nursery, and memory hit Aurora with a slap. It was the castle. This nursery was her daughter’s, and the room next to it hers and Starlight’s. She was home.
She ran quickly from the nursery through the bed chamber and the small antechamber into the solar. There, in a patch of sunlight streaming through the real glass windows, sat a cradle holding a small bundle. Aurora ran to it with a low cry and scooped the bundle to her chest. She settled into a chair and cooed softly, not seeing what she held. Distantly, she heard the door open and shut. She looked up and smiled.
“See how perfect she is?” she asked in a false-bright voice.
Jareth grimaced and tried to cover it. “She has always been a beauty, little sister,” he said gently. He tried not to look at the pile of rags Aurora cuddled protectively. He knew Adryanna had been deeply hurt by her mother’s defection, but he had no idea that her cruel streak was this wide. To deliberately drive someone mad smacked of something one of his less-scrupulous brothers would relish.
“I’m never going to leave you,” Aurora was saying. “I love you more than anything is the whole world. I’ll always be here for you, not matter what happens. Nothing will ever separate us.”
Jareth turned away, sickened. Even when Adryanna had been an infant, and undeniably adorable, Aurora had never been this way. She had loved her daughter dearly, but she had retained her mind and will. The pitiful creature before him now resembled nothing so much as a puppet to feed Adryanna’s vanity.
There was a motion in a dark corner, and he went over to investigate it. He found his niece there, leaning against the stone wall. She was staring intently at the figure in the chair.
“This is nauseating, and you know it. She’ll go mad here,” he whispered fiercely.
Her eyes cut to him quickly, then away. “She will have everything she needs. Look,” she said, gesturing.
The door opened, and a ghostly figure walked in, bearing a strong resemblance to Starlight. It stopped in front of the chair, and Aurora smiled up at it, and spoke to it, too softly for Jareth to hear. She didn’t seem to notice anything even slightly out of the ordinary with it. Jareth looked away, fighting to keep his rolling stomach under control.
“It’s disgusting, Princess. She’s your mother. She deserves to be treated better than a simple-minded child with hollow fantasies.”
“I don’t care. I need to know what she would have done if we had been important to her.”
“Let me show you just how important you and your father are to her.” The world around them blurred and swirled, then cleared, and they were in another room.
The furnishings were similar, and the walls still stone, but the place felt alien to Adryanna. She saw Aurora crouched in the deep recess of a window embrasure. She was speaking to someone Adryanna couldn’t see.
“It’s fitting, child,” she said softly. “No one will take your father’s honor from us.” Then she stood, and let herself fall into the emptiness below.
Adryanna rushed to the window and watched her fall. “Why did she do it?” she asked softly.
“An idiot of a baron had abducted her and thought he could get her dowry from your father by marrying her quickly. She was going to jump when I convinced her that I wasn’t in league with the fool. She didn’t want to baron to claim you as his own,” Jareth explained simply.
Oddly enough, it was touching. Medieval values had been a large part of her upbringing, and Adryanna’s heart cracked a little with the thought that her mother would have sacrificed her own life for her family’s honor. “Where is she now?” she asked, distracted.
“In the forest outside the city. Your little distraction has cost her quite a bit of time, you know,” he commented.
“It was supposed to. She could have stayed here and never known the difference. She would have been happy.” Adryanna sounded a great deal less confident now.
He studied her a moment. “You have no idea who you’re dealing with, Adryanna. No idea at all.”
Aurora wandered among the trees, trying desperately to remember what she was doing. She saw a wall in the distance, and moved toward it. Maybe someone there could tell her what she was doing. The trees thinned slowly, giving way to untidy piles of junk. She skirted the edges of the worst of it, but tripped on some bit in the dark. She pushed herself up, then scrambled away when one of the piles under her hand moved and muttered.
“‘Ere, now. Watch out.”
Aurora was stunned. “I... I’m sorry. I didn’t see you there,” she stammered.
“No one does, dearie, no one does. What are you doing here?” It was a small, wizened creature, and Aurora had a feeling it was female.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I have to go...somewhere, but I can’t remember where.”
“Well, in that case, what about here?” the creature asked, drawing the curtain aside from the nearest pile of junk.
Aurora peered in, and was astounded. The foyer of the mansion was before her, and she was home. She ran up the left-hand staircase and down the hall of the south wing.
“Steven!” she called. “I’m here!” She burst into the giant master suite only to find it deserted. She left it quickly and ran downstairs to the study. It, too, was empty.
She ran from room to room, searching, calling for Steven, and finding nothing. She finally ran back to the south wing and stood in front of the last door. As she was reaching for it, a clock chimed at the end of the hall. Distracted from her task, Aurora walked slowly toward it. She reached out and traced the numbers, counting them slowly to reassure herself that what she saw was real. No doubt about it. 13 marks around the face, and 13 corresponding numbers. “I’m not out,” she whispered. “I’m still in the Labyrinth.” She glanced at the clock again. “And I’ve only got an hour left. Damn you, child. I’m not dying in here.” She ran back to the unopened door. “I’m getting out of here, Adryanna. We’re going to work this out one way or another, and it sure as hell isn’t going to be your way.” She pulled her foot back and kicked the door open.
Through the door was a small city, with the castle looming above it. Aurora looked back after passing through it, and saw the door was set into the wall she had observed from the forest.
She crept through the city, dodging goblin patrols and citizens, frustrated at wasting precious time, but unable to do anything else. She settled into a hollow near the huge doors to the castle, and waited for a clear moment to run through. Finally there was a quiet moment, and she ran pell-mell for the door. She was almost there when a small, brown-green goblin leaped in front of her, brandishing a spear.
“Stop in the name of Princess Adryanna!” it hollered.
Aurora skidded to a halt it avoid impaling herself, and sized up the situation. It was an impressively large spear, but the goblin wasn’t quite as intimidating. She raised her hands and moved forward slowly, trying to appear properly cowed. The goblin relaxed and let down his guard some. It was the chance Aurora was waiting for. She grabbed the end of the spear behind the barbed head and yanked it from the goblin’s grasp, then swung it in a neat circle and rapped him sharply on the head. The goblin slumped to the ground, dazed, and Aurora ran past into the castle. “You shouldn’t point things at people,” she commented as she passed, then chucked the spear into a dark corner.
Now she was on familiar ground, and moved quickly through the halls up to the throne room. It was empty, however, which didn’t really surprise Aurora. She knew she had to confront Adryanna, and standing in front of a throne like a petitioner didn’t strike her as the way to go. She went out through the room’s only other exit.
She came out in a bizarre room only partly based in reality. Steps and doorways were everywhere, coming out of the walls, the floor, and even the ceiling. Aurora followed the best path she could, trying to resist the vertigo that threatened every time she looked somewhere other that right in front of her. She rounded a corner only to find the end of the path directly before her, and nothing in practical jumping distance. “Jareth was right,” she muttered to herself. “I should have spanked her more.”
“I wish you had,” said a voice behind her.
Aurora wheeled around and saw Adryanna, decked out in black leather, leaning against the wall. “Nice of you to show up,” she commented, taking a step away from the edge. “I suppose we’re done now?”
“Sort of. You see, part of the object is to get here, which you have managed to do,” Adryanna said.
“And the other part?” Aurora asked, certain she wouldn’t like where this was going.
“You have to actually catch me. You get out either way, so I’d suggest calling Uncle and having him take you home now, because I’m not planning on leaving.”
“Your father wants you to come home, Adryanna. He wants to put this family back together.” Aurora reached out to touch her daughter’s cheek, but Adryanna flinched away.
“He wants me to fill in a spot in a portrait, not for myself,” she groused.
“Why would you think something like that?” Aurora asked.
“He hasn’t told you yet, has he? I didn’t spend my life living with him, being the carefree little daughter of the house. He shipped me off to the Labyrinth before I was ten. I overheard them talking one day. He couldn’t stand the sight of my face, your face, haunting his home. He didn’t want me without you there, so I became the ‘poor, little, motherless child.’ Only now, you’ve decided to put yourself back into the picture. Fine. But I’m out of it, and out I’ll stay.”
“Adryanna, don’t do this to us. Don’t do this to yourself. You are a member of this family, and cutting yourself off won’t make you feel any better. You belong with us. You’re one of us,” Aurora said, reaching out again.
“No,” hissed Adryanna. “I’m my father’s daughter. You’re nothing but an insignificant, puny mortal who will be nothing but a memory in a century. I’m not one of you!” She slugged Aurora across the chin with a powerful right-cross, sending her reeling to the edge, then over toward the darkness.
Jareth popped out of thin air and threw himself flat, trying to grab her, but her fingers slipped through his hand and they both waited for the sickening thud that drifted up from below. Then he and Adryanna vanished.
Jareth gazed sadly at the crumpled figure, then glanced at his niece. “Well,” he said dryly, “you seem to have gotten your wish after all. And by your own hand, as well. I suppose you’re terribly proud of yourself.”
Adryanna sank to her knees and silently brushed back the hair from her mother’s face. What she saw made her heart race and stomach churn. Eyes closed, her mother was identical to her, and it struck Adryanna that she might as well be staring at her own lifeless corpse. “I didn’t mean it,” she murmured softly.
“What was that, dear?” Jareth asked brightly.
“I didn’t mean it,” she repeated louder.
“Oh, you didn’t? It’s all you ever talked about, don’t you remember? If she was dead, then all your problems would be solved. Well, now she’s dead. Don’t tell me you’re not enjoying it.”
“I was wrong,” she whispered. It hurt to admit it.
“Excuse me? What was that?” he asked.
“I was wrong, okay?!” she shouted. “I didn’t get it then, but I get it now. It could just as easily be me there. I just didn’t think....”
“No. You certainly didn’t, did you?” Jareth was silent a moment. “And now it’s too late.”
Adryanna raised her eyes from the broken figure on the ground, staring unseeing into the distance, thinking.
Jareth eyed her speculatively. Maybe something could be salvaged here after all. “Yes,” he reiterated. “Much too late now.”
“No,” Adryanna whispered. Then louder. “No. I can take it back.”
“And do what?” Just one more little nudge now. “Regret is all very well, but what’s said is said, to quote myself. Saying differently now does nothing.”
She gathered the broken form to her. “I’ll make it different, then. I’ll do it right this time.”
He put a gentle hand on her head. “You won’t know. You won’t remember any of this, and you won’t be able to make another choice. Better to grieve once now rather than over and over. You’ll forget eventually. Eternity is a very long time, child.”
She bent over the still figure, chanting under her breath.
“Time and place like water flow,
Wheel of Life a moment slow,
Back above from here below,
To the past I wish to go.”
A brilliant glow surrounded her, and she closed her eyes. When she opened them, she was standing on the ledge, listening to her mother’s words.
“Adryanna, don’t do this to us. Don’t do this to yourself. You are a member of this family, and cutting yourself off won’t make you feel any better. You belong with us. You’re one of us,” Aurora said, reaching out again.
Her first impulse was to deck Aurora, but she pushed it down and took a deep breath, trying to steady her emotions. She wrapped her arms around herself, breathing deeply, trying to keep the anger from lashing out. She felt a soft, cool hand on her cheek, and opened her eyes to find herself looking straight into Aurora’s. She simply stared, not trying to blunt the impact she knew they had.
Aurora didn’t blink or look away, letting love and hope flow out of her and waiting for Adryanna to accept it. She held her breath, hardly daring to breathe, afraid it would break the spell that seemed cast over this endless moment. Then, so slowly she thought she was imagining it, she saw Adry’s hand come up and felt it rest almost haltingly against her cheek. Aurora leaned forward until her forehead rested against Adryanna’s, and waited to see what would happen next.
Adryanna felt the touch of her mother’s mind, and the invitation to go further. She let herself sift through her mother’s memories, feeling Aurora’s pain from the death of loved ones, and the loneliness of separation at the Academy, and the overwhelming joy and strength she gained with Adryanna’s father. Adryanna slowly disengaged herself from her mother’s mind, but didn’t break the physical connection between them. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, closing her eyes against the tears welling in them.
“There’s no need,” Aurora whispered back. “You’re my flesh and blood.”
Later, they walked arm in arm into the family quarters on the castle. They paused in a doorway to watch Jareth pace before a window and mutter partly to himself and partly to Sarah.
“I lost contact with her after Adryanna cast the spell.” He stopped in front of the window and stared out across the Labyrinth, his back to them all. Sarah saw them and her jaw dropped, but she said nothing as Aurora gestured for silence.
Aurora held a whispered exchange with Adryanna, then slipped up behind Jareth and rested his head against his back, her hands on his shoulders.
“I’m sorry, Uncle,” Adryanna said from just behind Aurora.
Jareth didn’t turn from the window, but he reached across and patted the hand on his left shoulder. “I know, Adry. You did try to make it right. Sometimes there’s just no way.” He squeezed her hand, feeling an unfamiliar shape there. He traced it with his fingers and recognized it, but not as anything belonging to his niece. He looked, and saw he was right. It was the ring his brother had shown him, just before he went to reclaim Aurora. Jareth whirled around and found himself face to face with Adryanna’s mother.
“You made it!” he cried, throwing his arms around her.
“I had a little help,” she replied, returning his hug.
“And you,” he said, turning to Adryanna. “I wasn’t sure you could pull it off. You know you’re always welcome here,” he continued, brushing aside the fine black hair on the forehead.
She smiled and nodded. “I know. But I need to go home for a while. My family needs me now.” She reached out and took her mother’s hand. “I’ll take you home when you’re ready,” she offered.
Aurora smiled. “Thanks. I’ll be ready in just a minute.” She hugged Jareth again. “Thanks for all your help. I wouldn’t have made it without you.” She turned to Sarah. “And thanks for the advice, although I probably should have followed it.”
Sarah laughed. “It’s never the same twice, so if you got anything out of my help, I’d be amazed. Do you two want to stay for breakfast?”
“Thanks, but no. Steven is probably wearing holes in the new rugs I bought, so we should let him know everything is okay.”
“And is everything okay?” Jareth asked, looking at Adryanna.
“Yes,” she replied. “Everything is fine.”
They stared at the huge double doors at the front of the house. “Are you ready?” Aurora asked.
“Yeah,” Adryanna replied. “Betcha he wants to ground me,” she said.
“Too late,” Aurora replied. “I want to ground you right now.”
“Mom!”
Aurora held up her hand. “Wait just a minute. I want to, but I won’t. You’re too old to be treated like that, and I know exactly how little good it will do. So no grounding. Just try talking to me before you start sending people places. Okay?”
“Okay.” She looked at the house again. “So are we doing this?”
“We are.”
They walked though the door arm in arm.
“Honey, we’re home!”
*THE END*
SilverHawks, Narnia characters, Labyrinth characters, Beauty and the Beast characters and Gargoyles characters are the properties of their respective owners, and are used without permission. These stories are not for sale, and no money is being made from them. Original stories are the property of Lady Moonhawke, as are any original characters. Krysten Barter (AKA Krysten Merino / Skyedansuer) is the property of Lady Razorsharp, and is used with permission.
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