Enchanted: The Labyrinth

by Marie-France Leger

  Kaylin...please...listen to me...

  “Stop!” I heard Nate scream. “I’ll go, take me not her.”

  “Oh?” The Enchantress turned her attention towards Nate. I dropped out of my trance and into reality. Whatever sick reality this was. The power shifted, not to rule, but to defeat.

  “So the love really was real?” The smile on her face held sinister and entertained. Nate what are you doing?

  “What makes you think I want you?” She laughed.

  “I know that you’re intrigued.”

  You can’t leave me. You’re not doing this. In that instant I rushed over to Nate, gripping his arm in panic. “What are you doing, Nate?”

  He shrugged me off and took a step forward towards her, standing tall with his fist clenched. “Take me.”

  268

  My heart was sinking; tears kept rushing down my face. This isn’t you...Nate!

  “I want no part in what sacrifice you’re attempting to make, peasant.” She spat, turning towards the chair she rested on when we first saw her.

  “I want to go.”

  I watched as Nate took his position in front of The Enchantress and knelt down.

  “I’ve always wanted to be as powerful as the creator.”

  He leaned down and kissed her hand, eyeing her every movement. I felt the sudden urge to burn my insides. This was not Nate; she had to be controlling him. This was her influence, not his own doing. This isn’t you, I know you.

  Before I realized, my feet were at Nate’s side and my arms were dragging him away from the vile queen. “Nate, I know you. This isn’t you. She’s controlling you.”

  He looked at me with tears filling up at his waterline, the kind of tears that were so familiar to me when I cried every night since my father's’ disappearance. Despite everything Nate was saying, his movements, his whole being, I knew the one thing that was real were his tears.

  He took in a breath and opened his mouth, exposing the crusted cuts underneath his top lip.

  “You don’t know anything about me, Kaylin.”

  Soon enough, I felt those tears rise up to my own eyes. I felt them drip one at a time until I realized that water wasn’t flowing down my cheeks, but droplets of flame. My cheeks began to burn as did the rest of my body. I knew what was about to happen next.

  269

  I glared at The Enchantress who seemed partially amused. The pain stabbed me as I watched her take Nate by the arm and held his hand, a bright light searing through the cracks of their intertwined fingers.

  “You’ll have to do,” she smiled.

  I watched as Nate’s crystal eyes burned through mine; he looked at me as if it was the last time he was ever going to see me again. Don’t leave me.

  Flashbacks of our first kiss, our last kiss, him saving me, everything blew up my vision. My instinct was to take his hand and replace it with mine. It’s what she would want, and it’s what would save him, everyone. I was prepared to put my life in her hands, as long as my family was left alone. As long as everyone I loved was safe again.

  How I got to this point, where I would give everything up, I truly don’t know. Every single part of me just knew what I had to do in order to stop this chaos, this loss.

  I conjured up whatever strength I had left and stepped up towards her throne. I felt the ground beneath me begin to shake. I felt a painful burning sensation around my ankles and looked down to see chains of fire, the same chains of fire that took Liz, coiling like snakes around my legs. Are you serious right now? I turned to see that everyone else was locked down as well, but instead, by chains of brass. I heard the soft pant of Ethan’s tears as his father yelled.

  “Why are you doing this to us?!”

  I watched as Marrow attempted to slice the chains with his clan dagger, breathing heavily. No use. The chains were spell bound. Everything was blurry, as if the chains of fire poisoned me to the point that I couldn’t even feel it

  270

  burn. I felt nothing anymore. The toxins just entered my body like a serpent, and its tail was virulent.

  Sticks and stones may break my bones but flames forever carry...

  The voice, that voice, was my father. He use to tell me this when I got hurt, and that’s how he taught me how to heal. With flame, with fire. We controlled it, we’ve mastered it. Fire runs through us like blood; it is our second nature. As much as The Enchantress wanted to control us, she couldn’t control memories. It’s you.

  There is no way she could have known that. I don’t know how or where my father is, I don’t even know if this was him, or a product of my now crazed imagination.

  Maybe it was my subconscious mind, or maybe he was the voice all along. All I felt was strength, a lot of it, sprinting through my veins and filling every part of emptiness.

  Every part of me lit up in my flames, as the chains of fire sizzled down and crisped off of my legs. I stepped towards The Enchantress at an unexplainable heat and stared into her eyes from the distance away. You will burn. I saw a bright light through amidst the cracks of her black veins, although it wasn’t her reflection, but mine.

  I didn’t think, I just raised my hand and hoped that whatever spell came out would take her away. The shock of a fire ball sent her flying, hitting her head against the board of her throne. I enjoyed the disappearance of her smile in that moment, as she was hunched over in pain, her legs conjoined at the knees.

  It was only then did I realize Nate was against the rail perimeter of her throne, in a mirrored position of The

  271

  Enchantress. He, too, held his abdomen and looked as if he was going to throw up. Nate!

  How did this even happen? I rushed over to his side in a panic. I hit The Enchantress, not Nate. I knew that for a fact. I would never hurt him.

  I heard a laugh and averted my attention to The Enchantress who was already on her feet, dusting her hands. A cold rush flew up my back, extinguishing all the flames circling my body. She threw her hand up towards the side to where my family was as well as Lore, Marrow, Paul and Ethan. I watched as black vines sewed themselves around their mouths, sealing all of their lips closed as they struggled to speak.

  Before I realized, The Enchantress was before Nate with a wicked grin on her face. She turned to me and flashed me a smile.

  “Whatever you do to me, you do to him.”

  She lifted up his hand and showed me a mark that I’ve never seen before on the top of their hand. It was a circle with anXcross in the middle. Each line of theXhad a different pattern: one was straight, one curled, the other spiked, and the last spread out.

  “We’re bound.”

  I felt a sharp pain at my chest that sent me sailing to the ground, unable to move. I watched as The Enchantress stepped over me, twirling a multicoloured ball of red, blue green and white.

  “Poor girl,” she spat. “You could have had it all with me. I knew from the second I saw you that we could rule. I would’ve shared my power with you. You’re special. It’s truly a shame things had to end this way.”

  272

  Everything from that point moved in slow motion. The only thing vivid was the ball of colour that was at my chest, the rest, endless shades of blur. I felt a pain heave within me, and then a bright light.

  She took everything from me, including myself. I did everything I could to save my family, but there was nothing more left that I could do. I begged for my father to come back, my sister, Devon. Begging was useless. I was in my own world now, of white and red seas. It’s just yelling...that’s all it is Kaylin, beneath the ringing in my ears; maybe The Enchantress removed the spell that sealed the voices of my family. Just, maybe, she had a change within her cold heart.

  “No! What have you done?”

  A woman.

  “Nate, stop running!”

  A man, deep raspy voice.

  Then everything was over.

  Chapter 18

  Wake up Kaylin.

  You’re alive.

  Someh
ow.

  How are you alive?

  I awoke face down on a bed of soft grass. I heard grunts all around me, some painful, most indistinguishable.

  My eyes began to focus in the clear. How do your eyes still work? How do you feel?

  I turned over to find Mable, my mother, Devon, Lore, Marrow, Paul and Ethan gathering their balance in a sea of nothingness. That’s exactly where we were.

  It was nothing.

  274

  All that surrounded us was each other, grass, and a teal sky. Something was missing.

  “Bold,” I heard Marrow say dusting his pants. “Guess we know who’s braver now, eh pops?” He turned to Lore.

  Lore said nothing. He had a sad look on his face, the look my mother had when I couldn’t retrieve Ann.

  It’s not true.

  I was too busy analyzing Lore’s behaviour that I didn’t realize my mother and Mable wrapping their arms around me, whispering over and over. “We thought you were gone.”

  He’s not gone.

  I, too, thought I was gone. I truly had no idea how I was even alive.

  Don’t ask. You don’t want to know.

  “Where’s Nate? Where is he?” Stupid.

  My mother and sister released their grip and moved away from me. Marrow finally glanced up at me, his eyes shining deep blue.

  “Oh, you don’t know? Right, you don’t, you were dead.” His voice was erratic and irritated. “Nate pushed the bitch off you, now he’s gone zo.”

  Told you.

  My heart raced like an animal trapped in a cage. I didn’t want to hear the answer, but I knew I had to ask. Stop asking, Kaylin! He can’t be gone.

  “What do you mean, gone?”

  Lore stood up, his arms crossed as he spoke, tears filling his eyes.

  “Nate saw that she was going to kill you. He was glowing blue; I never seen it before. I never taught him

  275

  anything like that.” He paused in between sentences and tried to collect his breathing. “He jumped into The Enchantress just as Devon cut the cord linking the Carhness of water to her throne. After that, everything turned white, and we woke up here.”

  “Nate’s gone.” Marrow added bluntly.

  Die. I felt the inner parts of me shatter. I just want to die. I couldn’t find the right words to say because I, too, didn’t know what to say or even how to feel. Take me! Just take me you evil snake!

  “How are we getting him back?” I asked, sniffling through my tears.

  “There’s no way,” Lore began. “How do we even begin to know?”

  A breeze stopped my thoughts as I watched a shirtless Devon, miraculously walking fine with a man covered in his shirt.

  This can’t be...

  His hair was white and his eyes the brightest blue I have ever seen. His skin was pale, and glowing blue veins flashed ever so often through his arms and the back of his neck.

  “Is that --?” Paul’s mouth was gaping as well as most.

  That was the Carhness of water.

  “Hello,” he spoke. His voice was clear and smooth, just like the sea. “My name is Dryde.”

  My tears dried on my cheeks. No one spoke because no one knew what to say. I sure as hell didn’t. It

  276

  didn’t take a mind reader to know what everyone was thinking. Dryde, this man, was the ancient Enchanted. He was the stem of water. He is water. He created the source, the power, the spells, knowledge. He created Nate.

  “There is much to be said.” He spoke again. “But we must first tackle the one true quest. I know how to find your friend; he is wherever The Enchantress is. Because they are bound, Nate is alive. Otherwise, The Enchantress dies if she had killed him.”

  “How do we know they aren’t both dead?” Paul asked, seemingly afraid.

  The Carhness, Dryde, moved away from the crowd and looked up to the sky. He lifted his arms as glowing blue veins spiralled underneath his skin, exposing a soft crystal glow.

  “My brother and sisters are still with her. I will feel it if one dies.”

  He was referring to the other Carhnessess, he had to be.

  “Let us start our journey onward,” he began bending down.

  As he put his hand to the ground, the world around us started to shake and beams of white line blasted out from the grass, transforming the once now green field into a dark cave of stone and blue rock.

  Glowing blue maggots squirmed around the walls of crystal, hugging each part of the wall.

  “This is where we really are, not where The Enchantress wants us to believe.”

  “That was all fake?” Paul asked holding Ethan’s hand.

  277

  Dryde nodded, touching the walls. As he pressed his fingertips to the sides, the blue maggots turned into droplets of water. He walked forward and turned around to face us all.

  “Shall we begin our journey?” He asked.

  No one spoke, but we walked together. As if our legs were as one, we moved as a team. We lost a lot of people along the way. Hearts broke. Things would never be the same again. I lost my sister, my father. Marrow lost his brother and his mother, as well as Lore, son and wife. Beth and Sage were no longer in the midst, but the only way to move forward was to move past it. We will find Nate, and we will find The Enchantress and punish her for what she did to not just me, but to us all. You’re alive Nate.

  We were stronger as a clan. Although, a clan wasn’t the appropriate term anymore. A clan was what The Enchantress wanted us to call ourselves from the beginning, but now, we were more than that.

  W were a family. The journey brought us together as one.

  We were whole.

  My fingers wrapped around my clan dagger as I walked up to my mother and sister, grabbing hold of their hands. My tattoo flashed a brilliant crimson as I stared forward into the unending nothingness, opening my lips with a smile.

  “I’m coming for you.”

  - Enchanted -

  The Quest