The Tangle Box

“We shall escape,” he replied, for he still believed they would.

“The forest and this river go on and do not show any sign of ending. They show no change. The mists still wrap us about and close us away. There are no people or animals. There are no birds.” She shook her head slowly. “There is magic everywhere; it controls everything in the Labyrinth. You may not be able to feel it, but I do. It is a place of magic, and without magic to aid us we shall not escape.”

“There will be a town or a pass through mountains or—”

“No,” she interrupted, her slim white hand coming up quickly to stop him. “No. There will be nothing but the river and the forest and the mists forever. Nothing.”

He woke early the following morning, having spent an uneasy, mostly sleepless night. The Lady’s words haunted him, a grim prophecy he could not forget. She was sleeping still, curled into her cloak in the tall grass, her face serene and smooth, no trace of anger or despair, no hint of bitterness or fear. She was very beautiful lying there, all pale skin and dark hair, flawless and perfect, the coldness that sometimes marked her when she was awake replaced in sleep by softness.

He looked down at her, and he wondered what they had been to each other before coming into the Labyrinth.

After a moment, he rose and went down to the river’s edge. He splashed water on his face and wiped himself dry. When he rose, the Gargoyle was standing next to him. The beast had cast off his cloak. Dew glistened on the bare patches of his bristly hide, like water on a reptile newly risen from the river’s depths. His wings hung ribbed and listless against his hunched back. His face, so ugly and misshapen, seemed contemplative as he looked out over the river. He did not speak at first, but simply stood there.

“Where do you go at night?” the Knight asked him.

The Gargoyle smiled, showing his yellow teeth. “Into the woods where the shadows are thickest. I sleep better there than in the open.” He looked at the Knight. “Did you think I was off hunting down and eating small creatures too slow and soft to escape me? Or that I was performing some diabolical blood rite?”

The Knight shook his head. “I did not think anything. I simply wondered.”

The Gargoyle sighed. “The truth is, I am a creature of habit. We spoke of what we remembered—or did not remember? I remember my habits best. I am ugly and despised by most; it is a fact of my life. Since I am loathsome to others, I take comfort in keeping to myself. I search out the places others would not go. I conceal myself in darkness and shadows and the privacy of my own company. It works best for me when I do.”

He looked away again. “I did eat other creatures once. I ate whatever I chose and traveled wherever I wished. I could fly. I soared the skies unfettered, and there was nothing that could hold me.” The yellow eyes shifted back. “But something changed that, and I think it is tied somehow to you.”

The Knight blinked. “To me? But I do not even remember you.”

“Odd, isn’t it? I heard what the Lady said to you, about how she believes the Labyrinth is magic. I was listening from the trees. I think she is right. I think we were somehow transported by magic, and that magic keeps us prisoners. Do you feel it as well?”

The Knight shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“The Labyrinth does not feel like any real place,” the Gargoyle said. “It lacks the small things that would make it so. It feels artificial, as if it were created by dreams, where everything happens a short step out of time from how we know things to be. Did you not sense it to be so with that town and after the Gypsies? Magic would do that, and I think it has done so here.”

“If so,” the Knight said quietly, “then the Lady is also right when she says we shall not escape.”

But the Gargoyle shook his head. “It only means that since magic brought us in, magic must take us out. It means we must look for our escape in a different way.”

The Knight stared off again. What other way was there? he wondered. He could not think of any. They lacked magic themselves; to sustain them they had only the weapons he carried and their wits. That didn’t seem enough.