Pan's Labyrinth: The Labyrinth of the Faun(52)

“Yes, I would,” Ofelia repeated.

Yes, I would. . . . Those were the words Vidal heard when he finally staggered into the clearing. Maybe Ofelia’s voice had shown him the way, or the Faun’s angry speech. Or maybe the labyrinth had been built just for this purpose—to have them all play their part in a story written once upon a time and long ago.

Vidal couldn’t see the Faun at all. Perhaps his own darkness made him blind to too many things. Perhaps he already believed in too much grown-up nonsense to have room to see anything else. It mattered little. What mattered was that he was a few steps away from the girl who appeared to be talking to herself.

“Yes, I would,” Ofelia said again, her voice a broken sob. She stepped away from the dagger, away from the well, away from the Faun, unaware of the man standing just a few steps behind her.

“As you wish, Your Highness.” The Faun spread his hands in defeat, his fingers painting her future into the night.

He was still dissolving into the shadows when Ofelia felt a hand grabbing her shoulder. The Wolf stood behind her, the bandage on his face a blood-soaked mark. He pulled her brother from her arms, peering at him, as if he needed to make sure she hadn’t harmed him.

I protected him! Ofelia wanted to scream. The Faun wanted his blood! Didn’t you hear? But when she turned around, the Faun was gone and she was once again alone. All alone, without her brother’s warmth to comfort her.

“No!” she cried. “No!”

Her arms felt so empty and it was so terrible to see the child in his father’s arms that for a moment she wished she’d given him to the Faun after all. But what did it matter? They were both monsters thirsting for the blood of others.

Vidal took a step back, the baby in his arms. He didn’t make the effort to take aim.

He shot Ofelia in the chest without even lifting his hand.

Her blood spread on her nightgown like an opening flower as Vidal holstered his pistol and walked away with her brother.

Ofelia lifted her hand and watched the blood drip off her fingers. Her knees gave way and she fell by the side of the well, her hand pressed against the wound the bullet had torn, but there was too much blood to hold it back. It painted red patterns on her nightgown and ran down her arm, stretched helplessly over the well. The air rising from its depth cooled her skin, while the blood kept dripping from her fingers, deep down into the womb of the earth.

None of her fairy tales had ever ended like this. Her mother had been right: there was no magic. And she hadn’t been able to save her brother. All was lost. Her breath grew shallow. She shivered: the ground was so cold. . . .





38


His Father’s Name


Vidal found his way back easily. The labyrinth didn’t try to keep him in. He had done what had been foretold, but he was not supposed to meet his fate inside its endless circles. The world outside would take care of him.

They were waiting for him—Mercedes; her brother, Pedro; and the men from the forest. They were marking the end of Vidal’s path with their bodies, standing side by side outside the labyrinth in a half circle that mirrored the stone arch. The moment had finally arrived—Vidal felt as if he’d lived it a thousand times in his dreams. The moment to prove he was his father’s son and to show his own son what a man’s life was all about.

Stepping out from under the arch, Vidal returned the rebels’ hostile glances one by one, until his eyes found Mercedes. She didn’t move as he walked toward her with his son. Pedro was standing by her side. Vidal never knew he’d fought both sister and brother. He held his son out to the woman who had cut—but not killed—him.

“My son.” The world needed to hear it one more time. And the child had to live, for he would live through him, as his father had in him, with every breath he took.

Mercedes accepted the baby. Of course. She was a woman, she wouldn’t harm a child, not even his.

Slowly—as had been the ritual of his life—Vidal took the watch from his pocket and cradled it in his hands. This is it, he thought. The glorious ending. He was ready to step over the edge. Despite his dead soldiers and the burning mill reddening the sky, he felt no fear.

The spirit of his father filled him. Made him whole.

Mercedes stepped back to her brother’s side, the baby in her arms while Vidal stared at the watch’s shattered face, its hands counting away his last moments as meticulously, as it had counted away all the years since his father’s death. He could still hear the ticking, even after he closed his fingers around the silver.

Vidal cleared his throat, eating the fear when it tried to rise, swallowing it. They would see no trace of it on his stiffening face.

“Tell my son—” He took a deep breath. It was not as easy as he’d imagined it, yearning for this moment in front of a mirror, playing with Death, the razor in his hand. “Tell my son what time his father died. Tell him that I—”

“No!” Mercedes interrupted, pressing his son to her chest. “He won’t know your name.”

Blood drained from Vidal’s face. For the first time in his life he felt terror. This was the moment he’d always dreamt—the one he’d rehearsed in the mirror every morning. Honor in death. This couldn’t be going so wrong, it just couldn’t. His mind was racing.

Pedro raised his pistol and shot him in the face. The bullet shattered Vidal’s cheekbone and severed his optic nerve on the way to his brain. There it lodged in the back of his cranium. The entry wound cried a single tear of blood. Such an insignificant wound, but Death was nesting in it.