The Labyrinth Sequel

Chapter 3

"So, which door are we supposed to choose?" Hoggle asks, moving the shields aside to get a better look at them.

"Well, if I remember correctly, one of them leads to the castle, and the other one leads to certain doom..." I say looking at them thoughtfully.

"Lovely..." He grumbles.

"Well, last time I picked the one on the right, and I fell through the hole into the oubliette... So maybe it was supposed to be the other one." I suggest.

Hoggle mumbles to himself and then steps forward to open the one on the left. When he pushes the door open all we can see is darkness. He steps to the other side and pushes open the right door, and peers inside. 

"Well, this one isn't darkness, but it isn't all that much better..." He says opening the door up further.

The door I had gone through before had a hole in the opening and lead into a light tunnel. But now the door leads to a tunnel leading down that is lit by only a few torches on the wall.

"So, which one do we choose?" I ask.

"Well, I would say not the dark one. From what I've seen, things that go into the darkness never come back." He sighs.

I shiver at the memory.

"So we go down the tunnel then." I say, pushing away any doubts.

"Right." Hoggle agrees.

I take the lead into the tunnel and grab one of the torches off the wall to help light the way. But as soon as the torch leaves the wall the stairs under our feet disappear, replaced by a smooth surface angled down.

We both cry out in surprise as our feet fly out from under us and we are quickly sliding down hill into more darkness. The flame in my hand manages to give us a little light, and I am horrified to see a large spikey wall approaching us quickly from the bottom of the slide.

"Watch out!" I scream, grabbing onto Hoggle's leg and throwing us both to the side.

We roll off the slide just in time and our bodies slam to the ground in a loud thump. But thankfully we manage to land in something soft, so nothing is broken, from what I can feel, and I am able to get back up quickly.

"Are you alright?" I cry, helping Hoggle to his feet.

"Great choice in doors Sarah!" He grumbles to himself as he brushes off her outfit.

"Hey, it could have been worse. We could have hit those spikes!" I point out.

"But now we have to find a way out of this dungeon before..." He looks behind me suddenly with wide eyes.

"Before what?" I ask following his gaze.

Suddenly I realize my mistake. What we had landed in wasn't just soft, it was straw that had been left down here for who knows what reason. And when I had thrown us off the ledge I had dropped the torch... The torch to which the fire quickly traveling along the walls of the dungeon originated.

"We have to get out of here or we will be burnt to a crisp!" I cry, looking back up the way we came.

"There's no way we can go back up that way!" Hoggle says, "We have to find another way out, and quickly!"

We scurry around the flames and search the walls for anything that might lead us out of the fiery death trap. The walls are cool and damp but they offer no way out, or any protection from the fire which is quickly approaching from behind us.

"There has to be a door or a ladder or something!" I cry.

My hands search the wall until I feel something cold and round against my hands. It feels like a knocker of some sort, but I can't see the door where it should be connected to.