PRINCESS CARMELITA
(Adapted from the movie “El Laberinto Del Fauno” or “Pan’s Labyrinth”)
(Adapted from the movie “El Laberinto Del Fauno” or “Pan’s Labyrinth”)
“Welcome to Garcia Manor, Miss Maya Andre.”
Maya was caught off guard as the strange man opened the door for her to come out. It was the first time he spoke since they left the village. As she got off tentatively, she found herself standing in front of a huge manor on the mountain outback. There was an enormous wooden warehouse just right beside the manor and a couple of stables for horses, a cattle ranch, and a sheep farm behind it. There are also a number of chickens pecking here and there on the ground that came from the little pen beside the stables. There were servants and maids and errand boys and girls going about their businesses, helping the strange man to unload the rest of the stuff that were taken from her room out of the carriage. At least she knew where she was: carried off from her nice, quaint village to the rich, isolated manor of Miguel Garcia, the one and only Count in the entire La Luna region.
“Alberto, shall I call the Master?” an errand boy asked while carrying Maya’s suitcase of clothes.
“No, Pedro. I’ll do it,” the strange man replied, then turned to her and said, “Wait here, Miss Andre, while I call the Master.”
Maya watched as the strange man called Alberto left her alone outside and went into the house. She watched as the servants gathered her belongings into the house, forgetting her presence momentarily. Why was she here? What was she doing here? Why was she taken away from her family to be here? Why didn’t her parents or grandmother stop Alberto from taking her away? Why were the village people standing there doing nothing but watch her leave? Why wasn’t anyone willing to tell her anything? Why was she kept in the dark for so many years, only to find herself in a strange place without knowing head or tail what was going here and with more questions than answers? This was all very confusing for her.
Suddenly she heard a sound. More like a sound made from crickets or something. She turned around and saw something crawling on a rock. As she came in closer, the crawling thing came into view. It looked like some tiny naked being that walked on two legs and had transparent film-thin wings on its back, looking back at her with naughty blue eyes.
Like a little fairy.
Maya’s eyes lit at the sight of it. A fairy! A real life fairy! Here in the mountains! Not the one in her story books, but one for real! She couldn’t miss out on a chance like that! Without thinking, she quickly made a dash towards the rock to try and capture it. It slipped out of her fingers and flew further away from her reach. She gave chase and soon found herself in front of a towering stone entrance. In the middle of that entrance was a symbol, or to be more exact, a stone face that showed features of a creature with a frozen scream, piercing dead-fish eyes and horns like a ram. If she’d thought any further, she might assume that it looked like the Devil she had seen described in her story books.
The cricket sound brought her back to what she wanted to do in the first place. She quickly followed after the fairy which led her deeper into the stone entrance. There were stone walls around her that twisted and turned like a maze, and tall dark trees with its long branches hovered above her head like long, spidery fingers ready to snatch her up and eat her whole, with the dark night sky above her like a gaping mouth. Dead leaves and rocks crunch and crumble at each step she took and the night sounds did not seem very comforting either. Before she knew it, she was deep inside the maze and not knowing where she was anymore, the fairy gone out of sight.
“Miss Andre, you shouldn’t be in here.”
Maya spun round to see Pedro, the errand boy, right behind her. Seeing him up close, she could tell that this teenage boy was someone who has a mind well beyond his age. With copper-brown eyes and burgundy hair, he definitely seemed like someone who had seen more troubles than a man of war. She shifted her gaze towards his wrist. There was a red string tied onto it and the rest of it led towards outside. Pedro realized her staring and chuckled.
“It’s a fail-safe precaution. No one should be in here. This is El Laberinto; The Labyrinth. This place has existed even before the manor was built. People who go in often don’t come out. Considered one of the Devil’s Playground.”
“Thanks,” Maya replied timidly.
“The name’s Pedro Sanchez. Pleased to meet you, Miss Andre,” Pedro said as he offered her his hand for her to shake. Maya reciprocated.
“Can I know…why am I here?”
“Didn’t anyone tell you?” Pedro asked, surprised. Maya shook her head as a reply. Pedro sighed in defeat and said, “That’s what you get when you have Madame Adrianna to do the matchmaking. She’s just full of surprises. Come, Miss Andre, I’ll tell you everything on the way.”
“You can call me Maya.”
So, as Pedro the errand boy led Maya out of the labyrinth with the help of the red string, he told her everything that was going on. It turns out that Madame Adrianna had made a prediction for the Garcia family: Mrs. Garcia, who was currently with child, will give birth to a stillborn son unless they were to hurry and match-make and immediately engage him with someone who has the physical and spiritual compatibility with him while she is still pregnant. It was something very unorthodox and out of the ordinary—bizarre, even—but the Garcia family had wanted a son for years, what with being without child for almost 4 years of marriage, and although they were not very superstitious, they would not take any chances. They immediately gave the order for Madame Adrianna to find a suitable daughter-in-law for them, and that was where Maya came in.
“You see, Maya, you are chosen by Madame Adrianna because you are compatible with our future Young Master. Our young Master is born under the constellation of the sun and you are born under the constellation of the moon. A perfect match. At least that’s what she says. It’s like how princes and princesses marry. They get betrothed, engaged with each other before they get married. Same case as you are, dear.”
“But I thought princes and princesses fall in love with each other before they get married.”
“Not all princes and princesses fall in love. This is real life, dear, not stories from your story books.”
“Then…why didn’t anyone tell me about something this important?”
“I think maybe they didn’t want to tell you because they thought you weren’t old enough to understand all this. Getting engaged and married in a situation like this, and at your age, is not exactly a walk in the park, I can tell you that.”
“Why?”
“Dear, no one in the history has ever been engaged as young as you. Ever. Not even Madame Adrianna has ever match-made anyone that young. Even the youngest people to marry, like our Master and Mistress, for example, got married when they were 16, and that’s as far as it goes.”
Soon, they both got out of the labyrinth with Alberto and his other strange men looking at them in disapproval. Alberto went forward and took Maya by the shoulders.
“I’ll take it from here, Pedro. You go make sure that Miss Andre’s room is ready.”
“Yes, Alberto,” Pedro replied, then turned to Maya and whispered, “Don’t worry. Everything is going to be just fine. I’m sure you’ll make lots of friends during your stay here. Go on, the Mistress is longing to see you.”
Maya nodded and quietly took Alberto’s hand to be led into the manor. It was done and there was nothing she could do to stop it. She was no longer Maya Andre, but the future Young Mistress Maya Garcia, and she will be living out the rest of her life on the mountains in her new home.
And her new family.
As she walked in with Alberto to face her fate, the blue-eyed fairy perched quietly on the stone entrance and watched.
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