Pan's Labyrinth: The Labyrinth of the Faun

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Ofelia bent down and closed her fingers around the stone. Time had covered it in moss, but when Ofelia brushed it off, she saw it was flat and smooth and that someone had carved an eye on it.

In the bathroom, Ofelia examines the book again, hoping for clues about her next task. The book fills with red the color of blood, and Ofelia closes it, frightened. When she goes into the next room, she finds her mother, bleeding profusely. The faun hands Ofelia The Book of Crossroads, which include the instructions for how to complete the three tasks. After he disappears, Ofelia opens the book and is confused to find that there is nothing inside.People talked about all the pain the thorns of the rose could cause,” Ofelia whispered to her unborn brother. “They warned each other that whoever climbed the mountain would die. It was so easy for them to believe in the pain and the thorns. Fear helped them believe that. But none of them dared to hope that in the end the rose would reward them with eternal life. They couldn’t hope—they could not. And so, the rose would wilt away, night after night, unable to bequeath its gift to anyone. . . .” This will help you sleep,” he told her mother as he added a few drops of amber liquid to a glass of water. Just two drops,” he said, handing Ofelia the small brown bottle so she could close it. “You’ll see it will help her.” Ofelia knew that the man she would soon have to call “Father” was evil. He had the smile of the cyclops Ojancanu and the cruelty of the monsters Cuegle and Nuberu nesting in his dark eyes, creatures she had met in her fairy-tale books. But her mother didn’t see his true shape. People often grow blind when they get older and maybe Carmen Cardoso didn’t notice the wolfish smile because Capitán Vidal was handsome and always impeccably dressed in his gala uniform, boots, and gloves. Because she wished so badly for protection, maybe her mother mistook his bloodlust for power and his brutality for strength. Ofelia goes to bed with her mother, but is kept awake by creaking and wind. “Why did you have to get married?” Ofelia asks, and her mother tells her that she was alone for too long. When the baby begins to act up, Carmen asks Ofelia to tell it a story, which she does.

Vidal frowned. He hated anything interrupting his nightly ritual. “Come in!” he called, keeping his attention on the shiny workings of the watch. There once was a forest in the north of Spain, so old that it could tell stories long past and forgotten by men. The trees anchored so deeply in the moss-covered soil they laced the bones of the dead with their roots while their branches reached for the stars. Dr. Ferreira was a good man, a gentle soul. That much was apparent to Ofelia the moment he walked into her mother’s room. One can spot kindness as clearly as cruelty. It spreads light and warmth and the doctor seemed filled with both. He. Nobody spoke his name. Vidal. It sounded like a stone thrown through a window, each letter a piece of broken glass. Capitán. That’s what most of them called him. But Ofelia still thought Wolf fit him much better. And what about my son?” he asked. The child was all he cared about. A man was mortal without a son.

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The son removed his worn-out cap. Vidal knew why the boy was avoiding his eyes. Dirty peasant! He was proud—one could hear it in his voice—and clever enough to know that his captors wouldn’t like that. Ofelia was staring at a huge arch that had appeared between the trees, spanning the gap between two ancient walls. A horned head stared down from the arch with empty eyes and an open mouth, as if it were trying to swallow the world. The gaze of those eyes seemed to make everything vanish: the mill, the soldiers, the Wolf, even Ofelia’s mother. Come in! the crumbling walls seemed to say. Ofelia could see faded engraved letters below the head but she didn’t know their meaning.