Fourth (and Final) Foray
Organa Incarnate
It was the day after their anniversary (whoo, what a night that had been!). Oro and Sarahi had decided to take the day off, figuring it would be exactly their luck to find a fight when they were still tired from lack of sleep, and hung around the house doing some light exercise in the yard with Diya and Sonny while Nayeli and Kylan were at their classes. The pair of college students had just pulled up to the garage, and Oro and Sonny were having a not-quite-friendly tug-of-war with Gorgorond in the middle, when Tuli came out to the porch. "Oro! Sarahi! There's someone here to see you..."
That made everyone tilt heads. The only cars in the garage were their own, and half of them had been in the yard for most of the afternoon. They were certain they would have seen anyone coming up the drive, even on foot. With only quiet and hasty greetings, the whole family marched curiously inside. "Who the fuck are you?" Oro demanded of the unfamiliar face in the living-room, crossing his arms over his chest as the group trickled in.
The tall, elegantly postured Fennec sitting in the recliner smiled smugly over the glass of tea Tuli had courteously poured her before going to fetch the Rabbit. She was thin, but not unpleasantly so, with glossy fur and tastefully painted lips and eyes. The single-piece dress clinging to her appealing curves was an even deeper red than Oro's stained fur, and her pale green eyes seemed to sparkle like the gems dangling from her broad ears. Setting the glass aside, she flashed the guarded Rabbit a pearlescent smile and snapped her fingers sharply.
The sound had hardly reached their ears before she was replaced by a much shorter and plainer version of herself, more cute than elegant...and quite familiar to everyone except Tuli and Nayeli. "It's just a minor illusion," Organa explained, "Easy as putting on make-up, and much less time consuming." With another snap, she became the taller, more exotic version of herself again.
Oro's tone and expression both turned as cold as ice. "Oh. You. Fucking finally flesh, huh?"
The tall Fennec nodded smugly. "That little surge of generative power all of you put out last night finally boiled the pot, as it were. I bound soul to flesh to bone this morning. Thank you." She even managed to make it sound sincere, as she reached for the tea again, savoring the first sampling of flavor she'd had in centuries.
"Yeah? Good for you," the Rabbit's ears twitched, like he was hearing something she wasn't saying aloud that annoyed him, "So...I take it we're done, then? All oaths kept? You just dropped in to say goodbye?"
Organa paused mid-sip, eying him over the rim of the glass. Carefully swallowing the contents already in her mouth, she set it safely aside again. "Ah, about that—!"
Gorgorond hit the wall beside him so hard it embedded itself in the studs. Nayeli jumped back with a short squeak of surprise as the weapon barely missed her. "Be very careful what you say next," Oro warned in a low, soft voice, already very still and relaxed like a cat prepared to pounce, "I took pity on you once, and I have never regretted an act of good will more in my life. Yank my chain again, and I'm going to eat your fucking face, oaths be damned."
She gave him a dour look, thinking him a fool even if she had expected something like this. "Precisely why I'm saying this now, before we declare all oaths fulfilled and you are free to act as rashly as you desire," she pointed out in a tone every bit as cold as his own. She raked her thumb across the straps of her dress, as if to demonstrate how well they held to her in spite of any contact. "You do realize this is also part of the illusion, right? I am actually sitting here quite naked. I am destitute and untethered in this world. So no, we are not done. I require at least one more favor before I will call the oath fulfilled and release all of you from it."
If he had been a wolf, or a lion, or nearly any kind of actual predator, they surely could have heard his growl from the Gritpaw's house. Oro was hunched and trembling with a fury he could barely restrain...not least because very little of him wanted to. Gorgorond began chewing slowly through the wall where he held it, vicariously gnashing in his fury.
Nayeli put one hand over his eyes, and the other around his chest, taking advantage of his moment of shock to drag him back into the hall and just around the corner, out of sight of the Fennec. "Breathe, honey," she whispered in his ear, still hugging his head against her, "Just breathe. Please."
He was struggling with that right now. What breath he was getting was shallow, quick, and seething with hate. A lot of people had pissed Oro off over the years, to varying degrees, but she was the first he could honestly and whole-heartedly say he actually wanted to kill. And sing sunny pop songs at her funeral. And dance the rumba on her grave.
Nayeli could feel each and every one of those thoughts in the tension threatening to crack his body. He didn't need to say a word. Honestly, Organa could probably feel the heat of his hate even from here. Nayeli shushed softly in his ear, never letting go of his eyes. "Calm down. We're with you. I'm right here."
"I'll fucking kill her," Oro hissed through clenched teeth, softly, but not so softly he couldn't be heard in the living-room, "For making this fucking cage...for fucking chaining you to me with fucking fucks...!"
Sarahi watched their wife wrangle him for a moment, with a mix of pity and resignation, then gave a sigh and stepped forward to confront Organa. "I don't think he's going to be able to talk to you anymore today," the Sha'khari shook her head, "So I'll hear you out instead. I think I can guess what you're after, anyway: clothes and a roof over your head, right? The essentials that you don't have right now."
"Smart girl," the Fennec nodded with a smirk, "But I'm obviously not going to find those in this house. I have never had such a poor relationship with any of my champions...but I'm through with trying to understand that man."
Sarahi couldn't help but chuckle. "He's a one-of-a-kind jerk, for sure. That you don't intend to stay with us will be music to his ears, but what are you proposing instead?"
Organa rocked her head from side to side thoughtfully. "I've got a feel for things like ‘rent' and ‘take-out' now, I think. No thanks to him. I imagine I can make my own way with just a little funding. So I want the money, and just the money, that you bring back from your next trip through The Gauntlet. I dare say that will be adequate to get me on my feet again, and no real imposition to you."
"No imposition, you say," Sarahi frowned, "Like asking someone to run a death-trap was just a quick jog to the bank."
"Well yes, it's no light favor," the Fennec shrugged, "But you were planning to make at least one more run anyway, quite apart from anything I want. You need to, for her," Organa nodded to Tuli, still standing with the twins in the hall, listening carefully. Then she reached for a small book sitting on the table beside her glass of tea. "Look, I even brought a token of good will to share with you. I'm not an unreasonable woman, nor entirely selfish. He and I are just oil and water in spirit." Opening the book to a seemingly random page, she laid it down flat on the coffee table in front of her, sliding her hands out from under it with something approaching reverence as she displayed it. "This is my Akaishic Connection. If you like, I will use it to tell you anything you want to know about the treasures you have brought out of The Gauntlet so far. For instance, what that ring on Tuli's finger really does. Or your spear."
Sarahi blinked. "You have that? I thought you lost everything."
Organa replied with a smug grin, laying one hand delicately on top of the open book. "Girl, it would be no stretch to say that I treasure this book more than my own soul. And you have seen how carefully I guard that. Now, I could not be certain after all this time that it still remained where I hid it before my death...but if anything I ever possessed would survive and be safe, it would be this book. And it did, thankfully. Do not bother trying to find out how or where I kept it," she warned, "And do not entertain even the thought of trying to take it from me, or I will read a few pages to you that you won't appreciate. Now, do you want answers, or not?"
The Sha'khari bit her lip, but Tuli moved forward, extending her hand toward the witch. "I think we understand this now, at least roughly. But I would like to have it confirmed, or corrected, if necessary. What can you tell me?"
The Fennec smiled, gesturing to her book. "Lay your hand on this for a moment," she instructed, and Tuli pressed the hand bearing the ring onto the page. When she felt it move underneath her palm, she withdrew her hand quickly. The pages whipped themselves over rapidly, seeming to go through hundreds of pages in one brief second, without actually progressing any closer to the back cover. When they stopped turning, Organa leaned over to read the revealed page. "Mother's Kiss," she read the title aloud, running her finger down the page quickly. Whatever was written there was in an alphabet Tuli was not familiar with, and it seemed Organa planned to sum up the entry rather than read out the details. "Guarantees your children will be as safe as you are," the Fennec chuckled as she turned over to the following page, continuing the entry, "By letting you keep them inside you. You are literally their shield, for as long as you live, and they will never be separated from you..."
Organa quirked a brow at the anxious-looking Lioness, but it was Sarahi who asked the obvious question: "What does that mean?" the Sha'khari huffed, "She's been pregnant twice since putting that thing on, and both times..." She bit her tongue on that. To call it a "miscarriage" seemed both harsh and inaccurate, but there had certainly not been any children as a result, living or otherwise.
"It means that her babies are invulnerable...and possibly incorporeal. They will never leave your womb, physically," the Fennec shrugged, "Also it looks like the ring ensures you will have plenty of them. Hightened fertility, accelerated gestation, wards against miscarriage or defect...you definitely gave birth, whether you realize it or not."
Sarahi looked skeptical at best. But Tuli just nodded, clutching her hand to her chest, and simply answered, "Okay." Then she sat down on the couch and seemed lost in her own thoughts.
"How about this, then?" Diya broke the uneasy quiet, bringing forward her mask and laying it lightly on the book.
Again the pages turned themselves, and Organa read off the title and interpreted the gist of what came after. "Eyes of the Monarch. Connects you to the arch-spirit of a wolf, a king among his kind. You will understand each other, you may share senses while the mask is worn, and travel to each other's worlds."
Diya blinked at that last tidbit. "We can...what?! I mean, obviously he can come to ours, but...he can call me to his, too?"
"Or carry you there," Organa grinned, "Never occurred to you, huh? You might try it, if you're ever in danger beyond your capabilities. Not many creatures can cross back and forth freely." She turned her smug smile to Sarahi, then. "So...curious yet?"
"...Fine," Sarahi sighed at last, trotting back to the hall to fetch her mirror and spear. She laid the mirror on the book first.
"Mistress' Mirror," Organa smiled smugly, apparently reading some reference into that which the gathered family didn't understand, "Manifest sunlight...repel harm (in other words, form that shield)...revealing reflections... that's quite the trinket you picked up," the Fennec grinned.
"Revealing reflections?" Sarahi quirked a brow, looking into the mirror, "Not that I use it much, but everything in it looks pretty normal to me."
"Try taking a look at me," Organa suggested with a knowing smile. Sarahi caught on to the hint, but still turned to angle the Fennec's reflection into the mirror. Sure enough, instead of the tall, alluring body they all saw sitting in the chair, the mirror reflected Organa's much smaller, natural form...all natural.
Sarahi quickly turned the mirror away. "Diya, I hate to ask this, but you guys are about her size: would you mind giving her a shirt and skirt or something? Old things would do. Illusions or no, this is not acceptable," the Sha'khari frowned.
"...Sure," Diya nodded after a moment's thought, quietly fighting the urge to present the Fennec with a couple of things not much more acceptable than being naked. Squelching the temptation, Diya went upstairs to pull something out of her and Kylan's closet.
While she was gone, Sarahi laid the head of her spear on the book. The page it touched flashed with golden light, and a luminous script began to spread itself across the paper before the pages started turning, making Organa's eyes go wide. She instinctively snatched the book up from the table, as if the spear were a lit torch threatening to burn her treasure, and frowned at the page it finally presented her. The Fennec flipped through a couple of the pages without saying anything, then closed the book entirely and opened it again, seemingly to a random page.
Finally she blew a sigh of relief. "Well...that's a first," she muttered, hesitantly laying the book back down where Sarahi could see the letters. Whatever was written there still made no sense to the Sha'khari, but Organa made certain she got a good look before turning back to the entry with the golden script. "Mother's Barb," Organa read the title, written in plain Heartherran, tracing her finger over the words as she spoke them, "Carried to glory by Sarahi Ironheart, daughter of the house of Swordbright, first of her line to bear the torch." She paused at the start of the next line, tapping the luminous ink. The rest of the page used a completely different alphabet from the body of the book. Even Sarahi noticed the difference in the characters. "And I have never seen figures like these," she frowned (at the spear, rather than the book), "It doesn't want me to know the details of it. It can't hide the information from my Akaishic Connection, but it's powerful enough to force it to present a language I cannot read. At least, that's what I suppose has happened. Fortunately the change is contained to its own pages."
Sarahi gave a low whistle. "That tells me enough, I guess," she said, turning the spear in her hands as she stared at the glowing blade, "Mother's Barb, huh? Nice to meet you." A sense of amusement ran through her fingers into her heart, and she chuckled on the weapon's behalf. Then she looked over her shoulder at Gorgorond, still firmly embedded in the wall...
Organa closed the book with a clap. "No," the Fennec declared simply and firmly, "Even if you could carry it here, if it abides that Rabbit's will at all, it will certainly try to eat my book...and it is just strong enough for me to worry it might succeed."
"Oh, you had better fucking believe it," Oro growled as he and Nayeli entered the room from the direction of the kitchen. The Rabbit had calmed down a little, but only just enough not to be an imminent threat to the witch's safety. He was venting what remained of his anger on a bundle of tough jerky, gnashing it between his teeth like he intended to drink it after he chewed. "Show-and-Tell all done now? Because you need to get the fuck out."
"She needs some clothes first," Sarahi sighed, shaking her head, "And maybe one of the sleeping bags. It's the middle of spring, but nights could still get cold for a while."
"Maybe she could stay on the couch, just for tonight," Nayeli suggested gently, "She has nowhere to go, Oro. That hut wouldn't keep out a stiff wind, much less rain."
They could hear his teeth wearing each other down. "Fucking damn lucky I love these two more than my own life," he hissed quietly, just as Diya returned with two changes of clothes in her arms. The first thought that went through her head was that he could fry chicken with his temper right now. The second was that she must not, under any circumstances, say that thought aloud. Oro was in one of those moods where there was no telling what he'd do. Just laying the clothes down on the table made him shoot such a red-hot glare at them that they might catch fire.
"Nothing fancy," she gestured at the short stack of faded shorts, teeshirts, and underwear, "But warmer than bare fur, and there are no holes in them."
"Thank you," Organa said, seeming sincere, as she immediately pulled one of the shirts over her head. It appeared to lengthen and tailor itself to her figure as it meshed with the illusion, followed by the shorts, and her dress disappeared altogether. "Ah, much better," the Fennec sighed, examining herself briefly before collecting her book, "But as for the rest...I think I'll take my chances with the rain, thank you very much."
"Hey," Oro barked, stopping her in her tracks, "Just to be clear: we make this run, give you the money, and then we. are. done. Correct?"
Organa turned to face him with a wary look. "That's right. And I'll be just as happy never to see your face again as you will mine."
"Good," the Rabbit grunted, "Saturday, then. Day after tomorrow. We'll make our run then. Be here that morning, and you can have run of the house while we're gone."
She tilted her head in no small amount of surprise...but nodded, and quickly finished making her exit before he could change his mind. Organa was, by now, thoroughly convinced it was useless trying to make sense of that man.
Into the Labyrinth
"So...I know this is kind of late in the planning," Tuli admitted as they were wrapping up dinner the next night, with everyone around the table, "And I don't know how I could be useful...but I want to go with you this time."
"No," Oro grunted with her last word still ringing in their ears.
Tuli nodded sympathetically, but insisted, "You're doing this almost entirely for my sake. It doesn't feel right to make you take that risk while I sit here in safety. Especially given how firmly against these runs I have been."
"I'm doing it to break the fucking witch's curse," the Rabbit disagreed, "Breaking yours is a bonus, but I'm betting I could do that in this world. Forgotten gods know I have enough connections to magic-huffing crack-pots now..."
Nobody at that table was buying his act. He wasn't that type, and they all knew it by now. Sarahi shook her head, but was actually in agreement with Oro over Tuli for once. "I'm all for more hands on deck, but they need to be hands that know what they're doing. Our last run made that clearer than ever. No offense to you two," she winced a little at the twins, "And it may be hypocritical for me to say...but someone who can't fight and has no survival skills is just a liability, even if they make the payout at the end bigger. It's hard for us to protect ourselves in there. Having to worry about protecting someone else raises the bar more than I'd like to admit. We almost couldn't do it last time. And you," she glared at Oro, "Are entirely too quick to self-sacrifice."
The twins, far from offended, nodded sympathetically. However, it was Kylan who offered the counter-argument: "You could leave that to us," he suggested, "I'm not going to be much use in a fight anyway. Not on the offense. I don't have the runes for that, or the skill, so I'll be leaving it to you and Oro. But the runes I use to make walls will give us good cover, and keep things off from our back, letting you focus on the front. We were already going to let Sonny play guard-dog for me and Diya anyway. Adding Tuli to that shouldn't make any real difference that I can see."
Oro tossed his fork up in the air and rolled his eyes. "Fine. Sure. Why not? Family outing, just like an amusement park. Hey, Nayeli, you want to come, too?" he asked, practically salivating sarcasm and irritation, "We can make out in a field of bones surrounded by fire-spitting dogs."
With a sigh, Nayeli collected his fork from the floor, and stacked his empty plate on top of hers, shaking her head. "I don't want to go. I don't want you to go. Any of you," she said quietly, "My feelings on that place have not changed. With that said—" Oro's face hit the table where his plate had been. Hard. Nayeli frowned, but let him have his moment of drama and accepted his otherwise silent invitation to continue. "I don't like being left behind. Especially with the thought that you might not be coming back. Ever. It bothers me more and more every hour that you're gone," she admitted. "I stayed behind last time to look after Mom. She needed me. She doesn't this time. If I'm not needed here...and especially if she's going, too...I don't want to be here, alone, wondering when and if you're going to make it home. If the worst should happen...I'd honestly rather be there with you, and meet my end by your side, than spend the rest of my life half hoping The Gauntlet is just mucking with time again and half certain that you are all dead or worse. So yes, I'm going, too."
Oro took a deep breath, and kept his head down for another minute, apparently trying to think calmly about the situation. In the end, most likely, he simply surrendered to the one person he never wanted to fight. "Fine," he sighed, more sincerely this time, but not any happier, "Fine. We'll grab a couple of extra sleeping-bags and toss in some more MREs. The tents will hold three, even if one of them's Sarahi, so we don't even need another one of those." He sat back up and slouched in his chair, giving a sideways look to Nayeli. "You realize, of course, that my life is going to be Hell with you in there. I must not keep an eye on you. I have to trust the twins to keep you safe at all times. Because I am going to be fucking busy when shit hits the fan. And that is going to be almost completely fucking impossible for me," he sighed, "I get how you feel, being left behind, and I guess you get how I feel about you coming along. So...let's both do our best."
Nayeli nodded, fully aware that he was likely to have a harder time thanks to being worried about her safety. Yes, it was the exact mirror to her own fear. She could sympathize. "Thank you. I'll try not to make it worse than it has to be."
"Fair enough," Oro grunted, rubbing his face, "Okay. I'm going to bed now. I'll run down to Double-O in the morning for the sleeping bags...and extra backpacks. Then we'll get this shit-show started." There was a silent agreement around the table as he pushed back from it. Nobody slept soundly that night...
"...Wow," Nayeli and Tuli gasped almost in unison. Sarahi smiled knowingly, and the twins giggled.
"Yeah, that's about what we said, too," Kylan nodded as the massive gate in front of them finished swinging open. He adjusted the straps of his pack on his shoulders, and anxiously checked his pocket for the runic cheat-sheet he'd made. That yawning darkness was still a little unnerving even to Sarahi. Oro, ironically, seemed more bothered by Organa's conspicuous absence this time than the gate welcoming them to their deaths.
Standing at the head of the group, the Rabbit turned to face them...and pulled a familiar dagger from the pocket of his hoodie. Flipping it over in his hand, he offered the handle to Nayeli. The Lioness arched a brow, slowly accepting it with her eyes fixed quizzically on Oro. "If it comes to that...I think the hatchet will do better," she noted, tapping the tool strapped to one side of her pack.
Oro chuckled with a smirk. "Yeah, but the Newbie Knife's more like a good-luck charm at this point. I keep giving it to someone going in for the first time. Don't break a sweat over it, but try not to lose it." Turning back toward the gate, he thumped his bat on his shoulder emphatically. "Everyone ready?"
"Close as I'll ever be," Tuli tried to smile confidently, but there was definitely a nervous edge to it, and understandably. Sarahi and the twins nodded quietly, and Oro stepped across the threshold into the darkness.
"CHAMPION!!" boomed the voice of The Gauntlet, causing Nayeli and Tuli to almost jump out of their packs. The other four couldn't help cracking grins. Even Oro snickered.
"We're going to have to make new friends to bring next time, just so I can watch them jump," the Rabbit smirked, then addressed the ceiling while pointing at Tuli, "Hey! Remember what you promised me last time? I'm back for—"
"YOU HAVE TAKEN WHAT IS RIGHTFULLY MINE!!" the voice cut him off, and Oro suddenly realized it had not greeted them with the usual phrase or tone. The Gauntlet seemed...angry. And it didn't take the Rabbit more than a second to guess why...
"...The souls," he growled, tapping his bat on his shoulder.
"Oh...shit...," Sarahi whispered, taking a firm grip on her spear and looking around at the entrance chamber warily, "We pissed off the dungeon."
Diya, following close on her tail, pulled the polished mask from her pocket and slipped it onto her face even as she asked, "What?!"
"Remember how it greeted us last time?" Sarahi explained quietly, "‘Fail, and your souls become part of my halls,' or something like that? I don't know if it needs them or what, but I think it's upset that Oro ate Sonova and her sister."
"The child is wise," growled the voice of The Gauntlet.
Oro growled right back, waving his bat at the ceiling as if he could threaten it. "Yeah? I guess we both got cheated, then. Tough cookies."
The walls groaned, and trembled faintly, like they were on the far edge of an earthquake. Kylan was already frantically sketching runes on the floor, trying to prepare supports in case the ceiling came down. "By the Eternal Law," the voice returned ominously, "I cannot deny you entry, and must reward your efforts. But for your punishment, I consign you to the halls of my brother, The Labyrinth!"
"The fu—!!" Oro started to ask, but the floor suddenly dropped out from underneath them. All of them. A general, surprised shriek rose from their collective throats. The dark of the cavernous setting was overwhelmed by a flare of brilliant light, a rush of warm(ish) air, and the sudden shock of being submerged in cold water. "Fuck you!" Oro gasped instinctively the instant he found the surface again. Shaking the water from his eyes, he was relieved to find they weren't in anything like an ocean or even a lake. It was more like a garden pond, dominating the center of a room comprised of four walls and no ceiling. Two good kicks brought him to the edge of the floor that filled the rest of the room, steady as the stone it was made of.
A quick glance around showed everyone else in their group making similar moves...except Kylan. "Fuck," Oro growled, but Sarahi didn't waste enough time even for a syllable before kicking back off into the water and beneath the surface. Her four strong legs had Kylan and his pack back at the surface in no time, sodden but none the worse for wear. Diya had been rescued by Sonny almost as soon as she hit the water, and Tuli and Nayeli managed to keep their heads above water despite the weight of their packs without assistance. It helped that the pool was shallow enough for Tuli to simply bounce off the bottom the one time she went under. It was just barely too deep for the twins to manage the same with their packs on.
"Thanks," the little Feline huffed as he crawled onto the stone floor.
"No sweat," Sarahi answered with a shake of her head, making a double-check to be sure everyone was safely on solid floor before hauling herself out. "Ugh...this is going to start chaffing fast," she groaned at her sodden jeans.
"That would be the one advantage of skirts over pants, I guess," Oro grumbled, trying to knock some pernicious drop of water out of his left ear, "Water-logging aside, everyone okay?"
"Mostly," Kylan immediately piped up, working very carefully to ease a soaked sheet of paper out of his pocket without tearing it more than could be helped, "Already glad I brought a cheat-sheet instead of the actual book, but I really only know two runes. So if I can't save this, I'm going to be even less useful than expected."
Oro's ears twitched with irritation. "Hey, leave the negativity to the professional," he poked his thumb against his chest, "Same's true if Sarahi twists an ankle or loses her spear, if Diya breaks her mask, or if this demon gets exorcised out of me. Not your fault. Do what you can. Anyone else?"
"I'm good, thanks to Sonny," Diya confirmed, giving the big wolf a grateful hug.
"Physically fine," Nayeli nodded, laying on her back and catching her breath, "Trying not to think about the phone in my pocket."
"Whew!" Tuli panted, still hanging half in the water, "I think I might be in worse shape than I thought!" Nayeli reached over to pat her shoulder encouragingly, just before an unfamiliar voice spoke into the room.
"Oh good," sighed a deep, lethargic voice that sounded much more sleepy than pleased, "In that case, welcome to my halls, Champion. I am The Labyrinth, and you are presently at my center. If you can find your way to the exit, you will be free once more. Good luck."
"Fuck off," the Rabbit snapped, wringing the water from his hoodie. After thinking about it for a second, he added, "But thanks for keeping the volume down. Any rules we should know?"
"It's dangerous to peek," the voice sighed, "That is all."
Oro muttered something under his breath, followed by, "Why couldn't I have got this fucker from the beginning? Quiet. Simple. I could almost like him." Stepping over to Tuli, he took hold of the pack on her back and hauled her fully onto the dry floor, letting her squirm out of the shoulder straps before setting the pack to the side. Everyone else quickly began shrugging off their sodden packs as well, and Kylan used his chalk to inscribe five instances of the only two runes he knew by heart on one side of the room: four large "project" runes in a square, and each of these connected by a line to the one much smaller "heat" rune he'd drawn in the center. Holding his hand over it briefly, his eyes went distant with concentration, and a warm, stiff wind began to blow from the space between the runes...sort of like a giant hand-dryer.
The group took turns standing in the airstream to dry off, humming praises for the little Feline's resourcefullness, while Kylan made a much smaller setup to dry out his cheat-sheet. Once they were all comfortably dry, they began laying out the contents of the packs, checking for anything else that ought to be dried before they moved on and assessing the water-damage. Fortunately, the latter was minimal, since they hadn't brought along many electronics and no paper besides Kylan's notes. Their food and water was all individually packaged and stored in plastic bags besides.
Oro started looking around the room while the others got the clothing and sleeping bags dried out. Each of the four walls had a door in its center, flanked by torches. Oro quirked a brow at these, looking up to confirm that there was no roof between him and the open sky, with a bright sun shining down on them. "Guess I should take that to mean there is a day-and-night cycle here. Terrific." Eying the sconches holding the torches, he couldn't help thinking that, if he got a foot onto one of them, he could probably jump high enough to reach the top of the wall and see what was on the other side.
This, no doubt, was the "peeking" The Labyrinth had warned was dangerous. But it hadn't said he couldn't, assuming he was willing to take the risk... "Maybe later," the Rabbit sighed, thumping Gorgorond against his back. "Dangerous" could cover a pretty broad spectrum here: everything from getting pushed back off the ledge to being met with arrows, and possibly worse.
A short time later, with all their clothes and equipment thoroughly dry and repacked, the group considered the doors in earnest. "I guess it doesn't really matter which one we pick to start," Diya shrugged, "We're at the center, supposedly, with no idea which way the exit might be at all. Any of them is as good as another."
"My thoughts exactly," Oro shrugged, "It's not where we start that matters, but how we solve that ‘which way the exit might be' problem. I'm not too keen on spending literal years in here. We only brought enough food for a week, at best."
"Isn't there supposed to be a trick to solving these things?" Nayeli noted, "Only make left turns, or something like that?"
Sarahi nodded. "It works so long as there are no free-standing sections anywhere. No guarantee this place follows the rule, but it's solid as a start."
Oro nodded his agreement. "Alright. Sarahi and I will move in front. Diya and Kylan, I want you two in back, since you at least have Sonny to help. Tell the dog to bark if it smells anything it doesn't like," he suggested to Diya, "We're all going to be jumpy for a while, but I don't care. Better to double-check something that's safe than miss a threat. So point out anything that makes you nervous." Everyone nodded agreement and understanding. Diya and Kylan climbed onto Sonny's back, the large wolf easily able to carry them both. Sarahi turned her mirror to create a shield, nearly tall enough to cover from her shoulder to her knee. Oro thumped his bat on his shoulder and turned to push open the nearest door.
There was a short hallway on the other side, barely wide enough to allow any two of them to walk side-by-side comfortably. A case of shelves briefly narrowed the hall at one point about halfway down its length, and the hall terminated in another door like the one they now peered through. Oro's lip curled in a sneer, already not liking something about this. Reaching through the door with his bat, he firmly tapped the ceiling that covered the short hall, suspicious of the mere fact that the hall was covered but the room was not.
Understanding his hesitance, Sarahi trotted over to open the door in a different wall. Nayeli and Diya went to do likewise with the remaining doors. Each one lead to a similar hall, with variations on the interior decorations. One of them contained a steaming, wide-grated vent near the floor. Diya immediately closed that door, already anxious about what might reach through those bars.
"Alright," Oro rolled his eyes, still standing by his original door, "Might as well stick with this one, then. Let's go." He marched down the hall with Gorgorond at the ready on his shoulder, reaching the other end without incident. The shelves proved to have nothing useful on them, being decorated with a candle burning atop a skull and a couple of empty bottles beginning to mold on the inside. Shoving the door at the far end open, Oro paused to take in the scene before him, careful not to step into it.
"...Is that a graveyard?" Nayeli asked, peering over his shoulder at a handful of headstones planted in a patch of dirt surrounding a large tree. The dirt gave way to more stone flooring around the perimeter of the room, almost like a walkway, all contained within a hexogonal arrangment of walls. Across from the door they peered out through, the "room" extended down a long, narrow corridor, then seemed to widen out again on the other side. The open sky overhead was grey and cloudy.
"Looks like it," Oro growled, "I don't think this is going to be as simple as ‘walk down the hall, keep turning left'. Watch yourselves," he warned, stepping into the room at last. Sarahi followed right behind, walking between the tombstones with him toward the tree. Each of them went around opposite sides of the tree, eying the branches, while the rest of the group emerged into the room, taking the long way around the little graveyard and keeping to the stone walkway.
A scream ripped through the air from the far end of the room. It sounded like it tore the chords out of the throat that ushered it, and even Oro was startled back a step before he and Sarahi brought their weapons to bear. Floating over another small patch of graves at the far end of the room, a horned skull wreathed in flames stared at them with hateful fire in its eyes. Another floated into view, out from behind one of the tombstones, and still another from somewhere off to the side of the narrow hall in the middle of the room. Before they knew it, over a half-dozen of the skulls were slowly, ominously floating in their direction.
Sarahi jumped over the tombstones between her and the hall. "Make a choke-point," she called to Oro, "Keep them in the hall!"
"They can fucking fly!" he growled back, though he was right on her heels.
Whatever she was about to say in answer to that was cut short as the nearest skull suddenly shot forward like an arrow. Sarahi's shield took the hit only because she'd already been holding it in front of her. Shards of bone and flame dashed against the glowing circle before dying out on their way to the floor. Sarahi blinked in surprise. "They're...kinda weak," she observed with no small amount of relief.
The next two rushed her, and Sarahi took one on the shield and let the other impale itself on the end of her spear. Apparently they were kind of dumb, too. Oro, standing just behind her with his bat at the ready in case one managed to zip by her, actually looked disappointed...but wasn't about to complain out loud. Checking over his shoulder, he found the rest of the group huddled with their backs to the tree, eying the tombstones around them warily. Nothing seemed to be rising up on their end, though, which was a relief.
He turned back just as the remaining group rushed Sarahi all at once. Two hammered her shield, barely rocking it. Three more were skewered on her spear, though she had to move quick to catch them all. And one passed too high, nearly taking her head as she flinched out of its way...and came to a stop a foot or so in front of Oro. "Heh...sucks having a limit, doesn't it?" he chuckled as he brought Gorgorond around in a hit that would make their old gym coach proud. The blazing skull was snuffed like a candle...and Oro's eyes shot wide and he nearly dropped the bat. "Holy fuck!!"
"What?!" Sarahi wheeled around, as if expecting to find a new threat behind them. But the room was quiet now, and no more skulls floated into view.
Oro ran his tongue along the front of his teeth, as if checking whether he'd remembered to brush that morning, and sneered. "I can taste it. These fuckers are souls. Gorgorond swallowed it."
Sarahi stared at him blankly. "...Are you okay?"
"Yeah," the Rabbit grunted, resting Gorgorond on his shoulder again, "Just surprised. If we meet any more of those...I'd like to take point. It'd be nice to feel full again."
Nayeli winced a little at the implication as she and the others grouped back up with him and Sarahi. "Um...so, how is it?"
Oro tilted his head from side to side thoughtfully. "...Sweet? It's faint, like I just sniffed a jar of sugar to be sure it wasn't salt." Running his tongue over his teeth one more time, the Rabbit looked down the empty hall, noting that none of the destroyed skulls had turned into crystals like he'd gotten used to. "We should get going again. I don't think this place is like The Gauntlet. Escape may be our only reward, and the race will be against our food supply."
The other end of the hall terminated in another small graveyard, without the tree, and two more doors set into adjacent walls of the hexogonal room. Oro marched up to the one on their left, keeping with the original plan just to make decision-making easier, and pushed it in...
