The maze gets darker and darker until Bexley is half nauseous. She can still see okay, but it catches her off guard, how quickly the weather is changing in here: every ten steps or so she notices more frost on the leaves, a harder crunch of ice under her bleached hooves, the air getting damper and colder. She almost shivers. With each exhale comes a cloud of white air that Bexley watches with fascination, focused on each tendril, the curls it makes in the wet air, how it dissipates within seconds but is replaced just as quickly. Frost may be starting to form over her skin. But nothing compares to the chill that rushes up Bexley’s spine when she hears that noise: an unreal shriek, a laugh, a witch’s cackle, reverberating from somewhere up ahead.
Bex almost stumbles, and forces herself to pause. The hair on the back of her neck is standing up, and her heart is thrashing inside her chest, beating so deep she can feel it in her mouth. Blood rushes to her head in dark waves. What the fuck was that? She strains but can’t see anything ahead; the laugh echoes but belies no more information. For a moment she's frozen with a sickly-cold rush of uncertainty. Then a horrendous, glowing smile splits itself across the girl’s face, her nostrils flare with genuine amusement, and for a short moment she dances in place, hips wriggling, those huge white curls swaying as she prances. In her head, the thought saturated with affection, she thanks Solis. How long has it been since I had a really good adventure? Too long for an idiot adrenaline junkie like her, for someone so hellbent on getting intro trouble. Bexley barks a laugh and bolts forward.
Winding around the next corner brings her face to face with what must be the source of the laugh: someone ghostly and gaunt, dark eyes, draped in fur. His bones are the loudest part of his body - ribs and hips shouting their presence from each corner of that pale frame. Bexley frowns at him, and draws to a stop. His face is shrouded by hair, his body overwhelmed by the pelts, and he smells foreign as far as Bexley can tell, leaving her utterly confused as to what, exactly, he is, and what he’s doing here. She leaves a respectable distance between them out of caution as much as politeness. And when he speaks, it’s so young, so confident, that Bexley is both pleased and startled to hear the sound of his voice, feeling it’s almost homely in the strangeness of the maze.
Is it the relic of almighty Tempus you seek, Bexley? You will have to follow me to find it. Only a little off put, excitement flares in Bexley’s chest again. The name thing is unsettling but not surprising. Why wouldn’t he know? She doesn’t even really think he’s of this earth - maybe an off brand version of her own gods - besides, the more people know her name, the better. This situation is both terrifying and right up Bex’s alley. She loves the hot rush of adrenaline that’s coursing through her body, loves the thought that she’s on the edge of something, death or fame, doesn’t matter. Her brain is hazy with gold. The creature takes off, and Bexley darts right after him.
Tempus’ relic! Tempus’ relic! Bexley is away from home, and she’s strong from traveling, strong from putting up with that Day Court nonsense, she’s ready, for whatever bullshit this maze will try to pull on her. She has the love of Solis behind her. That has to be enough.
Deeper and deeper into the maze they go, the man always just ahead of her, the walls of the brambles getting narrower until they scratch at Bexley’s silky flanks, but she pushes harder, slinking through the undergrowth, tugging her hair from the knots of the foliage, refusing to give up when she knows that there is something here. She’s so invested in keeping up that at first she doesn’t notice the sounds behind her. The cooing of something avian, the shadows of that start to move at her sides. She only takes notice when it becomes impossible to ignore: something flying overhead, the beating of huge wings moving cold air toward her, the flapping of birdlike movement making noise just above her head.
Bexley’s step almost, almost falters. She hates things that fly. Absolutely fucking hates them. It’s why she doesn’t trust Maxence, it’s why she was wary of Camdis, it’s the reason she loves the desert, for its lack of all things living. Her whole body crawls with incomprehensible disgust. Keep moving, she tells herself, watching the flash of white that is her guide here. The air is now swirling with multiple pairs of wings, their horrible caws scratching deep into Bexley’s ears. Keep moving. They won’t bother you if you don’t bother them.
It’s something Laszlo told her, a long time ago - that birds, like most creatures, will stick to their own unless provoked. But this place does not adhere to the Briar family rules. It probably does not even adhere to the rules of common sense. This place is black with the sudden oncoming of night, white with a winter that shouldn’t be here. These birds are huge and black and gory, not like the sparrows that Bex used to jump at. There are two - she thinks - and they’re moving closer to her with every swoop, drifting low, low, until she swears those wings are touching her. She jumps forward with a startled yelp, and now they’re really coming after her. Dark feathers painted in some places with iridescent purple, thick ivory claws, the biggest wingspan she’s ever seen, their eyes yellow-gold with huge, catty pupils. One dives at her side, and Bexley jumps sideways into the brambles. An almost gentle pain blossoms over the shallow cuts that she knows are now lining her ribs.
One of the things lands near the other side of the lane. It’s three feet tall at least, its bony head cocked at her in curiosity, coat shining iridescently even in the near-blackness of the maze. “Fuck you,” she snarls at it, baring every tooth she has; it chatters at her condescendingly. Experimentally she lashes out a hoof, but it takes an easy jump back and misses the blow completely. The chatter is growing louder now. She feels it like a pulse in the back of her brain, chalky and insistent. “Where’s your little buddy,” she mocks it, venomous, but then the reality of the situation sets in, and when she repeats it, the words are laced with genuine fear: “Where’s your little - “
The chain around her neck is pulled upward so hard Bexley screams. The gold is too strong to be broken easily, and the bird is too stubborn to let go, and she can feel that last breath of air as it’s crushed out of her windpipe. Her legs flail, panic ensues. Then the pressure shifts - the bird has realized the chain won't snap and is now floating right in front of her, trying to pull the necklace over her head. Its wings are endlessly huge, its beak incredibly sharp. Bexley is filled with so much fear she’s not sure if she can move, but in the moment she realizes it’s trying to take her necklace - the last thing on this godforsaken planet she has left of her family - the terror is replaced by a rage so intense that she loses all the feeling in her limbs. Another tug. The chain starts to slips over her ears. Bexley lets out a huge snarl, plants her legs firmly in the wet earth, and then lunges forward with all the force she can muster.
Her head smashes directly into the bird’s abdomen; it lets out a guttural shriek, and a cloud of pearly feathers spatters on either side of her. The creature is blown forward out of view. When Bex looks up, she realizes the hedge across from her now has a bird-shaped hole where her attacker was thrown through it. But she’s pissed off its companion. The one on the ground has its wings outstretched and is cackling wildly, walking toward her in a strange, slow shuffle. “Piece-of-shit knockoff magpie,” she flares, head still fuzzy-black from the impact.
Then she turns on her heel and bolts as fast she can after the shaman, praying to Solis that it won’t follow.
@Random Events
