Fred (Book 6): Undeading Bells

by Hayes, Drew

  Unless this was some sort of false victory, it seemed like we’d made it to the center of the maze. One clue was that all the exits from this circular area were identical to the one we’d come down: long hallways that I had a hunch were enchanted to keep folks out in the same manner as mine had been, or perhaps each with their own challenge. The other major hint that we’d reached our destination was the elaborate stone jutting up in the exact center of the room.

  It resembled a much sloppier, smaller, and darker version of the Washington Monument, a five-foot-tall obelisk with strange lines and notches etched all over it. Leaning in close, I noticed that some of the parts had visible give, and that all the decoration formed some sort of pattern. One last puzzle, then, if we were lucky. Find the pattern, move the bits around until it worked, and go from there. My main problem was that the more I looked at the obelisk, the less I could see any breaks in the pattern to even solve. I wasn’t just failing to see a solution; I couldn’t even find the problem.

  Mercifully, I eventually hit upon the obvious explanation after a few moments of intense study.

  “Hey, Amy, did you already solve this while you were waiting on us?”

  “All but the last switch. Didn’t want to risk getting yanked out of here without you.” Amy barely paid the question any mind; she was examining the pinned minotaur, which had gone silent since tumbling down. The most it would do was glare, most often at me, a fact I neither understood nor was particularly comfortable with. “There’s also a keyhole on the other side. I guess this place has different ways to clear it.”

  I was thankful Neil was occupied with Albert and unable to claim his rightful “I told you so” about my item selection. It might have been useful in other contexts, just not with someone like our alchemist to handle tests of intellect.

  While Amy worked to satisfy her curiosity and the two friends caught up, I made my way over to check on Gregor. “How did you hold up?”

  It probably was significant that I saw the annoyance fight to rise on Gregor’s face, given how stalwart he was by default. “That woman is as chaotic as she is effective.”

  In my bones, I had no idea if that was meant as a compliment or an insult. Not that it mattered: Gregor might have just more accurately encapsulated Amy Wells than anyone else had previously managed. “I think she may put that on a crest or a shirt, if you tell her. But things went okay? No major problems?”

  Another strange look before he shook his head slowly. “Only that I failed in my duties and was separated from my charge.”

  Part of me had been braced for that sort of reaction, so I had a rebuttal locked and loaded. “Look, when it comes to parahumans, nobody sees every trap coming. Even Gideon has to go rescue Sally sometimes. What matters isn’t that we got split up, it’s that you stayed safe, kept calm, and made it back. I’ll never ask you to be so good you don’t make mistakes; all I request is that you try to learn from them.”

  More staring, some that might have led to eventual words if Amy hadn’t chosen that exact moment to stand up and clap the minotaur fur from her hands. “Okay, everyone, if we’re all feeling nice and ready, I should probably solve that last puzzle. In about thirty seconds, the binding foam will start to dissolve, so we’d best be gone by then.”

  A loud crack came from the dark foam near the minotaur’s hooves as the first section began to break.

  “Or maybe twenty seconds; never held something that strong before.” With a casual ease that somehow made my own anxiety worse, Amy strolled over to the obelisk, motioning for us all to gather close. Whatever this triggered, we didn’t want to be split up again. Behind us, more cracking sounds arose from the struggling minotaur.

  Bending down, Amy ran her hands delicately along the stone, fingers dancing from notch to notch. “Where was that little turd… no, no, no… ah, here we go.”

  A thunderous cacophony rose from behind us, the foam fully breaking apart as the minotaur rose steadily to its feet. As it reached for its axe, Amy took a socketed chunk of stone and wiggled it forward, completing the last anomaly in the winding pattern. For a fleeting moment, there was nothing, and I feared she’d made a mistake.

  Then, as we all really should have expected, the floor fell away. Again. Only this time, we weren’t split up. The entire area around the obelisk popped down, forming half a sphere that sent us all to a single hole in the center. The obelisk stood above us, floating magically in place, tethered to nothing. I wondered if this was what it felt like to be flushed as I flew into the dark opening, falling through darkness for several seconds before coming to a surprisingly soft landing.

  I was seated on a couch, along with the rest of my friends, in what appeared to be a slightly less-than-contemporary living room. In front of us was a coffee table with various refreshments of the mundane variety: chips, beer, soda, and cookies, but no blood or anything of the like. Overhead was a large, wrinkled banner, bearing the single word: “Congratulations!”

  Confusing as it was, I forgot all about the room as soon as I heard a new, unfamiliar voice pipe up behind us.

  “Looks like somebody made it through my maze.”

  10.

  My eyes went wide, Albert laid a hand on his sword, and Gregor started to rise from the couch, shoved back down by the dainty, yet forceful hand of Amy Wells.

  “Everyone, I’d like to introduce you to Shun. Shun, you might want to speak quickly. While I realized what you were doing, the rest of the group still thinks they were being attacked.”

  A new form stepped into view, a woman not too far from Neil’s age. Her black hair was a wild mess, the sort that hadn’t even seen a comb in years, and she wore robes that were simple and well-used. The most noticeable facet of her was her smile, which was small but warm as she excitedly examined our faces.

  “Attacked? They think I’d try to kill a vampire and a gargoyle with puzzles and slugs?” Shun shook her head, laughing slightly off-harmony. “That was my pitch! I’ve been working on it for years. Humans have these escape rooms that are all the rage, but to most of us, they aren’t scary or challenging. I want to make attractions catered to parahumans, and this is my proof of concept.”

  With that, it clicked. I’d even thought to myself several times that if our lives hadn’t been in peril, the whole experience might have been fun. Now, it made sense: I’d been on a roller coaster without knowing there were security measures in place.

  “Hang on, you built all of this alone ?” Neil looked skeptical, if not outright incredulous. “In just a few years? Even if you have the skill to weave all those spells, there’s no way you could do that; the construction, the hollowing out of sections of pure rock, and everything else required to create something like this is too much work. Especially that maze section.”

  Shun’s smile dimmed a touch, a sheepish look darting across her face. “Sorry, I phrased that poorly. I didn’t make the center of the attraction. I found it by chance while I was out here doing research on areas of magical anomaly. After I defeated the maze, I won power over the entire area; that’s how I was able to do all the hollowing and building. Everything within a certain range of that structure is malleable to me.”

  With a single wave of her hands, a stone chair shot out of the ground across from us—a chair onto which Shun took a seat. In the meantime, I was mentally flipping back through the adventure, hunting for any detail that didn’t mesh with the story we were getting. None of the traps had seemed especially deadly, and even the scarier ones might have had worse bark than bite.

  Although, one notable exception did stand out.

  “What about the minotaur trying to murder us?”

  “He only puts on a show,” Shun replied. “If you fought him, you’d find he always just misses, or stays a little behind you during pursuit. Adds stakes to the last session. Be thankful: when I did the maze for real, he actually was trying to kill me. It’s how the last person in control set him. I had to dissolve him in acid before I managed to get the controls f
igured out.”

  That was both horrifying and confusing. Thankfully, Neil leaned over and explained to Albert, purposely raising his voice so the rest of us could hear. “Some minotaurs are creatures of their labyrinth and bound to them. You can’t kill the guardian—for good, anyway—while the maze still stands.”

  “And if you control the labyrinth, you control the guardian.” Amy took a long sip from one of the provided beers, the lights on her skin speeding up and slowing down. “Is he sentient?”

  “Not so far. Artificially created—reforms from the labyrinth’s material within a day or so of being destroyed. Follows orders and instructions well, but I don’t think the designer intended for independent thought.”

  Spinning her beer bottle by the neck, Amy watched the liquid slosh within its container. “Good thing. Controlling a creature with will of its own would be a very different proposition than using an automated defense system. Break it all down for me, Shun. Tell me about this place.”

  Fascinated as I was by the prospect of such a discussion, it became clear almost immediately that the knowledge would be lost on me. The conversation veered directly into the sort of complex, magical equations and practical discussions where I didn’t even understand enough to know how much I was missing. It was akin to them switching into another language, so I took the time to examine our new surroundings.

  I rose from the couch and walked around through the large room, one big enough to comfortably hold twenty plus people without anyone feeling cramped. This was obviously going to be the success room, a spot where people who’d finished the challenge would be able to bask in the satisfaction of their achievement. Refreshments were good, though given how long we’d been down there and the metabolism of many parahumans, such snacks would be woefully inadequate to slate any true hunger.

  Near the back of the room, I found a secluded section with more couches stacked and tucked away—extra seating in case of larger groups. I started to wonder how Shun had moved these around and stacked them so casually, then the image of her stone chair returned. If you could control the very shape of your environment, these sorts of chores were probably quite minimal, which meant changing things could also be accomplished on the cheap.

  The idea as a whole was a neat one, and had legs, but to my mind, Shun’s biggest obstacle was the maze itself. First off, the remote location put it much too far out to draw in any casual traffic; people would have to make a pilgrimage for this experience. Then, there was the sheer size of the thing. With a brilliant mage on each team, we’d made it through the entire game over the course of several hours. A team less puzzle-oriented could be down there for days. Like many parahumans, Shun had grasped the concept of a mortal creation without understanding the smaller details that led to a successful business.

  It was while I was investigating a shoddy bar set up by the rear wall that Albert wandered over, also evidently weary of the magic discussion. Gregor stayed put, his eyes never leaving my location. I was impressed he hadn’t turned into an eager shadow, but maybe he just didn’t want to tip off Shun if he still expected a surprise attack.

  There was no such worry in Albert, not that I’d expected to find any. He strolled up casually, hand near the hilt of his blade without touching it. It was a stance he’d nearly perfected over the years: ready without being threatening. While I was positive he’d never say it, I was even more sure that Arch had to be proud of the progress Albert and Neil had made.

  “How was everything?” For Albert, it was a delicate touch; he didn’t even glance over to Neil as he posed the question.

  “Good.” I realized a moment later that he didn’t want to articulate what he was truly asking and shifted to the topic for him. “Neil and I bonded rather well, in fact.”

  “Happy to hear that, and also a little surprised. The two of you have never… well, some of us get along better than others.” Albert’s diplomatic skills might not have grown as quickly as his combat ones, but he’d managed to find a polite, if honest way of describing my interactions with Neil.

  Unlike Albert, I did look over to the couch, taking a long look at our necromancer. It was amazing how much Neil had grown up when I wasn’t noticing. Even now, it was easy to still see that mad gleam in his eye as he cackled before his captives. But that Neil hadn’t been around for a very long time, and it was well past time to acknowledge that difference. We’d both become locked into that dynamic by habit and resentment, but the silver lining to being shaken up was that things didn’t always settle back down in the same shape they’d been before. Whether today was a blip in our history or the start of a new dynamic for us would depend on the efforts we each made moving forward.

  “I think we just needed a little time to better see each other. Being thrust into what we thought was a near-death experience certainly helped with the team building.”

  Albert laughed at that notion. “Maybe we should use this place for all new company employees. Start them off with a bond.”

  I felt like someone had just thrown a hammer through a glass wall of my own blind spot. That was it. “Albert, you’re absolutely correct.”

  The panic on his face was crisp and immediate. “I was joking. I don’t think Al’s going to be happy if you drag her out here for a first assignment.”

  “Not about us, specifically, about the team building.” Rather than explain myself twice, I walked back over to the couch with Albert following close behind.

  No sooner had I drawn near than Amy looked up. “Good timing. We were just about to call you over. I think I’ve got a good, general sense of how Shun managed most of this, and while it is still a marvel, having magical control of the area explains most of my larger logistical questions. Next question is, how viable is this as a business?”

  “For an escape room? It’s a non-starter. You have no other attractions nearby, you’re miles from major roads—to say nothing of foot traffic—and you don’t even have lodging where people who wanted to come could stay. Unless you made a gate from somewhere more accessible using spatial magic, which I’m given to understand is quite difficult, this place would be unlikely to even sell a ticket, let alone recoup a profit.”

  With every word, Shun’s face had fallen, her smile growing dimmer and dimmer, until it threatened to fall away entirely. Just before we reached that point, I swung around to the rest of my assessment.

  “That said, there is a viable business model here. Don’t bill it as just an escape room: it’s a parahuman corporate team-building exercise. Human businesses do versions of this constantly. The simulated danger and need for cooperation force people who might not normally get along to work together, perhaps even overcoming their own issues in the process.” My gaze darted to Neil, who rolled his eyes but couldn’t stop himself from chuckling a little.

  “How is that better, though?” Albert, despite it technically being his idea, was having trouble seeing the bigger picture. “Aren’t all those other issues still problems?”

  It was Amy, funnily enough, who’d already seen the answers. “Nope. Corporate retreats are supposed to last for at least a weekend, so the longer time frame isn’t an issue. Nor is travel; most of these things take place some distance from centralized society. Lodging might be a problem, but I’m guessing Fred and I both see the same easy fix. Not hard to make more space when someone can shape this whole area at will. Form a small village up top, and we’ve even got somewhere for them to relax if they finish early.”

  The dim grin flashed back to full strength as Shun looked back and forth from me to Amy. “I could do that. I could make changes to the maze, as well, turn it more team oriented.” There was a familiar hunger in her eyes, a look I’d seen on both Neil and Amy’s faces when a new ambition had their attention. “Does that mean you’re interested in investing in my project?”

  “The magic is sound. Since my money guy thinks there’s potential, and I’d love to see more of what you can do, it seems like it’ll be cash well spent. Let’s start small
, work on a new room design and a sample lodging unit, then we’ll go from there.”

  To my surprise, Shun shot out of the stone chair and wrapped Amy in a hug. She’d been so reserved in her body language that only now did I realize it had probably been the result of nerves. While they embraced, I made my way back over to the shoddy bar at the rear of the room.

  Digging around, I found a few cold bottles tucked away and brought them forth into the light. Once the tops were popped, I headed back and began to hand them out. Since Amy and Shun were still talking, I set a pair of bottles down near them and moved on. Gregor accepted his drink with a nod, Albert looked uncertain, while Neil drained a quarter of the bottle immediately after touching it.

  “Should we toast to the new business?” Neil proposed, after noticing that no one else had drunk yet.

  “That’s a good one.” I lifted my own drink and tapped it against the others’. “To new ventures, and old friends.”

  That earned me another eye roll, though this time, it was paired with a smile. We weren’t the best of friends, or suddenly bonded for life, but Neil and I had definitely found a new footing with one another. If that didn’t convince me this place was magical enough to invest in, I couldn’t imagine what would.

  A Place of Blue

  1.

  With one week left until the wedding, we were officially hitting crunch time. Between Krystal and me, we were beginning to feel like we had no time at all. We still had to finish clearing our plates for the honeymoon, planning the final touches, and putting logistics in place for our convoy to drive down—we were bringing far too many things and people to fly. Thankfully, our friends had been pitching in to pick up the slack.

  On the afternoon where this part of the tale begins, we were seated in the living room of Charlotte Manor, going over cake samples. While we’d ultimately decided to use Boarback’s catering in general, Charlotte had graciously offered to create our wedding cake. Given her culinary skill and ability to conjure food seemingly at will, she was an ideal fit, even if it did mean one more item to bring in the car. I’d have to ask the Clovers about purchasing some sort of stabilizing enchantment to prevent slippage, or else ask if they had anything like a magical Mary Poppins bag.