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The impact of the pendulum against his wing must have stunned him momentarily for Xiu could not remember being dragged to the small space between the swinging pendulums. And Cesc was peering at him worriedly while apologizing all the while.

Xiu shook his head. It was not Cesc’s fault. Anyone could have made that mistake. Especially since the earlier three had been nothing but cardboard and paint. Xiu gave a low but silent growl, his temper getting the better of him. He was sore, wet and smelling faintly of bird poop and the maze had still dared to pull a trick like this onto the both of them. Someone could have gotten seriously hurt. A bone may have been fractured, for example.

Xiu sat up and took a brief glance at his left wing. Apart from the feeling that it might simply drop off at any moment, there was no external damage to be seen. Xiu gave his wing an experimental flap and winced as his muscles protested against the weight of his wings. Okay...his left wing was probably sprained. Best not to trouble it any more than he had to.

Giving Cesc a reassuring pat, Xiu glanced behind the stag and noticed the alternative exit that had opened up to them. Points at them Xiu gave the frei a wary look. Should we chance it? His gaze seemed to say.

With the maze shifting as often as it did, Xiu doubted that whichever path that they had left would be left open for them to return to should the alternative fail. But there was no point in thinking about that. What the two of them should do now was to find a way out of this infuriating maze. Already the Sigel was thinking of a few choice words to say to the Doctor. Most of them involved “explain” and “dangerous” and “insane”.

Floating off the ground, Xiu nodded towards the pathway. Let’s go and get this over and done with sighed the Sigel as he took the path on his right. Apart from the smattering of coloured flowers along its walls, this path looked similar to most of the other paths that they had taken.

Now that they had hit another blank wall, Xiu was more than happy to give Cesc the lead. The Frei seemed grim and determined to find his way out of the maze and Xiu was in one thought with him on this. The sooner they find the exit the better. The maze had ceased to be amusing around the second encounter or so and had gotten downright dangerous by the third and fourth encounter. Xiu wondered if something might have gone out of hand...


The path that the both of them had backtracked into seemed to be rather long and lonely and narrow. But after the dangerous wide open ones, this had got to be safer at least.

Xiu gave Cesc a small glance and took his notebook out. The pages were still a little damp and might tear if he tried to write in them. Shaking his head Xiu kept the notebook once more. The path that the duo had floated into seemed to be stretching much further than what the Sigel thought was logically possible for the Garden Maze’s size. Floating beside Cesc, Xiu could not help but reach out to the soft blooms and marvelled at them.

This seemed almost peaceful compared to the varying situations that they were in earlier. Tucking the bloom away for pressing later, Xiu floated along the gentle stag. Given the hedge scene before them, Xiu would not have been surprised to hear harp music in the distance; such was the ambience of the place,

This part of the maze was so relaxing, so beautiful and calming, that Cesc could not help but feel his mood rising. True, it did not seem to make sense -- they had been going straight for so long, it did not seem to be possible. It must be a trick of some sort, a subtle arc that seemed straight but wasn't? But that was hardly a present thought in Cesc's mind. The scent of the flowers was heavenly ... he could smell jasmine, orange blossom, honeysuckle. It both refreshed and calmed him, the same way he felt every morning when he fed on the beautiful dawn. His shoulders relaxed. Tension slipped away.

He turned to Xiu with a companionate smile, preserving the silence so that they could both enjoy the beauty of this part of the maze to its fullest. He knew now that Xiu's notebook was in no shape for conversation, anyway, so it was better to delight in this meditative garden instead.

Then, from his left side, a hedge rustled! A creature leapt out, and Cesc's heart jumped with it -- a new trial for them to overcome! He tensed, halting quickly, his shoulders up and his eyes sharp, ready. He was still, his peripheral vision keeping Xiu in his sights, his hands balled into fists. His wings twitched and became intangible light once more, the feathers glowing. Whatever the maze had to throw at them this time, he felt prepared to face it!

... but what was this? A beautiful creature, unaware of them, making its way through the maze in its own pace. A gorgeous flank, silvery white, unblemished in any way. Gentle eyes and white eyelashes. It seemed carved from wind and marble, this animal of grace and poise and purity. It was like the drawings of the stag that Vivi had shown him -- like it, but even better, more regal. It dipped its head and the tension whooshed from Cesc as fast as it had come; he stood still, his jaw slowly unhinging, his eyes filled with awe. He could not escape the feeling he was in the presence of royalty.

A unicorn.

He could barely tear his eyes away for long enough to exchange glances with Xiu, his eyes speaking for him: Have you ever seen such beauty?

There’s a rustling in the leaves as a hedge in between the unicorn and the Raevans visibly shook. The beautiful creature turned around to stare in shock, finally noticing the Raevans not very far as well. There was an eerie quietness and a pause, before the rustling seemed to... move! Towards the unicorn!

The unicorn reared up and neighed in shock when vines suddenly appeared from within the hedge walls and wrapped themselves around the unicorn's body, dragging it to the ground. The more it struggled the more they seem to want to curl around tighter and restrict the unicorn's movements, as if they have a mind of their own. When it seemed like running in the opposite direction seemed to be a plausible idea, the hedge walls shook around the Raevan and the path closed behind them, only leaving them one way to go - forward. Whatever shall you do to save the beautiful creature?

Xiu watched the whole scene in a horrified and yet somehow detached kind of manner; the way the hedges had rustled, the way the slender unicorn lifted its graceful head and whinnied in fear as the sudden explosion of vines wrapped itself around the lithe creature. The way Cesc had selflessly rushed over to save the being only to be tangled in a mass of suffocating vines; his glowing wings flapping frantically with desperation and anger.

The white Sigel had watched it all with a dreamlike amazement. Just when they had thought that the dangerous part of the maze was over...

But what Cesc had selflessly done and the manner in which the vines had aimed for the unicorn...

Something clicked within the Sigel’s mind. The common factor of the two was...motion. The two beings had inadvertently struggled and caused a ruckus; something of which the plant had obviously responded to with horrifying vigour. The plants were thigmonastic; that is, they responded to touch and motion as stimuli. Xiu cringed as yet other vine wrapped itself around Cesc’s body and another tore at his clothes. It might have been his imagination but Xiu was partially sure that he saw a thick vine caressing Cesc’s lips through the tangle as though daring the frei to cry out again. Xiu had never heard of plants responding to sound but...who knows?

Floating warily towards the struggling mass of raevan and unicorn, Xiu kept his motion to a minimum. It was all good that the Sigel was floating silently along the path as well. Perhaps if he could slip pass this barrier and find the plant’s main body or root...
He would have to act quickly though as yet another vine joined the fray with the sound of more clothes being torn following soon after.