Welcome to Gaia! ::

September 13th

He smelled a forest before opening his eyes. A real forest, not a city park’s scattering of tree and bush. The older, wilder, and truer forest he hadn’t realized he’d missed this badly. It was night here too, casting everything in midnight tones, but something about the color of the grass, of the tree leaves, seemed different. He had a feeling that in the sunlight, the forest might not look much like anything he’d ever seen. But then again, this was apparently a forest in space. A Wonder. Wouldn’t it be a let down if it wasn’t strange and appropriately wondrous?

Halle had hardly time to even notice the large building a little ways ahead, nestled among the trees, when suddenly a piece of notebook paper appeared before. Reading his brother’s scrawl, he gave a crooked smile and answered aloud, “Good job.” And the abruptness of sound in the forest made him fully realize how silent it was. Like he’d just chucked a boiler into a still pond.

Letting out a sigh, he put away the note and walked toward the building. It was like a cabin, but the kind a millionaire might have. A millionaire with a thing for medieval architecture or something. Even in the dark it looked like something out of a historical drama. Or a Disney movie. Gaston would live here and Halle realized he was looking at a hunting lodge with a certainty that was far from rational.

It was impressive and beautiful, even in the dark, and as he carefully walked up the stairs a burst of torchlight lit up the area. Spinning around he saw the flickering flame sputter for a moment and then…die out. It was both spooky and annoying. If it was going to scare him all of a sudden, the least it could do is stay lit. Be useful.

The stairs underfoot creaked in complaint, lending a shabbiness to the place in counter to the ornate scrolls and carvings peeking through the night’s shadows. The door didn’t have a handle, but a heavy knocking ring, it’s metal first cool to the touch and then warmed too quickly under his hand. Giving the door a swift knock, something small and cautious, a thunderous BOOM! sounded throughout the forest, completely shattering whatever silence lingered in its depths. And there should be birds bursting through the trees right? The call and response of the natural world? But here…

Birds burst through the sea of trees, flocks of dark silhouettes emerging from soft pastel leaves. The shining brass knocker in hand was raised again, fell again, but this time no sound emitted. Not even the barest of rapping. Instead the door lit up, revealing the Crown of Lysithea above, the Bluebells of Halle below, and a symbol of some kind in between. He sighed, and then in a deep, low voice, griped, “One final test, huh?”

He turned back to the forest, with its lavender grass and thick beds of bluebells, and saw, ahead of him, a flash of a glowing symbol. The Crown. So it was…

“A map,” Halle said outloud, and this time his voice was…his voice. Light and young, that of the boy he was. And it was night. Not daytime. Turning back to the door, there were the same symbols glowing lightly. The Crown of Lysithea. So that was the name of this world? Or its ruler? If it was the latter, he definitely had some words for them.

“A map,” he repeated, already counting the nearby tree with its symbol as north. The middle symbol was ornate, but on closer look, it was definitely, absolutely a maze. One without the convenience of walls. And at least a dozen entrances. Exhaling, Halle resigned himself to the fact that it may, in fact, be awhile before he could answer Lisse back.

Taking out the clipboard they used for training, he turned a sheet over and began to carefully sketch out the map. The result was irritatingly ugly, but he could tell what was what. Mostly. Sitting on the steps, he traced a finger along each potential path, finally picking one that would lead to the center with the fewest snares and tangles. There were probably interesting things to find along those other paths, but not right now, when everything was strange and new and in the dark.

He was lucky, in that he had some woodcraft, knew how to really see trees and boulders and bushes, even in the dark. For a bit, he considered using his phone’s flashlight to see. In the end, he decided that keeping his night vision would be more valuable for a wider view of his surroundings. Still, there was a lot of back tracking, and two hours was up well before he finally stood before a tree that was shorter than any other he’d seen in this forest, but was much thicker, at least as wide as a shed, As he approached it, a strange shuddering feeling brushed across his skin, and he knew that if he’d approached it along the wrong path, maybe he wouldn’t have been able to get any closer. Maybe he wouldn’t even see the tree. And he kind of hated that fairytale logic, even as he was also a little intrigued by it.

Running his hand along its bark, Halle circled the tree until his fingers slid into an almost invisible crevice.Click! And there was a rushing out of air, musty and old, as an entryway appeared. It was very fairytale appropriate, as most things here seemed to be. Slipping inside the tree, he nearly fell down the narrow set of stairs, spiraling down further and further into the dark.

“Really?” He sighed. How had Lisse gotten his ring so quickly? And then, it occurred to Halle that there might not be a ring down here for him at all. Which he quickly dismissed. Whatever was down here, he needed to find it first. This was a test. He was sure. Even if he didn’t exactly like why he was sure. At least, he figured, I’ve gotten this far.

The stairs ended and the tunnel began, twisting and turning like it was also a root of the tree above. The path varied between claustrophobic and the sense that he was in open chamber, the walls of which he could not see from his centermost path, And there was a path, well tread and puffing up ages worth of dust and debris with every step. Where the above smelled like a forest, this place smelled like a grave. He didn’t feel that tired at least, not physically. In fact being here energized him in a way he hadn’t been expecting. But mentally? He wanted to go to bed. It was late. He’d had to solve an invisible magic maze, and now he’s been wandering in an endless tunnel for hours? Or…

Halle checked his phone.

Twenty minutes. Whatever. His patience for this place was beginning to be worn pretty thin. But then there it was. A door that was a match to the one at the lodge, a heavy brass knocker that immediately began to heat up at his touch, and this time when he knocked, a bright and clear clarion call of purpose rang out. And the door opened.

The ring sat out in the open on a simple wooden table, like it’d just been placed their casually while the owner went to wash up or something. It felt very simple after all he’d gone through looking for it, but he’d take it all the same. And so Halle did, slipping the ring onto his finger and tolerating the sense of relief it gave. Of, once again, rightness. The first thing he did was take a blank sheet of notebook paper off the clipboard, and try to send off a note to his brother.





There was another door ahead, with a strange lock at the center and a faint glow shining through the crack below. Shining his phone at the lock revealed that yes, it was the mirror to the ring, and to the doors, with the Crown above and the Bluebelle below. Pressing the ring into the lock had the door opening simply and silently to reveal a glowing orb, the ripples of its power filling him with a sense of a sacred existence. Something to both honor and protect.

This was what took his oath, wasn’t it?

“Well? Here I am, are you happy now?”

It didn’t answer back, which was both a relief and a disappointment. He wouldn’t get any answers from it, but talking with a glowing orb of power sounded a bit too burning bush for his comfort level. Behind him, the door shut, but there was another door just ahead. A second way into the chamber? With a massive sigh, Halle gave the light a side eye, and headed out of the room, hoping this new path was at least shorter.

Thankfully, it was. After about five minutes he emerged into what his phone light revealed as some sort of cellar. A cavernous one, full of bottles and kegs and moldering mounds of some kind of organic material. The steps that led up looked sturdy, but they didn’t at all sound or feel that way walking up them, the wood sinking and creaking with every step. When he stepped out into the ground floor, he saw an ancient looking kitchen, and beyond that huge, dusty rooms of stone and wood paneling, ornate carvings glinting in the phone’s light. And finally, there it was, the entryway, and again, that door.

He was inside the hunting lodge, and he supposed, that the first time its knight arrives, it can only be opened from within. Maybe there was some kind of symbolism in that. But maybe, probably, whoever designed it just wanted to gently haze its newcomer.
Stepping out the front door, Halle collapsed onto the stairs with an immense sigh, feeling distiller and grosser than he had in…well, a month, because moving sucks. He leaned back, elbows resting on the stairs and gazed up at the sky’s strange stars. The horizon was already starting to lighten, and he figured he might as well stay and see if the grass really was lavender. .