Del was sitting in a chair, ignoring the kids, when a large book dropped. It went so fast, and dropped out of sight so quickly, he could have sworn that he'd imagined it. A moment later, Mara followed, and he jumped up, calling to her. He ran to the edge and saw her, sitting on the book, fine, looking as though nothing had happened whatsoever. "Mara!" He called down. She gave a tiny wave.
A few minutes later, he was at the bottom with her. She had stood up and was now rubbing her behind. When he asked how she was, her mouth twisted into a wry smile. "I think that my ass is always gonna be black and blue from now on," she laughed, and he sighed.
"You almost gave me a heart attack," he chuckled, and she smiled.
"Sorry," she said sheepishly. "But getting down seemed like it would be a bit of a problem..."
He nodded in agreement and opened the book, flipping through until he found the spell. "Mushrooms, poppies, sugar and spice. All these things are very nice. When combined the proper mixture makes a 'getting small' elixir," he read.
"Del? Are you really sure about this?" she said. "Because I'm not. I'm going to have to find all this stuff, I know. And it's only going to get me killed." Del shook his head.
"It'll get you small, and that's what matters," he told her. "And somehow, I highly doubt that you'll be killed when you're getting the ingredients."
"What about after I take it?" she asked dryly. He shrugged.
"I'd be more concerned about the antidote - it was just discovered 50 years ago." She read the note of pride in his voice and guessed - correctly - that he had been the one who had discovered it. Though she was curious as to why he'd be proud of something that could potentially kill her.
"What is the antidote?"
"It used to be a toadstool. That's still used by another spell. The antidote to this one is..." he thought for a moment. "Rat's eyes, fungus, slips and snails." Mara winced.
"I have to bloody eat that??"
"You'll survive," he said cheerfully. "Besides, there's a plus. You don't need to get those ingredients. I think I have an old batch somewhere."
She nodded doubtfully and discreetly escaped to throw up while he read the other workings of the spell.
Soon after, she was searching the skool for the ingredients to the shrinking potion, and eventually found herself in a large, circular room. The actual room was two stories, with a hole in the centre and a broken spiral staircase separating the two. There were guards downstairs, clearly stuck. She walked around a bit more, ignoring them for the moment. There were three doors on this story, all locked. It appeared as though the surviving guards would be expecting company pretty soon. 'Surviving' because she had just let loose two croquet balls down there, and she saw one plunge through the chests of two.
She sauntered down the stairway, enjoying the sounds of the ball bouncing around, hitting the guards, but held her breath whenever it hit the stairs and knocked out a new hole. Once it almost hit her as she was jumping, but fate was with her and she twisted frantically and it missed. There was dead silence in the room, but then she caught a guard skulking around, evidently waiting for her to come down. She waited until he came out slightly into the open and threw her knife, and he was dead.
When she was at the bottom, she walked around. There were two doors: one on the right, one on the left. The room on the right was the first door she tried, and it was unlocked. She stepped through the doorway, only to find herself at the top of a staircase in a room that was mainly a void, with only a narrow ledge there, with nothing on it. Disappointed, she turned and left, though it bothered her that there seemed to be a room without a purpose.
Once out, she hurried up the stairs as two club guards ran out of the other room. They followed her until she got to the first big hole in the stairs, and then they just shook their fists and yelled. She killed them, fearing that the noise they were making would summon more guards.
She saw Rabbit when she got in, and he was in the rafters. "Hurry! There's not much time!" he called to her, and she wandered around, trying to find a way to join him there.
"You know, there is an easier way to get small than the method that Alice used," Cat's voice said.
"How?"
"Ask Del, and see what he says."
"You mean hear," she corrected absently.
"Yes, we are here. Quite the unpleasant place."
"That's not what I meant, Cat," she growled.
"Do stop that, you sound so like a dog."
"CAT!" she shouted, exasperated. He vanished, his leering grin staying behind to mock her. She swatted at where his body would have been, but her hand passed through nothing. Furious, she turned away, presenting her back to empty air. Directly in front of her was a lever. Torn between amusement and exasperation with the mangy feline, she pulled it, and bleachers started extending from the walls. There didn't seem to be anything else to do in there but climb them and see what the rafters held, besides Rabbit. Once she caught sight of him again, he called back to her, and scampered off, keeping low to the ground.
She nearly lost her balance on the narrow beam she was standing on. Before her was a twisting, turning maze of corridors and doors, and Rabbit had completely disappeared into it. Then he came back, thoroughly exasperated. "Faith!" he snapped. She glared at him and he sighed, remembering his error. "All right. But whatever your name is today, hurry up!" Then he was off again, and this time, she followed.
Left, left, right... left again, straight... She followed Rabbit through a maze of corridors, trying not to lose sight of his tail. She did anyway, and when she couldn't even hear him anymore, felt very much alone. "Rabbit!" She called. There was no answer, no sign of him at all. "Rabbit! Cat!"
"I've heard that self reliance is a virtue. Now practice it."
"Dammit Cheshire, I'm in no mood for these games!" But he was silent.
Slowly she wandered through, opening no doors, and randomly selected corners to turn.
Rabbit was hopping along at a steady clip, not noticing that Mara was not behind him until he met up with Del and the elder frowned at him.
"Where is she?" the old dwarf asked. Rabbit was confused and turned, fully expecting to see Faith coming out of the maze, a little cross, but not too bad. To his alarm, she did not come at all. Without a word to Del, he sped back in, hoping that she had the good sense to stay put.
About eight corridors away in the opposite direction, Mara wandered around, now quite lost and totally disoriented. Hesitating, she turned down a dark corridor of doors, whose only lighting came from a small window high above. A creak from nearby assured her that she was not alone, and she backed up, out of the light and silently drew out her knife. Two young dwarves were there, scared and shaking.
"Who are you?" she asked, in a voice that was much braver than she felt. The dwarves were apparently more afraid than she was; they must have jumped at least a mile. When they heard her voice and saw the vague outlines of her shadowed figure, they resumed their shaking so severely that she was completely convinced that at least one would end up with a broken jaw.
"Wh-who-who's th-there?" the taller one called. He took a step forward, shielding the other from view. She raised an eyebrow and took a step toward them, coming into the light.
When they saw her they gasped in fear, and jumped away. "Hang on! What's the matter?" she asked exasperatedly, seizing them both by their beards. "Hey, I'll put away the knife, okay? Just hold still!" She let go, and they fell in their efforts to get away. In falling, they hit their heads against the wall and sat still, fighting the vertigo.
"You're one of them!" the taller one squeaked in fear. She rolled her eyes.
"Me? One of those guards?" She was disgusted with the very notion of it.
"She has-spies-like you so that she can keep us in the mines!" he gasped. The littler one was pressing an elbow into his stomach in his efforts to hide, and he couldn't draw a proper breath.
"She may have spies, but I'm sure as hell not one of them," she snapped at him. He cowered. "Now, who are you?"
"My name's Ray."
"How did you and your friend get out of the mines?" she asked curiously.
"Why?" He still did not trust her. She didn't care for them, either, so she decided that between them, they were even.
"I heard that no one ever escaped before."
"No one has, until Del. We dunno how he got ou-wasn't supposed to tell that he's out," he moaned. She decided to forgive that lack of judgment temporarily, and pressed on.
"Right. I went up to the rafters of a gym and found myself here. How?"
"Uh, that's just the way it works." The littler one was staring at her blankly, as though she had just asked the most brainless question in the world.
She shook her head exasperatedly. "Okay, fine. Just leave now, okay?" They scampered off as fast as they could, and she calmed down quickly. "That was smart, girl," she muttered. A shadow fell over the remaining light suddenly, and she was left in pitch-blackness.
A hand grabbed hers and started pulling. Startled, she lost her balance and was pulled a good distance before she recovered her senses and saw what was pulling her. "Rabbit!" she said. She was very glad to see the detestable little bunny.
Swiftly he led her back through and to the right path, this time never letting go of her hand. "What was that?" she panted.
"Clouds," he said uneasily, and led her through a final, long corridor, not letting go until they reached the end. There she saw Del again.
"Del! What are you doing here?" She asked in shock. He always turned up in strange places - as long as he was mostly out of harm's way.
"Never mind that," he said, and handed her mushrooms. " I can't promise I'll be here to do this every time, but someone needs to keep the stuff away from the children." He started going.
"Wait!"
He stopped.
"Cat told me to ask you about the 'other' way to make me small. He said that it's faster."
"It is," he said calmly. "But it's also harder to undo. This pendant is a big part of it." He held it up. It flashed in the fading light and she saw a million colours inside.
"I thought it was..."
"Just a pendant? Most people do. If you want to do it this way, go ahead. But I'll warn you now: if you choose the other way, you won't need to face the Mantis in order to get big again. Remember what I told you about the antidote? I've still got that batch."
"I don't think that Cat would tell me about the other method unless he wanted me to face the Mantis, however bad it is."
He nodded and thought for a moment. "How about I make the potion just in case, and if you want to use that instead, you can."
"No, I don't think that'll work," she sighed. "I'm going to use the pendant. How?"
"I'll tell you later. I need to brew a different potion, but I have all of the ingredients I need."
He hurried over to a stairway that seemed it would barely fit him, but nevertheless, he fitted inside with ease. She couldn't follow- it was too small, so she hunted around for another door- there was none. She hurried back to the circle room, and went through one of the doors on the second floor. She was in the Second Grayd. Del was in there, being attacked by a few diamond guards. They jabbed their spears at him, elbowing each other and laughing as they advanced.
The one closest to Del toppled over suddenly, and his companions turned to see a knife in his back. They gasped and turned, and instantly another had the knife embedded in his chest. One of them panicked and grabbed Del, using him as a shield. Mara killed the other and hesitated, feeling unsure. Her aim had been a little off the last several times she had thrown, and she was terrified of hitting Del. She started coming closer, but the guard held the edge of his spear against Del's throat, and a thin trickle of blood seeped out. She froze and the guard laughed. Del was standing still, but there was fire in his eyes.
She threw the knife, hitting the diamond's spear hand, and he screamed, dropping it. When she felt the knife materialising in her hand, she charged, slashing him several times, but never touching Del. He shakily stepped away from the corpse, and gingerly felt his throat, wincing as his fingers hit blood. Frantically she searched for something that he could use to stem the bleeding and clean the cut, and came upon the clean rag that she'd filched from a guard. He accepted it with thanks, and carefully held it at the wound. He stepped into the shadows, and she ran back out before anything could come to get her.
Once she reached the third grayd, she stopped, just beyond the door. There were a few guards there, and they had not seen her yet. The two Boojum that had been hiding had, though, and they both screamed at once. She was thrown back a few feet, but threw her knife and hit one.
She was just about to charge again, when she saw the second croquet mallet. She picked it up and took her old one out. The new one was hollow, with a space in the middle for the old one. She snapped it in place, and pounded a Boojum, pleased to note that it was sent flying a few feet before disintegrating. The other charged, but was taken out easily. Just then, a guard bludgeoned her across the back, and she fell. The mallet rolled towards them, and they laughed. She was down, disarmed, and they would probably take her weapon. They did, but when the guard raised it, it vanished out of his hand and reappeared in her own. She used her knife to block the spear and sent a croquet ball flying. Only this time there were two of them, and the other collided with the guard behind him. They grew steadily larger as they traversed the room, and were the size of a guard's head when one hit him and vanished.
She stared in some disbelief over that turn of events, then stared down at the mallet.
Once she finished, she explored until she came back to the empty room. There was a dice that she hadn't noticed her first time in, with skulls and demons carved around the numbers. She reached towards it.
"This game can turn distinctly nasty. Don't ever play alone," Cat warned, appearing suddenly behind her.
"What d'you mean?" she asked, but he was already gone. She took the dice.
At that moment, three Boojum and three diamond guards burst inside, the guards shouting and the Boojum screaming. Mara barely had time to dodge the screams, and almost fell off. When they began closing in on her, she rolled the dice. A small demon appeared behind the guards, who seemed to think that the dice was a dud. They elbowed each other and laughed, thinking the same thing: she had gambled and lost. She backed behind the stairs as one of the guards started firing at her. Another started towards her, and before she could get her knife up, a jolt of electricity pounded through him, killing him. The other turned away from her for a moment to see where the attack had come from.
Immediately she took care of him from behind, while the demon attacked the other from the front, though it didn't succeed in killing him. Easily, she switched to the croquet mallet and sent a ball hurtling towards the three Boojum. It killed one, and seriously maimed another, and she finished it off with the knife. She quickly jumped underneath the other Boojum, which the injured guard did not see, and screamed at him as he attacked her.
Once the guard was finished, she killed the final Boojum. The tired demon went back to its dice, and she sighed, relieved, and hurried out of the room. She explored some more until she found Del. He nodded, telling her that the potion was ready, and left. She was about to follow when the mallet... winked at her. She looked strangely at it for a moment, then followed, slinging it over her shoulder in a forced gesture of absolute nonchalance.
He was in the lab, concocting a smelly potion, which she instantly drew away from. He stared at her in blatant disbelief. "You can pick the pockets of dead and bloody card guards and stand directly under a Boojum, yet you can't drink this?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes, Del, but I wasn't eating them!"
"Yes, but technically you aren't 'eating' this, either."
"It is going inside my mouth and through my intestines," she said, nervously running a hand through her hair. He laughed at her.
"Take the potion and the star key," he told her, pushing it into her unwilling hand. "You'll know when to drink it when the time comes."
She placed the key in a star-shaped hole in the doorjamb, and the door fell open, revealing a portal. She took it out, and Del came up next to her. "Good luck, Faith," he whispered, and pushed her through.
She landed on a cushioned chair and instantly was in pain when her rump hit the rock-solid pad. Inside the library, she ignored the one club guard, and saw a doorjamb that had a star-shaped hole in it. Would the star fit? The hole seemed so tiny, compared to the key. Tentatively, she placed the star inside it. The door opened into a small, cramped room, and she stepped inside. As a parting gift to the guard, she sent a croquet ball flying and it hit him dead in the face as he ran to stop her.
A few minutes later, he was at the bottom with her. She had stood up and was now rubbing her behind. When he asked how she was, her mouth twisted into a wry smile. "I think that my ass is always gonna be black and blue from now on," she laughed, and he sighed.
"You almost gave me a heart attack," he chuckled, and she smiled.
"Sorry," she said sheepishly. "But getting down seemed like it would be a bit of a problem..."
He nodded in agreement and opened the book, flipping through until he found the spell. "Mushrooms, poppies, sugar and spice. All these things are very nice. When combined the proper mixture makes a 'getting small' elixir," he read.
"Del? Are you really sure about this?" she said. "Because I'm not. I'm going to have to find all this stuff, I know. And it's only going to get me killed." Del shook his head.
"It'll get you small, and that's what matters," he told her. "And somehow, I highly doubt that you'll be killed when you're getting the ingredients."
"What about after I take it?" she asked dryly. He shrugged.
"I'd be more concerned about the antidote - it was just discovered 50 years ago." She read the note of pride in his voice and guessed - correctly - that he had been the one who had discovered it. Though she was curious as to why he'd be proud of something that could potentially kill her.
"What is the antidote?"
"It used to be a toadstool. That's still used by another spell. The antidote to this one is..." he thought for a moment. "Rat's eyes, fungus, slips and snails." Mara winced.
"I have to bloody eat that??"
"You'll survive," he said cheerfully. "Besides, there's a plus. You don't need to get those ingredients. I think I have an old batch somewhere."
She nodded doubtfully and discreetly escaped to throw up while he read the other workings of the spell.
Soon after, she was searching the skool for the ingredients to the shrinking potion, and eventually found herself in a large, circular room. The actual room was two stories, with a hole in the centre and a broken spiral staircase separating the two. There were guards downstairs, clearly stuck. She walked around a bit more, ignoring them for the moment. There were three doors on this story, all locked. It appeared as though the surviving guards would be expecting company pretty soon. 'Surviving' because she had just let loose two croquet balls down there, and she saw one plunge through the chests of two.
She sauntered down the stairway, enjoying the sounds of the ball bouncing around, hitting the guards, but held her breath whenever it hit the stairs and knocked out a new hole. Once it almost hit her as she was jumping, but fate was with her and she twisted frantically and it missed. There was dead silence in the room, but then she caught a guard skulking around, evidently waiting for her to come down. She waited until he came out slightly into the open and threw her knife, and he was dead.
When she was at the bottom, she walked around. There were two doors: one on the right, one on the left. The room on the right was the first door she tried, and it was unlocked. She stepped through the doorway, only to find herself at the top of a staircase in a room that was mainly a void, with only a narrow ledge there, with nothing on it. Disappointed, she turned and left, though it bothered her that there seemed to be a room without a purpose.
Once out, she hurried up the stairs as two club guards ran out of the other room. They followed her until she got to the first big hole in the stairs, and then they just shook their fists and yelled. She killed them, fearing that the noise they were making would summon more guards.
She saw Rabbit when she got in, and he was in the rafters. "Hurry! There's not much time!" he called to her, and she wandered around, trying to find a way to join him there.
"You know, there is an easier way to get small than the method that Alice used," Cat's voice said.
"How?"
"Ask Del, and see what he says."
"You mean hear," she corrected absently.
"Yes, we are here. Quite the unpleasant place."
"That's not what I meant, Cat," she growled.
"Do stop that, you sound so like a dog."
"CAT!" she shouted, exasperated. He vanished, his leering grin staying behind to mock her. She swatted at where his body would have been, but her hand passed through nothing. Furious, she turned away, presenting her back to empty air. Directly in front of her was a lever. Torn between amusement and exasperation with the mangy feline, she pulled it, and bleachers started extending from the walls. There didn't seem to be anything else to do in there but climb them and see what the rafters held, besides Rabbit. Once she caught sight of him again, he called back to her, and scampered off, keeping low to the ground.
She nearly lost her balance on the narrow beam she was standing on. Before her was a twisting, turning maze of corridors and doors, and Rabbit had completely disappeared into it. Then he came back, thoroughly exasperated. "Faith!" he snapped. She glared at him and he sighed, remembering his error. "All right. But whatever your name is today, hurry up!" Then he was off again, and this time, she followed.
Left, left, right... left again, straight... She followed Rabbit through a maze of corridors, trying not to lose sight of his tail. She did anyway, and when she couldn't even hear him anymore, felt very much alone. "Rabbit!" She called. There was no answer, no sign of him at all. "Rabbit! Cat!"
"I've heard that self reliance is a virtue. Now practice it."
"Dammit Cheshire, I'm in no mood for these games!" But he was silent.
Slowly she wandered through, opening no doors, and randomly selected corners to turn.
Rabbit was hopping along at a steady clip, not noticing that Mara was not behind him until he met up with Del and the elder frowned at him.
"Where is she?" the old dwarf asked. Rabbit was confused and turned, fully expecting to see Faith coming out of the maze, a little cross, but not too bad. To his alarm, she did not come at all. Without a word to Del, he sped back in, hoping that she had the good sense to stay put.
About eight corridors away in the opposite direction, Mara wandered around, now quite lost and totally disoriented. Hesitating, she turned down a dark corridor of doors, whose only lighting came from a small window high above. A creak from nearby assured her that she was not alone, and she backed up, out of the light and silently drew out her knife. Two young dwarves were there, scared and shaking.
"Who are you?" she asked, in a voice that was much braver than she felt. The dwarves were apparently more afraid than she was; they must have jumped at least a mile. When they heard her voice and saw the vague outlines of her shadowed figure, they resumed their shaking so severely that she was completely convinced that at least one would end up with a broken jaw.
"Wh-who-who's th-there?" the taller one called. He took a step forward, shielding the other from view. She raised an eyebrow and took a step toward them, coming into the light.
When they saw her they gasped in fear, and jumped away. "Hang on! What's the matter?" she asked exasperatedly, seizing them both by their beards. "Hey, I'll put away the knife, okay? Just hold still!" She let go, and they fell in their efforts to get away. In falling, they hit their heads against the wall and sat still, fighting the vertigo.
"You're one of them!" the taller one squeaked in fear. She rolled her eyes.
"Me? One of those guards?" She was disgusted with the very notion of it.
"She has-spies-like you so that she can keep us in the mines!" he gasped. The littler one was pressing an elbow into his stomach in his efforts to hide, and he couldn't draw a proper breath.
"She may have spies, but I'm sure as hell not one of them," she snapped at him. He cowered. "Now, who are you?"
"My name's Ray."
"How did you and your friend get out of the mines?" she asked curiously.
"Why?" He still did not trust her. She didn't care for them, either, so she decided that between them, they were even.
"I heard that no one ever escaped before."
"No one has, until Del. We dunno how he got ou-wasn't supposed to tell that he's out," he moaned. She decided to forgive that lack of judgment temporarily, and pressed on.
"Right. I went up to the rafters of a gym and found myself here. How?"
"Uh, that's just the way it works." The littler one was staring at her blankly, as though she had just asked the most brainless question in the world.
She shook her head exasperatedly. "Okay, fine. Just leave now, okay?" They scampered off as fast as they could, and she calmed down quickly. "That was smart, girl," she muttered. A shadow fell over the remaining light suddenly, and she was left in pitch-blackness.
A hand grabbed hers and started pulling. Startled, she lost her balance and was pulled a good distance before she recovered her senses and saw what was pulling her. "Rabbit!" she said. She was very glad to see the detestable little bunny.
Swiftly he led her back through and to the right path, this time never letting go of her hand. "What was that?" she panted.
"Clouds," he said uneasily, and led her through a final, long corridor, not letting go until they reached the end. There she saw Del again.
"Del! What are you doing here?" She asked in shock. He always turned up in strange places - as long as he was mostly out of harm's way.
"Never mind that," he said, and handed her mushrooms. " I can't promise I'll be here to do this every time, but someone needs to keep the stuff away from the children." He started going.
"Wait!"
He stopped.
"Cat told me to ask you about the 'other' way to make me small. He said that it's faster."
"It is," he said calmly. "But it's also harder to undo. This pendant is a big part of it." He held it up. It flashed in the fading light and she saw a million colours inside.
"I thought it was..."
"Just a pendant? Most people do. If you want to do it this way, go ahead. But I'll warn you now: if you choose the other way, you won't need to face the Mantis in order to get big again. Remember what I told you about the antidote? I've still got that batch."
"I don't think that Cat would tell me about the other method unless he wanted me to face the Mantis, however bad it is."
He nodded and thought for a moment. "How about I make the potion just in case, and if you want to use that instead, you can."
"No, I don't think that'll work," she sighed. "I'm going to use the pendant. How?"
"I'll tell you later. I need to brew a different potion, but I have all of the ingredients I need."
He hurried over to a stairway that seemed it would barely fit him, but nevertheless, he fitted inside with ease. She couldn't follow- it was too small, so she hunted around for another door- there was none. She hurried back to the circle room, and went through one of the doors on the second floor. She was in the Second Grayd. Del was in there, being attacked by a few diamond guards. They jabbed their spears at him, elbowing each other and laughing as they advanced.
The one closest to Del toppled over suddenly, and his companions turned to see a knife in his back. They gasped and turned, and instantly another had the knife embedded in his chest. One of them panicked and grabbed Del, using him as a shield. Mara killed the other and hesitated, feeling unsure. Her aim had been a little off the last several times she had thrown, and she was terrified of hitting Del. She started coming closer, but the guard held the edge of his spear against Del's throat, and a thin trickle of blood seeped out. She froze and the guard laughed. Del was standing still, but there was fire in his eyes.
She threw the knife, hitting the diamond's spear hand, and he screamed, dropping it. When she felt the knife materialising in her hand, she charged, slashing him several times, but never touching Del. He shakily stepped away from the corpse, and gingerly felt his throat, wincing as his fingers hit blood. Frantically she searched for something that he could use to stem the bleeding and clean the cut, and came upon the clean rag that she'd filched from a guard. He accepted it with thanks, and carefully held it at the wound. He stepped into the shadows, and she ran back out before anything could come to get her.
Once she reached the third grayd, she stopped, just beyond the door. There were a few guards there, and they had not seen her yet. The two Boojum that had been hiding had, though, and they both screamed at once. She was thrown back a few feet, but threw her knife and hit one.
She was just about to charge again, when she saw the second croquet mallet. She picked it up and took her old one out. The new one was hollow, with a space in the middle for the old one. She snapped it in place, and pounded a Boojum, pleased to note that it was sent flying a few feet before disintegrating. The other charged, but was taken out easily. Just then, a guard bludgeoned her across the back, and she fell. The mallet rolled towards them, and they laughed. She was down, disarmed, and they would probably take her weapon. They did, but when the guard raised it, it vanished out of his hand and reappeared in her own. She used her knife to block the spear and sent a croquet ball flying. Only this time there were two of them, and the other collided with the guard behind him. They grew steadily larger as they traversed the room, and were the size of a guard's head when one hit him and vanished.
She stared in some disbelief over that turn of events, then stared down at the mallet.
Once she finished, she explored until she came back to the empty room. There was a dice that she hadn't noticed her first time in, with skulls and demons carved around the numbers. She reached towards it.
"This game can turn distinctly nasty. Don't ever play alone," Cat warned, appearing suddenly behind her.
"What d'you mean?" she asked, but he was already gone. She took the dice.
At that moment, three Boojum and three diamond guards burst inside, the guards shouting and the Boojum screaming. Mara barely had time to dodge the screams, and almost fell off. When they began closing in on her, she rolled the dice. A small demon appeared behind the guards, who seemed to think that the dice was a dud. They elbowed each other and laughed, thinking the same thing: she had gambled and lost. She backed behind the stairs as one of the guards started firing at her. Another started towards her, and before she could get her knife up, a jolt of electricity pounded through him, killing him. The other turned away from her for a moment to see where the attack had come from.
Immediately she took care of him from behind, while the demon attacked the other from the front, though it didn't succeed in killing him. Easily, she switched to the croquet mallet and sent a ball hurtling towards the three Boojum. It killed one, and seriously maimed another, and she finished it off with the knife. She quickly jumped underneath the other Boojum, which the injured guard did not see, and screamed at him as he attacked her.
Once the guard was finished, she killed the final Boojum. The tired demon went back to its dice, and she sighed, relieved, and hurried out of the room. She explored some more until she found Del. He nodded, telling her that the potion was ready, and left. She was about to follow when the mallet... winked at her. She looked strangely at it for a moment, then followed, slinging it over her shoulder in a forced gesture of absolute nonchalance.
He was in the lab, concocting a smelly potion, which she instantly drew away from. He stared at her in blatant disbelief. "You can pick the pockets of dead and bloody card guards and stand directly under a Boojum, yet you can't drink this?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes, Del, but I wasn't eating them!"
"Yes, but technically you aren't 'eating' this, either."
"It is going inside my mouth and through my intestines," she said, nervously running a hand through her hair. He laughed at her.
"Take the potion and the star key," he told her, pushing it into her unwilling hand. "You'll know when to drink it when the time comes."
She placed the key in a star-shaped hole in the doorjamb, and the door fell open, revealing a portal. She took it out, and Del came up next to her. "Good luck, Faith," he whispered, and pushed her through.
She landed on a cushioned chair and instantly was in pain when her rump hit the rock-solid pad. Inside the library, she ignored the one club guard, and saw a doorjamb that had a star-shaped hole in it. Would the star fit? The hole seemed so tiny, compared to the key. Tentatively, she placed the star inside it. The door opened into a small, cramped room, and she stepped inside. As a parting gift to the guard, she sent a croquet ball flying and it hit him dead in the face as he ran to stop her.