The party began to consider how they might approach the maze they had to get through in order to reach Xonthal's Tower. Looking into the maze entrance, they saw a pleasant, paved path with well-trimmed hedges on either side. After 50 ft. or so, the path bent off to the left, and they could see no further.
"Maybe if one of us could fly over it, we could figure out the path through," suggested Kellen.
"Frostbite and I could fly over the maze and see where the twists and turns are. We could figure out how to avoid the dead ends." said Talis, and Frostbite nodded in assent.
"Hmm, good idea," said Borovik. "I could cast invisibility on the two of you so that you don't invite ranged attacks from cult members. I could also cast Rary's Telepathic Bond on the party so that Talis and Frostbite can communicate with us as they explore, without having to shout and blow their cover."
This seemed like a good plan. Borovik cast Rary's Telepathic Bond as a ritual on the entire party. Talis climbed onto Frostbite's back and then Borovik cast invisibility on them.
"So, Frostbite," said Bree. "We can't see you, so don't expect us to move out of the way if you come in our direction. If you don't watch where you're going, you could knock one of us down."
"Understood," giggled Frostbite, using the telepathic bond to communicate. The party was a little shaken to realize that, now that they could neither see nor hear him, they couldn't really tell where he was.
"Now remember, both these spells expire after an hour, so don't waste too much time," Borovik cautioned.
Frostbite and Talis rose into the air and flew above the maze.
"Weird. From above the maze looks like an overgrown mess of hedge and thorns," Talis reported.
"Even the entrance?" asked Kellen.
"Yes. I think there is an illusion spell or something that hides the real state of the maze."
"Keep flying around above the maze and see if you can find any trace of a path," suggested Borovik.
Frostbite and Talis flew the entire circuit around the maze without seeing any paths longer that about 100 ft.
"The maze looks impenetrable from up here," Talis reported. "We're going to fly up close to the tower and see if I can spot a way inside."
"Be careful!" Mara telepathically called in a worried voice. "We already know that the cultists want to kill you! I don't want them shooting arrows or throwing nasty spells at you!"
"We will be."
She and Frostbite approached the tower, and immediately caught sight of the body of the dead cultist who had tried to kill Iskander. It lay on the ground under the balcony with sword induced wounds and scorches from some fire-based spell. They then made a circuit around the tower, seeking a door to get in. Talis searched carefully, using her heightened perception skill, but didn't detect any secret doors.
"No sign of an entrance into the tower," she reported. "We're going to fly up and see if it's possible to enter through the balcony."
The balcony was shielded by some sort of magical barrier. Frostbite and Talis were unable to penetrate it. They could see through it, but a closed door blocked any view of the room beyond the balcony.
"The balcony is protected by a magical barrier. We can't get in that way, either. We'll make one more circuit to see if there are any windows large enough to enter from."
The invisible pair flew around the tower, but only found very narrow windows.
"There are narrow windows, but even Bree couldn't squeeze through one of them," Talis reported.
"Maybe Mara could turn into a small bird and fly into one of the windows," suggested Bree.
"I don't like the idea of sending Mara alone into a tower full of cultists!"
"I don't like the idea, either," said Mara.
"We're returning," said Talis. "Whatever the magic is, it looks like it's going to force us to go through the maze in the way it was intended to be approached."
By the time Frostbite and Talis returned to the party, the Invisibility and Rary's Telepathic Bond spells were both close to expiring. Within a short period of time, the both of them became visible again.
"Well," said Bree. "Shall we enter the maze and see what happens?"
"I suppose," responded Borovik. "I'm going to cast Detect Magic and see if I see anything as we move along,"
"I recommend we all stick together. It's all too easy to get lost and separated in a maze," said Mara.
They very cautiously stepped into the entrance of the maze. Careful inspection of the entrance revealed it wasn't an illusion. They would not be walking through overgrown bushes.
"Does it look like there is some sort of canopy over us?" asked Talis. "Maybe the tangled vegetation was an illusion to make us think the hedge was overgrown."
Looking up, they could clearly see the sky. There was no illusory canopy over them.
"I am detecting magic, but not in any specific direction. It seems to be permeating the entire area," said Borovik.
They proceeded down the path for a short while. It bent a couple of times before leading them into a clearing to the north. There was an intersection of 8 paths here, and a sundial in the center of the clearing. They had entered through the southern path, and Xonthal's tower lay straight ahead to the north. The sundial cast a shadow pointed north, directly at the tower.
"This is strange," Mara mused. "The shadow of the sundial doesn't point away from the direction of the sun, even though our own shadows do."
"I sense magic coming off that sundial," Borovik noted. "I'm going to see if I can figure out something about it."
He went over and touched the sundial.
"It carries the aura of the Conjuration school of magic. Maybe it's associated with a teleportation circle, or maybe with a planar portal."
"Great!" grumbled Bree. "Are we going to be sent to another plane? This isn't how I expected the day to go!"
"The sundial seems to be telling us to take the north path. I say we just do it and see what happens," said Neega.
The path they took bent this way and that, and eventually brought them to the sundial clearing again.
"What? It brought us right back to where we started!" bellowed Neega.
"But something's different," said Kellen. "Look! The sundial now has 2 shadows!"
Sure enough, two shadows emanated from the sundial, one pointing to the north, and one pointing to the east. The tower itself still appeared to lie to the north, although no closer than it had been before.
"Now we have a puzzle to solve. Do we take the north or the east path?" mused Borovik.
"I suggest we try the north path again, since it does seem to go toward the tower," said Bree.
Nobody had a better idea, so they tried that. After following the curving path for a short distance. The entered a large, cleared area, far larger than any they would have expected to find in the maze. It was 90 ft. wide, and the far end was around 150 ft away. To their right was a large pond of water and to their left was an oversize cottage with a fenced in vegetable garden next to it. Beyond was a boulder strewn pasture, with a couple of cyclopes tending to a flock of grazing sheep. Curiously, neither the cyclopes nor the sheep were moving. They seemed to be frozen in time.
"How did this large clearing fit into the maze?" asked Preston.
"If the sundial transported us into a pocket dimension, we may no longer be in the original maze at all," guessed Borovik.
Noting that there was an exit at the other end of the area, the party walked a short distance into the scene. The creatures came to life, with the sheep beginning to eat the grass and the cyclopes chatting with each other. Shortly, the cyclopes noticed the party and began walking toward them. They carried no weapons and didn't act menacingly. One of the cyclopes picked up a small boulder, turned, then threw it toward the far end of the field. The boulder flew 100 ft before hitting the ground, and then rolled 20 more ft. before stopping. The cyclopes then looked expectantly the party. They said something in a language that no one in the party spoke.
Borovik cast Comprehend Languages on himself and was able to understand what the cyclopes were saying.
"They want us to play a game with them. They have thrown a boulder and want us to do the same. We win if we can make our boulder fly farther than theirs did," he said.
"How can we do that?" griped Bree. "They're a lot bigger and stronger than we are."
"If I turn into an earth elemental, Neega and I can probably beat them at this game," said Mara.
Neega grinned, warming up to the challenge. Mara became an earth elemental and she and Neega took up positions on either side of a boulder. They coordinated their backwards swings to get ready for the toss, then with 2 loud grunts heaved the boulder forward. It flew through the air, landing about 10 in front of where the first boulder had landed. It then rolled past the first boulder, coming to rest at the hedge wall on the fall side of the clearing. The cyclopes smiled at each other and went back to tending the sheep.
The party proceeded cautiously toward the exit to the area, and when they passed the cyclopes' boulder, they realized that it had split in half when they won the boulder toss. A topaz that had been encased in the boulder lay on the ground. Seeing it as spoils of their victory, the party grabbed it up.
They exited the cyclopes area and continued on their way. They emerged back into sundial area, with the shadows in the same configuration as when they left the area.
"Huh! We're right back where we came from," said Borovik. "I wonder if that means we took the wrong path?"
"Well, what now?" asked Neega.
"I guess we try the east path, since the north path wasn't correct," responded Kellen.
No one had a better idea, so they tried that one. They tromped off on the east path and before long emerged into another maze, this one looking a lot more traditional. They couldn't see the opening in the hedge where they just entered, nor could they see any exits. The paths through the maze were only 10 ft. wide, so Mara had to squeeze to get through them. The hedge walls of this maze within a maze seemed a little different that the ones outside this area. They didn't seem as dense, and the walls weren't as high.
As soon as they arrived in the inner maze, they heard a horrible roar from deeper within. Frostbite managed to flit up a little and get high enough to look over the walls of the maze. He quickly dropped down.
"There's a gorgon in the maze!" he squeaked.
"Let me take the front," Mara said to Borovik in Terran. "I'm immune to his petrifying breath."
He was still under the influence of his Comprehend Languages Spell and so understood her. He nodded in assent.
"Stay behind Mara," he commanded. "Let her shield the rest of us from its petrifying breath."
Mara stepped in front, facing the direction from which they had heard the roar. The others crowded behind her. Talis cast Bless on the party to increase their chances of hitting an enemy and of avoiding any petrifying breath attacks. Bree climbed to the top of the hedge in the inner maze and prepared to fire an arrow as soon as she could see the gorgon. Neega likewise prepared to attack with Hazirawn. Frostbite again rose up over the hedge and flew to within 30 ft. of the gorgon. He fired off his cold breath. Tough as the gorgon was, it failed to shrug off the cold breath and took full damage. Frostbite then landed so as to be within melee range when the gorgon approached.
The gorgon now had clear knowledge of where the party was and charged directly toward them. Its charge led it right through the hedge, opening holes in the walls as it went. Bree fired her shortbow as soon as she saw it and injured it. The gorgon tried unsuccessfully to gore Mara as it charged toward her. It had stopped out of Neega's melee range, so she couldn't attack with Hazirawn.
Kellen scrambled up to the top of the hedge and cast Hold Monster at the gorgon, but the gorgon managed to resist the spell. Kellen slid back down the wall to hide from the monster. Borovik also scrambled up to the top of the hedge and cast Chromatic Orb at the gorgon. The gorgon dodged to the side and avoided damage from the spell. Borovik then also slid back down the wall.
Preston climbed up to where he got a clear line-of-sight on the gorgon, then cast Lightning Bolt at the gorgon. It jumped and roared loudly as electricity coursed through the iron plates that composed its hide. Mara now punched the shaken gorgon. She hit with one of her blows and it staggered as she boxed its ear.
Talis had no offensive spells to cast, and no one needed healing, so she took the opportunity to move further away from the gorgon and its petrifying breath. Bree was still on top of the hedge wall and shot at the gorgon again. She hit and got sneak attack damage because Mara was within 5 ft. of the gorgon. Her arrow lodged deeply into its throat. It gurgled and fell unconscious.
"Okay, now that the gorgon is down, let's start looking for a way for us to get out of here," suggested Borovik.
"We need to approach this with a plan," said Kellen. "I think we need to follow the outside wall and see if we can find an exit."
In Terran, Mara said, "It looks like the gorgon was able to knock down some of these interior walls, and I bet we could, too. It would make it easier to navigate around here."
Borovik translated for the rest of the group, and they all nodded. They began at the northernmost exterior wall and traveled clockwise around perimeter. Mara went in front, happily smashing hedge obstructions as she went. Frostbite brought up the rear. Others in the group carefully examined the exterior wall, looking for exits.
They had traversed around a quarter of the wall when they heard another loud bellow from further in the maze.
"Is there another gorgon?" frowned Neega. "Where did it come from?"
"I'm going to go find it and kill it!" Mara shouted in Terran from the front.
The gorgon sound seemed to come from the center of the maze. Mara headed that direction, pushing through the hedges as she went. This slowed her down but made progress for those behind her a lot easier. Neega fell in behind her. Mara pressed through the maze until she got right next to the gorgon, but she didn't have enough time to do an attack. She did, however, let loose an enormous bellow, alerting the party that the gorgon had been found. Neega came up directly in front of the gorgon, and she did have time to attack. Going into a rage, she took 2 attacks with Hazirawn. Sparks flew from its iron hide as she delivered 2 solid hits.
Bree ran through some of the smashed hedges and got a short distance behind the gorgon. She once again hit with her shortbow, and once again got sneak attack damage because of the proximity of her allies to the enemy. The gorgon snorted angrily, and smoke seemed to come from its nostrils.
Talis assumed a position in the center of the party and cast Bless on all of them. Frostbite rose into the air and landed next to the gorgon. He slashed it with his claw.
The gorgon roared and blew a noxious, green gas from its mouth. Mara noticed that something fell out of the gorgon's mouth as it released its petrifying breath. The noxious breath encompassed Mara, Neega, Talis, Borovik and Preston. Whatever it was, Mara seemed to be immune. Talis and Neega felt some sort of magic trying to affect them, but they shrugged it off. Borovik and Preston succumbed to the effect of the breath weapon. They looked at each other in horror as the skin of each began to turn to stone.
Borovik made an attempt to shake off the effect but failed and became fully petrified. Kellen realized what was happening and used his bonus action to cast Bardic Inspiration on Preston, giving Preston additional chance of throwing off the petrification effect. After that, he ran through the smashed hedge until he could see the gorgon. He cast Hold Monster a second time, and this time the gorgon froze in position. Preston focused his attention and managed shake off the petrifying effect.
Neega took another swing on the paralyzed gorgon. She knocked it unconscious with one blow. With the gorgon down, Mara immediately began to search for what had dropped out of the gorgon's mouth. Bree, Talis and Frostbite came over to help her. Talis spotted the item. It was a diamond. She picked it up and put it in her coin purse.
As soon as she did, Preston called out "Hey! An exit just opened here right behind me! And someone get over here and help Borovik!"
Several party members ran over to Borovik.
"He's been petrified," said Talis. "A Greater Restoration spell will fix that."
She cast the spell and Borovik's skin returned to normal. He shook himself and stared at his hands in relief.
"Oh, that was horrible!" he shuddered. "Thank you, Talis!"
They went through the exit and followed the path, which led them back to the clearing with the irritating sundial shadows, still pointing at the paths they had found to be dead ends.
"All right, folks, any ideas which way to go now?" sighed Neega.
"We know that 2 of the paths are the wrong ones. There are only 6 left to try," said Borovik.
Everyone groaned at this.
"I don't want to do this 6 times more!" said Bree. "Who knows what other messes could be waiting for us to get into?"
"I'm running low on magical energy, so we can't afford to make many more mistakes," said Talis. "Until I take a long rest, I will no longer be able to cast Bless on the whole party. I can only do 3 people at a time."
Borovik scratched his chin. "If I had to take a guess, I would choose the path between the north and the east one. Maybe the shadows are bracketing the proper choice."
"You mean take the NE path?" asked Preston.
"That would be my guess."
"It's as good a guess as I could make. Let's try it."
The party nodded and trudged somewhat wearily toward the NE path. They emerged from the path and arrived back at the sundial, but this time it had a different configuration of shadows. Now there 3 shadows: one pointing north, one pointing SE and one pointing SW.
"Oh, no!" groaned Bree. "This is just bizarre! How will we figure this out?"
"Well, we have already been down paths N, NE and E. I really don't want to try them again," frowned Neega.
Borovik studied the shadows. "If we use the previous shadow pattern as a clue, we might say that the south path is the choice, since it's bracketed by shadows pointing to the SE and to the SW."
"But isn't that the way we came in?" asked Preston. "Won't that just take us back to the entrance of the maze?"
"Maybe not," said Talis. "If we are being teleported to various places, this sundial location may not be the same as the location of the sundial we first saw. Borovik already said he thought that teleportation or planar portals might be involved."
No one came up with a better idea, so they decided to try it. They went south and followed the path for a short while. It twisted around and led them back to the sundial. This time, there were 4 shadows point to the NE, SE, SW and NW paths.
Borovik looked weary. "Great! Now if we use the rule of following the bracketed path, we have to try out 4 paths! I'm getting such a headache!"
"Maybe there are some distinguishing features on the shadows we're supposed to pay attention to," said Talis. "Let's examine them."
The group began to examine the shadows, 2 on each shadow. After about a minute, the shadows started to slowly rotate, pivoting around the sundial.
"Weird!" stammered Bree.
The shadows began rotating faster, and then begin to shrink radially in toward the sundial. The party stared in stunned silence. Faster and faster the shadows spun. Shorter and shorter they grew. Eventually the shadows shrank into the sundial itself and were no longer seen.
Bree had had all she could take. "Where did they go? How are we supposed to figure out which direction to go now?"
"Maybe there is some switch on the sundial that will make them reappear," Kellen suggested. "Let me take a look."
He went up to the sundial and looked closely for some sort of mechanism. Not seeing any close to the ground, he climbed onto the sundial to search the top of it. The sundial seemed to suck him in, and he vanished.
"Kellen!" everyone screamed. "Where did you go?"
There was no sound, so Bree declared that she would search the spot from which he disappeared for any sign of him. As soon as she climbed onto the sundial, she also disappeared.
The rest of the party looked at each other with horror.
"Do you suppose the sundial ate them?" asked Preston fearfully.
"I didn't hear any screams," said Talis. "'I've never heard of a carnivorous sundial."
"I haven't either," Borovik shook his head. "I'm inclined to follow them and see if we can help. I can't bear the thought of just leaving them wherever they are without at least trying to rescue them."
The rest of the party nodded. One by one, they climbed onto the sundial and vanished. Each one found themselves at the sundial again, in the company of all their companions. Again, the sundial had a new pattern of shadows. This time there were 8 shadows, one pointing to each of the paths.
"I guess this indicates we have progressed through the maze," pointed out Kellen. "But what in the world could this new pattern mean?"
"I don't know, and I don't want to think about it now," said Borovik. "I'm tired and I'm hungry. I would like to take a short rest and eat."
"So would I," said Neega. "How about the rest of you?"
In response, the other party members sank to the ground and began pulling food out of their packs. Mara returned to half-elf form so she could lie down next to Talis and chat with her. Frostbite took a brief nap. Preston and Neega sat down, together, leaning up against the sundial.
Looking at Preston, Neega smiled and said, "You look so manly when you throw that magic around!"
In turn, Preston giggled and responded, "You have no idea how sexy it is when you swing your greatsword!"
The two of them were clearly having too much fun.
While they rested, Borovik studied his spellbook and used his arcane recovery ability to regain some of his magical energy.
Having refreshed themselves, they got up and examined the new sundial pattern. Despite an animated discussion, no one came up with a good suggestion for which path to try.
"I guess we could try them all," suggested Bree. "One of them has to be the right one."
"Ugh!" cried Neega. "We could spend a couple of days fighting monsters down the wrong paths!"
Talis sighed "If we get into too many more battles, I don't know if I will have enough magical energy to heal up everybody."
Meanwhile, Frostbite had become impatient.
"I'm just going to start tearing out the hedge walls and make a way to the tower!" he growled.
He walked up to the corner of the hedge that separated the north from the NE path. He ripped large chunks of the vegetation out of the hedge. Once he had a whole big enough to enter, he stepped into the hedge. And promptly vanished.
"Frostbite!" Talis screamed. "Honey, we have to go find him!"
Talis and Mara jumped up and ran to the hole in the hedge. Like Frostbite, they vanished from sight when they entered the hole.
Kellen sighed, "I guess we have to go after them. If it means we all die, at least we'll die together."
One by one they stepped into the hole, and one by one the found themselves transported to the clearing surrounding the Xonthal's Tower. A path behind them led back to the sundial, and a path on the other side of the sundial seemed to lead back to the village. A dead cultist lay on the ground, and when they looked up, they saw the balcony from which its body had been thrown. As Talis and Frostbite had reported on their reconnaissance mission early that morning, there didn't seem to be a physical door onto the tower. There was, however, a teleportation circle at the foot of the tower.
"Does anyone want to take bets on whether that teleportation circle takes us into the tower?" Bree asked.