Far away on another part of the island, Goliath and Lexington were searching for some ruins in the forest. Or rather, they were attempting to do so. They were guided by Gabriel and Ophelia, who had insisted that they knew of a place where some children of Oberon had been seen by the clan, and suggested that this might be a good place to learn about Old Felix and find out where Demona might have gone. The two young gargoyles had initially been confident about the location of these ruins, and bid their two guests land with them at a certain point among the trees. They had shown obvious surprise when the ruins weren't where they'd thought they should be, but seemed unconcerned as they led them along a path which they were sure would quickly bring them to the right place. After a few minutes of walking, however, the two young ones became frustrated and began arguing with one another. It was an eerie, silent part of the woods and Goliath began to feel that the twists and turns in the path made no sense.
"I fear I've lost my sense of direction entirely," he muttered to Lexington who nodded in agreement.
"It's so dark. It's too dark and quiet. It doesn't seem natural, but I guess I've just gotten used to life in the city."
The two young ones glanced at each other uneasily. They'd lived their entire lives on Avalon, but it seemed particularly dark and quiet to them as well. They were also disoriented and they were certain they should have already arrived at the ruins.
Suddenly, Gabriel came to a halt, signaling the others to be quiet. Peering around him, they all saw a dark shape, lying low to the ground in the center of the path.
"Hello? Is anyone there," Ophelia called gently and the shape seemed to shift slightly and a dim, silvery glow seemed to come from it.
"Come," Goliath urged them, "It might be someone injured." They approached the glowing shape cautiously, and as they drew closer, the glow was revealed to be the shimmering face of a child of Oberon, who had taken the form of a young girl with long, dark hair and a heavy, hooded cloak that covered all of her form except her face.. She didn't speak as they approached, but looked at them with round, enticing eyes and a coy smile. She had the look of a mischievous youngster that enjoyed trouble-making.
"Careful!" Gabriel warned Lexington in a whisper, "No matter how helpless and endearing she may appear, that is NOT a child!"
"Good evening to the noble guards of my lord's palace," chimed the clear, bell-like voice, "Where do you travel tonight?"
The four gargoyles bowed in greeting and Gabriel replied, "We are looking for the lair of Felix the Healer."
The girl laughed in response and rose to her feet. Her cloak seemed to have a will of its own, keeping all but her face covered entirely from her crown to the leaves on the forest floor.
"There's no lair!" she corrected them, "Felix lives on the wind now. He won't settle anywhere other than his own island. Here on Avalon, he just roams, night and day. He's very cranky."
"Then how can we find him?" Goliath asked her.
"You can't!" she laughed, clearly amused by their frustrating situation, "If he wishes to see you, he will find you!"
"How will we know him?" Goliath asked again, "What does he look like?"
Her eyes widened at the question and replied, "Like you, or like me, or like whatever you would fear the most, or whoever you would trust unquestioningly. He's a master shapeshifter."
Goliath scowled in frustration and asked, "Our friend was trying to find him and get a magical stone he has. Do you have any idea where she would go or where he might have taken her?"
The fairy smiled at him in an almost maniacal way. She seemed to be greatly enjoying the attention.
"You're very clever!" she praised, "You know how to ask the right questions. But where he would take her all depends on her trial."
"What is the trial?" Lexington asked, "Is it dangerous?"
She turned to him, a devious glint in her eyes.
"Often it's very dangerous," she explained, "Many mortals have perished trying to prove their worth. But I wouldn't worry about your friend. Humans seek Felix's powers for their own glory and selfish desires, but Felix has a fondness for your kind, who are naturally noble and selfless. I'm sure your friend's trial will be little more than a challenging game for her!"
"Noble and selfless?" Lexington snorted, "It's a good thing she's immortal!"
"Don't worry about your friend," the girl cooed, stepping toward Lexington. She had an eerie way of moving. She and the hem of her cloak almost seemed to float. Lexington stepped back instinctively.
"Do you like games?" she asked him, "Would you like to play a game with me?"
"I do," Lexington answered uneasily. He glanced at the others nervously. He wondered if turning down this fairy's invitation to play would likely provoke her ire.
"Then come play with me while you wait for your friend. I can tell you are clever, and I have no one else to play with!"
"Thank you for the invitation," Goliath interceded, "But we really must continue looking for our friend. She may need our help and-
"Oh, you will not be allowed to help her," the girl explained, "She must face the trial alone. That's the rule. Just come play a short game with me?"
"I'm sorry," Lexington told her, "But we have to get going."
"But you'll never get anywhere taking that path!" she exclaimed.
"Oh? Why not?"
"It's a lost path. It goes nowhere. If you keep walking on it, you'll never get any closer to where you wish to go or further from where you want to leave."
Gabriel and Ophelia groaned in unison.
"Not again!" Ophelia whined.
"What is it?" Goliath asked earnestly, "What's happened?"
"Every now and then, these paths spring up on the island," Ophelia explained, "No matter how long you walk on them, you won't get anywhere. Most of us have been trapped in one at some point or other, but sometimes the enchantment can last for nights!"
"Why not just leave the path and walk in the same direction until you leave the woods? Or climb a tree and glide?" Goliath asked.
"It does no good," Gabriel explained, "You just become more and more disoriented and whatever direction you go, you end up back on the path. We have found no way to beat them other than to wait them out."
"Well, there is one way," the fairy interjected. Her cloak billowed as her form seemed to shift beneath it and she retreated a few paces to reveal a sprig of glistening hawthorn, bound on one end with silver cording. The other end was split evenly into a fork, which levitated and glowed with its own light. White flowers and berries budded suddenly from the forked end. Then they blossomed and decayed within moments before the strange wand extinguished itself and lay silent and still upon the forest floor. The girl floated forward again, covering the wand and descending briefly as if to pick it up beneath her cloak.
"What was that?" Lexington asked in wonder.
"A guiding wand," the girl explained, "This would lead you off the lost path and back to where you came from. I'll let you win it from me, if any of you wish to play."
The four travelers looked at each other in hesitation. Gabriel and Ophelia shrugged. They were both reluctant to engage in a game with one of Oberon's own, but they stood to lose a great deal of time if they didn't.
"What sort of game is it?" Goliath acquiesced in a frustrated voice. The girl's face brightened and she glided suddenly toward Lexington.
"You first! You first!" she declared, and a menacing, claw-like hand shot out from beneath her cloak, seizing him by the arm and whisking him through the forest before he could even shout in protest.
A moment later, Lexington found himself on a large platform of stone tiles. The fairy stood, or rather, floated opposite him, watching him happily over a low table, on which the strangest game board he'd ever seen was placed. His opponent reached into a decorative box to the side of the board and withdrew a metal token, placing it on the board. The guiding wand appeared on one of the tiles on the marble floor.
"Now you must choose your token," she explained to Lexington.
"Lexington!" he heard his friends calling frantically from nearby in the forest.
"I'm here!" he shouted back quickly.
"Hurry! Hurry!" the childlike fairy ordered as his friends emerged from the trees, and to Lexington, she said, "Go on and choose!"
Lexington watched his friends climb onto the platform, then reluctantly chose a token and placed it beside the fairy's.
"So, what happens now?" he asked apprehensively.
"Watch!" she said excitedly and the board reformed so that the playing squares rose and fell to various heights. Just as suddenly, the tile on which the guiding wand sat, as well as the tile where Gabriel stood, shot up above the rest.
"Hey! What's going on?" Lexington demanded.
"That's how the game is played. See? It's a puzzle! You have to figure it out before I do."
Apprehensively, Gabriel attempted to jump down from his tile, only to find himself trapped inside a force field. He struck the invisible, impenetrable wall in fury, but could not break it.
"What are you doing to my friend?" Lexington asked angrily.
"I'm not doing anything," the fairy insisted, with a touch of mischief in her expression, "I put the guiding wand on the board, so you have to put something there as well. It's more fun that way!"
"No!" Goliath shouted at her angrily, "Let him use me instead!" The childlike fairy smiled at him sweetly, as if she found his demand amusing.
"You can play against whoever wins this round," she assured him.
Rapidly, the fairy began to explain the rules of the game board and Lexington struggled to keep up as most of them made no sense to him. Ultimately, he understood that there was some sort of code or pattern on the game board that he had to guess before his opponent, but the rules of the various figures inscribed on the board were varied and confusing. Though he tried to pay attention to her explanation, he was left with little confidence when she had finished, particularly when he looked at Gabriel, who seemed very distressed at being held captive on her raised tile.
"What happens to Gabriel if I guess wrong?" Lexington asked uneasily.
"That depends on which figure you guess," she explained excitedly, "But if you make mistakes, you pay a penalty."
"That doesn't seem fair," Lexington protested, "I've never even heard of this game before, and I didn't know I was gambling a living gargoyle for a thing, even a useful, magical thing."
His opponent seemed to consider this point, though her impatient expression suggested that she thought it was a somewhat trivial concern.
"Very well," she conceded in an amiable tone, "I shall give you three extra turns to start, with no penalty, since you are a beginner."
"Thank you," Lexington replied with a sigh, and he examined the board carefully, trying to get an idea of what strategy he might use to figure out what the code might be, "Would you like to go first?"
The fairy beamed at him appreciatively and removed another object from the box on the side of the board. This one was a glittering gold and in the shape of a dodecahedron. Each face of the die showed one of twelve figures, which Lexington had never seen before struggled to tell apart. She cast the die onto the board and seemed pleased with the figure it revealed to her. She took her token and placed it on one of the tiles, which immediately went black and sunk into the board. At the same time, her side of the platform burst into an eerie green flame.
Clearly disappointed, she said, "It's your turn Lexington."
He took the die in his claw and rolled it, revealing a different figure. Lexington stared at the bored, still trying to understand what he was seeing. He placed his token on one of the raised tiles that matched the figure on the die, and his opponent encouraged him that he'd made a good guess. Glancing with relief at Gabriel, he saw that nothing had happened to him, though Goliath and Ophelia had taken positions just beneath the tile where he perched.
"You get to take another turn now," she explained. Lexington rolled the die again, this time revealing the same figure she had gotten. Her expression indicated that she found this bad luck, though he wasn't sure whether for him or herself.
Lexington chose a different tile, but to his dismay, it went black. He looked across at his opponent in alarm, but she just reminded him that he had three free turns to figure out the game. He watched, perturbed, as she took three consecutive turns, trying to discern what it was she was doing to find the answer. The first two of her turns, she was satisfied, but with the last, she scowled. On the platform, half of her tiles crumbled and the green flames grew greater. Lexington rolled and chose again, only to see that tile turn black.
"That is the last of your free turns," she informed him unnecessarily, "Now you must face the penalty if you guess incorrectly." Lexington nodded and watched carefully as she rolled. Her face betrayed her annoyance at what she received, and she took a while to make her selection. When she did, the tile turned black and the guiding wand fell from its place atop the tile, writhing around angrily, and making a horrible sound that was a cross between a squeal and a hiss. The buds disappeared, and the branch transformed into a two-headed serpent that dove around in a furious panic.
Unnerved by the appearance of this creature, Lexington quickly rolled again, this time revealing a new figure. Striving to remain calm and use his best judgment, he focused on the board, trying to guess what the figures meant. Did they represent a sequence, a word, a number? He placed his token, glancing nervously at Gabriel. To his horror, Gabriel had frozen and turned into stone. Not the normal granite of stone sleep, but a strange, cream-colored alabaster.
Lexington turned back to face his opponent, who had already eagerly rolled her die again and was placing her token. She groaned as the tile turned to black and Lexington watched in fear as the two-headed serpent that had slithered its way to the center of the platform to escape the green flames, grew to such a size that it looked down, even on Goliath. The two fearful heads whipped back and forth aggressively, focusing their cold gaze on Ophelia, who was too distracted by the spell afflicting her brother to notice their approach.
"Ophelia, look out!" Lexington cried, but the serpents had already wound around her and poised to strike. Goliath came from behind it and grabbed one of the two heads, wrestling with it until its grip began to loosen, while the other head turned and attempted to strike him instead.
"Go on!" the fairy encouraged Lexington, "It's your turn!" Lexington rolled again, receiving the figure he'd been hoping for. He hesitated for a moment, but his friends didn't have time for him to suffer indecision. He placed his token, and two more tiles arose, exposing the beginning of a code. He rolled two more turns, trying his best not to be distracted by the sounds of Goliath's infuriated roars as he battled the duel-headed monster. The code had become more clear to him and he was becoming more confident. Goliath had freed Ophelia, who had seized the second of the two heads, and now they were both being whipped around frantically, unable to get a good grip on anything other than the smooth, scaly skins of the snake.
"Hurry, Lexington," Goliath called to him urgently as he struck repeatedly at the beast.
Lexington rolled again, and again, now certain what the correct answer was, but unable to roll the figure he needed. He suspected that his opponent knew the answer as well, but was hoping that he would make a mistake before he could get the last figure he needed. Meanwhile, one of the heads had succeeded in shaking Ophelia free and Goliath was desperately trying to keep both heads from striking himself. At last, Lexington rolled the figure he needed and placed his token on the winning tile. The fairy groaned at her defeat and the two-headed serpent fell to the platform, a budded branch once again.
"You've won, Lexington," she conceded reluctantly, "Well played! You may have the guiding wand."
"Thank you," Lexington replied with relief, but then caught sight of the platform, "But Gabriel! He's still a statue!"
"Yes," she agreed, seemingly unconcerned. Then she added, "Would you like to play again?"
"No, I wouldn't like to play again!" Lexington retorted in frustration, "I won the game. Turn my friend back!"
"But you were playing for the guiding wand," she protested, "I never said I would turn him back. That isn't how the game is played."
"But that's not fair!" Lexington argued, his own eyes beginning to glow with rage, "I played your game, and Gabriel never agreed to be part of it! Turn him back!"
"I won't!" the girl replied stubbornly, "I want to keep playing."
"You will!" a cold voice thundered suddenly, and they were all taken by surprise by the arrival of Lady Titania, who did not seem the least bit pleased.
"Have you not been told what your Lord has decreed?" she bellowed furiously at the fairy, who had sunken into her cloak before the wrath of the fairy queen.
"I only wanted to play with them!" the girl whined sheepishly.
"Enough! Be gone from here!"
In an instant, the fairy ascended, her cloak flowing from her like a strange jellyfish, and disappeared with a crack and a flash of light. Gabriel, having been returned to his own form, staggered in confusion, then catching sight of Lady Titania, bowed in respect.
"Thank you, your Majesty," Goliath said in relief, also bowing before her.
"I come to you with a warning, Goliath," Titania replied earnestly, "Demona has strayed from her quest, and is in the palace now. I fear for the safety of Princess Katherine."
"No!" Goliath replied in horror, "Can't you stop her?"
"I cannot intervene," Titania explained, "But technically, you can. Come!" She gestured for the four of them to approach her and instructed them to grasp the cloak she wore. A moment later, they were transported to the main hall of the palace.
"Quickly!" Goliath ordered, "We must find her and stop her!"