MAZED

I left the ruined building, troubled. I took a step… and found myself elsewhere. I was alone. My surroundings were totally different. I was standing on stone, formed into concentric rings. There were gaps between the rings, although stone bridges connected the rings at irregular intervals. The rings themselves also had gaps in them.

When I looked down between the stones, all I saw was a gray nothingness. There were only a limited number of rings as well. Beyond the outer ring was more of the gray nothingness, as though the space I now occupied was somehow bounded. Arches were placed regularly along the next to outermost ring, each arch I soon learned contained a portal. However, the portals only transported me across the rings; none seemed to lead out.

As I was verifying this, I noticed a place that wasn't bare rock, where rubbish was piled. I moved to investigate, and found someone before me had camped here. I found a curious object at the camp site.

It appeared to be some sort of journal. Sheets of dried human skin had been stretched across a framework of bone, and strangely enough, it appeared the sheets of skin had healed together at the seams, forming the spine of a makeshift book. It looked like the outer sheets of skin formed a cover for a series of other skin sheets locked inside the bone frame.

A series of symbols had been written in blood across the exterior of the sheets of skin, but I couldn't make them out; they appeared to be some form of writing, but they seemed to be written upside down, right to left, and at odd angles that made my eyes hurt.

Despite the crudity of the writing, I had to admit the design of the bone frame was actually quite intricate; the bones had been carved so that they snapped neatly together. It looked like the bones could be unhooked from each other, allowing the book to be opened and read.

I unlocked the bone frame, which unfolded with a neat *snap.* I opened the book, and studied the pages... they were filled with the same strange series of symbols as were on the exterior cover, and they didn't seem to make any sense.

Much as I tried, I couldn't make sense of the symbols. I despaired, and decided to put the journal down. As I re-hooked the bone frame, I was suddenly struck with a strange thought - that the pages of the interior weren't *supposed* to make any sense. I... whoever I was at the time... put the symbols there to deceive anyone looking to read the real contents, which were hidden somewhere else in the journal frame.

I examined the edge of the frame, and noticed that one of the bones had a hairline fracture around one of its ends; I put my hand over the edge and twisted off the top of the bone, revealing a hollow space. Inside the space was a small, rolled-up scrap of skin.

It was difficult to read, but I could make out most of it.

TRAPPed TraPped LADY'S WILL be done DODge her gaze... too MANY I KILL'd, too MANY strangle and kill and stop the BREATH in their throats... there's a WAY OUT I KNOW it then I'll give the BLADed one the laugh...
...ONE of the ARCHEZ holds way Out, ONE of them does, ONE has the way out, can't just keep GOING through them one at a time, maybe - maybe I should go through one, THEN walk back to the same portal without...

The entry trailed off into indecipherable scrawls. For some reason, I had a feeling that was the last entry... either the incarnation died in the maze or escaped somehow.

I found that if I entered the portal in one of the arches on the periphery, then went back to that same portal without entering any other, I was transported to an arch I could not reach before. The portal in that arch allowed me to leave, returning to the Hive at the spot where I left. I felt I now knew where Aola's disciples had disappeared.

I briefly explained to Morte what had happened. We left the Alley of Dangerous Angles on its other side, not too far from the Mortuary if my reckoning was right. I continued exploring the Hive, heading towards a section I had not visited before.

I heard a howling up ahead. What strange animal was producing the sound? Then I saw it was actually a wild-eyed man, hunched over, snarling and giving low growls. It looked like he hadn't trimmed his hair in years... it was so long it formed a veil over his eyes. He had a long, stringy moustache caked with grease and sweat, and the tips of the moustache drooped so much that they had become tangled in his ragged beard.

I greeted him. The man stopped in mid-snarl, and he reached up to part the curtain of hair that covered his eyes. As his withered hand pulled away his dirty locks, several strange, puce-colored bugs fell from his hair and scattered across the cobbles. Behind the cloak of hair, the man's flesh was moon-pale and creased with wrinkles. His thick, bushy eyebrows formed a 'V' as he stared at me.

"Hand, my take th' moon fly, toooo?" I had difficulty, but thought I could puzzle out his meaning.

"'Take your hand and fly to the moon?' Not today, my friend."

The man frowned, but his eyebrows tilted upwards in a reverse 'V,' creating a bizarre expression. I had no idea how he accomplished the facial expression, but it made me uncomfortable watching the muscles beneath his face shift into the new pattern. I couldn't tell whether he was angry, curious, both or neither.

"Singed kisssspeak a man, answersss pre-fur a wood woman heart."

"'A single kiss speaks a woman's heart, but a man's answer is what you would prefer?' Very well, then, but know this: my answer is a question, and an answer from you is what I would prefer." The man seemed mesmerized by my voice. With every word I spoke, a light flickered in his eyes.

"Barking Wilder Am-I, I-Am! A-Wanting, Asking-A, May-You, You-May?" I was starting to get a feel for his language.

"You may, and I will: Who… or what… are you? "

"Kay-osh!" He stuttered out the word, as if having difficulty getting his tongue around it. "Some say Xaositects, I say S-tect-I-soax. CHAOS-men. Men no. Nem no, men yes, three nose make a yes." He hunched down on his knees and began to rock back and forth, singing in a child-like soprano. "Chaos-man, chaos-man, hop-a-long home, a faction-it-is, yet we-are-alone." Not having anything to lose, I asked another question.

"I'm looking for a lost journal. Do you know where I might find one?" He frowned, squinted his eyes shut, then opened them back up. When he spoke again, his voice was level and straightforward... it was like a different, saner, person was speaking. The effect was eerie.

"More than one lost, more than one must you find. Each part of you had one, so more than one must you find." He blinked and shook his head for a moment, as if surprised at himself, then chuckled uneasily. I asked if he could tell me where at least one of them was. He looked like he was about to object, then suddenly his left fist came up and smacked him in the temple. He howled in response, then suddenly stopped, blinking.

"One is in a cupboard in your guest room in the hall of the Sensates, and another is on the walls of a tomb sealed deep beneath the city where the stones weep. The others are..." Before he could finish, his right fist came up and smashed him in the face, causing him to yowl again. He blinked and shook his head for a moment, as if surprised at himself, then smiled uneasily.

That was his last moment of clarity. No matter how much I questioned him, I got no more answers. In fact, he didn't even seem to remember what he had already told me about the journals.

Rather than spend the rest of the day in pointless conversation, I turned away. Morte commented on Barking Wilder.

"Well, that's one tree with a snapped branch too many." Morte rolled his eyes. "No sense in chatting with Xaositects, chief. They're a barmy bunch." I asked him to expand on the Xaositects.

"They're a 'faction' who don't have any rules... except don't keep one thought in their head for too long. They're sometimes called 'Chaosmen.' No need to explain why. They just seem to attract members like flies... well, members that are crazy or chaotic enough, I suppose. I don't think they have any recruiters... though you really can't say anything about them for sure."

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