Halls of Bewilderment (04/06) (BB)

After signing up to what sounded like a particularly interesting fey game, I was quickly visited by a helpful human in the form of Heret and an incredible firefly that could make invitations appear, who were both very encouraging about my involvement in the games. After all this it would be rude not to go right?

The invitation said to arrive at a portal at dawn, and arriving there I saw quite a few people I hadn’t met before. Managed to just catch their names, Nix, Spemen and Bibisa, before we all jumped through the portal (Stedd who I have met briefly before was also there and Pieni got there just before it closed). And I’m glad I got names before we jumped in because oh my goodness it was quite the celebration when we got to the Feywild. All sorts of magical creatures everywhere having a jolly time, and were all very friendly to us, I even got a rainbow striped apple off of them (they failed to tell me what it could do, more on that later). Then in the distance was a humongous clam shell! It was big enough to even have a stadium in it surrounded by multiple coloured tents!

There wasn’t much time to hang around and enjoy the party as we were approached by a butterfly pixie creature with its swan assistant, who was very well dressed in a bowtie might I add. They introduced us as the champions for the various courts to the crowd in a very extravagant way and was getting us ready to start the game. It was at this point that I thought it would be great to have a pre-game snack of that rainbow apple, and it was wonderfully tasty but it also turned me into a man, who would have guessed. I didn’t have any time to react to this because the game had begun! Looking back that apple was a clear indicator of the chaos that was about to occur.

So back to the game, we’re all put in this room with mirror walls, glowing numbers on the floor and each given wands that represented the courts we were championing for. I got one covered in flames to represent the summer court of Queen Titania, which didn’t actually burn anything thank goodness. These wands were literally the key to opening up this mirror maze we had been put in. Touching them to the walls opened up new sections to this maze revealing more numbers on the floor, or interesting sections called boons or banes.

So off goes the klaxon and everyone runs to different corners of this initial room before I can even blink, at this point I will admit I was a little nervous about what would happen, especially as I didn’t know most of the contenders that well. So I cast a spell to slow everyone down so no one could try and catch up to me.

After this no one came after me surprisingly, they were all quite upset even in slowmo, and all went to separate corners on the maze and from what I could tell most people stayed in these areas throughout most of the game. The numbers on the floor in these sections seemed to change and from what I could figure out the higher the number the more likely an interesting section was nearby. Some of these interesting sections included berry bushes of all sorts of colour combinations on them, they caused magical symptoms when eaten, others had magic literally burst out at you. I ate one of these berries and it caused me to levitate, another made me spit bubbles, others caused people’s skin to glow, in fact I’m sure a lot of these symptoms were really similar to what happens when my magic goes haywire. I should ask one of the fey folk about that when I next have the chance, might just be a coincidence.

At this point I hear a lot of commotion going on at the other side of the maze, Sperren crying about his poor box boy I think, and then one of Pieni’s ape friends comes barrelling down towards me. Luckily they seemed quite friendly to me, but they were kinda looking at me a bit too intensely for my liking, so I popped into invisibility for a little bit. As I turn around and open a new section to the maze I feel the weirdest sensation overcome me, and I’ve experienced some weird things in my life. My vision of the maze gets much sharper, I feel myself shrinking, my hands and feet more padded and with less fingers, my forehead felt weighted like something was attached to it, and my ears are definitely much more floppy. At the time I was unsure exactly what I had turned into, but holding the wand was much, much more difficult. Pieni then walks over to where her ape is standing (and still looking very confused) and triggers a section that makes me go blind! So much for dropping invisibility to check what I actually looked like. At this point Stedd seems to also be in my section of the maze, at least I think it was him, I can only guess through voices and sounds at this point but he sounded annoyed at Sperren getting through a gate right in front of him.

As I’m trying to reorient myself mid-air with some very uncoordinated movements the klaxon goes off to signal the end of the game. Turns out Sperren, Pieni and Bibisa got through the gates in that order but Stedd was the overall winner based on points, a grand total of three swans. I was hoping to win so I could ask a favour of the fey, maybe I’ll get my chance next time. While points are being awarded I manage to drop invisibility by poking Stedd in the shoulder, because even though this form was very cute (I checked in a puddle what I looked like later), I cannot cast any magic! Pieni was especially fond of the creature I turned into, informing me I was a rabbit with a tiny unicorn horn on my head which is formally called an almiraj.

After all this excitement I think it was time to go home and rest a bit, I was also hoping leaving the fey wild would reverse the remaining effects of the game, it did not. I finally turned back into normal BB a whole day later while hiding amongst the flowers of the small garden I have managed to maintain, hence I am now able to write this journal entry.

I think this experience has allowed me to understand the potential of what my magical accidents can do, maybe?



Until next time,

BB



(I am no artist but this is the best drawing I could make of the almiraj form I was in, I had managed to maintain my blue hue surprisingly)