“I’m going to call her Glory, for short,” Penny proudly announced. Then she nodded to the ghostly book floating on her right. “And you, I’ve finally decided, I shall name Rodney. After my grandfather, Rodney Amberwine. He taught me to read when I was two.”

  Her latest familiar, the Sister of Gloriana, was a straight up black hole. It had taken the shape of a butterfly.

  This Gloriana figure referenced in the name of Penny’s new power was the Heschian Goddess of Mystery. Seymour had read a bit about her, and she had this entire mythology that as far as he could tell mostly had to do with her exceptionally hairy lady-region.

  In the creation tale that most Heschians believed to be actual history, the fundamental building blocks of reality had long ago emerged from the Sacred Garden of Gloriana’s Nethers—as the natives called it—not by being birthed or anything, but simply by being discovered by the other deities who were all just digging around amongst the thickets of her fur. Seymour had hurried to put the book back after reading about it in Adara’s library because he didn’t want anyone to think he was a perv. This seemed like one helluva spicy creation myth, but somehow most Heschians accepted it without batting an eye.

  Seymour bit his tongue. In addition to the obviously lewd associations with Gloriana herself, Penny’s choice of names had him on the verge of a laughing fit. There was a joke in there, something about the name Glory and a black hole, but Penny would have no idea what a bathroom stall was, let alone a truckstop. So he kept his crude comments confined to his mind.

  Penny’s class, the Arcanum Collector, came with a trait which increased the rank of her summons by one. This meant that Glory had effectively been born as an adept-ranked familiar, which gave it a second, highly-desirable utility power: portaling. Judging by these first two abilities, Penny had acquired a familiar who was going to be focused less on combat and more on utility. It would no doubt make her highly sought after by any team of savvy adventurers.

  She instinctively knew the range of Glory’s portal. At the current rank, she could step through and be instantly transported a distance of up to roughly five-hundred meters. Not a huge distance, not enough to use as a travel shortcut, but perhaps it would gain range as Penny continued to rank up.

  One other limitation existed. She—or at least her familiar—needed to have visited the destination at least once before. This made escaping the hedge maze extremely simple, for while the alcove through which they had entered was out of range of her familiar’s portal, the second floor of Dragon Dan’s Adventure Depot was still somehow directly below them. Penny could sense it through Glory, which she found fascinating in its own right, like a magical range-finder in her head. And she knew that if she so desired, she could command her new familiar to transform into a portal that would take them all down to the library, just as simple as that.

  “And that is why I don’t think we should leave just yet. We ought to explore this place further.”

  “Are you serious? I mean I’m not completely against the idea either, I just assumed you’d—”

  “We should see if we can find the Midnight Express for you. And possibly some more catalysts, for us both.” She waved her hand in a wide circle, indicating the hedge maze. “We are already deep within a labyrinth that we know won’t remain accessible indefinitely, so the ability to portal out of here at a moment’s notice justifies further investigation. The situation presents an acceptable level of risk, in my opinion.”

  “I really didn’t think you’d want to hang out for even one second longer than we had to,” Seymour explained. “Not after everything you’ve been through tonight.”

  “Well, you assume incorrectly. While it’s true that this expedition has gone poorly, it still presents us with opportunities to redeem the endeavor.”

  “And if it means fighting another one of those creepy pod people, just the two of us, you’re cool with that?”

  “You bet,” she said, stealing one of Seymour’s most common Earth-expressions. “I would not be bothered in the slightest if that event came to pass. Not one bit.”

  “Okay, I think I get it. You just want more catalysts. You’re addicted to getting new powers.”

  “There is that,” Penny acknowledged, “but perhaps I am simply after a portion of payback, as well.”

  Seymour led the way, trudging through snow which had now drifted damned near up to his knees.

  “It’s coming down harder again.” He turned back to face Penny. She was hugging her own elbows and shivering. “Maybe it’s really time now that we just got out of here? Live to fight another day and all that.”

  “Just a little further.”

  They had fought through only a handful of topiary creatures—Seymour smashed them apart easily using Jerome as a club—but as they progressed deeper into the maze, the monsters had stopped appearing. Penny had surmised that it was probably due to the snow and excessive cold. It made sense that creatures made from plants wouldn’t wish to venture into an environment like this.

  “Disappointing,” she said for what must have been the twentieth time during their march, “that the creatures haven’t adapted better to the climate. I should have liked to kill many more. Maybe even find you a card you aren’t too afraid to use.”

  “You’re seriously still giving me crap about that?”

  “It might grant you a useful sigil power, Seymour.” They’d already had this argument twice before, but this time her teeth were chattering. “Granted, for the time being at least the topiary animals and their more exotic cousins seem to have ceased being a threat, but we don’t know that they are the only monsters to be faced in this maze. Perhaps with the shifting climate we will encounter a polar bear or an ice golem.”

  He retrieved the card he’d taken off the Surrogate Nursery from his pocket and examined its sacred geometry:

  “I just don’t think the Skin Thief is the best use of this cardstock. Like, it’s just not for me, right? It was meant for Thornton, which makes sense because he’s like a nature boy and shit, out there skinning dire critters and whatnot. But I’m a Moneymancer, and the depot has every card anyone could ever ask for, so I just want to see if I can use Infringement to turn this into something…. better.” He put the card back in his pocket. “Besides, seriously, what kind of power would I get from such an evil sounding catalyst?”

  “Perhaps something offensive. A spell that removes your target’s skin seems likely.”

  “Well there you go. If I hold out until we’re back in the shop, I can get something more useful to us. Topiary monsters don’t even have any skin.”

  “But polar bears do.”

  “Yeah, fair point.” He laughed and his breath fogged out in puffs. “But I’m still not gonna use it right now. Maybe if you didn’t have your new portal – like maybe if we were really stuck in here and knew we had to fight our way out, then I’d feel more pressure. But just think, if I can use Infringement to turn this sentient cardstock into something like, I don’t know, a Card of the Ninja or something, well, that would be super badass, right?”

  “What is a ninja?”

  “You don’t have ninjas? Well, damn – that’s a serious bummer. Although I guess I’m more into the aesthetic than anything—”

  “Let’s keep moving.” Penny shoved him.

  Seymour laughed up another cloud of fog and pressed on. Despite her complaints about his hesitance to apply the card, they had at least both been benefiting from a facet of one of his other sigil powers:

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  He had mostly leveled this power up by creating magical items with basic material requirements using Infringement, and then consuming those items with Cash Out, and then using his Blood Money trait to power-level himself. He’d used up all the materials Penny had managed to procure from the Guild of Artificery’s retail shop, but making and consuming duplicate items didn't actually progress any of his powers toward adept-rank. However, the process had given him enough gold to animate the corpses of Handsome Gentry and Rathbone Killmaim, and he actually still had a decent stash of coins that he’d been forced to leave back in the testing chamber when he decided to come to Penny and Thornton’s rescue.

  But Cash Out had a second functionality, adding coin loot to every monster defeated by his party – and leveling up by one-fifth of a percent with each of these activations, too. For every monster they defeated, a bag of gold coins appeared floating in the air above the carcass, containing between ten and twenty coins. After first triggering against the Surrogate Nursery, it had now gone off a total of only thirteen times, but had already provided 192 gold, which Seymour decided they would split equally. He was going to progress through the ranks so quickly using his Blood Money trait that he figured it would be wise to help Penny fund some basic adventuring gear for herself and, of course, more catalysts.

  And the fact was, she had become obsessed with acquiring more catalysts to fill out her powerset as soon as possible, and was hoping out loud that they’d encounter another pod monster – or worse.

  “Penny,” Seymour said, once again halting their trudging advance. “We could always come back better equipped tomorrow night. With jackets, and shit – maybe even mittens.”

  “There is no guarantee the maze will still be here tomorrow night, Seymour. You know that as well as I – better, even, this is your expedition!” She gestured with a jerk of her chin for him to get moving, and unpacked her reasoning as the march continued: “This might be our only chance to loot any catalysts for the foreseeable future. And our ability to portal out of here is a huge advantage. Think about it. The only other place in all of Heschia where cards and essences and the like are known to reliably drop as loot is the dungeon inside Vol’kara. Do you think we’d do as well in there yet?”

  “No, you’re right. I begrudgingly see your point and whatnot.”

  “Furthermore, without two-hundred chits apiece to spend on Sigils of Return,” she continued, “we’d be forced to rely on my ability to portal us out as our only hope of evacuating if we found ourselves in too deep of trouble. And unlike this topiary maze which somehow exists directly above the second floor of Dragon Dan’s Adventure Depot, the dungeon sprawls out, occupying an unknown space beneath an enormous super volcano. The odds of our needs exceeding the range of my ability to portal us out of danger would be too great. A near certainty. So that’s why we—”

  “Penny,” Seymour interrupted.

  “What? I was nearly finished beating you over the head with how right I am.”

  “Look.”

  Seymour pointed forward along the hedge corridor. Penny had to squint to see anything through the swirling snow.

  Up ahead, she could make out a door that clearly hadn’t been repurposed from the magic shop. It was made of dark black metal and trimmed with gold.

  “What is this place?” Penny whispered, mystified.

  “The motherlode.”

  Through the mysterious door they had first discovered a pitch black hallway, the walls and floors made from the same dark-colored metal. Their footfalls echoed as they paced along and Penny’s ghostly book provided just enough sepia-toned light to let them see that a second door was set into the far end of the passage. As eerie as it was to find a place so different from the hedge maze which had brought them to this point, they were both grateful to be out of the cold.

  After passing through the second door, they found themselves standing within a chamber so large it could have fit Dan’s entire magic shop inside – if the space hadn’t already been stuffed with mounds of gold and treasure which were far taller than Seymour himself. Unlike the hallway which had led them here, this chamber was brightly lit with magical torches placed along the walls in regular intervals. The walls and ceiling were made from gray stone. A dusty odor Seymour could only place as antiquity drifted on the stale air.

  “It’s like the hall belonging to a king of giants,” Penny mused as she scanned the drifts of treasure. “But twenty times as rich.”

  “It’s like a dragon’s secret treasure stash,” Seymour said, “maybe Dan’s.”

  “You think that’s what this is?”

  “I really don’t know.”

  They stood side-by-side at the beginning of a lush, red carpet which stretched out across the great hall, so vast that they couldn’t see the other end. On either side of the carpeted walkway there towered massive columns of what appeared to be more gold. Each would have represented an unfathomable fortune. Penny’s familiars hovered above her shoulders, while Jerome perched on Seymour’s right, still in the form of a little cactus man.

  Other than the red path of carpet, not a speck of the floor could be seen, buried entirely under loose gold coins and glittering gems. The treasure drifted up along the walls as high as thirty or forty feet, Seymour estimated. It was only a rough guess because the walls themselves were so removed from the red carpet. Whole chests could be seen half-buried in the mounds of gold. Seymour noticed just the head of a statue peeking out from the golden ocean, a marble-sculpted man drowning in riches.

  Seymour staggered along, his head on a swivel to take in the glittering sights. Penny followed close behind.

  “You’re not unnerved by the way we got in here?” she asked.

  “You mean how the doors didn’t have any sort of knob or handle but instead each was built with a hand-shaped depression in the middle which exactly matched my own?”

  “Yes, that is precisely what I mean.”

  “I’m trying not to think about it.”

  “Because if you did think about it, you would be forced to conclude that we’re not here by any sort of accident, and that someone designed those doors specifically for you to open – and no one else.”

  “Yeah, that’s about it.”

  “And if someone set this all up just for you, someone with these resources….”

  “Then I’d have to start asking myself why someone so obviously rich and powerful would do that. And you’re right – I don’t want to do that.”

  They trudged along in silence except for the soft sound of their footsteps on the luxurious carpet and the low growl of the burning torches.

  “This is almost certainly a trap,” Penny surmised.

  “Yep.”

  “Then why aren’t you more worried?” She seized his wrist and turned him about to face her. “Maybe you were right before. Maybe we should get out of here.”

  “You’re the one who wanted to stay and explore.”

  “Yes, but….” She trailed off a beat or two before explaining, “my portal is already at its limit, just to get us back to the dark hallway, let alone the actual maze or the shop. I can tell, we’re not anywhere near Dan’s depot now. That hallway led us somewhere else. I think we may have already passed through a portal, in fact, without our consent. Which, in case you were unaware, would not be possible at anything less than master rank. Are you listening to me? I’m telling you that I believe whoever this place belongs to is at least the equivalent of a master-ranked adventurer.”

  “We’ve come this far,” Seymour said, “shouldn’t we at least see what’s through that next door?”

  “I don’t think so. I think we should fill my dimensional space up with as much of this treasure as we can and then I think we should get out of here at once. I now find myself afflicted by an awful foreboding. Why is it so quiet in here?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “This much treasure would never be left unguarded.”

  “You’re right.”

  This hall was the biggest single room Seymour had ever set foot inside, on par with an indoor arena back on Earth. It took a long time for the two of them to cross it, probably the better part of ten minutes, he figured. And once they finally did arrive at the far end, they came to another door, same as the one they’d found back in the hedge maze.

  It was once again made from the same dark, unidentifiable metal. It didn’t seem to be painted – in fact it might have been some sort of dense crystal, rather than metal. And in the center they once again found a depression shaped like a hand with its fingers splayed. They already knew that Seymour’s own hand would be a perfect fit, but examining the door without the impediment of the blizzard engulfing the hedge maze and in this new, better lighting revealed that drawn upon the palm of the depression in a slightly raised relief was the mirror image of Seymour’s greed sigil.

  “What do you think is on the other side of this door?” he wondered.

  “Nothing good.”

  Seymour chuckled. She was probably right.

  “Might gut says it could be the Midnight Express,” he nearly whispered. “If what this Oscar Rusk person wrote in his letter is true, it could be my only way home.”

  “Are you okay? You sound…. I don’t know.”

  Before Seymour could answer, the door began to rumble. He and Penny both backed away a few steps. Jerome’s prehensile appendage tightened its grip on Seymour’s shoulder. A line of red light appeared running directly down the middle of the door as it slid apart to either side. The silhouette of a man stood in the new opening, backlit dramatically by the blood-red glow. He managed to take one step forward before Jerome’s harpoon-like feeding spine zipped out and sunk into the man’s throat.

  “Jerome!”

  The cactus-man leaped off Seymour’s shoulder. Using his spine as a grappling hook, Jerome flew across the space and attached himself directly to the stranger’s jugular. They fell to the floor, the hapless man attempting to wrench Jerome off with both hands but finding his fingers jabbed by a rapidly-growing coat of ultra-fine spines.

  “Jerome!” Seymour howled like the owner of a bad dog. He rushed forward but wasn’t sure what he could do. He turned to Penny but found her standing in stunned silence, her mouth agape. Jerome had entered some sort of frenzy. Seymour knelt and attempted to pry his pactmate off the man’s throat but the coat of spines Jerome had grown made it impossible to get any sort of grip. Even barely laying a hand on him caused Seymour to retract it in pain and he nearly lost his balance entirely – but caught himself by bracing against the fallen man. In doing so, his Sigil of Greed came in contact with the stranger’s arm, and his schematic was suddenly made visible:

  Seymour pulled his hand back like he’d accidentally touched a hot stove. He scooted away, helpless to do anything but watch as Jerome burrowed into Oscar Rusk’s throat. A wave of loss and remorse and hopelessness crashed over him. This whole thing, it had all come down to this. Oscar Rusk had lured them here with the promise of a way home, and now Jerome had killed the poor bastard in the blink of an eye, judging by the rapidly-expanding pool of blood.

  “No,” he muttered, “no no no.”

  When Jerome lifted himself from the gory crater he’d dug, he now had a mouth.

  “You better quit your goddamned crying and get your shit together, Seymour Little,” he said, voice discordantly deep and mature for such a tiny cactus man. “Your girlfriend is right: this here’s a trap.”

  “I’m not his girlfriend,” Penny muttered, sounding as blank as the look on her face.