I licked the powdered sugar taste from my lips. It was tempting to lick the cookie again...the one that had brought me here, but doing so would take me away from Crumkinvidia before I’d had the chance to achieve my goal. I got my bearings by the old gingerbread mill to the south. 

I was here to beg amnesty of the Licorice Queen. I shuddered, thinking about her imperious demeanor. She really was quite intimidating, and my previous attempts to beg forgiveness had not gone well. 

I had not meant to kill the peeps... 

More powdered sugar descended upon me from the sky, in a delicious mimicry of snowfall. I stowed away my castle-shaped cookie and happily opened my mouth to accept the sweet bounty of this land. My eyes were closed as I savored the dusting of confection that accumulated slowly on my tongue.  

Therefore, I was startled by the voice that intruded upon this moment of private indulgence with a cry of “Who are you?” I spasmed in surprise, then jumped, then twirled to face the owner of the voice, my hand instinctively rising towards the button on my goggles. But I stayed my hand when I saw a scowling gingerbread man. I’d encountered such creatures before on my travels through Crumkinvidia, and knew he would not attack unless he was convinced I was on the side of the Licorice Queen. 

“Power to the pastries,” I said in a bit of a lackluster manner, but he seemed convinced I was on his side of the pastry revolution here. He began to inquire as to the nature of me. He could see I was neither pastry nor candy. I saw no reason to tell him I was a fox furrikin, since I was wearing a glamour that made me appear as an ordinary human. 

“I’m a human,” I said, “and a bard at that. I’m a tailor, and an explorer, and an adventurer.” I stood proudly in my human guise, and showed him a few of the most intriguing items amongst my equipment. I wanted him to like me, and to be impressed. I can be a bit vain at times, I admit. 

He seemed more than just intrigued, asking me numerous questions about both my experience and gear. Did I embellish my accomplishments and my abilities? Who can blame me if I did? I was just passing through. But later I would come to regret this decision. 

After a short while more gingerbreads happened by, and the one to whom I had been talking quickly gathered them round. “If anyone can do it,” he said, “I’m convinced this traveler is our best bet.” 

The other gingerbread people looked skeptical, evaluating me thoroughly with their piercing eyes as well as their soft, pastry hands. I bore the impoliteness well, if I do say so myself. In the end they seemed satisfied. Either they believed I could do whatever it was they couldn’t seem to manage themselves, or they didn’t see the harm in asking me to try. 

I started growing curious about the nature of this task. I am a curious person, after all. I could feel excitement rising within me, like flame licking at kindling and then blazing higher. “So are you cookies going to tell me what this big secret is?” I said as charmingly as I could. I grinned, showing my gleaming white teeth.  I hoped the sharpness of those teeth would not be off-putting to these tasty morsels. I tried not to inhale their appetizing scent. 

“Follow us,” said the gruff little fellow who had first come upon me. I happily obliged, opening my mouth to let stray sugar wander in as we walked through the streets, just me and a gaggle of pastry people. 

As we trudged through the street I noticed that the gingerbread people were excited too, maybe even more than I was. But there was something different about their excitement. As I became used to their alluringly spicy scent enough to look past it, I noticed there was something else in the air. Desperation. I instinctively started humming an ancient tune I had learned from my mentor, one that put me in touch with the spirits of my ancestors.  Before I realized what I was doing, and certainly before I had the opportunity to give my new entourage any forewarning, one of these ancestral spirits, summoned by my song, rose from the ground beside me. Needless to say, my companions were more than a bit startled, especially considering they had already been jumpy before the arrival of an unannounced apparition. 

“By Crumkane! What sort of pudding is this?” said one of the gingerbreads. She was taller than the others, and her shape and frosting indicated longer hair than most of the other gingerbreads I’d seen. I started to wonder about gingerbread hairstyles and culture, but only for a moment before the cry of another gingerbread snapped me out of it. 

“Are you a demon sent by Lord Necco!?” shouted a squat little gingerbread, slightly less well-baked by the look of him; his body was a lighter shade of brown. He was kind of a tan khaki color. His shout made me chuckle a bit, but it also reminded me I owed these folks an explanation of sorts. 

“No demon am I,” I said, “and this good spirit is no pudding. This is one of my ancestors, whom I have summoned here to help with my endeavor. They shall aid me in aiding you.” I didn’t want to admit that I hadn’t even meant to summon such a spirit. “Which...since we’re talking about it,” I said, “how am I helping you?” 

“We’re almost there,” said the long-haired gingerbread. 

“Easier to show you than tell you,” added the gruff one. 

“Are you some kind of brave hero or aren’t you?” asked the tan one, in his nasally tone. I don’t know why he had begun to annoy me. I barely knew him. Maybe he reminded me of someone I already disliked. Does everyone tend to prejudge new acquaintances based on their similarity to old ones, or is it just me? 

As I wondered about the peculiarities of personalities and other such philosophical phenomena, I was startled to see I hadn’t even noticed a building coming into view amidst the sugarfall. It was two stories, from the look of it, and constructed from enormous planks of tempered chocolate. I had seen no other structures in this part of Crumkinvidia. I was curious if the gingerbread people had made it, or whether they had discovered it and made use of it. Or maybe they needed me to help them clear it out of its current occupant. My apprehension was giving way to my growing curiosity once again. 

I quickened my step, outpacing my companions before I even realized it. My hand was already on the door of the chocolate edifice when I heard a gruff voice call out to me, “Wait!” I wouldn’t have hesitated, even then, but I caught sight of my ancestral spirit guardian out of the corner of my eye. Was it my imagination, or did he look nervous? I paused long enough for the short legs of the gingerbreads to catch them up to me; I watched them as they trudged through the snow that was really sugar. I reminded myself that just as the snow was really sugar, this chocolatey building might really be hiding something more sinister. Still, I was itching with excitement. My fur was bristling; I was ecstatic for adventure. 

“What we need...from you,” panted the gruff one, catching his breath, “is to climb down under the machine and figure out how to make it...work.” 

I frowned slightly. A machine was far from my forté. And furthermore, it wasn’t exactly the adventure I had been getting so excited about. I thought they were looking for a brave bard to daringly defeat a dragon—in this case, probably made out of eclairs or somesuch—but instead they needed a mechanic to repair some sort of device. It was more of a job for a Hallifaxian. I shivered at the thought of that cold, logical city. 

I started to protest, but the tall, long-haired gingerbread reassured me. 

“Brave traveler,” she said, “we are not nimble enough to climb below the machine. And what’s more is we are too afraid. It's...empty below there. A pit or an abyss. And it’s dark. One of our number tried and...” She stopped, but her meaning was clear. One cookie had already perished in pursuit of fixing this machine. 

“What does it do?” I asked, wondering what would drive them to such lengths.  

“However would we know that?” barked the tan one, angrily. “Didn’t you hear him? It’s broken!” 

“What it does is give us hope,” long-hair cut in. “We believe that it was created to help us defeat the Licorice Queen once and for all!” 

It occurred to me that if word got out of my participation in this scheme, my chances at forgiveness from the queen would be drastically reduced. On the other hand, I reasoned, if the revolution was successful, then the amnesty would be a moot point. And more importantly, my curiosity had been revived. I wanted to know what the machine did too. 

It didn’t take long for the gingerbreads to show me the opening at the base of the machine where I could climb down below the it. The machine that loomed over this opening was not much to wonder at—like most machines it was essentially a giant metal room, with glass and metal knobs, panels, buttons and levers on the outside. Inside the room was presumably more of the same, or perhaps wires and tubes like below it. As I’ve said, I’ve not much experience with machines, nor do I want any. Give me a good old fashioned towering tree any day. More useful, more lovely, and more helpful than any machine. And part of a greater whole in a way that no machine I’ve seen truly is. But this isn’t the time to discuss such things. Suffice it to say that as far as machines go, this one was quite impressive. Which to me, isn’t something to get too excited about. 

But the myriad of pipes, tubes, and wires that formed a climbable sort of labyrinth below it were something to marvel at. Especially because as it descended outward and downward into the darkness, it seemed to go on forever. It reminded me of a strange jungle. I heard a dripping far below to the west, and I shivered. I told myself it was only liquid chocolate. Perhaps it was. 

A faint light emanated from my guardian spirit, and I hummed to him in the hopes that he might glow a bit more brightly. I certainly wanted to do anything I could to keep him around. I started slowly clambering down a large metal pipe that had a sort of lip with rivets in it every few feet to hold the sections of it together. When I’d climbed downwards equal to about ten times my height, I heard an ominous creaking. I paused, heart pounding, and tried to decide if it was safer to scramble back upwards or further downwards. If the spirit had an opinion on the matter, he gave no indication of it. 

I didn’t have much time to ponder this conundrum, because the pipe to which I was clinging started to move. I noticed as I began to lurch sideways with the pipe that the metal of it had corroded, but it was too late to do anything to ameliorate the situation. In the dimness of this cavernous chamber I sensed or saw a patch of darkness that seemed more solid than some others, so, having little choice, I leapt towards that shadow within the shadows, praying to Maylea that it indicated some solid object, and that that object would not turn out to be some furrikin-eating beast. 

The thing on which I landed was, luckily, solid, and even more luckily, not interested in eating me. It was a metal pipe thicker around than any I'd ever seen. Unluckily, I landed so hard upon it that I fractured my arm and smashed my violin to bits. I screamed in agony, and although the scream echoed into the emptiness of the cavern, it was also swallowed into that giant nothingness too. I realized that even if the gingerbreads could hear my cry, they could do nothing to rescue me. I turned to my protecting spirit, but without the conduit of my instrument, this too had left me. 

I lay there for some hours. I had taken some herbs and had steadily sipped on some amber beer to dull the pain, but I felt hopeless and defeated nonetheless. A few times I tried to hum and then to sing my guardian spirit back to me. I had even tried a bit of percussion on the pipe on which I lay. I am sure you can guess that such efforts were futile. 

You may wonder, why did I not call out a prayer to the Lady herself, the divine Maylea of whom I spoke earlier. The truth is, I did pray to her, several times. In that dark time, I felt she had abandoned me, or that she could not reach me in this dark place. But looking back on the events, I am ashamed to have ever had this perspective. Maylea was there with me, I am sure of it. It is because of Her I did not die, and because of Her that I was saved by a beautiful candy. Or do you believe it a coincidence that the gumdrop’s floral aroma led me to it? But wait, I have gotten ahead of myself. 

I wiped tears from my eyes many times in my hours of laying there. I am not ashamed to admit it. A bard must be in tune with their emotions, for emotions give music their power. They also give life its wholeness, I say. Tears are a piece of that. And so, yes, I did shed quite a few of them as I moped there, shattered and stranded. Perhaps it was the cleansing effect of these tears that opened my senses to the smell that crept up to my vulpine nostrils. 

It was the smell of elderflower. I would recognize it anywhere, as so many times I had gathered a bouquet of elderflowers from the shrubs in my home forest of the Serenwilde. I was fond of flowers, particularly because it was Maylea herself who painted each one, brought forth the beauty that was on the inside of each one and displayed it on their outside. It was my belief that in following her I was learning to do the same for myself. Besides which, flowers are quite beautiful, and quite useful too, for those who enjoy flirting. But in the moment I smelled the gumdrop, it was not flirting I had on my mind. 

The smell of elderflower brought me back into my body. I was no longer a creature of reverie and philosophizing, of misery and wallowing. I was a creature of sensation, and I stretched each of my senses out into the emptiness, trying to smell and listen and feel and taste and even see into the darkness to find the source of that pleasant aroma. If there were flowers, I reasoned, there was dirt. Dirt meant ground. A way out of here, certainly. If I could only reach the outdoors, then my transplanar device, the castle-shaped cookie that had brought me here, would be usable. The desperation and excitement drowned out the pain that had begun to resurge. I took another sip of amber beer for good measure. Then I took a sip of whiskey to get my spirits up. Then I closed my eyes—it was too dark to rely on them anyways—and sniffed into the darkness. 

I crept along the vast metal monstrosity of a pipe, my arm still faintly throbbing, my ego still in tatters, but my hope not quite extinguished. The cold of the metal was invigorating, too. I crawled for what felt like a quarter of a day, though it may have been much longer or much shorter. I had no sunlight nor starlight by which to judge. But even had it taken days upon days, I would not have stopped. Even a little bit of hope can flicker steadily for years before going out.  

And then I felt it. My hand brushed something soft about the size of an acorn and I instantly knew it was the source of that floral smell. As soon as my hand made contact, I felt the object start to roll away from me. I yelped in anguish, feeling that flicker of hope sputtering like the flame of a candle that has no more wax to burn. 

And yet, that hope had even then not been extinguished. I had trained in acrobatics from Miakoda herself. I rolled my body in the direction the object was rolling, my hand scrambling along the pipe while my other hand pressed itself tightly against my body, trying to minimize the pressure on my fractured left arm. My hand made contact with the rolling little thing, and I felt it roll again, now in the other direction. I slid awkwardly on the metal—it hurt quite a bit—half lunging, half lurching, and scrambled my hand again. My hand moved like a stoat hunting a hare. Only my prey was far smaller, and invisible in the darkness. 

And then I could hear the little round thing rolling off the side of the pipe. I felt the flame of hope die. 

And yet. That moment lasted only and instant, and in the next I had scrambled over the side of the pipe. I could not let that be the end of my adventure. In midair I caught the thing, still not knowing its name nor its use. But sometimes you know something long before you have reason to know it. I risked everything in tumbling off the side of that pipe—and yet, what had I had to lose at that point? Now I would either plummet to a swifter death, or maybe—OOF. Yes. There had been another object below the pipe I had leapt from. 

I shattered another few bones in that landing. My right leg, my right foot, probably a few ribs. It was an even larger pipe I’d landed on from the feel of it—no sweet air of the outdoors, still the stale old air of this strange endless cavern. But I laughed. I laughed like a clown! I wasn’t dead! And not all hope was lost! The little flame of it that had gone out had reignited a moment later. And now I made a literal flame too, using the tinderbox from my bag. I needed to see what treasure I’d plundered.  

In the light from the spark, I saw a small confection I had once received as a gift from my mentor, who in turn had gotten it from a strange little candy box. It was called a gumdrop, as I recalled. This one was white, and glistened beautifully in the moments the sparks illuminated it. As I have made very clear by now, it smelled of elderflower. But there was something else about this gumdrop that I could neither see nor smell but rather sense. This gumdrop possessed some measure of magic, I had not a single doubt about that. The question then was what manner of magic it possessed. 

I suppose there were other questions as well. Was it poisoned? Was it cursed? Would it be of any use in my predicament? I wondered also if there was any hope of succeeding in helping the gingerbreads to fix their mysterious machine, though I doubted I had any chance of that. 

I sniffed the gumdrop again. I licked it gingerly, but could taste little, since I was too nervous of licking too much. I rubbed my fingers softly across its surface. I pressed it against the fur of my cheek. I don’t know why I did that, but I did it, so I am telling you. I sang to it a little too. I thought about offering it a drink, but took one for myself instead. Cognac. It did nothing to clarify the situation. But it tasted good. 

What was there left to do with a magical gumdrop but eat it? I wish I could say I had used some brilliant thinking to deduce this as the proper course of action. In truth, I merely had no other ideas. And I also love sweets. Who doesn’t? 

There was no ceremony to my gumdrop consumption, not even a prayer to Maylea, I’m embarrassed to admit. Just a desperation, a hunger to keep living, and a curiosity about the taste of this gleaming candy. I popped it into my mouth as though I had a dozen more in my pocket. I know of no other way to eat a gumdrop. 

It only took a few moments for the gumdrop to take effect. It felt like my body was becoming a milkshake and that the milkshake was being sucked through a straw. This may sound uncomfortable, but it felt positively delightful. It was a creamy, melty feeling, as happy as drinking a milkshake. The milshakey feeling slowly fell away. There was a sound like the tinkling of a thousand chimes, and then I found myself standing on a snowy street. I realized the snow was sugary—I was back above ground in Crumkinvidia. 

I reached for the cookie that had brought me here, relieved to finally have a way home. I needed to seek a healer, and to rest. But despite the pain that was sneaking back into my body, I knew I had unfinished business in that confectionary land. 

It didn’t take long to find the chocolate building again. I stopped to drink more amber beer and to ingest more herbs. The pain was sharpening again. Again, I thought of leaving. But then I thought of how nearly I had come to my demise. I pushed myself onward once more towards the chocolate edifice. My eagerness to be done with this place overtook me, and I found myself sprinting madly towards my destination. 

I slammed open the chocolate door, out of breath and panting like a wild beast. The gingerbreads, clearly startled, shrieked and cowered. There was a chaos of miscommunication. Apparently they had not expected me to approach from the outdoors, nor to be panting and bleeding and covered in grime. I tried to calm them, but their panic was too great. I had a song for just such a problem, a soothing tune that would have settled these gingerbreads down in mere moments. But without my instrument, and as wounded as I was, I could not employ the magical melody. The exhaustion and pain built up in me, surging through me like water vapor preparing to escape the spout of a kettle. It erupted out of me in a bestial roar, more aslaran than furrikin. The shock and fear in the gingerbreads shifted—they ceased shouting and running and cowering, and froze, stock still. 

There was a brief silence while I collected myself. 

“It’s you!” said the gruff one, astonished. 

I nodded. “Never send anyone down there again,” I said as sternly as I could. “The machine cannot be fixed. I suspect that perhaps it also should not be fixed.” 

I could see that some of the gingerbreads, the gruff one included, seemed to be taking my words to heart. But I had to be sure. I reached around in my bag for something to use as a convincing prop. I had to convince them that I would be watching to ensure they did not send any one else to try repairing the machine. My hand touched the cold metal of a cowbell and I knew I had found just the thing. I sighed inwardly at losing it, but there were other ways of rounding up bovines. Slower more tedious ways, but still. 

I placed the cowbell on the ground near the entrance to the area underneath the machine. I paused again, this time to plan out the next few moments. It was a little performance I was improvising, and if I did it just right, I could save whatever adventurer came through Crumkinvidia next from falling into the abyss as I almost had. 

“You,” I said gravely, directing my gaze to the long-haired gingerbread. “Come here.” I spoke as though I were addressing a naughty child. My performance was quite good, I am pleased to say. Well, it was good considering the state I was in. The poor gingerbread stepped forward. When she neared the opening, I wove a glamour to disguise the movement of my foot kicking the cowbell hard. The gingerbreads jumped suddenly, startled by the unexpected chime of the bell, but I could see on their faces they were not overly impressed by my little trick. I ignored the cries of my battered body once again, and wove a further glamour, bathing the cowbell in lavender light, then producing the image of a lustrous bird beside me, squawking in alarm. 

“As soon as my trusty watchbird squawks,” I said, “I’ll be back here in a flash with the fury of a tempest,” I said, to drive the point home.  

“What’s a tempest?” asked the tan one. I didn’t bother answering, as I trusted they’d understand my message, even if they didn’t understand my words. Besides, I needed to get home to heal. 

Seeing the frightened looks on their faces, I felt a little bad. But I knew scaring them had been for the best. Still, I wished them no ill will. 

“Good luck to you,” I said, a bit sheepishly, “in your quest against the Queen.” I hoped the Queen would never hear of how I had tried to help them. 

I strode back out into the fresh air of Crumkinvidia, the sugar snow swirling about me. I breathed one last sigh of relief before taking my cookie out of my bag. I even felt a twinge of excitement at the thought of replacing my violin. But mostly, I was tired. I sniffed the sweet scent of the cookie, then reached out my tongue towards it to leave Crumkinvidia. I was not eager to return any time soon.