Devils in the Library

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Breakfast is very chaotic. Marybeth says our attackers should not have been working together like they were. They’re from different factions. Warring factions, even. She hasn’t ever found information about them in the library, but has learned from her contacts. When Klyce joins us, Nat asks about using her dreams to could guide us. The Knights and Aranea attacking the clones? Or, could the cult of the not-Dawnmother have something to do with Marybeth’s Grandfather. What about the Library dream, is there something there we need to find. Is it Grandfather who burns the book, or Marybeth.

Remy interrupts, asking Dalish about getting us more mana and spell scribing materials, so Dalish and Gerhardt head off to see what they can get.

Then we devolve into discussion of our military service, the government, and what if they split us up again. But Nat pulls us back on course with her Library dream. It could be that we have to go in and stop Grandfather, or it could be that we need to go burn a book before he can get to it. We have to find him, could we scry on him without just finding Marybeth? Can we somehow break the bond between them? Marybeth wants to think about it, she’s worried about us getting hurt trying to save her.

Dalish and Gerhardt return with 20 motes of mana, but no more scribing materials. This kicks off a discussion about resources. Wizarding, as always, seems a very strange thing to deal with. Glad I don’t have to do all that.

Marybeth pulls us back to the library. She wonders if she can find a future book about how we solved this problem of her Grandfather. We have to stick together, so we decide to all go to the library. I try to convince everyone to stick together and pick one goal, but they just won’t listen. Marybeth, Remy, Gerhardt and I head off to look for the future answer. Nat, Klyce, and Dalish head off to try and specifically find the burning book from Nat’s vision. We all write in the books, and head off in two opposite directions.

We walk for a long time, and eventually come upon a tower. The pull leads us up quite a few levels, but what we find there is only soot and ash. Everything on this level has been burnt. Written in the ash are two words: Too Slow.

Then a loud shrieking noise rips through the air. I pull away from the group, looking for where the attack is coming from. Remy pulls up light to see better. Marybeth and Gerhardt prepare for an attack. Suddenly, there is movement at the windows around the tower, and purple spines come shooting in at all of us. From the stairs come two large creatures who immediately attack. Remy dimension doors away with Marybeth, and they turn on Gerhardt and me. I fall under their blows, but Gerhardt revives me inside a wall of force. The creatures are gone, and I grab his hand and dimension door us all the way back to the Library entrance in one jump.

The others aren’t there. I send to them, but somehow they’re still in the tower. Gerhardt and I wait, but I’m barely alive, we can’t go back. We dont wait long, what if the things come after us? Gerhardt and I leave the library, there’s nothing we can do to get back to them in time.

A short time later, the rest of them pile out of the Library, bleeding, but alive. Gerhardt sets to work, patching up wounds, while Remy explains that they wanted to make a deal with him. They were only after Marybeth. They didn’t seem to care if they died, as though they would just come back again. We try to ask Marybeth, but she says she can’t talk about them. Klyce asks if she could talk about a hypothetical contract, instead of her own, but she won’t. Nat says her other planar contact always tries to make deal with her, too. Marybeth says this is different because the contract was made by her Grandfather, long before she was born. Remy explains that they offered to let him take the debt of 200,000 souls, but he refused. Klyce asks if Marybeth can set up a meeting, and Remy suggests bringing a lawyer along. They’ve got to be violating terms of the contract, surely we can get them to stop?

Marybeth says she has a handler, and spoke to them the night before. Soemething is happening, some sort of revolt or civil war. There is chaos wherever they are, more than usual. We ask if she can talk to them again, we have to figure this out. Maybe we can help settle things? She says she will try.

Family History

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Our Marybeth casts a message to her Mother, and it looks like a few message are exchanged before she tells us to wait and walks right over. We all stop at across the street from the cafe. Waiting and watching, but we can’t see much and can hear even less. The conversation does not look friendly, however. Then, suddenly, her mother screams and attacks the false Marybeth. “You should have stayed dead when I poisoned you!” We all hurry over as Marybeth pulls her mom away and the other Marybeth leaves. Dalish pays the tab for the unfinished meal, and we escort Marybeth and her mother to a park to talk. We all stay out of this conversation, as well, and shadow them when Marybeth walks her mother home.

When her mother is all safe and sound, we all gather around to find out what happened. It was her grandfather, of course, that weird part of him that came back when she did. We immediately begin offering to kill him, banish him, trap his soul, whatever she might want or need. Then we have a quick conversation about how he knew to be there. Marybeth is worried that he can hear her messages, that he is now tied to her magic, or she to his. Nat offers to try and dig into her head and break the connection, but Marybeth says it’s too dangerous. We go back and forth on this a bit, because we risk our lives for each other all the time. But we decide it might be best to let it rest and go get some lunch.

We all meet up with Klyce at the gate to the school that afternoon. They all head in, I don’t even try, but Remy does, and gets blocked. We can see the groundskeeper and some servires meeting the group and asking their business. Then they come down to the gate to talk to us. Remy explains that we’ve only come to help Klyce’s little sister, Patty. He asks us to promise not to break any rules. Remy says he promises not to unless it is to save a life. I promise not to break any rules on this visit. He gives Remy permission to enter for the foreseeable future, and me permission to enter just today, just for the stated purpose of this visit. Fine with me. Servires fall into step behind us. Not so fine…

We catch up to the others on the way to the infirmary, and find James there, but no Raltus. James greets us friendly enough, but quickly makes excuses to get right out of there. Remy goes over to take a look at Patty. She’s still asleep, and she hasn’t aged a day. Alok says it’s a slumber curse, and she can only be awakened by true love’s kiss. She’s just a little girl! Don’t be so literal. Klyce, do you love your sister? He goes and kisses her cheek, and she wakes up. Confused about where she is and what happened. Klyce whisks her, and us, down to the dining hall for some ice cream to soften the blow of having been asleep for a few years. Remy runs up to leave a note for Raltus as we all head back to the bakery to take Patty home. Their mother is overjoyed to see her little girl again, and Phil is happy to finally meet her. He suggests a celebratory dinner, and Klyce heads out with him to go pick up steaks. Even Elizabeth comes home for dinner and everyone is quite happy to be a family again. Even Klyce seems to be more relaxed now.

Klyce stays with his now complete family, and Dalish to guard the door, while I take everyone else back to my place to sleep. We have a bit of spiced rum, and then the girls all retire to one room while the boys take individual rooms. Boys never have to worry, it’s not fair. Marybeth says she smelled sulfer at Klyce’s and Nat asks her to say something next time, so she can look for extra minds in the area. Marybeth is really worried about her grandfather knowing everything she knows. We try to comfort her. Nat says we’re going to kill him, and that’s all he needs to know. You’re strong, Marybeth, and we’ve got your back. We all settle in to sleep, but Nat says she’s going to stay up for a bit to think.

Next thing I know, there’s screaming and I’m very cold. Jumping out of bed, I see two icy monsters and one big pigish monster. The icy things freeze over the walls and door of my room. They’re really strong and really big. The boys finally pop in to help with the fight, but when Marybeth falls, I pop her and myself right out. There’s a voice in my head then, “There is nowhere you can go. We only want her.” No, you can’t have her, she mine.” “No, she’s not.” They must have killed it shortly after that, because it stopped talking. I didn’t mean to say she’s mine, just… my friend. But it doesn’t matter, they can’t have her. No matter what.

Gerhardt comes out of the room when they finish and the ice all dissapates. He tends to Marybeth’s wounds and wakes her up. I send to Dalish, who doesn’t need to sleep anymore, about what happened. He offers to come over and help. We talk it over a bit, then ask him to come make a hut for us, and when he arrives, we camp out in the living room.

Family Matters

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While waiting for Dalish to come out of his paralysis, Nat leads Marybeth, Klyce, and myself back down to Old Town. We map it all out and bury the dead, which are now just bodies instead of trying to kill us. When Dalish does get up, he almost immediately has Remy kill him, so he can become fully a lich. So then, we wait for him to reform his new undead body for another six days. He gets back just in time to head home.

We have a debate about his phylactery. Sure, it would be safe here, in the Rathbone castle, assumedly. But if we get sent to the western territories and he dies, he’s going to have a heck of a time getting back to us. We have to take it with us. Dalish decides that I ought to be the one to protect it. Sure, Dalish, Rictus never mind controls me and makes me do things, I’m sure it’ll be safe. But I don’t say that, I just take it. Hopefully Rictus won’t do that again for while we’re all together.

Travel back to New Gnosis is pretty smooth and uneventful. When we arrive, we can see the Petals have been completed in their glory. We also see a large military presence at the gates, search all comers. We join the line and learn from the people around us that two Primes have been killed in the last three days!!! But Rictus sent for us weeks ago…

Lt. Col. Dalish gets us waved through the gates by flashing his rank and Rictus’ name. We drop our spoils from Lord Tepish’s castle in the bank on our way to the Hall of Justice in the Petals. Remy decides to be Alok Rathbone for the time being, and Orrin stays with him while we head up to see Rictus.

He isn’t there. Aleria is, however, a much nicer sight to our eyes and hearts. She tells us that Rictus is off hunting the assassins, but he wanted us close. She offers to answer any questions we have. She tells us that we’re to remain in New Gnosis for the time being, but will have to find our own lodging. School did re-open, but we’re not students anymore, so we can’t go back there. Marybeth asks about her family, and she says that they were caught up in an investment scheme and ruined. She also tells us that as far as she knows, there has been no Fae or Magia trouble in the city lately. Having no more information about what we’re supposed to do, we all head out to check on finances and family.

I head, alone, back to my house. No one but the groundskeeper is there. I wander around a bit, and it feel so empy. I ask, and he says that they never came back from the Caribbean a year ago. I assumed they had just gotten home and were done gloating. Gerald is still here, it looks like, so I leave him a note saying I’ll be home later. Then head for Klyce’s bakery.

Remy has brought food for us all to have a nice dinner, so we sit around and fill each other in. Dalish has apparently rented an entire floor of a hotel in Brooklyn. Remy definitly wants to take Alok to see what had happened to the people there. Klyce wants Alok to look at his little sister, who is still unconscious at the schol infirmary. Dalish asks for his phylactery back to take and show Rictus tonight, so I hand it over. I let folks know that my folks are missing, and everyone is welcome to stay at my house, if they want. Marybeth asks us to go with her to meet up with her mom, and most of us volunteer.

After dinner, I take Nat, Gerhart, and Alok back to my place. Gerald arrives shortly after we do, but he’s so distracted, I have to yell out to him to get him to even notice I’m there. He rushes over apparently very excited to see me. He even gave me a hug! After blinking for a few moments, I ask after Mom and Dad. He says they went on vacation, but the last letter he got was from the Caymans, and he hasn’t heard anything from them since. Didn’t he send to them? No, he doesn’t know that spell.

Then he apologizes! To me! For being a terrible brother! He asks if we can start over. I’m in such a state of shock, I agree. I even defend him, that he didn’t know any better than to treat me the same as our parents did. He says he should have and we go a couple rounds, before I just relent and say sure. We can start over if he’s really going to be nicer. I’ve died a few times, I can bury a childhood hatchet. Seems less important now.

He’s a little put out by that, but I push him past it by asking about school. He says they hired new teachers and things are pretty safe. At least as they ever have been. I try a sending to Mom, but nothing comes back. Remy offers him the sending spell, but he gets a bit creeped out and heads to bed. So, I put everyone else in rooms for the night.

The next morning, Nat tells us she had some crazy dreams. A cult doing a sacrfice to bring about the darkness with an inverted Dawnmother symbol. The red and black knights cutting open sack of bodies, one of which was Remy. They had Areana with them and she was holding a jar with a brain worm in it. Gerhardt says it sounds like the clone pods.

Then we get into a really strange argument with Remy about contacting the Knights or Areana or others and it just goes down hill until he tries to send to her, and gets nothing, so we drop it and head out to see Marybeth and her mother. When we get to the cafe, we see Marybeth already talking to her mother. With Marybeth right beside us, in disguise.

What Have We Done?

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We go around and around a few more times. What are we going to do with this ritual? Create an item? Return the power to the family? Give it to someone else? Mummy Dalish? Disapate it? Can we even do any of that? Can we do anything besides give it back to Great Grandpa Bones?

There’s a quick sidebar when we realize Dalish has been communicating with Rictus fairly regularly. Remy asks he not inform Rictus that he’s alive, since when Rictus tried to clone him, he shot himself in the head to stop him. I ask him not to tell Rictus about all the fae and god-stuff we’ve been into. Fortunately, he finds leaving things out of his report easier now, as he gives up more and more of his humanity. Ugh! Well, at least he promised not to tell.

We get back on track and Klyce gets everyone to quiet down. He asks Nat what she wants to do. She thinks the best plan right now is to bring Great Grandpa back, then have a good talking to him about what he’s done, and how he can make up for it to the people of the town. It’s her family, so we agree and set about performing the ritual.

It works. Screaming spirits stream back into the skull and his eyes light up once more. The cave feels empty once more, as Nat and the skull head into a catch up conversation. He still thinks it’s three years ago. She catches him up on clearing the mines then, and then what has been happening lately. She tells him she knows he sacrificed his own sister to the Green Witch, and that she came back and murdered townsfolk for revenge. He claims it was all to save the family because no one else could take care of the mines, no one was powerful enough.

He asks that we don’t tell Nat’s parents or siblings. The burden is heavy, and he doesn’t want them to bear it. We tell him that Stephen already knows, and then have another whole conversation about what happened with Stephen and his undeath. We all agree to keep it between us, and head back to the castle to get drunk and forget everything else for the night.

The next morning is the Harvest Festival. No one is in a very festive mood. It’s starting to hit me, as I get up for my morning prayers to the Dawnmother, that she’s probably very upset with me for what I did. I just, it doesn’t seem fair, they’ve had him locked up for centuries. I hated being locked up for a year and a half. I couldn’t just leave the door closed. We promised.

Before I get too far down the rabbit hole, the others wake up and join me down by the Green Witch. What are we going to do about the body? Well, we can’t take her out, but perhaps, the cremation could be part of the ceremony tonight? Nat agrees to talk to the family about that, and I stay by her side for the day, stuck in my cloud of self-doubt.

About midday, Marybeth brings me some pie and a cup of wine. Nat and Remy come with her. Nat says the family has agreed to making it a funeral rite for Beatrice. I remember that Remy went to check on Dalish and ask where he is. Remy tells me that Dalish stayed behind to work on his ritual, and poisoned himself on purpose as part of it. This has apparently left him temporarily paralyzed (we hope), but it was one of the better outcomes? Oh dear.

Then folks start going off about the gods and the primes and how we’re touched. I don’t really follow the conversation, until Marybeth starts shouting at Remy about the phrase “your gods.” Exasperated, I ask if he could please, for the sake of peace, just use the phrase “the gods.” He grudgingly agrees, but who knows how long he’ll remember it. I then turn the conversation back to wine and pie. Unfortunately, I make a random comment to Remy about his nobility and it turns into a lecture on his family history in the royalist nation.

Eventually, people wander off and leave me in peace until the evening ceremony. I had a quick trip up to the castle to change my green dress to a red one for the burning, but I leave on the green mask. Nat has dressed in proper funeral attire for her part, as well.

Nearly the entire town gathers for the burning of the Green Witch. Nat gives a wonderful speech about the troubled times, and the losses they have suffered. She explains a bit about the vengeful spirit, in vague terms, and our defeat of it. She then turns to speak of the strength of the community. She encourages them to remember the lives of the fallen. To celebrate them. This town has survived so much, and will continue to endure. It is time to celebrate the town, their friends, and the people they have lost. She then performs the funeral rites and lights the pyre.

As if on cue, the clouds part and stars shine down upon the bright burning blaze. There is even a moonbow across the square. The Green Witch is pleased as we all watch the fire burn. Then, the biggest celebration this town has seen in quite a long time begins. And continues well into the early hours of the morning.

The next day, Nat fires up a telepathic bond with the whole group so we can talk to Dalish. He tells us that Rictus sent him a message that we’re to return to New Gnosis for a new assignment within three weeks. Oh man! UGH! Dalish also tells us he doesn’t kow how long he’s going to be paralyzed for.

Well, we have three weeks to find the door and get back home then. We start pondering strategies. Scry? Marybeth’s Library? Remy Sends to Hank, who says he’s really bad and we shouldn’t release him. Remy thinks they’ll stand against us in what we hope to do. Well, what else is new? Klyce brings up logical thinking as an option. Where would they have put the door? In the temple below us? Or in Stephen’s old place where the Eye was found?

Wait, we have a quick spell. I ask Nat to scry before we go running off in all directions. She tries, but gets nothing. Okay fine, but it was worth trying. Next easiest is below the mines. So, we head down there. Klyce gives us all waterbreathing because we flooded it last time we were here. Nothing has changed, unfortunately, and Stephen’s is too far away to check. We say hi to Great Grandpa on the way out, and remind Nat to tell her parents we fixed things with him.

After that, Marybeth takes Nat and Remy to the Library in her necklace while I stand guard. Against what, I don’t know, but I always do that when she goes inside. When they pop back out, I ask what they learned. That the knowledge is forbidden, and there are tentacle monsters guarding it. Oh, okay, great. Well, makes sense the gods wouldn’t want us to know how to undo what they did. Remy wants to go back in and fight an army of tentacle monsters and demand answers, but we tell him he’d be on his own.

The rest of the guys are ready to give up and just let the door find us. Trouble usually does, and we don’t have a timeline on our promise. Can’t we just take it easy for a little while. I’m afraid of what the gods will do if we give them time, though, and we still have easy options. Or at least, Nat does. I ask her to do her Contact Other Planes thing, so she does. While she’s in her trance, the group goes into another argument about gods and power, and I tune out, mostly, watching Nat.

When she wakes up, she has some news, none super helpful, but it’s more than we knew before. The Door is deep and on Earth. But the nation or city is is beneath is unclear. If we are successful in opening it, we will create a “singularity” in reality which will crush into a single truth and then explode back out into many paths. I’m not sure what that means, but that’s what Nat said. At least it won’t end everything and send us all to Oblivion. That’s a good thing, right? Well, none of that points us anywhere, maybe something popped up on Rictus’ radar, and that’s why we’re recalled. We’ll have to wait and see, I guess.

A Queen, A Goddess, and the In-Between

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Alok escorts us out of the flying temple and back to ground. He says we must go Dusward towards Autmn, to find the Harvest, where the wedding was meant to be. He once against reminds us of the dangers, and begs us guard our thoughts as we head out. Time and our surroundings fluctuate strangely. We pass a cozy cabin with three bears, and before we get out of earshot, there is the shrill scream of a young girl. A young elfish prince comes toward us on the road, carrying a bloody slipper, begging the girls of the group to try it on. We turn him down, but Nat asks about the blood. His betrothed, he tells us. He swears he’ll recognize her, the cuts on her feet, or at the very least, the shoe will fit. We hurry away as he does the same. We pass a house made entirely of candy, and more and stranger things.

After a while, Alok stops the group. He says we are making good time, but the seasons are fickle and he is unsure of the path. He suggests we get a bit lost to find the right way to go. A short time later, we decide to stop and rest. Alok suggests making a fire to see if a guide while come to us, or at least someone who knows the way. He reminds us to be good hosts to any guests, as guests must behave as well. Hospitality rules.

We make a campsite, and start a small fire. There are strange noises in the night. Pipe playing. But Alok says we must not follow the music into the wood. Nat asks if there are any special herbs in this forest for dreaming, and Alok finds her a few. We sit and wait. And wait. And wait. And wait. But no one comes. Until heavy footsteps and crackling branches break the night’s stillness.

A huge, two-headed creature with hooks for hands bursts through the brush. One head is cursing and screaming, the other simply roars at it attacks. We don’t have to be good hosts to this thing, right Alok? Right! It’s another monster made by the gods. This things is brutal, and it takes all we can throw at it to bring it down without losing our lives. Klyce blames himself for his negative thoughts, and turns into a gigantic snake for the rest of the night. Exhausted from waiting and from battle, we decide to sleep, but take watches in case a guest arrives.

After a long rest, while we are eating breakfast, flute music approaches. Into camp rides a hedgehog of a man, on a large jaunty rooster. He introduces himself as Hans the Hedgehog, and finds us all very strange and large. We ask for his help and explain our situation. He says he knows where the wedding is, and asks if we were invited. No, we just have to go anyway. He says this is good, because those that were invited cannot leave until it is over. And since the King began it and then died, the wedding has not ended still. The queen and her 137 daughters, and the entire wedding party are still all there. He says he’d like it if we could bring the King back, as he owes Hans a daughter for helping him once in the forest. But can he help us, too?

He says he can get us there, but we will all owe him favors. One favor each, should we see him again afterwards. Alok ponders leaving, now that we have a new guide, but Hans goads him into staying to see the end of the story. The pact is sealed, and he leads us out of the forest onto a dank, foggy fen. Where his rooster leaps nibly from grassy knoll to grassy knoll. There is no animal life here, except for us. The grasses are even mostly dead. I do not like it one bit.

Hans keeps up a stream of conversation to keep us distracted and focused, but Klyce remains a giant snake the whole day. We quickly arrive at the Harvest grounds, and start to see the wedding reception still in progress. There is soft music and servants wander with rotten food on trays they cannot put down. Alok warns us not to accept an invitation to dance. I ask everyone in the group to surround me, and cover my ears and squint my eyes as tightly as I can. Hans looks at me strangely, and I explain to him my deal with the Hag of the Woods, all that time ago. I promised to always accept hospitality, so, here, I must not allow them to offer me anything. I beg to go around, but he says the Tomb of the King is right behind the Queen at her table at the feast. We must go through.

We make it through, not stealthy at first, but able to deny those who ask us to dance. We sneak more carefully after that, and manage to make it to the Queen without further trouble. The Queen sits alone, deep in grief, at the head table of a long since rotten banquet. The tables are lit with torches, row upon row encircle the high table at the far end, like a theatre. Behind her is a cave entrance, not twenty feet away. Nat and Dalish have a quiet and quick argument about approaching her or avoiding her. Hans wishes us luck and wanders a bit away to watch, his part in the deal completed. Dalish wins the argument, and we try to sneak to the cave.

Unfortunately, she sees us before we even get close. Who goes there? Who disturbs my grief? Nat had wanted to talk in the first place, so we push her forward to speak for us. Terribly sorry, great lady. We did not mean to disturb you. We are travelers out of place. Who are you? What are your names? Nat introduces herself, and then the rest of us. Why does that sound like equal parts Truth and Lies? There is a taint on us. The cause of your grief. The gods of the other world have touched our lives. Perhaps you sense that? Come closer.

We all head closer to the Queen. She recognizes us then, or the gods within us, probably, and asks again why we have come. Nat explains that we are from the other world, and we were told by the prophet that the way bad might be here, in the resting place of her dead husband. We wish only to find it and leave, to not bother her world any longer. What are you hiding? What possible connection could there be?

Nat offers her details, knowing it will be bad, no matter how she spins it. Telling her that one of her husband’s eyes was in our world, and being used for terrible purposes by other men. We defeated them and him, but then another of our friends somehow uses some of that power to craft an eye for himself. And we think this connection might take us home. You want to defile the grave of my husband to find your way home? Not defile, but yes, it might be our way home.

You come here! Representatives or chosen or whatever, connected to the people who murdered the king! To gain access to his resting place? You have robbed me of my daughters, too! No! I forbid it! As a mercy, from a grieving queen, I will allow you to leave and never return!

Dalish bows and immediately backs a way. Nat gives an As you wish, and turns to go. I pause before going, telling her that we had hoped to bring her son back to her, and would that maybe be worth it. She concedes, that should we do that, she might consider allowing us access. Then I retreat with the rest of the group.

Some distance away, we discuss. The mana machines! Did we steal her daughters and murder them in the machines??? Or were they many of the other things we killed in the city? Is Aranea one? We have to figure out what happened to the Prince, and how we might get him back for her, for everyone. Should we ask the gods what they did? Klyce reverts to human, and Alok calms his emotions to keep him summoning more monsters. The bookish folk look at Banishment, to see if they could reverse it somehow. I sit down and focus on the Green Witch and her love for the Clever Prince. Klyce suggests we chill out and tap into the world around us. Maybe a drum circle?

Alok agrees with the use of music in this place as a good way to connect. He gets us all to circle up, and uses calm emotions on the entire party to try to mellow us out and help us get in touch with the fae world. Nat decides to take it a step further and, using the herbs Alok had gathered, makes us all tea. We pass around cups and settle in to take a trip together with Nat guiding the dreaming.

It is all very confusing to me, time and space, and then great big nothingness with light at one point. The whiteness is the unknowable beyond, she tells us. It is beyond our order-wrapped world. We are in the in-between. We have to find the Prince and set him free. Focusing on that desire, we find a Door. Nat says it’s the Door to Oblivion from her dreams. There were terrible portents in that dream, but it is unclear what they mean. Things might explode if we open it, or he might just be an angry Prince. But this is what we came here for. This crudely painted door with the Prince beyond.

I settle down next to it with Nat. There are countless runes worked into the painted surface. Nat knocks, but nothing happens. I focus in on the door and there is a flicker and then a brilliant light. The Dawnmother commands me: DO NOT OPEN THAT DOOR! But she is afraid, almost pleading. I feel no compulsion in that command. I reach for the doorknob, and I can feel it. Not flat like the painting should be. I’m sorry, Dawnmother, but we must fix the damage you have caused here. I twist the knob and open the dor. It disappears in a crack of thunder.

Nat says something bad has happened with that action. We keep focusing on the Prince. Even calling for him, but nothing. The door is gone. Someone suggests that it must be back in reality now. Quite probably in our own world. We have forced the door to exist, but when they banished him behind the door, they must have also then banished the door. We have to get home and find it. I have been staring at the empty space in shock for a few moments, but the word home snaps me back to the discussion.

Home. Can we get home from here? From in between? Without going back to the queen? We rise up from where the door had been and we focus on going home. Nat stops us. We could do it, but in a dimished capacity. We have to go back and get our bodies and our full power. We turn back towards the fae, and the going back is a lot harder, but we manage it. Barely.

We clean up, and explain to Alok what has happened. Klyce has another strange ramble, this time worrying that if we find him, I’ll fall for the Prince, and then my other promise to the Hag will have him gone all over again. Oh man, Klyce, I’m pretty sure it was Oliver I gave to the Hag, but we’ll just have to risk it. I’m not going to fight the real Green Witch over the Prince. I’m only 15.

Alok asks us to swear we will try to undo the crimes of our gods, and bring back King Balor, the Clever Prince, and Time to the realm of the Fae. We agree to the Prince and Time. He goes to speak to the Queen on our behalf, turning blue as he does so. He gets her to agree, and we head back to see her. This one has said many words, I wish to hear them from you. We swear to her to try to open the door and attempt to repair time. As it is Sworn, So shall it Be. There is a tightness with these words, but then it passes.

We have to get the Prince back before we can fix time. Alok also asks us to find the daughters if we can. She then insists he go with us, to ensure we keep our word. Nat asks about her daughters, but she says we will know them when we see them. She then rises to leave, and we see that she has a gigantic bulbous body and eight legs. She heads away and we head into the tomb.

Nat reminds us to be ready for the fight. We apologize to Alok and tell him our world is awful. We have to help him disguise himself, maybe Remy can share his hat. We head down the cave to a set of double doors with a huge cycopian lion.

Who seeks to enter? Natty says the Queen sent us down. We must answer questions three.

What loses its head in the morning and gets it back at night?

A Pillow!

Yes!

The beginning of eternity and end of time…. he goes on for a while with this one, but it’s

The letter E!

Yes!

The more of these you take, the more you leave behind. What are they?

Shits? No! And lasers strike Gerhardt.

Moments? No! And Marybeth gets hit.

Breaths? No! More lasers.

Lives? No! Lasers.

Steps? Yes!

The door opens. We head in and down the stairs. A huge funerial chamber. The dias is 20 feet tall. The King does not look decayed, but there is golden ichor flowing from his wounds. His armor is rent and he holds a broken spear. His eyes is gone and his face is smashed. Do we need to go through the eye or just use his blood. His blood is certainly filled with power. We could use it to transfer, to connect. Drink his blood? Alok suggest this might be best. I remember the power, and how good it felt. I’m a little scared to feel it again, but I really want to. I get my phail from Marybeth so I can save some after we go through. We take one more look around, and notice he’s still breathing. Right, time to go!

His blood tastes awful!!! I give Marybeth my spare phial back, I do Not want more of that! We think really hard about going home as we circle up and hold hands. There is the feeling of movement. Then cold, strangeness, flickering dark of the cavern.

We made it! We’re alive and back in our bodies! The nightwalker looms above us and Nat’s aunt is cackling in glee. Remy stands up and shoots the monster. Klyce stands up and slices it in half! Shadows fly everywhere from its broken form. Natty and her Aunt pick up their internal fight and we all rush over to support her however we can. She crushes the spirit and gets some of her memories.

Okay, good. Now what about the ritual? We need to cleanse Old Town, but do we want to give Great Grandpa back his power? Wait, Remy? How are you alive? Where’s Alok? He says it’s complicated, but he and Alok are now sharing his mind. The conversation then devolves into what to do with the ritual.