WWW #53: The Queen of Swords

This is the sound of worlds beyond number. Standing in the darkness of crowded telever mill after sunset, the few late workers here wrapping up odds and ends as some have already been released home but those remaining working well past the hour of the night where they should be released. To skeleton crew because there's so much work that can't be done but they have to try to make ends meet and in a back office across from the room where Ursuland's golden shield was first discovered before he painted it. Ursuland and Armee stand with a confused Hana looking at you both weeping. He's okay. He's okay. Yes and we're going to take you to him. Where is he right now? I mean, I thought it's got the city else. He's in the village of Toma and you will be there soon as well. Armee's capabilities are great. Okay, excellent. I would like to start putting the door knobs of Common Cause on the office door. You begin to put them on the office door working as fast as you can. The fox here Ursuland you are here as well and very quickly you see Hana says oh my goodness, okay and takes a gulps gloves and begins to modify them a little bit and she has modified them to be your size. Honestly on your hands they look like good like workmen's gloves or gardening gloves and just with these little rails of a ridium iridescent metal on the palms and she's going to hand you a pair of gloves that she has enchanted and says I know that you speak to spirits true with these gloves if ever you wish. You will be able to speak to the spells that animate constructs. Thank you. What these gloves are basically going to allow you to do is allow you to roll persuasion checks against constructs if you are in contact with them. I have so many questions for them. Thank you so much. This is the most magic I could do in the short time but this is marvelous. You open a door there is no hallway. Instead there is a sunrise in the cottage. Gult turns around looks at the open door Hana goes dad. Sorry. And you see Gult turns around and goes and he rushes forward, lifts her up in his arms in the doorway, pulling her into the cottage. He turns around and says there's a huge amount of baguettes and cake here. Is that just for anybody? It was 480 children but they are now gone. So it's for you. Okay. The kids are right. Well, I have to assume so. Yes, they're quite fine. Oh good. You two do a lot for people. It's in on nature. We must go. You sort of lovingly shove Hana through the door and she says, okay, we'll try to be useful over here and then you close the door. As you do, you see the fox looks around and says they call that heroes. And you see that the door closes and the fox was up and says people that do a lot for people. They call that heroes. I think I wouldn't keep myself the title. Yeah, real heroes don't call themselves heroes. Yeah, that's why I'm doing it. Okay, but in a way aren't you calling yourself a hero by describing yourself as a real hero? Well, I'm talking to you. I feel like by calling yourself a real hero who doesn't call themselves a hero. Aren't you admitting that you think of yourself as a hero? I don't consider myself a hero. And you see the fox bugs his eyes out and leans his head forward looking at you both. So you think you're a hero? No, no, I would never refer to myself as a hero. How do other people feel? You're so a heroic little boy. He leaves in your eyes. As you take the door knobs off hearing suddenly the noises of crickets and Hana and Galt vanish as you break the door knobs off and open it to put the other door knobs on. You see standing in the hallway are a tall, scholarly, mustachioed, black, academic. He has sort of spectacles and very regal looking and a short middle-parted sort of lush kind of like cafe poet. Oh, I pull them in and close the door again. As you pull them in and close them in. Also with them you see there is a young what looks like a street tough who has some like arcane graffiti on his arms. As you pull this young sort of brash teenager in all of them drop their glamors and Enzo Cerel and Vandal are flitting around. Oh, Vandal! You mother of Maggie! And you see the Enzo is carrying a stack of books from Suvi's sanctum in the top of the Tower of the Glove. Give me a perception check, both of you. 15. 21. Ursula of the books many are abdurative spell books but you see that there is a single tone on art history here. It is good to see you. What is the nature of these books? These are a number of books of great interest to me. To you, yes, the wizard sky has seen fit to give us our freedom, Vandal the most newly freed. She is in the process of shattering her own bottle. I think I watched her finish the transcribing of some important spells. You see Vandal goes, yeah, she took that shitty guildmate counter spell and she made it look in shine. Hell yeah, she's got glass in her fingers. In a good way. What? I can't tell what is real and what it's metaphor. She's Cyril goes, alas and alac, my biggest problem with metaphor. I noticed one of the books is on art history. You see, Enza says that it is. My business after this will well and truly be my own. After we are concluded here, my business takes me and you see he looks right in the eyes of her son says. Elsewhere in the citadel. But I come as one last favor to say that the wizard sky knows that you are present. She has called, tasked the spider back to her side once more and it's spec'd you in the tower of the glove at your nearest convenience. Ursulon and Ami, you guys can give me insight checks. 14. 23. Ursulon pointing out the book of art history. You see that Enzo has some malevolent designs within the citadel. Oh, Enzo, you might also want to look up a couple of spirits. A Kachali, Rambu and Totom. I would of course keep those names in mind which of the world's art. Are there any other names you would be willing to part with? Names of a truer nature. Oh, yes, and I write down on scrap of paper. Quinfilm, wruth right here. You give Enzo, pomeroy's true name. As you go to scrap, Enzo puts one finger on the corner of the page and rather than the name staying put, the ink slithers letter by letter across the page into Enzo's finger as his eyes roll back in his head. Ha! The reading spider. Well, he who has betrayed his kin shall find himself bent to more useful tasks. I would see yourself safely from this citadel before the witching hour. Thank you. Good evening to you all, brothers. Our job here is finished. We'll be on our way. Three glamours assumed as the three ink demons moved down the hallway. Goodbye, you pig chees, you fart-pucker. You ass-um-brilla! Goodbye, witch of the world's art. Goodbye, brave spirit, free and true. Goodbye, fox. Goodbye, loom. Goodbye, hallway. And you see that he continues off down through the doors. Till a vermil at once was said, the place where artifice could gain its bread. Those who here in daily stead found that you see, he's just so s- and that black and he gets yanked up into the sky as they hit the street and fly off. I didn't finish, it was all the same rhyme. Some small part of me will miss them. Where do you head now in this moment? Well, it seems that we are awaited at the Tower of the Glove. Returning to Malacanth Court. Leaving UC Malacanth Court is returning to you. There is only one court in front of it as the witching hour approaches and it will touch down and have a word at midnight. Here comes the next reason why Screams, clacksins, shouted warnings, seen visibility cast to and fro, may just take to the sky to see if there are other attackers hidden away invisibly. Silver's body on the ground hit by so many spells, grueling bolts, firing lightning, many of them from panic as is clear that Silver attacked first, the injury of the archmage silence present on his body bleeding into his white robes, but you can't also help but wonder in the glee of the number of spells fired on Silver. How many of those wizards at some part of their mind wondered if saving the life of the archmage silence might mean great glory and opportunity for them? Maybe the wounds on Silver's body represent the same quest for glory that lived in his heart. Blood pools on the white stone outside of the tower of the archmage silence. Sufi, what do you do? Oh my god. And I take a step back to go rundown, and then I remember Steel's words, stay in the tower, and it begins to form a line, an easy set of jumps to make, to make all the little things that don't make sense that didn't make sense, make sense. One more problem to clean up. Stay in the tower. I can't be here. I know what I promised her, but I can't stay in my tower. I can't stay in this tower with these greedy, hungry, awful things. And I throw the rug back over the knoll clef, vandalism that I had vandal do, leaving a little of it peaking, because when they eventually come back here, some enterprise and young wizard who volunteered to come clean out my sanctum. We'll see a bit of magic and maybe set them on the same path. There's nothing to rush to now. Silence is fine. Silver is gone. And he probably, if the compulsion was strong enough, he never would have read the letter. It's over. One last show. And I walk down to the exit from the tower of the glove with my effects and take it to a couple deep breaths and then a couple more and work myself into hyperventilation and panic and then sprint out to go see the scene and match the energy there. You exit the tower. You see the scene unfolding around you. Guardians of the Perian Dome, Green Cloud, War Wizards. Bend down. Someone is picking up silence, tending to him. Frail old man. I went rest over to him. Yeah. Skye. Skye. Are you okay? Are you okay? Are you alright? Yeah. Are you? Are you? What happened? Hey. I was walking back with some young pupils and approaching the tower as I was. I turned as I heard a shout of the young wizard's silver who has just been promoted. And he looked at me with a look of fire in his eyes, raised his hand, laughed and caught a spell of lightning. He was raised towards me. I thought to counter it if I could, but he countered my magic. He gave everything to the power and badly into me. I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have been so far away. I'm sorry. No, no, no, no. It's alright. Listen. You've done everything perfectly fine. You see, he turns and looks at me and says, this is the young lad who had become quite smitten with you, yes. Yes. You see a war-mage pulling, a letter out of his inside pocket, unopened. It's rude, but I am going to slip away from silence and leave him to be ferried off to be attended to. And make my way over to silver as they are moving him. If he's still on the ground, I'm going to drop to my knees and just touch his shoulder. As you do, you see one of the imperial war-mages looking at you in a position of leadership. You have the markings of a sage. People know that you are simultaneously close to this person, but also a apprentice to silence. You see that the letter in the war-mages hand silence a little bit more loud than normal says. To live with that here, deliver it to me, the assailants miss it. And they bring the unopened letter over to silence. Who opens it to read it? You are kneeling beside silver. Massive injuries on his chest sustained at 12 brooks. It's Aza. This is my fault. And I'm going to let the sort of sound of silence is yelling and my own beginning of collapse and the rolling of my shoulders. Hide as I cast identify, but I'm going to use the secret of a laquerity. So instead of it taking a minute, it will take an action. I want to know what spells he is under. He was under. Fading quickly from the warm body of Aza Fizier. Is a gayest spell. Not unlike the one that you have known the touch of yourself. You catch it in the last moments before the spell no longer has a living person to cling to and vanishes on the wind. Oh God. Oh, you can't stay at the letter at the letter. I'm just going back in my head over what I wrote. I don't care. I don't care about that. I wanted to explain. I wanted him to know how much I still loved him. And my love killed him. Love killed him. Castile did this. Thru slate. Out of a tremendous love for me. And I think I'm going to be sick. I got to get out of here. I'm going to get up and move. I don't know where I'm going. I just have to get out of here. You just start walking. You get away. Give me a perception check as you leave. Six. What you don't hear is the rumors start to spread as you walk away. You see silence watches you leave. Crumbles the letter in his hand. And with a can trip burns it. Vanishes. He turns to one of the inspectors and says, oh, seems the young lad was a worm or a mole of some kind dedicated to some kind of destruction. Ha, poor girl. He must have picked her as a target. You head out and find yourself at a Gallaudddoctor station. I just ask going back to the tower and so sending... Got to go to Gavriel. Gavriel. Gavriel. Gallaudddoctor, you stand astride it. Put your hand on it. Give me an arcana check. The advantage. Thank God. Dirty 20. Last time you got a Gallaudddoctor, you couldn't activate it without alerting the sort of the citadel. As you activate it, just remember that knelt clef. The name's the action. You've been unlocked by not the wizard's god, but simply a servant of the citadel. Gallaudddoctor takes off and you head to Gavriel. Walking across gravely stones, you see. It is now, you know, truly in the heart of evening. Lights, festivities, there are two major victories when it's a party here. Gravel court long tables in Grimhall, the Beergarten. In off in a corner, you see the wizard's horn. There are five glasses around him, only one of which has beer. I do my best to slide up as silently as I can. Swoop the beer glass and sit. It's just absolutely how it is. As you do, you see the little castle of shot glasses he's made in front of himself. Oh, okay. You good? Catch your letter. Is that what did this? What did this? No, no, no, no. You stopped doing not this. This is who I was before the sky shone brightly. So this didn't happen. Not this stopped happening. I feel like you feel like that made sense. It doesn't have to make sense. It's just true. You see the kids shouting at you from the... I was guarding your room in case you tried to go out the window of the epiphany. I was stationed right above you. You see those girls hoot-natchy? I know the prince did, but you see the young girls hoot-natchy out at the window. He did. Doss, there's a lot of nobles in the inner city there. It's a rosemary. Never asked. Where are you from? Takes three guesses. Have a word. Serasmir, you're like the third born of a very noble family. No, no, no. You were close. You should have stopped to your guests at the beginning. You would have gotten all right. You should just say, Serasmir, you would have gotten all right. You're from Serasmir? Knee lighten to me. Oh, no, you tell me. You're thinking, hey, this guy is half-right. Wizard is an old piece of boot leather. This guy's what, pushing early 40s, mid 40s, maybe he's in his 30s, he just looks bad. But what you gotta remember is just because I don't have any class doesn't mean I'm not from the cap. There's nowhere that nobles can live without their servants. There's nowhere they go. There are towns without nobles. There's no towns without servants. Most of the people who live in Serasmir don't live on a floating chunk of stone. They live in between the lakes far away. My folks spent half their waking hours on those fucking highways. I'm so sorry. A little thing I saw there. I hadn't seen one of those in a long time, but I knew about it because my mom used to clean the shops. A little citadel trophy? Yeah. Oh, do you? What is that? Well, they do the test for everybody, right? So the kids that pass... They don't have to get sent here. They give them a trophy saying you were good enough. Oh, fuck. It's nice like that. And we've got our versions of that here. They got versions of that everywhere. You guess you drink? No. No, I'll take a drink. He raises a hand. Someone comes over. He lines up two shock glasses and another two tankers of beer. The rest of the seven star... ...seed each of the penumbra. Congrats. Thanks. Why didn't she think I'd come with you? Would you have? No, no, no. Answer my question. Why didn't you think I'd come with you? I didn't think you wouldn't. I didn't think it was fair that I would ask. Yeah, taking it easy on me. That's nice. No. You kept me alive. I should be dead in that palace ripped apart by a witch. I should be dead in the woods beneath Mount Korhai. I should be dead in Hallacher. He saved my life again and again. And it didn't feel fair to ask you to risk it again when we were finally sick. When you'd finally done your duty. I'm sorry I didn't ask. Would you have come? I'll never get a chance to know. But hey, you tried to save me, but... Silver... ...is gonna get me killed. Well, he told me about the Grinot family in Hallacher, beside a stone row. So now I know that you lied. But you matter. And once they remember I exist. He drags the thumb across his throat. You know, it downs the shop. Answer my question. The one in the letter. To what are you sworn? Give me a persuasion check. Natural one. Maybe I should be sworn myself. It seems like what people do for the most part. It seems sort of like suckers following people. But... But! I have to tell you. That's the greatest time I know. Within those words almost dying with you. And Sivy... She wants to like... bump his shoulder or just... She doesn't have the urge often to physically connect. But just wants to reach out but knows. Especially because as the events on Malacanth, the knowledge of its spreads, someone's watching and someone will report this. And it can be... I have to be more careful. I wasn't careful with Silver, and now he's dead. I will not let that happen to sworn. Maybe like... She whispers low and like swerves towards him to try to cover the whisper with the sound of like glass hitting polished wood. We need to go now. He looks at you and on that net one persuasion, he says, I'm not going to fucking anywhere. I'm going to sit here and drink. And maybe if I work hard at it, I can do glory to the Empire by killing a problem for them here in the corner of this beer hall. But I'll tell you what, Sky, because you are so nice to me. There's a little bit of trees in just for you. And he waves his hand over your beer, going, shot, chaser, and drops a drop of some kind of arcane liquid into the beer that swirls. You have a sudden memory of the bridge of the meridian. She's just going to pull it closer. Can I do any kind of arcane check before? Yeah, do an arcane check. 24. An antidote to a memory modification. We're back in college. We're back in Banners, baby. As fast as possible. You slam it and retrieve your memories of the moments leading up to the gas when the bridge of the meridian, what steel told you, how she asked, what was asked of you, everything laid out with the music box. It comes rushing back, the one person drinking in this beer garden is gaining lucidity. I'm going to turn and grab him by his like the front of his collar and summon whatever leadership, whatever instinct if I can yell past this drunkenness to the part of him that is well trained to listen to orders from people like me. Got it. Get the fuck up. We're getting out of here now. Give me intimidation. You rolled a nap. What can you do with a second natural one? He shoves you bodily off of him. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, he's trying to drink. Slady's hitting people, huh? How many staff they got? Sage of the Penumbra. He holds his hands up in a circle. Zero! Counter-spelt to Mori. Zero! What they put you in charge of? What they put you in charge of? Oh, I'm the sage of dying right here. I'm the provost of running around in a fucking circle chasing my tail. Wake up! You fuck. I don't want to be here. I don't want to be here. I want my mom and dad to know my name. He, now you've got people's bad attention. You've rolled two nap ones. One's not moving with you. Yeah, I know. I am going to do the full, like annoyed, just weird drunk getting into, like getting into an argument with someone, and she'd be like, go fuck yourself and sober up. And as I point at him, turning to walk away, I'm going to cast one last message. Yeah. I need you to remember this when you wake up. Get out of here. I will find you. The message comes back. It's like, it's strained nauseous telepathy from a man who hasn't had control of his wizardry. You hear a voice of his simultaneously say, I follow you anywhere. And another voice says, I can't move. Captain, I'm sick. Can you hear another voice come in and go, what do you think? Slate was going to do when she found him. You want to know what I think? And these voices tumble over each other. Over and over and over again. As you leave, Grim Hall. Oh. Back to the tower. I gotta get out of here. You get in your Gala thought to head back to your tower. Ursula, Ame, and the Fox. Arrive in Malacanth. And Arsalan, you walk past it. Candlestry Bakery. Here it is, Mr. Calum. Polishing up, getting ready for the last hour of service before... Clock strikes 12 Malacanth lands in Hiverwood, where Candlestry can't really do that much business. They just landed in Hiverwood, the night market's open. That's where everyone's going to go. As you land, you can see sort of distantly the edges of Hiverwood. The court is low enough in the sky, low enough in the area, and you can see the tops of the building says it slowly glides down. As you approach the tower of the glove, you are protected by shadows but see heightened security around the tower, a troubling sight, indeed. You walk guarded by shadows and Anzo's non-detection. What do you do as you see security around the bottom of the tower? What's happening? I'm not sure. I'm gonna eavesdrop and try to listen in. Give me a protection check. 19. The guards here speak about an attempt on the arc-made silence's life by the traitorous wizard Silver, who is dead. Oh no. We should be careful. Yeah. There is heightened security below as there heightened security above. It doesn't look like it, and though the tower of the glove does not have any base doors, it does have windows on the kitchens and other areas. All right. Well, I've learned a couple of things in my time apart. They have my broom, and your shadows can follow us up. I believe so, yes. All right. I would like to attempt to help Ursula on my broom, and I know we all have to go slowly, but it still moves vertically. Ursula, you get behind Amé, and for the first time to just stay there. Yeah, just hang on. Okay. Try to distribute your weight comfortably. All right. I'm going to put the pressure of the broom slowly rising up, and suddenly, your feet are off the ground. All right. The fox looks happy to you. Stop it. Stop laughing. Stop laughing. I'll need stealth checks from both of you. 22. 23 with an at-20. Well, well, 33 with an at-20. Yeah, 33 with an at-20. Wow! Shadow's surround as a witch and wild one take to the sky. Your light and land. And a kitchen. With some fresh lemons and some mushrooms in a corner, like there were the last time you were in this kitchen. I hate look around, make sure that there's no alarms or traps or anybody else in the tower. You see no such alarms or traps? I mean, it seems the alarms or traps are up at the sanctum, but here in the base of the tower, it seems, you know, the entry is fine. Even with all the citadel's vast resources, you can't alarm and trap every square inch of 20s, 24 cities. All right. I suppose we wait here a while and listen for, if in when Suvi returns to the tower. You both in the kitchen have been told to come here and wait. Before long, you hear footsteps walking across the sky bridge from the tower of the Archmage Silence. A door opens. Abrea, I'm going to need you to come in and reunite this party. Wow! You're in this, you know? Do I get the convoluted tooth? Yeah. Ursula and Amé, entering the kitchen. Under this buttering candlelight, you see your true friend Suvi enter. You're alive. Are you all right? Fine. Silver's dead. We have to go. Now. Now? We heard. You tried to kill silence? Yes. He was under a compulsion spell. Stealed it. She's going for sworn next. I couldn't. It's my fault. I keep putting them in harm's way. I have to. And you see Suvi goes for her pocket and I fish out the sea glass. I have to get ghost. I have to save one. We have to go. Why are you here? I thought that maybe you might want help. I... I... I hold forward a pot of coffee. Suvi, give me an insight to check and do some with advantage please. Seventeen. Amé holds a pot of coffee up. You look in her eyes. Lips are chapped and almost bleeding because she flew across the sky of this continent trying to find you. You see reflected in her eyes a promise that she will never leave you behind again. I slap the pot of coffee out of your hand and then hug you. Oh! Come here. First one will complete the trio. The trio is completed! You feel it. Magic. Fireflies. You remember moments of the summer. Amé putting flowers in between your toes while you sat in Ren's big chair reading a book about a history of nights, Ursula swinging a stick around, marching in a parade over a fallen log and a forest somewhere, and then you and Amé side by side finding Ursula on that stage. Amé, you seeing Suvi stand there a dinner blood on her face looking at the witch that had killed one of her companions there with her heart broken to save you. You both see Ursula getting off his horse having ridden away from his sister because you were his true friends. The love you bear for each other has to find spirits, wizards, witches. And as much chaos as it has brought into your life, it is the reason you stand knowing the truth, knowing hope, knowing freedom, and above all knowing each other. I love you guys. You are my family. If we stay here, you will die. Do you have everything you need from here? Almost. The door flies open above you, above the kitchen, and you hear footsteps. A wizard sky of some really interesting discovery. Fucking yelia. Hold on one sec. And Suvi wipes her face, pulls herself together, and runs upstairs. Down below, both of you hear the conversation unfold upstairs. Yelia walks in and says, I double a triple check, and I was very glad to do so because you are not wrong to remember that name. But it's not a book at the Citadel. What? The only record of stars of the Southern sky is the name of a project in a scroll kept in the court of reverie. You recognize reverie as the court of illusion. Oh, stars of the Southern sky is a fabricated text, an illusory text. Illusory text? It was requisitioned as part of an extremely large project that they was put together in reverie that also had, I believe, some large elements of the schools of enchantment and abduration as well as divination, a multi-court project. Thank you so much. I have to go to the bathroom now. Please leave. You've got it, and I'm happy to help. I knew I didn't miss it. Yeah, you're perfect. Wonderful. Great. Do you mean that? Yeah. She bursts into tears. Oh god, damn it. I'm gonna hug her. Yeah, you're all good. Yep, yep. We're all touch star here. You got it? Good. Go, go, go, go. Okay, I'll see you tomorrow. I'm ready for work. Yeah, bye, bye, bye, bye. Ami! Bring me that book now! Oh! Start digging through my things. Ursula on Bring Wave Breaker. All right. You get stars of the Southern sky. You pull it out of your bag, and you have Wave Breaker. You're on the floor of the kitchen. Here you go. No, no, no. Sorry, not kitchen. What is this room? What is it for? It's my ranking foot. Okay. And I run back upstairs. And I'm gonna get into my sigil, because that means I can cast things better and faster. Hell yeah. She steps into the chalk sigil, but it still got the glass staff sand overlaid on it. So the moment her fingers begin working the notes for identify the ritual version, you just see like bumps, like a subwoofer is underneath. So with each of her movements, it's like you're feeling the sound, the song, like the bass from a song in a party in the apartment below you under her feet as she casts identify on this fucking book. Show me that curse, Brett. Hell yes. Glass and... You cast identify on stars of the Southern sky. And the spell comes apart. The book is a vessel. It is a constructed vessel and the text unravels under your identify spell. It is the illusion of an extremely dry astronomical text. And the illusion is structured to make one swiftly board of reading the book upon looking at it. But what you know from the identify fundamentally is that you're casting identify on an empty glass. And so, but what you see is the effect of it being boring to read is a part of the construction of the glass and not necessarily what is in it. Coffee. And you know that that information is in a court called Reverie. Okay. Okay. See, it's not that I'm bad at paying attention to books. It's that it was enchanted to be boring. Oh. Probably had the curse inside it. A curse inside it. There was something in here. My curse. I swear it was... I wouldn't put it past her. Damn. Yeah. You being in the cottage that day that is what placed the curse on grandma and grandma? No. I think we were... I thought we were cursed before that. The answers to these questions would be in Reverie. Yeah. Okay. I want to, as I look up from this and I'm just going to kind of call out to task. Is he in the room? You feel task. Is closer than before. He's not in Malacanth. You see, task is running again and again on a window sill. Trying to smash through a glass window that he is not strong enough to smash through. Over and over again. You see that he looks... This is a bizarre thing to say. He looks full of light or spell energy. It looks like he's eating something. You remember him saying on his way and you're like, on your way. It's a weird way of putting that. You freaky little spider. What are you up to? But nothing gets a spirit without getting some willfulness. And so task has fucked off and done his own thing. Much like his wonderful wizard. Okay. As you reach out to him, he asks, he feels you and goes, I wanted to get you something. I wanted to get you something. And looks up and you see on a small door up a kind of plaster stair... Like, up a sort of white stone stair case. You see the number 28 on a door frame. Okay. You stay there, but don't... Don't chip yourself. I'll be there soon. What's there? My parents' old spy, hey. Hideout. What? And task is there. Oh, task. And then you also have the sea glass. I have the sea glass. I want to go to... I want to get ghost out. I... She's there because of me. I need one win before we leave. We'll go with you. Let's take care of this business here in Citadel first and then we'll be gone. The fox looks up and says, Boss, why don't I go with Suvi? I think the big guy should go with you if you're going to like a court court. Okay, where are you going? Reverie. Okay. You go to Catawall. Okay. Uh... While your sword's out, I'm going to fish into my pocket and throw my father's ring at Ursula's feet. Would you be so kind? S2? Break it. Oh. You're sure? I'm sure. I strike the ring. The sword of spirit touches a ring of the Citadel. Green light. The crashing of waves. Emerald sand scatters on the floor of Sky's sanctum. I reach my hand out and call back the Emerald sand along with the mirror staff sand. If you allow it, I take the hand that has the glove that I gave you and I squeeze it. You feel a warmth. The four of you depart from here. Ursula and Alma are bound for the Court of Revery and Suvi and the Fox bound for Haverward. The Fox calls out to you, Alma, as you stride to the Gallathoptic deck. I mean, Haverward's just Haverward, right? There's not going to be extra security in the place where just the regular people live. Hopefully. Okay, but you'll be able to find us, because I'll be there. Absolutely. Okay. Be good. Be cunning. Hmm. Let's drive their Gallathoptor, Ursula and Alma, we roll through the skies, heading upwards towards one of the many courts of the Citadel. Revery. You approach a large platform neighborhood, but something strange about this one. Everything about it seems ephemeral. You realize it is made of Muslim and canvas. Its buildings separated like the pages of storybooks, pop-up structures. All the buildings appear to be made of origami folded paper. And as you look, everything appears to seem almost like optical illusions. The trees seem too dimensional, but always present their broadest face to you. As you move these glass ornament trees, you see roads lined with swans that swim in rivers, but the rivers are not of water. They are of painted paper mache, and the swans move along them too dimensionally like art. And yet, you can hear the sound of rushing water. As you move swiftly through the court of reverie, having gotten the location of the library where this information was kept, you arrive in a small cul-de-sac with various book shops. Even though you realize that the shops have neither registered nor payment at them, but simply in how they are constructed, they are adorable, town-home places, gilded letters in the front with various numbers on them. As you look at them, you suddenly feel a gog because you are seeing numbers that you can't remember. What are these symbols? They mean they are somewhere in between one and ten, but they are not two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, or nine. Which ones are they? It is a confusing place to be, and you look down, not even recognizing what was written down in Julia's notes, but at least being able to match it to one of the book shops that has been closed for the night. This looks like the place. The swans are going to try the door. Locked. Are there any signs of an occupant? Give me a perception or arcana. 19 perception. You do not see any occupants within, but this also is the court of illusion, so you can't be perfectly sure. I'm going to use Detect Magic. I run my hands over the bricks of the building, feeling it beneath my fingertips. Detect Magic reveals that there is a guardian of spellcraft within the building, invisible to the eye, but stalking the halls and staircases. And when you say it's spellcraft? Perhaps it's a mori. I'm going to just stealth check from both of you. 23? 30. The shadows cover you both. As you cast the spell on my Detect Magic, the guardian within swivels. You just notice the ores, you can't see a face or a body or anything, but there is something guarding this place, which is in some ways an indication that you are in the right place. The information you seek would not be left unattended if it is as important as it seems. I can open the lock. You open the lock. Can I...it hasn't detected us yet? Can we try to avoid it? Or is it going to be patrolling in such a way that we'll always bring it into contact with us? There are multiple levels of the building. It may, if you give it a moment, patrol elsewhere within giving you a chance to dart inside. All right. I'll keep an eye on the watchman. Go ahead and start. You wait for the aura to vanish upstairs on its patrol, Ursula, a cast knock. Go ahead. You're going because of the nature of the spell. I'm going to ask you for a stealth roll without...with disadvantage, which will cancel out with your boots, but you are still adding pass without trace. 18. You roll an 18 for yourself as you approach the front door. How do you call on your breath in this moment? Ursula unwraps one hand around the handle, placing his other hand on the door. He's just...inhaves. Pushes. You feel the spirit of the door, acknowledge your presence, and open. You move inside and close the door, behind you, unless leading it open for Amit to sneak in after you. I do, I see that. As you do so, I'm going to need a investigation check and a stealth check. You can choose Ursula because you have that advantage from your boots, but if you wish to pass it onto your investigation, you can enroll the stealth check flat. I will pass it onto my investigation. Oh, investigation is a five. Investigation is a seven. Stealth is a 34. Oh my god! Both of you move through the bookshop, staying well out of sight of the Guardian and you are looking in darkness. Even your night vision, Ursula, is just not used to pouring over the letters of arcane texts. And there is too much of a sense of tension, Ursula, because you...there's a creature here that you can't see, only Amit can see, and even Amit can't see it. You can just detect the presence of an illusion stalking this bookshop. Something is going to have to change for you to be able to find what you're looking for here. Ursula is going to change tech. And it's going to... because it is related to Grandmother Red, because it is related to... I curse. It's going to open up his divine sense and try and use Arcana to see if he can just match... if he sees something with... or can sense something with the essence or scent or feel... Perfect. ...of that. Give me Arcana for free, but actually we've already connected your breath to your survival skill. Okay. So feel free to use that if instead, if you wish. Please, let's do that. 22. Ursula, as you open your divine sense, your breath. You smell... iron... like tusks and blood coming from upstairs. Come on, Amit. This way. Go ahead and give me your stealth checks. 18. 22. Amit, you see this guardian slink down the staircase. Suddenly, for the first time, opening higher. You got up to the second floor... with it going up to the third and fourth. But the way it's been patrolling, this is the first time it's going back down to the first floor, which has opened up the higher floors to you. Can I... can I actually sneak a peek... at... whatever it is that's patrolling? So wait until the aura has passed, but peek out from behind a bookshelf. You wait hidden in shadows on that stealth check. You look out. Illusion magic. Powerful. Tomorrow. Why can't you see this tomorrow? You realize... that there is an invisibility tomorrow. Patrolling this space. Both of you. Slink up the stairs carefully. Witch and Wild One. Here in the heart of the Citadel. You arrive here in this. You realize not... not a library, it's an archive. These matters aren't resolved. One guardian set to look over them for... these are those missions of the Citadel, which have been put to bed. Mark has done. You arrive upstairs. I want each of you to give me a... perception with advantage as you arrive upstairs. Twelve. Twenty-six. Arriving upstairs, Chris Lennon. Your scent leads you to a corner of the room. With a twenty-six. Ame. You behold an upper story to this place. With... a series of marble side tables, small circular side tables. A little bit larger, almost like a cocktail table that drinks would be placed upon. You see upon them there are... hovering bubbles. Made of soap, sort of hanging in the air. And within them are objects. Many of them scrolls some folded paper with different paint and drawings on each side. You see that there are a number of other objects throughout. You see there is a festooned wand of twirling ribbons in one, and you see a... centrelating set of crystal keys floating in space. At the far end you see all these wondrous treasures kind of floating here on these tables. Each one of them on a table that is then tagged with a list of arcane illusory numbers, gibberish numbers essentially, that mark it for a number of different project uses. The different citadel projects have used them. On that 26 you also arrive at a thick, ledger book in the corner with the exact description of the number that Julia gave you. All right. I'm going to do a cursory check over the book to make sure it's not trapped. It does not appear trapped. All right, I flip through the book quietly. The book outlines a project in which a cipher would be created. Stars of the Southern sky, a book only in disguise, but actually simply an object capable of carrying magic. An accompanying object was created to go along with it as a side vessel to the project, a scroll with a number of drawings of a creature from Spirit known as a Garen, and as you affirm and see the attached scroll case, the origin of the scent issues forth, a powerful illusion mimicking Jorin's scent, and you recall Amé, the time that Steele turned to you and said, it is trivial to give a witch a vision that I wish for a death. You see within that in the final words of this book, the third element was given that would be the substance included in the book. That substance was going to be a powerful mind-altering curse, delivered to the Court of Revery from its crafters in Malacanth. That curse would have to bypass a number of words, that its original target would be behind almost impossibly potent protective magic in the run-up to the creation of this curse, the illusory artifact that would carry it, and the illusory scroll that would accompany it. There was much discussion had about how to bypass the protections. It was remarked on that the magic protecting the intended targets, plural, would be superseded by a counter to the magic of witchcraft, which would be the open-heartedness of the one that wore it to its intended target, to bypass those words of the witch of the world's heart, and open-heart must be required. So, Suvi suspicions were correct. Yes. Ursulaun, as you turned to ask that question of Amé, Amé is levitating slightly off the ground, as forms of power avail themselves to a witch who has come into the knowledge that she was cursed by those she had not wronged. Amé, we should go. All right. Yes. I think I'm going to take the pages. You grab them. Feels good to steal. Yeah. Can I make a perception check? Yeah. Is there anything else worth stealing? Fuck yeah. I love it here. Go for it. Give me a perception check. I will help. You describe a bunch of beautiful things. I think you should make your own. I'm also Ursulaun sister. Can I leave a bardic inspiration to be like, take this good shit. Holy moly, that's 23. I got a five and you were going to help me. I'm going to have to go. This is you ripping pages out of the ledger. It's just trying to get a sense of what was in the bubbles you described. I think Ursulaun, you're just looking at the things floating in these bubbles. This is their beautiful, which is these crystalline keys floating here. You have to take magic up, right? Yes. Give me Arcona with advantage. That's a nine. Okay. Ursulaun, what's your role for your perception? You're Rosa five. You see these are some really lovely crystal keys here. They're in a bubble and I can't. I have my divine sense open. Oh shit. Is there, do I pick up any spiritual energy? Or am I able to learn anything from that? These keys, yes. These keys are connected to the magic of dreams. Oh, do I, can I sense any sort of alarm or? Yeah, I think on a divine sense and with the text magic up, these bubbles are essentially just alarm spells. Are we, can we open the windows? Yes. I look over and I want to prestigiate one of the windows. Window opens up. Get the broom ready. All right. I'm a god of three. One, two, three. Grab the, pop the bubble, grab the keys, pop on the broom. Yeah. From downstairs you hear. Yeah. You jump on the broom. Grab these keys out of this bubble. Take off out the window. It's just 25 feet. Yeah, outside the 200 pound way. Just scoot, scoot, scoot, scoot, scoot, scoot, scoot, scoot. We dropped like a cool 50 feet. I angle it. Even though the velocity is not as fast as it would be on my own, the angle of our trajectory is such that we can make maximum distance falling. Yeah, you get to the edge of every and just fucking drop like a stone. Walking swiftly down the street, not too far off the night market. It's good. Out of the way you could get here very easily without being seen, either if you wanted to stick to alleyways and byways, or just vanish like a face in the crowd of the night market. It's a good apartment for spies. Walking up the steps. See the number 28. Aborted up door. This place has been boarded up for a long time. And task. Something against the window. This turns around to look at you. Go go go! Hi, bud. Leaping and skittering up and projecting a little light onto the keyhole. Oh, okay. I don't have a key. No. How noisy is it right now? Pretty noisy night market's active. Everyone's getting ready for malacanth to dock at midnight. And for all those people to come swinging off the court into the night market. Sweet. I'm going to cast detect magic on the keyhole. There's so little magic. You think this place has been scraped. It's crazy how unpopulated it is. It's been left here for years and years and years. You see it's actually been officially condemned. And there's a notice of magical residue here, which is not too uncommon in some industrial parts of Havroward. But you're looking at where the magical residue would be that it's condemned for. And you don't see it anywhere. There's not any residue here that would condemn it. Before I do something rash, like I was gonna, I want to search and see if this sort of condemnateness of this is part of the affect that has kept it secluded in secret and see if there's a way to gain entry without having to like kick the door in, which is what I was about the cast, I was about the cast analog knock with my fucking boot. Give me an investigation check. 27. Yeah, I mean, well, you see that there's actually a staircase around the back for a different apartment that has roof access. And there is a balcony in this apartment. So it wouldn't require too much athletics to go up the other families. It's like an apartment building. You could go up another family's staircase, get up on the roof and drop into the little like balcony. This sort of like clustered little plaster and kind of a doby Havroward buildings that are very like top heavy and kind of on top of each other. It's a very almost doctor Sucian, lots of second story balconies and flower pots and things like that. This balcony is bare, but it's probably at least a door that's not boarded up. Okay, then I'm gonna look over at task and go, hey, what do you think if we kind of ignore the door, go that way. I love you, I miss you so much. And I grab a put a little bit of my shoulder. You head over, hop up on the roof, look out over Havroward and see the night market. There's Chura's, the good one. Can I see a Lake Harusel? Yes! People shouting as the bar whips through the night market, cheering and clinking glasses and toasting sounds of joy and revelry. See, he feels her breath catching her throat. The first time she ever had alcohol was sneaking off of banners with some of the older kids. And Aiza was one of them. This place has a lot of memories. And she'll turn her back on it and find her way in. Open a door. You walk through an apartment that you've never seen before. It's totally unfurnished, they pulled everything out of here. It's like a small little one bedroom, little flop house. But your surprise repair, it's had a beautiful home in Malacanth. According to urine, this is where they would come when they were supposed to be out of town. But wanted to stay in town for their own reasons. Okay. He mentioned pulling up a floorboard. I have time. I will ritually cast Identify and add the secret of warp and weft. I want the layout of this building. Coming to you in white and emerald light like the sand you now command. The angles of the apartment. And suddenly, there in the bedroom, in the wall facing the street. Lines of sapphire blue come back. There is a door in the wall that leads to a room hanging invisibly in the street. But it's not in the street, it's in the near spirit. Oh, that's fun. Near spirit. I have new interesting magic and I want to touch it. Let's stack a sea invisibility on top of it as we move to the door. Writing. Soft. Conjuration. Stone. Absorption. All around. In the very center. As you approach this bedroom, the seams of the door no longer rendered in the Identify spell, but truly glowing in blue approach as light from your pendant casts upon it. There is a secret here that no power of the Citadel could find. And it's been waiting in the dark for you all these long years. The words and writing move around a central point, a lock, a password, written in the hand of soft and stone. Around it says, our dearest treasure. SeaVy steps forward. And... And I just say my name. Super and Cadbury Cadd. Door opens and a study filled with books, with windows that look on a beautiful forest of rainbow fire. The forest of flames around the Citadel in the near spirit. The books are rich and open. There is one nearby that is open and with hastily scrolled with whatever the last workings of soft and stone were. You see there are desiccated, daisy chains. Flowers of the kind that you used to wear in your hair. There is a giant jar of beads, little beads. You see that it is a collection. It appears of things that were migratory on their way to the main house back up in Malacanth. But your mom couldn't help herself and just collected anything she could find from anywhere she was traveling. And you see a hung up around with no frames to constrict them. Are drawings. You haven't seen them in so many years. But they wanted this place if they had to be trapped here for weeks on end to feel like home. Oh. I'm home. I move through the space and where's the fox right now? The fox has come in behind you with the roof and is sitting in the doorway with his head cocked to one side. He's been so silent since he got here. He looks and goes. Do you want privacy? No. Will you come with me? I'd love to. Then I hope out my hand. He comes and jumps into your arms. He looks your chin. I love him. I love him so much. Oh God. I love you too. I love you too. I'm sorry. Why? For all this stuff. When I'm not my best. You have to apologize when you're not your best. Oh no. I have so many apologies. Yeah, you do. And I step forward a little more bolstered. The task starts dancing around happily and raising his hands. He did a task. And task goes and starts to, and you see, pokes the fox and the fox goes, I'm resting. It's a soft moment. Oh, you guys have a rapport. What's your thing? You see the task looks up at you and shakes his head disapprovingly and projects three words and quick order over and over again. Fox no work. Fox no work. Fox no work. Task, I love you. I like sun. You see that the fox gets up and says, what? And you see that a task starts to gesture at books and the fox is much bigger and stronger. Starts pulling books out and tasks starts running over them. Just putting light over them and grabbing all of the text from all of the books. Yes. Okay, Brandon, I've got a question. Is there something cute I can do? I want to steal pages of books and like, seem them into my spell book. I fucking adore that. So wait, just describe this to me again real quick slowly. I want to know what you're doing. Yeah. So inside of CV's like very fixed spell book, if she rips out a piece of paper, there's a raw edge. And I want her to be able to try to like to the best of her ability. Rip out pages from other texts and using mending, especially stones mending and that like interesting sapphire component to it. To like, seem and create a like whole page. Yes. So now the spell book is made of other pages, but they're not taped in. I love it. It's like, it was always bound to be that way. I love that. You begin to assemble this beautiful, perfect, mended spell book. You see that there is a little artifact in here, which is a small piece of glass, like stained glass, little emerald, little blue, little. And you see that task looks at you as he's getting the books and goes, and sort of bashfully rubs the back of his head and projects him running around in Malacanth. And finding a building. And you see him waiting and spinning a web in a mirror in a room and beginning to glow. And you see a little mirrored scorpion walk up, get caught in the mirror web and task eats the scorpion from the chamber where the resource is. Shut up! Amazing. You see that task shows a, it protects a memory of you saying your parents names to urine, which was the first time task heard them. And you see task going and sending a beacon to a scorpion. To go check the resource with their names. To go check the resource with their names. How hard can you hug task before he breaks? I want to get right up to the limit. You hug him as hard as you want. And you see that he sort of, when you remember him feeling full. You see he rubs his stomach with little mirror legs and projects an image. And you see a young handsome soft looking at a sort of barrel-chested, hover-word merchant. And being like, you guys are asking 80 marks for this place? You see he goes, I don't like to normally do viewings at night, but look, if you want it, you can have it. You see soft says, well, we're looking at other places in the neighborhood. You see stone turns around and says, well, this is fine. I think this is actually lovely. And you can see. Huggling. You're so stupid. You love them. You, and you see the task just starts to project any time that your parents were out of doors at night. Just projecting and projecting. I'm 70, I'm 80. So you be just going to sob and watch. You see, as task looks up and sees this hanging bit of glass, task projects something. And you see, young, like maybe like 16, 17, something like that. At the edge of Zhao court, way far away from the Kassoff collection, you see a young soft getting up on a series of rafters, these two big pagodas out near the edge of this place that aren't super roofed. The beams go out really far. And he's got like a cart filled with huge stained glass panels. He's got like 30 of them. And he's like 17 years old and gymying up this thing and putting them on the thing. And you see, it's like we hours of the night. And you see that you are mom who's also like 17 walks out and goes, whatever this is is so stupid. You are a stubborn. And you see, he goes, can I help you? And she's like, you are always slowing class down. And if you put half the effort into your work that you're putting in here, you wouldn't be failing the class. And you see, he goes, I'm not failing the class. I'm failing the teacher. And you see that, oh, I'm my parent. I'm both of them. How interesting. You see that she says, what is the point of this? Why do you have to just slow everything down to prove some kind of point? What is this? And you see, he looks and says, I don't have any point to prove. Chandrie. And you see, he goes, Chandrie. And he goes, whatever. We're not even in most of the same classes. She says, I just want you to have some respect. Because whatever this is, I know when we come to class tomorrow, it's going to be a whole fight with the professor. And I just want to come and learn. And you see, he goes, Professor Sentinel was insistent that when you're summoning these forces, when you're either conjuring them or you're evoking them, you have to give them specific directions. And you have to put the outline around all of them in order to summon them here to this place. And that 90% of what we do is figuring out how to word requests to these conjured elements. And she was like, yeah, how many legends are there about wizards summoning demons that eat them? And he's like, well, don't summon a demon. Summon something helpful of which the world of spirits has boundless. All this effort is going to cover up the mistake of picking the wrong thing to summon in the first place. CV, by the way, watching this is just nodding along. Like, she's a part of like, yeah, well, that's a fair point. I think it's narrating for the fox and for task. Like, oh, yeah, it's making a good point. I see where she's coming from though. Both sides. And you see, you see he looks up and he says, he was talking about the ritual of summoning and binding the light of the sun or a spirit of the sun. The whole thing was, okay, and this is the, all the grammar you have to use to get it to shine or to get it to create, you know, this kind of prismatic effect. The sun wants to shine. You don't have to ask the sun to shine. You just have to ask the sun. And you see he just pauses here and your mom goes to not be mad at you for talking to it. And he goes, exactly. You see she goes, this is so stupid. And a man just turns and goes, I'm going to prove a point. Okay. I built all these, I built all these yesterday. And she, you see your mom just cocks her head and goes, you built these yesterday. And he's like, I think that you put some, you know, basic protections. And then you have the sun do what it wants to do. And you see she goes, well, you have not done basic safety precautions. And you see that she goes over and starts to inscribe something on one of the panes of glass. And immediately can't help herself but is helping him to hang them up. And you see that here in the light of the citadel as they hang these, suddenly the sun starts to rise. And you know that you only have a few moments left of starlight at the far west of the sky. They can still see them. But you see as they're up in the rafters hanging these panes of glass, the sunlight hits the windows. And transforms. And magic energy comes through the panes of glass. A pain of wizardry, lingua arcana, inviting the sun to shine as it will. And as it does, music starts to play from light. You see your mother puts her hands over her mouth. It's beautiful. Why is it doing that? Where did you tell it to play music? Your dad takes a piece of plum out of his jacket and hands her wand. I didn't ask it. It wanted to. The sun gets a little higher and the first actual peak of the sun comes out and it hits and the music gets loud. And the panes of glass start to swing. You go, oh, oh, and you see that one of them swings that in front of some light that is being produced by another window in a row up. And a bunch of snow blasts out. The music turns into snow. And you see your mom goes, uh, uh, that's not supposed to happen. And the wind kicked up by the snow blows a couple of other. And the music picks up and starts to get wilder as light turns into lightning and snow that turns into more music. Your dad goes, grab it and jumps up and is swinging around on one as the music picks up. And the music changes. It is not regimented. It is not formal. It is not demanded, commanded or enforced. It is free. Wizardry is free. And the music picks up. Snow and light and music all coming through the magic class. Your dad riding one, your mother riding another as the chains sway and they each grab onto one and as snow and light and rainbow and music. The snow turns into doves, the doves fly birds flying made of light and music all throughout Jow Court. And you see your mother and father look hanging there delirious laughing and share their first kiss. Task. Above everything else. Please don't let me forget that. Task nods his head. Your eyes move because Task has largely completed his work with the other books but sees the book that was the last thing they were working on in here. Give me an arcana check. 26. Your mother. It is in her handwriting. She had learned to transpose a spell from a dear friend into the lingua arcana in flicked wounds from grandmother. And you see there is a modification on it that you could immediately apply to your own magic. It seems like something to help it get around. There is a, basically the spell you need to get skin contact and this seems to be a work around if skin contact is difficult for whatever reason. If either an opponent is a construct or they are armored or there is some kind of creature that is like femoral or something like that. You see that you would be able to have your inflict wounds be modified by this if you wanted to pick it up on that 26 arcana I think it would be effortless to. And you can feel that you would be able to, this would be an effective spell for like bypassing normal resistances for that. That's clever. You cast it. Your hand goes translucent ghostly white as the spell of wounding gathers pointed to the very tips of your fingers moving your hand reaching forward. Your hand passes through the wood of the shelf like a specter in corporeal and immaterial. As you trace the lines knowing this spell would wound living flesh still upon the wood of the shelf the stone of the wall are left for jagged scars of white. Unnatural magic and yet eerily familiar. So familiar Suvi it's almost as if you had seen these scars before. Seen them almost every day of your life since that summer. Your mother's spell of wounding leaves the scars you have seen since that summer on the face of steel sword of the citadel. I'm going to kill her. From the bedroom you hear you turn from the library of your parents to see the dark figure in the doorway of the sword of the citadel the wizard's steel. Who are you going to kill Suvi?