BRIEF DROWNED QUEST PREDUX RECAP

  In the original Drowned Quest, the players were Ellery Routh, a weirdo trouble-magnet with a penchant for talking out of his ass. Ellery, “executed” for worship of the Eight (a false allegation— actually, he was trying to organize politically), drowned and woke up on the seafloor with glass lungs and an imaginary guy in his head. The guy, who looked exactly like Ellery except cleaner, better-groomed, and blue-eyed, was rapidly dubbed That Guy. Ellery and That Guy argued and bumbled around until they ran into a strange woman, Madrigal, who led them to the camp she lives at.

  After some shenanigans, Ellery met the camp members— among them Madrigal, Monty, and Eloise— and received some exposition about how things work underwater. He also learned that the camp is being protected/extorted by a bunch of bipedal crabs, who are stopping by soon to collect on their debt. After some more shenanigans with That Guy (and Madrigal), Ellery hits it off with Arledge Graves, an enigmatic camp-member who typically keeps to himself. Ellery and Arledge head out of camp to deal with the crab situation. On the road, Ellery experiments with That Guy, learns some metaphysics, and meets Arledge’s rude friend Lorne. He learns that Arledge and Lorne are magicians, or actual worshippers of the murdered sea-gods, and that they use blood magic to temporarily shapeshift into sea creatures.

  Ellery, always up for having bizarre things happen to him, tries it out. He runs around as a crustacean for a while and is surprisingly pretty good at it. Then he, Arledge, and Lorne set off again. Their destination is the mountains, where the crabs have a home base. Unfortunately, it starts getting dark, which is both useful and dangerous: reality becomes significantly more malleable in the darkness, allowing for fast travel but risking the manifestation of nightmare-creatures. Naturally, Ellery bungles it— he indeed manifests a nightmare-creature, which subsequently rips his entire chest open. Fatal abovewater, rapid healing belowwater means this is merely traumatic and extremely painful. To keep himself sane (or maybe because he isn’t), Ellery also manifests a pocket-size sun in his chest. This is relevant in Redux.

  He ends up passing out and being rescued by a squadron of Wind Court members, sworn to protect the seafloor from aberrations and weirdness. They get along fine until it becomes clear that Ellery himself is a total weirdo, and that he’s been hanging out with Arledge— the Wind Court, and especially the sadistic Courtier Dib, has a hateboner for magicians.

  After escaping, Ellery and Arledge wind up in the crab city, where they meet a bunch of other people, including the eccentric journalist Gideon. They also continue to evade Dib, who rolls ridiculously well on a particular dice roll, earning him the nickname “Lucky” in Redux. After many more aimless shenanigans, including some existential angst between Ellery and That Guy, the plot runs out of steam and Predux is unceremoniously ended.

  BRIEF PREDUX EPILOGUE RECAP

  The epilogue is only a chapter long! You can also read it for yourself here:

  You are Ellery Routh, MC extraordinaire, and you've volunteered yourself as a test subject for a bunch of crabs in a secret... crab... city... place. It's not important. What's important is that the machine you're hooked up to folds your essential being into such a small area that you fall through the skin of the universe and into unreality, the space between. Whoops!

  In another universe (and 3 years into the future), you are Charlotte Fawkins, come to petition Ellery for his assistance in your upcoming spelunking expedition. This is definitely not because you'd get turned down by anyone else who asked, and definitely because you think he's a weird friendless recluse who'll jump at any chance at social interaction. Unexpectedly, you find him sprawled on the floor of his tent, barely conscious. You kick him and promptly discover he's temporarily lost his memory— and furthermore, he's ready to believe anything you say. You convince him it was his idea to want to go on your expedition, tell him to clean up the place, and make your triumphant exit.

  THREAD 1 (Chapters 1 - 7) RECAP

  You are Charlotte Fawkins, feMC extraordinaire, and you are underwater. You've been underwater for three years, searching for your long-lost family heirloom, the Second Crown, in the hopes it'll prove your legitimate claim to the throne. Recently, you've found a definitive lead: you think it might be buried in Tom's Cave, a local landmark. You're a little pissed about this— it's not the dramatic climax you wanted for your quest. You are on your way there now, joined with Ellery and Richard, the talking snake who lives in your head. Richard is an asshole.

  You discover you've been leading the group the wrong way— you are somewhat direction-challenged. Ellery chews you out for this, and you contemplate sacrificing him to alligators and weeping over his dead body. He also queries why you're going to Tom's Cave, which is known for being gator-infested and possibly haunted, and you pretend someone's hired you to harvest algae from it. This works, somehow.

  Arriving at Tom's Cave, you find a group of Wind Courtiers (autocratic quasi-law enforcement) confronting Margo Lindew, the co-founder of nearby town Lindews' Landing. Margo guards Tom's Cave on the daily— she's gone a tad batty ever since her husband Tom died there, and she claims to be protecting his bones. Surveillance determines that the Courtiers, Molina and Hatch, are attempting to get into the cave, but before you find out more Margo spots you and calls you over. The Courtiers are dicks to you, so you insist they have no jurisdiction over the Corcass, the swampy region where you live— but they've set up an outpost in the last few weeks, apparently, so you lose that argument. You turn your attention to Margo, attempting to convince her you'll retrieve Tom's bones if she lets you into the cave. She declines your offer, but instead of arguing further or trying again later you sprint past her into the cave, dragging Ellery behind you.

  He's not super happy about this ("You know Margo is going to kill us, right? Maybe even literally."), but his frustration is interrupted by an ominous thumping and a message written into the algae: "GO AWAY." You write "NO THANKS :)" in response, and get a whole manifesto:

  "DO NOT TOY WITH US

  WE ARE MULTITUDINOUS

  WE ARE ETERNAL

  WE ARE HUNGRY

  BE GONE

  OR BE FOOD"

  Neither you or Ellery are overly concerned by this, and Ellery suggests you get a move on, but you decide to examine the writing more closely. Doing this makes you hallucinate: you are a hivemind of alligators, stacked and fused together, and your food sources have run dry. You are hungry for law, which is coming soon, and— you are interrupted by a man, who calls you Charlie and coaxes you out of the hallucination. You awake on the ground, Ellery checking your pulse. (Richard is the only one who calls you Charlie, primarily because you can't stand that nickname— but you don't press him about his appearance there.)

  Deciding to never speak of that again, you continue down the cave and come to a fork in the road: one path blocked by a cave-in, the other by warning signs about a "GIANT ALLIGATOR." Considering that your only weapon is a pocketknife, you opt for the cave-in, which Ellery points out isn't actually real: the rocks were hand-placed. Richard offers to aid you in tearing down the rocks, but you reject him— you've preserved your independence for three years, and you're not about to start now.

  It takes 30 minutes for you and Ellery to clear the blockage, and behind it you find a huge cavern, packed with piles and piles of human bones— some old and moldering, some newer. You consider trying to find Tom's bones, but it'd be impossible. Instead, you pick your way through the room, only to discover it's gone dead silent— nothing can produce noise anymore. Fortunately, as an underwater denizen, you're fluent in sign language ("handsign"), which lets you communicate with Ellery when you discover the four large alligators that have followed you in.

  When you descend through a passage out of the room, the alligators follow you single-file. You wade through strange, dark, waxy water and emerge suddenly into a sunny room, jampacked with even more alligators— some normal, some part of the writhing gator amalgamation you hallucinated about. You are horrified to find a strange man there, too, fighting the amalgamation with your Crown tied to his belt.

  Ellery figures out you're here for that, not algae, and gets mad. You ignore him and choose to... command the alligators against the man. Thanks to good rolls, you succeed, and you disarm and pin the man. You opt for "enhanced interrogation" tactics and force some answers out of him: he is another Courtier, his name is Duncan "Lucky" Blaine, and he claims to know you well, that you left something on bad terms, and that there's a minor bounty on your head. You have no idea what he's talking about, so you stomp his face in and celebrate your victory— for about 30 seconds, until the gator amalgamation (which calls itself the Congregation) informs you that it's hungry, it needs fed, and it'll eat you if you don't provide it anything. You offer it Lucky, which it rejects, then seriously consider sacrificing Ellery, but settle on the mysterious "alternative" Richard offers you.

  This alternative turns out to be blacking out and waking up somewhere you've never seen before: a cavernous, cobwebby marble cathedral. You are joined by a man you've never seen before: blond, middle-aged, in a cheap suit. He has Richard's voice. You accuse Richard of possessing some poor guy, but he claims to be doing no such thing: you are subconsciously making him look like this, apparently, because the two of you are in your mind. You attempt to contest this, but realize you can feel the cathedral lodged in your head, and fall silent.

  Big revelations out of the way, Richard gets to the point: this talking is taking place in the split-second before the Congregation gets impatient and eats you. You can escape only if you allow Richard to perform "alterations" on you. You are violently against this, but Richard coldly informs you that consent is a nicety. He's not going to let you die.

  You wake up in your cot the next morning, throat dry. Ellery stands in your doorway, a little scratched up but otherwise unharmed. He informs you delicately that both Monty, the leader of the camp where you live, and Madrigal, his second-in-command, want to talk to you. He also offers that he's there, if you want to talk about what happened last night, and leaves. When he's gone, snake-Richard tells you the Crown is somewhere safe, and that he'd like to talk to you, too. In person.

  You opt to do that first, and Richard leads you through a series of pointless mental exercises before you wake back up in the cathedral. Richard is in a better suit, which you approve of, and snakeskin loafers, which he's clearly pleased with and you find awful tacky. You tell him so, and he informs you curtly that you're not going back to the surface. It's not possible.

  You flip out. For three years, the plan was: get the crown, get back to your real home, be Queen. What does he mean, it's not possible? He told you he wanted to help you, back when you found him in a box in your attic. This is the first time you're hearing any of this. Has he been lying to you?

  Richard dodges most of your questions, but says you could've gotten back to the surface, if the gators hadn't spent the last few decades sucking the power out of the Crown, that he never technically lied to you, and that it doesn't really matter— if you can fill the Crown back up, you'll be a god. You tell him you don't want to be a god, you want to be *queen,* and he tells you beggars can't be choosy.

  You don't believe him, and so Richard tells you an abbreviated history of the Crown: before the world drowned, it was created on the orders of a king from fine, pure crystals and woven law. The king used it to bring peace and order to his kingdom, and he did, until the waters of chaos rose and swept the Crown away. You inform Richard this answers no questions, especially about "law": what the hell is he talking about? Richard tells you he's told you this, multiple times— you disagree, then realize it might've been a part of the lectures you typically tune out. Oops.

  Richard tells you he'll demonstrate: he retrieves a key from his pocket and asks you why it's a key. He shoots down your obvious answer ("someone made it") and tells you there's three laws making it a key: one from the universe, "KEYS MAY BE," one from the key, "I AM A KEY," and one from you, "THAT IS A KEY." He asks you what he's holding. You say it's a key. He breaks the third law, and asks you again— and you're unable to recognize the small metal object in his hand.

  Confused, you take the object from Richard, and on closer examination decide it must be a coin— and then it is. Richard is unamused and takes the coin back, transforming it again into the unidentifiable object he claims is a key. You're even less amused, informing him that he needs to fix this, or you will. He offers to let you fix it, with undertones of "you can't, moron." You accept.

  Your bad eye— the solid iron one— swivels in its socket, and you have the uncanny feeling that you're peeking under the world. And what's there is: nothing. All-consuming void, except for the glowing filaments strung and twisted everywhere. You don't have a body, just a thick bundle of filaments where your heart would be. Richard is just a few twisted together.

  Richard bails you out before you suffer a full-blown existential crisis, and you ask if he sees that all the time. Sort of, he says— it's just integrated into his vision, like how an ordinary snake might see in infrared. You decide not to ponder this, and move on to other questions: does he make a habit of breaking off little parts of you? (You still don't know what a key looks like.) No, he says— but alterations, certainly, and additions "only for our benefit." You ask why the alligators rejected eating Duncan— Richard doesn't know, but suspects it's Wind Court strangeness. You ask what Richard is. "A snake." You ask how to leave. He tells you to wake up—

  You wake up. After that, you decide you need to destress, and choose to work on your main hobby: building architectural scale miniatures. You decide to attempt one of the mind... cathedral... thing you were just in. (Richard informs you it's called a manse.) Of the manse you were just in. You spend 40 minutes carving out the shape of it before Madrigal bursts into your tent.

  You make a valiant effort to hide your work-in-progress as Madrigal berates you for not coming to see her, then asks you to come outside. You do, with all the dignity you can salvage, and she takes you somewhere private: she has a "personal matter" to discuss. You feign disinterest.

  The personal matter turns out to be Ellery: apparently he's barely left his tent, and Madrigal is concerned about him. Because you're the only one who's been able to talk to him for an extended period of time, she wants to enlist you to figure out what's up with him. You agree, but not before asking for compensation: an invitation to the bimonthly Game Night, which you insist you've been unjustly banned from. Madrigal disagrees— she says you rejected the first invitation, and thus nobody thought to invite you since. Either way, she invites you. (She also questions your bad eye, which she claims is an empty socket, despite there clearly being an iron orb in there. You give a vague answer.)

  You pointedly wait for Madrigal to leave before you do, then go to see Ellery, who offers you a seat in his tent and asks you point-blank how long someone else has been in your head. You panic— you've never told anybody about Richard— and lie badly that you don't know what he's talking about, and that's a stupid question, and he's stupid. Ellery points out that he's heard you having one-sided conversations with yourself, and if there's anyone to figure it out, it's him— apparently he used to have something similar, until he got rid of it. You attempt to ask how (you'd love to get rid of Richard), but he informs you it's not worth it, and Richard points out it'd be impossible, anyway— whatever Ellery had was surface-level, while Richard's rooted too deep in your mind to extract.

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  Ignoring this, you press Ellery on this removal: might it have any connection to, say, not talking to anyone? He stands defensively and accuses you of being put up to this. You deny this, which Ellery doesn't believe— he thinks it must be Monty, who's notorious for "teambuilding." He tells you to get out of his tent and tell Monty his 'help' isn't wanted. You leave with all the dignity you can salvage.

  You're not excited about the prospect of talking to Monty (he's overly pleasant, almost patronizingly so), but go to see him regardless. You don't knock, but at least make the effort to not comment on his missing arm. For his part, Monty politely asks you if you happened to spelunk Tom's Cave. He's received a demand from Margo— who you dodged to get into the cave, and who happens to charter the camp— to evict you, or she'll revoke the charter and evict everyone.

  Monty doesn't like Margo much, and he doesn't want to comply with this, but he doesn't have much of a choice. You call him a pussy. He offers you a way out: if you scrape up some letters of recommendation from people, he'll have some basis for standing up to Margo. You accuse him of telling you to make friends. He agrees.

  Unfortunately, you have next-to-no choice in the matter: you'd do just about anything to not be on the run again. You ignore the rest of Monty's speech and get out of there as fast as you can.

  Richard tells you to get some sleep: you're going to be getting into Ellery's head. Not figuratively.

  THREAD 2 (Chapters 8 - 15) RECAP

  Later that night, you are sneaking into Ellery’s tent, where he’s dead asleep. After pilfering some papers for your investigation, Richard guides you to Ellery’s unconscious body, then helps you through his eyeball and into his mind. Er, his manse, a sort of structured “mind palace” that Ellery created and can visit. It’s bound to hold clues.

  Inside the manse, which takes the form of a sandy, green-skied island, you inspect the sole structure in view: a tall, precarious, poorly-built house. Since it’s so tall, you immediately attempt to fly to the top, but Richard (who’s with you, still looking like a middle-aged man) informs you that you can’t: you’re in the top layer of a manse, which hews relatively close to reality. Deeper down, you can start to get wacky with things, but here, flying’s off the table. You walk up to the house instead.

  Inside, you find… Ellery. Whoops. He’s surprised to see you, but isn’t angry, though he has a hard time remembering your name. (You’re insulted, given you went through a whole alligator cave with him). He wanders off to get you a drink, locking you inside the room, and you immediately start investigating all the things lying around. One of the things is a mirror, which Richard deduces is actually a sort of doorway. You can’t get through, try as you might to [OPEN] it, and accidentally shatter it instead. Richard is condescending about this.

  Rather than stay at the scene of the crime, you convince Richard to open one of the locked for you, which he does by talking to it. You have no explanation for this, but are happy to head on through, discovering a room with ornate wallpaper. Naturally, you begin slicing the wallpaper off in search of clues. In fact, you find them: there’s a whole conversation written on the wall behind the wallpaper, though you have no idea what it means. You head back to the room Ellery tried to lock you in, where you discover the shattered mirror now leaking black goop. This is probably fine.

  You head into a room on the opposite side, which appears to be a sort of laboratory. Ellery has been busy growing crystals, apparently. There’s also loads of bookshelves in the lab, full of folders, but their contents are stained with black goop. Richard, who has a plan, gaslights you into believing the bookcase is not in fact set into the wall, then hefts the now-freestanding bookcase into the entrance room… or would, if the room were not now entirely flooded with black goop. Damnit. You refuse to wade through the goop, heading off to see if you can find another mirror, since Richard said they acted as doorways. You do, and pass through.

  You enter the mirror version of Ellery’s manse. Richard is here, but only as a snake, and he doesn’t talk. This is fine with you. You poke around, discovering a room full of fish and a staircase in the ceiling, and use the bookcase to climb up into it. You discover a dark space full of stairs, with a door at the end and a ribboned note from Ellery. Huh. You tie the ribbon around Richard’s neck, giving him a cute bow, then go through the door.

  You’re back in the entrance room… in the past? You’re there, saying what you said 30 minutes ago, and so is Richard and Ellery— but you’re also finding notes from Ellery in the present, discussing what you said in the past. He tells you to meet him in the other room once his “past self” leaves, which you ignore entirely, instead coming over to speak to Richard, who’s aware that he’s not in the past. He’s wearing a red bow tie to match the snake, which you find amusing and he doesn’t. Ellery keeps sending notes, and you finally wander over to talk to him.

  Ellery immediately traps you in a dimension of infinite whiteness, so you can’t wander off, and sets about interrogating: he’s pissed that you’ve wrecked his place, and he wants to know what the hell you’re doing here. You tell him that Madrigal sent you, and he reacts strongly, losing his anger and becoming defeated-looking. He answers a few questions, though not very helpfully, and asks you if you know how to get out of here. You don’t, so he offers to help, though he warns you you might have some weird visions in the process...

  THREAD 3 (Chapters 16 - 26) RECAP

  In a state between sleep and waking, you have three visions: of the past, of the present, and of the future. In the past, you see a man dressed in red and a man dressed in white, talking about something they’ve “gotten too old for.” The man in white has a child in the house, and calls the man in red Henry. The man in red has a tortoiseshell-handled knife. In the present, you see a man, his identity obscured, in a dimension of infinite whiteness. The man speaks businesslikely to a near-nonverbal woman, whom he calls Cora (though he can’t remember her name very well). In the future, you are sitting at a cafe table, talking to Richard about how you’ve become too similar to him, and he to you — how you must inevitably merge.

  You wake up on your cot. Richard hassles you as you head out the door, wanting to report to Madrigal about your Ellery discoveries. Unfortunately, Madrigal isn’t in her tent, but you’re greeted by a strange man with a horselike face. The man shakes your hand, but you want nothing to do with him. You leave to track down Madrigal, whom the man says must be in town.

  Actually, you catch her on the trail back from town. You tell her all about what you’ve found, hoping she’ll be excited, but she gets pissed: you let slip that you told Ellery she sent you, which is exactly what she didn’t want. You get her to admit that she sent you on this whole mission because she’s still hung up on the breakup, which was never adequately explained. Madrigal isn’t happy about admitting this, and the two of you get into an argument. You insinuate that she’s cold-hearted, and she punches you in the jaw. In retaliation, you use Richard-enhanced strength to coldcock her, then drag her off the trail into the brush.

  Rattled, you continue into town, heading straight for your usual haunt: the Better Than Nothing, the only bar in town. (You need a pink cocktail with a pink umbrella in it to make yourself feel better.) Too bad the Nothing’s bartender is pissed at you: you’ve run up a huge tab over the past few months, and you have nothing to pay it with. He refuses to serve you, and your attempt at a sob story fails. Outside, Richard berates you about your weakness and incompetence, and you cry, but stand up to him in a small way: you don’t give up on your passionate desire for a cocktail umbrella.

  You trudge back the long way to camp, in the hopes you won’t encounter Madrigal. The longer route runs straight past Tom’s Cave, where you spot some familiar faces: Margo and Ellery. Ellery is confronting Margo with some kind of evidence of wrongdoing, and Margo has a shotgun. You realize that, if Ellery keeps this up, he will 100% be shot and die.

  Rather than intervene in any way, or even keep walking, you observe silently— if you’re a witness to Margo shooting Ellery, you can use it as blackmail against her, forcing her to drop her anger over your trespassing in the cave. Indeed, Ellery gets shot and dies in gruesome fashion, though something strange happens: he starts smiling glassily as he dies, and some of his blood is silver. Robbed of your bravado, you sneak away and try not to puke.

  Back at your tent, somebody’s inside: the horse-faced man from earlier. You caught him looking at your stuff, but he ignores your suspicion and walks out cheerily. The clay model you were working on is missing. Monty knocks on your door.

  You tell him that that guy probably just stole your model, but he has bigger issues: he wants to know if you just punched Madrigal in the face. You claim self-defense, but he informs you that you already have a big list of strikes against you, and this could easily be the final straw. Apparently, anybody else would already be out on their ass, but Monty sees something of himself in you. (You don’t really get it, but whatever.) He tells you that you have to do whatever Madrigal tells you from here on out, or she’ll have you kicked out for sure.

  Annoyed, you return to your tent, where at least one person is proud of you: Richard. He claims there’s an emergency in your manse, but when you get there, he’s set up a little party for you: he wants to celebrate your coldheartedness in letting Ellery die. He’s provided pink cocktails and everything. You get drunk, and surprisingly, he does too, rambling about keys and telling you to never trust him as a snake: he’s too “efficient,” too laser-focused on an objective, without any space for feelings.

  Later, you’re a little less drunk, which is good: your manse is invaded! You come face-to-face with a black-cloaked person in a gold mask. Though genial, the person also has a GIANT AXE, and they tell you in no uncertain terms that they want the Crown. You tell them no, so they cut your arm off. Shoot. Richard hastily tells you that it’s a manse, and you’re not really injured, so you shove the arm back onto your shoulder. It stays put.

  Richard instructs you to use [OPEN], like you learned, and you do, spawning an open doorway in the Gold-Masked Person’s cloak. Surprised, the Gold-Masked Person chews you out for foul play. They offer to make this a duel, no trickery involved.

  THREAD 4 (Chapters 27 - 39) RECAP

  The Gold-Masked Person is trying to get you to honorably duel them, which you don’t really understand, given they were previously attempting to dishonorably cut your arm off. While they’re retreating to a reasonable distance, you sneak after them, then attempt to stab them through the cloak. You rapidly discover that the Gold-Masked Person doesn’t have a body inside the cloak. They grab you with their shadow arms.

  Instead of struggling, you duck into their cloak, discovering yourself in some kind of shadowy other dimension. Unfortunately, the Person follows you there. You’re still trapped. The Person takes the opportunity to interrogate you about the location of the Crown, and you lie wildly, picking the first person who pops into your head: you claim Monty has it. For some reason, this shocks and angers the Person, and they thank you for the information. They leave to go kill Monty. Whoops.

  You’re greeted by Richard, who pops out of nowhere to congratulate you for your victory. In fact, he has a reward for you: he wants to physically “alter” you to improve your combat effectiveness. In fact, er, he already has. He vanishes, and you brood about this until he reappears, chalkboard in tow. He wants to discuss the Ellery situation. After running through the known facts, you share your theory: that Ellery isn’t real, that he’s some kind of reflection. You press Richard for his own theory, but he gets irritated and wakes you back to reality.

  You set off to investigate the mouth of Tom’s Cave, where Ellery got shot, and run into Eloise, who’s doing the same thing. You tentatively greet her, and Eloise explains that she’s here to pick up the shards of mirror lying around in the grass— glass can be dangerous left unattended. There’s no other sign of Ellery’s blood or body. You wonder if the mirror is what’s left of Ellery, but decline to share this with Eloise, instead telling her that you’re investigating Ellery on Madrigal’s behalf. She’s interested in this information, and trades you some information of her own, telling you what makes glass so dangerous: it’s “extrareal,” or realer than real, meaning it actually sucks reality out of the surrounding environment. You inquire about Ellery’s ties to mirrors, and Eloise further tells you that she delivered one to him several months ago. Apparently, he was using it to read his own writing, which isn’t in code after all: it’s backwards and upside-down. How did Eloise get her hands on a mirror? Well, she got it from Madrigal, who acts as a middleman for smugglers hiding out in the Fen. You are aghast.

  Ellery is dead, so before you go to sleep you decide to sneak into his tent and poke around— but Richard stops you, telling you you’re too worn out. You insult him, but accede and fall asleep. You have a dream about a man in red and a man in white. The man in white is shot, but develops a stab wound, and blames you for it. You wake up.

  Now that the day is new, you stroll out to re-investigate Ellery’s tent, but discover the horse-faced man inside the empty tent next to yours. He lives there now, he tells you. You’re disgusted, but agree, begrudgingly, to come inside and have tea. The man introduces himself as C.M.S. Garvin, and he hands you a business card apparently intended for you, belonging to one Anthea Aves. You take the card and decide to call him Horse Face.

  Horse Face, who is apparently wealthy, offers you a job and a sizeable advance fee, provided you don’t ask questions. You’re broke, so you glower but take the offer, and Horse Face says he’ll be in touch. You return to your tent to stash the chit.

  Inside your tent, you make a to-do list for yourself, then use a mirror shard you filched to read one of Ellery’s “coded” papers. You then venture off to find Madrigal, barging into her tent. She’s crying. You fail to take any of her obvious hints to leave, and she gets mad instead of sad (improvement?). She chews you out for knocking her out and leaving her in the woods, which you don’t have a good excuse for. You attempt to evade her wrath by telling her about the paper you decoded, where Ellery talks about taking lionfish toxin. Madrigal freaks out: lionfish toxin is fatal. You wonder if that’s why he took it. You also tell Madrigal about the mirror and mirror writing, and she declares her intention to go confront Ellery with all of this. She wants you to come along.

  Ellery is dead, though (you haven’t told her), and his tent is empty. You poke around it with Madrigal, picking up various papers scattered around, and investigating Ellery’s coat (it’s lined entirely with pockets, apparently so he can pull things out of thin air easier – “legerdemain,” Richard says). You also find a small shrine to the sea gods, and, inside a box of wood for whittling, Ellery’s LOG– his journal. You sit down to read the entries from nine months ago, shortly before and after Ellery’s eidolon was reattached. Though it’s all poorly spelled, Ellery writes at length about the disorientation he experienced after the procedure, as well as his newly enhanced skill at “legerdemain” and other minor reality alterations. He wonders if, instead of being restored to his previous, pre-eidolon state (100% real), he’s become simultaneously real and unreal.

  Your reading is interrupted by a visitor. It’s Ellery, apparently no worse for wear, wearing nothing but a bathrobe. He’s confused to see you, appearing to think he spent the night blackout drunk. Not wanting to deal with this, you attempt to make a break for it.

  THREAD 5 (Chapters 40 - 44) RECAP

  You can’t escape so easily: Madrigal wants you present as a witness, so Ellery can’t worm out of this like he always does. You want a minute to read through all the papers you’ve collected, so you tell Madrigal to get started, and you’ll pitch in when you can. You warn her that Ellery is amnesiac, so it won’t be easy.

  Madrigal and Ellery start to argue while you read through the cryptic papers, which include a business card from “Anthea Aves” and a sample of Ellery writing forward and mirrored. Madrigal, already annoyed, calls you into the conversation, and you ask Ellery what explanation he could possibly have for waking up nude in the Fen with no memory. He tells you that he probably got blackout drunk, which isn’t unusual for him, but you counter with one of the other papers you collected: a tally of Ellery’s days sober. Apparently he hasn’t been drinking for weeks. Ellery claims to have no explanation, and he and Madrigal get back in a fight about why they broke up. Ellery claims to have fallen out of love, but you’re skeptical: he was writing about her in his journal and everything. You present the evidence, and he changes his story: he claims to remember why they broke up, but he can’t tell you. Physically can’t. If he tries, he coughs up black goop. He doesn’t know why you care so much, and you finally reveal your trump card: you saw him being killed by Margo.

  Ellery goes quiet, but Madrigal goes loud: she wants to know WHEN this happened, WHY this happened, WHY she didn’t know about this until now, and WHY THE FUCK you didn’t do anything to stop it. You attempt to explain, but as you don’t really have any good explanation, it just gets her madder. She calls you a psychopath. In an attempt to get back to the main point, you accuse Ellery of not being the same Ellery who died, but he evades again, going on a tangent about his “philosophical” deadness—as in, the Ellery pre-drowning isn’t the same guy as Ellery post-drowning, so the “old” Ellery is dead. You know, philosophically. You pretend to go along with this, then attempt to dig more information out of him. This succeeds, kind of. Ellery claims to have invented the term “manse,” or “M.A.N.S.E.”, which apparently stands for “mental aux node state experience.” You insult his weak acronym skills, and he tells you to get the fuck out of his tent.

  Defeated, you and Madrigal leave, having learned very little. You’re prepared to head back to your own tent and sulk, but Madrigal uses her Monty-ordained power over you to order you to tag along. She’s heading into the Fen to say hi to her friend Branwen. You begrudgingly agree, on the condition that you’re provided a sword (for effective adventuring). Madrigal doesn’t have one, so you try to imagine up a sword for yourself, which… half-works. You set off into the Fen.