A crack opens between the hearthstones without disturbing the longhouse. From the narrow darkness, a pale adult hare drags itself into the blue firelight, one hind leg trailing uselessly.
Its fur is silver-white beneath streaks of soot, and its human eyes gleam a tired amber. Black glamour burns along its flank, frost-edged like the feather and bark.
the pale hare
Do not follow the silver leaves, witch. Their path is a snare.
The hare collapses beside the hearth, claws scraping weakly at the stones. Smoke twists around its body but will not touch the dark mark.
the pale hare
The maker has already named you payment. The witness waits beyond the threshold, and the bargain is sealed in your blood.
Behind Veyka, the longhouse remains empty, its counted coins and cooling mead left undisturbed. No companion has followed her; only the blue hearthfire stays.
the pale hare
If she crosses, the door will remember her as an offering.
“"I thank you for the warning, friend. And bid you return to the dreaming to rest lest the wounds of crossing the Gauntlet harm you further. Pay no mind to the threat on me. This is not the first time our dark kin have invited me to the feast with my flesh and blood as prize. Even in this lesser mortal form though I am still a Sidhe Lord. I'll be fine, little one. They're inviting me to saye their hunger, and forgetting that I am the predator, never prey. And I still hunger." *I collect my coins, and move to leave the longhouse along the silver leaf trail*”
SUCCESS (Fair Willpower, rolled +1)
Veyka
I thank you for the warning, friend. Return to the dreaming and rest, lest the Gauntlet's wounds harm you further. Pay no mind to this threat. I have been invited to darker feasts before, with my flesh and blood as prize. Even in this lesser mortal form, I remain Sidhe Lord. I am predator, never prey, and I still hunger.
the pale hare
Then may the old blood remember you kindly, witch. I can offer no more than warning.
Veyka gathers every warm coin from the table, their edges biting cold against her claws. One blackened piece brands her palm with a brief sting before cooling among the rest.
The pale hare lowers its amber gaze as Veyka passes. Its wounded leg drags once across the hearthstone, then the creature folds into the blue firelight, breathing but unseen by the threshold.
Veyka crosses the longhouse toward the open door. Silver leaves stir beneath her boots, forming a narrow trail through the starless dark beyond.
the pale hare
The witness will know your name before you arrive. Do not let it choose the shape of your hunger.
She steps beyond the threshold along the silver-leaf path, coins secured in hand. Behind her, the door closes without a sound, leaving the blue hearth and injured hare within.
+ New Item Acquired
Hunt Payment Coins
“I follow the silver-leaf path toward its witness”
SUCCESS (Superb Agility, rolled +0)
Veyka follows the silver-leaf path into the starless dark. Each leaf folds beneath her boots without sound, while the longhouse vanishes behind a veil of black snow.
The trail ends at a circular pool of motionless water. Across it stands the witness, an elderly elf man in layered white robes, tall and spare, with a blindfold of silver thread and antler branches rising from his pale hair.
Veyka
The witness is waiting, and the path has brought me exactly where it promised.
the witness
Veyka, last ember of a broken domain. You cross beneath witness and carry the maker’s mark in your blood.
The pool reflects no face, only the black feather, the pale bark, and the coins clenched in Veyka’s hand. A ring of silver fire kindles around its edge.
the witness
I offer neither welcome nor command. I offer knowledge of the hand that named you payment, if you will hear the bargain before dawn.
The witness raises one long-fingered hand. Beneath the water, a red glow pulses like fresh blood, and the runes on the bark answer with a patient, hungry light.
“*I slip the coins into a pouch with a last flick of the wrist, offering him a fanged smile as the coins disappear* "A Seelie Elf? One of my former kin then. You bear witness, yet I still know not to who or what, or why one of my own would be at the trail of the darker kins own make. You are witness to a bargain...but I know not what the terms of the bargain are. Or who I will be bargaining with."”
SUCCESS (Fair Persuasion, rolled +1)
Veyka slips the coins into a pouch with a final flick of her wrist. Their cold chime vanishes beneath leather as she offers the witness a fanged smile.
Veyka
A Seelie elf? One of my former kin, then. You bear witness, yet I know not to whom or what, nor why one of my own follows the darker kin’s making.
Veyka
You are witness to a bargain, but I know neither its terms nor the one with whom I will bargain.
The silver fire bends toward the witness. Beneath the pool, the red glow spreads into three clear reflections: a black antlered hand, a crowned shadow, and Veyka’s marked blood.
the witness
I witness the bargain between the Maker and the one it named. The Maker is the Thorned Queen, last sovereign of the Gloam Court. The other party is you.
the witness
Its terms are plain. Your blood opens the road to the Queen’s court; in return, she claims one service freely chosen by her and owed before dawn. Refuse, and the mark becomes a claim upon your name.
the witness
I am Seelie, yes, but not kin to the Queen. I stand for the old law alone. You now know whom you face, what is offered, and what the bargain demands.
Quest Complete
Discover who sent the Aen-Sidhe summons
Attribute Upgrade: Willpower Fair→Good
“"A court issues a demand of me!" *I let out a boisterous laugh, one hand on my hip and the other resting across the generous swell of my breasts* "I am no lesser fae to be manipulated, elf. No servant of man nor fae. Let the Gloam Court mark my blood, they can get in line. She and every Fomor between here and the Isles of Albion crave me to sate one hunger or another. Mark me, Queen of Thorns, but the one who dances in the shadowed void between stars is not your servant. You're simply another one of my tallies. Careful you don't dance to close to intrusion. Open a path across the Gauntlet into the dreaming by accident, and I'll rip you from your throne." *I turn to leave the quicksilver pool behind*”
SUCCESS (Good Willpower, rolled +2)
Veyka
A court issues a demand of me! I am no lesser fae to be manipulated, elf, nor servant of man or fae. Let the Gloam Court mark my blood; they can get in line. She and every Fomor between here and Albion crave me to sate one hunger or another. Mark me, Queen of Thorns, but I am not your servant. You are another tally. Open a path across the Gauntlet into the dreaming by accident, and I will rip you from your throne.
Veyka laughs boisterously, one hand on her hip and the other resting across her generous breast as she turns from the quicksilver pool. Her coins chime at her belt.
the witness
Then leave, last ember. The old law does not chain what refuses its courtesy.
The witness lowers his hand. The silver fire parts, revealing a dry path across the motionless water and into a curtain of black, starless mist.
the witness
But understand this: defiance does not erase the mark. The Queen will hear your tally, and she will choose whether pride interests her more than payment.
Veyka steps onto the opened path. The pool releases her without resistance, and the Thorned Queen’s red reflection fades from the water as the dreaming waits beyond.
Behind her, the witness remains beneath his antlers and silver blindfold. Ahead, the mist folds open toward the Gauntlet, carrying the cold scent of distant thorns.
✓ Quest Accepted
Leave the witness
“The trail back to reality lay ahead, but if I knew the courts as well as I did, the route back would not be so simple as the straight route I'd taken here. The queen would bar my path in whatever way she could afford. Whatever way didn't allow me to cross over into the dreaming fully. As I'd done so many times before, I'd walk a route within the Gauntlet, and I'd be deposited back into the real world. Still stranded, and with one more enemy in the dreaming. For now though, I needed to walk the path of Silver Leafs back to what may eventually lead to Sri Baris.”
FAILURE (Poor Survival, rolled -4)
Veyka follows the silver-leaf trail away from the witness, each step carrying her deeper through the Gauntlet rather than toward any simple road home. The mist closes behind her.
The path bends through a forest of black glass, where every trunk reflects a different sky. Silver leaves continue beneath her boots, but their stems now point inward, toward her.
Veyka
The leaves remember the way I came, not the way I need to go.
She keeps walking. The trail carries her across a ridge of pale stone and descends toward a wavering red horizon that smells faintly of snow, hearth smoke, and mortal earth.
Then the Queen’s mark burns cold beneath Veyka’s skin. The silver leaves tear loose from the ground and whirl around her, sewing the red horizon shut with threads of thorn-dark light.
When the storm of leaves falls, the ridge is gone. Veyka stands within a circular hollow, her own shadow pinned beneath a silver root while three paths spiral away, each bearing the scent of reality.
The mark has not barred the Gauntlet entirely, but it has made her passage conditional: until her shadow is freed, every route will return her here, farther from Sri Baris than before.
Free Veyka's pinned shadow
Quest Complete
Leave the witness