Exhibit 12: "Slippery Mind"

Hey, now! Don’t look so glum! I told y’all we’d be raucous, and I intend to deliver.

We were heading south from Lunaris, lookin’ on to the newest point on the map: the final Favor. The queen told us there were tons of Harvest’s—Life’s, alright?—Favors scattered all over the world, and that she herself went on a similar quest a long time ago, which… re-contextualized some things. Why were we even getting four of these? Wouldn’t one be enough for one person to enter Harvest’s realm once we’d found the Scythe? Why not just send us straight to it? Did she even know where it was? What’s the use of this map, if not?

Had the Scythe been lost or stolen before, for the queen to have to gather Favors? Why did gods let their tools get stolen so often?

I still don’t fully know the answer to that, but we floated an interesting theory on our way to the last one. We didn’t know if she’d planned for Euphor to replace Cora in our group from the start, so maybe having four total was just happenstance, and the number had different significance. Since Favors, as far as we knew, were just special objects somehow connected to a god, maybe they were sort of connected to the Scythe, too—her big object. Maybe having more Favors would help the map point in the Scythe’s direction, or toward the biggest clue. Maybe four was just the lowest possible number to get a read on it; the same number of known Elder Gods.

That was Keelo’s thought. They were more talkative than normal the day we approached our fourth stop, sayin’ this place felt thin. The ground was rocky and craggy, and all sorts of shit jumped out at us along our path—mostly rocks, actually. Boulders, rolling at us from ground level, trying to smush us. Fightin’ them was even more clunky than fightin’ plants, because at least you can cut or burn or pierce that. We still did, don’t worry none, but it wasn’t quick.

Eventually we got out of smushing range, traipsing onto a desolate plain with a single small outpost standin’ out like a sniper target. Inside was a twitchy dwarf, who questioned us warily, reading from a script of some sort. Said they were “open for visitors” for the first time, and had to screen us real good first, but they let us through. We walked down stairs for hours before we got in.

Where in was—well. That was Tenelis. Freakiest place I ever did see.

Keep in mind where my head was at. I was stuck at the end of all things, deaths and dreads of death and humiliations and despairs piling up and up, thinkin’ it wouldn’t even matter if I prevented an apocalypse, because I wouldn’t get to live past it. Worse, I’d been thinkin’, not for the first time, about what might come after my death, about what things would rip my soul apart to tuck in their own lab jars, and if I would be awake to feel it all. If I’d have to stare at Harvest’s dispassionate face as she prodded what used to be me and kept it locked away for eternity.

All that, and I saw fluorescent lights for the first time.

That’s what Nivae called ‘em. They’re these strips of stupid-ass white light, brighter than the fuckin’ sun. Blind you worse, too; I was tryin’ to make sense of it, but it just hurt my eyes. There was scary shit like that all over—I mentioned Rebecca the metal raccoon earlier, didn’t I? She’s made of gears and metal and all that. Keelo really knew their stuff. I get that. The stuff here didn’t run on gears or steam power—it was smooth, and flat, and had all its component parts tucked away into the astral plane or something. Nivae held this flat black glass that—anyway. I didn’t care for that shit one bit.

Nivae is the monarch of Tenelis, last I checked. They’re a kid, younger than Timera was—or how Timera looked. They’re also batshit insane. Off the goddamn walls. More hyperactive than Cora, more prone to violent boredom than me. All their soldiers were strapped with these long metal pipes, a small version of which I have to show off today.

Pretty slick, ain’t it? I call it Bug Repellant—Promise didn’t like that, heh. This thing fires six little metal balls faster than any bow, and it sits right on my hip.

Nivae gave us a demonstration of the bigger thing. All I can say is I will not be returning to Tenelis without a warrant. No ma’am.

Sharin’ this might actually be treason, now that I think it? Or at least a breach in national security, since we’re neighbors with Inbraeva. Their national security, anyhow—then again, so was stealing all this, but I’m gettin’ ahead of myself. Point is, Nivae liked us! We explained our quest in the vaguest possible terms, though I don’t think they’d be too alarmed about the world ending, or people starving; things down there were shockingly, creepily well-regulated. We really turned on the charm and tried to keep things calm, because Nivae was sitting on enough power to level Solas Domum, and Mistston, and—y’know what, all of us—in one shot of the big metal pipe even they knew not to demonstrate. I can only hope this part of the story spreading around inspires them to move carefully, not the opposite.

They seemed suspicious of us after we asked for their Favor. Said they didn’t know specifically where it was, only that it was probably downstairs in Valdin’s workshop.

Even with the stairs we’d already walked, the elevator went down, and down, and down. It started to get cold.

I’d had a prickle of sweat on the back of my neck since we entered Inbraeva. Keelo had the same sense, that the whole country’s Weave felt thinner than normal. The boundary between us and other planes, or whatever else was out there, was thin. No wonder gettin’ over the border was so easy.

That feeling only got stronger as we descended. When the elevator stopped, the dwarves stayed back and let us venture forward—mighty encouraging. We picked our way through some rubble, and emerged in a giant chamber that had a stench of magical darkness so strong it made our stomachs turn.

It was a workshop alright, and it was fuckin’ huge. It spanned the length and width of the entire training field upstairs, and it had old desks and experiment tables lined with scattered metal bits and notes. The others searched—I didn’t want a damn thing to do with it. What I was fixated on was the wall we entered from: the entire thing was a spotless mirror, bigger than this whole tavern we’re in now.

The dark feeling in the pit of my stomach was too much. It infected me. I sat in front of it, depressed, staring at my sallow reflection that became more corpselike the longer I stared—when I looked down, my hands were normal, but that’s not how the mirror showed it. It shoved all sorts of thoughts into my head—thoughts that pissed me off. Maybe they’d been there the whole time, just uncovered now by the truth I saw in there. That pissed me off more, but mostly it just made me very, very tired.

I could tell the others were starting to feel it too, snapping at each other. Keelo started to get panicked, Euphor clammed up, and Promise just looked plain sad. I had a real nasty scowl on; could barely pick myself up, but I did, only to drag myself to an alcove where a cushy bed sat. I threw myself onto it.

Under me was a crumpled piece of paper. A startlingly well-rendered drawing of a woman I’d seen only once before, hopping on the speediest, most convenient wagon out of town.

‘Course… I didn’t really remember my mother’s face. A baby’s mind is too slippery for that, but the feeling is there. I didn’t even have the strength to crumple it up and throw it away; I just stuffed it into my armor and curled up further. Someone laid a blanket over me.

I kept that shit on me the whole rest of the journey. This piece is one I spent a little bit of time on each day after I returned. I still have the original portrait, but this is my best recreation of it. The purple temples was a detail I just couldn’t get out of my head, so I made sure to add that. No, I will not be showing off the original.

After a few minutes of anguish, which I’m a little tired of detailing so much—I mean, we’re slippin’ outta that and into something more comfortable, right? Anyway, I felt a pat on my back, and a little surge went through me; the same feeling as when Keelo cast that spell in Mistston. I felt a little lighter.

Maybe that’s not it. Maybe I felt the weight all the same, but I bore it on my skinny legs.

I got up, went over to that mirror, facing down the thing reflecting all my useless fear back at my me, and punched through it. It didn’t take much for the fracturing glass to ripple and shatter entirely, crumbling to the ground.

We all stopped for a minute. The heavy feeling wasn’t gone, but now we saw its source.

There was a rocky tunnel behind it. At the end of it was a dark portal.

Didn’t get the chance to go in, but a big rhino-lookin’ critter with sharp teeth and tentacles charged out from it! We’d already looted the man’s shiniest vault though, and some flame spells, magic arrows, and ol’ Bug Repellant did the trick just fine. It might’ve been our toughest fight yet—Euphor had been takin’ the dark feeling harder than we realized. He was covered in a layer of sweat, and when the thing died, it fell over on top of him. When we pulled him out, kicking and screaming, he bashed the thing’s head in with his boot. Only time I ever saw him well and truly lose his shit.

Before that thing’s blind eyes popped out of its skull, though, they looked at me funny. I’ve been trying to figure out what that look meant—got easier after I learned more. I think it was something like awe, or respect. Understanding. Relief.

We didn’t need to enter the portal to know where it led. I don’t think we’d’ve survived if we did. Keelo was knowledgable enough about the planes to know this was the plane of shadows, home of Dark. We were travelin’ through a veritable charcuterie board of Elder Gods, and this one surprised me the least. Harvest and Light both shared a nemesis, and it made sense that she held one of Harvest’s Favors for her own. Sucked real bad that this was one of the closest ones, but that was no doubt the reason she chose me.

GALLERY OF FORTUNE SIMPLECREEK—RECEIPT—9/18/1316

EXHIBIT #12: "SLIPPERY MIND" SOLD TO MAN IN CLOAK (2,000 GP)