Session 9: Belonging

Notice to parents: This adventure is intended for our teen and adults viewers. Parental discretion is advised. Thank you.

Persons of Note:

Fred .......... GM
Lydia ......... Sir Cyrus, Bastard Amberite (not declared a Prince)
Rob .......... Crown Prince Finndo
Jarrod ........ Prince Osric, twin to Finndo
Scott ......... Prince Benedict, youngest of the 3 brothers
Shai .......... Lady Sonnet Karm, no relation
Deborah ....... Sybil, the Fae
Cam ........... Lucan, Sonnet's eunuch sidekick

A brief explanation of stats: they translate as adjectives:

We use dice that have two + signs, two - signs and two blank sides (six sided, yes). The idea being that if we have a Good in a stat and we roll two - signs, we subtract two rankings for our results: Good is 2, minus 2, result; Average. If we had gotten all blanks, the result would have been Good; if we had gotten two +s, the result would have been Superb.

Hopefully that's useful to the reader.

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Before Game:

Paranoia expands to counter available gain:

GM to Jarrod: "Well, actually, you're in the best position..."
Jarrod: "That's not comforting, somehow."

Meet Cam. Cam is our guest star this session. Cam is Wacky:

Cam: "You are drawing outside the liiiiiines. I'm sorry! It's not my fault; you are completely inept."

Continuity is important, you see:

Lydia: "Yes, we were in the process of dying, I believe."
Fred: "Yep. You're dead. I really just wanted to gather you here for that."
Jarrod: "Thank you, Fred."

Careful what you whine for:

Deborah: "How come I don't get a packet?"
Scott: "Because you were still conscious at the end of the last session!"
Rob: "You get to see it all happen."
Jarrod: "Congratulations."

Folks have devolved into discussing their old Ambermush features (if you don't know, send up a thought of thanks to the deity of your choice). Note: Osric is traditionally a character from the Amber series who is treated as a special guest star in the Ambermush context, casted from time to time by application. It's good to compliment your friends:

Lydia to Rob: "Oh. You were not the _lame_ Osric, then..."

On likely consequences:

Cam to Deborah: "Yes, do not hassle the GM. Are you insane?"
Jarrod: "... for you are crunchy and good with ketchup."

The reputation of evil is evil:

Cam: "Yes, Fred was lying to you. I will not be playing Lucan this game; I will be Dworkin in disguise."
Everyone looks at Fred to _check_, fallacy or not.
Fred lifts his forefinger to his lips: "Shhhh."

It is my place as a strong GM. It is your place as players to submit. It is not wrong. It is your nature. It is the law of things. Accept the law and know you like it:

Fred: "I'm going to hurt you all."
Rob: "You're going to anyway."
Fred: "That's true."

Eric Wujik designed the original Amber diceless rpg, which we are not using. Views on his work... vary. On consequences, redux:

Cam: "From now on, I will be playing the part of Erik Wujcik."
Rob: "Okay, now comes the bitchslapping."

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When last we left our intrepid heroes, they had charged Ruustro's office. The Princes were inside, out cold; Sonnet and Lucan and Sybil were going after them into the burning building. Sonnet and Lucan were overcome by the smoke, Sybil was running into it after them... and, well, then the world shifts. On trending instability:

GM: "Last we saw, Sybil was running into the smoke."
Sybil: "Don't forget, I sent air elementals in ahead of me."
GM: "Yes. You've lost track of them."
Sybil: "Well, that was quick."

Use not the crutch, lest it be cast out from underneath you and you find yourself in film:

Sybil: "Smoke, no flames?"
GM: "No flames. Smoke... it's a lot like mist, isn't it?"
Sybil: "Okay. Another air elemental -"
GM: "With what?"
Sybil: "I have my bottles of them."
GM: "No you don't."
Sybil: "I brought them with me."
GM: "No, you're wearing something ... filmy."

When lost, go with the familiar assumptions:

Sybil: "Filmy."
GM: "Filmy."
Sybil: "Dear god, Lucan dressed me."

Sybil is apparently falling towards the ground from very high up. Her player takes a couple walks around the block to grasp this concept, so Lydia helps. Short, concise, succinct:

Sybil: "I'm falling towards that city, aren't I?"
Lydia: "Splat!"

Sybil summons an elemental (as she's falling) for help. On credit and creditors:

Sybil: "I'm falling!"
Elemental: "Yes."
Sybil: "10 gold!"
Elemental holds out a hand.
Sybil: "When I land!"
Elemental: "When you land, you will not be in a position to pay me."

He wasn't kidding about that 'gathered here' business:

GM: "And you land. You're dead."
Sybil: "I'm dead?"
GM: "You're dead."
Sybil: "Make a new char sheet dead?"
GM: "Yep. Dead. It's your last thought as you lose consciousness."

As it turns out, the packets everyone else received contained new histories - the histories, roles and lives their characters are deluded into thinking they have led all along. (They have no memory or notion of Amber or their roles in Amber; the Princes do not think they are brothers, for example.) Lucan believes that he is a pimp who owns a brothel, and Sonnet is his best whore. Noblewoman, bodyguard, whore, pimp: some relationships just don't change:

Lucan: "I do hope that's breakfast for me?"
Sonnet: "Would you like breakfast? It's breakfast for Benedict."
Lucan: "Are we charging him for that?"
Sonnet: "Since when do we charge him for breakfast?"
Lucan: "Since I decided you always make it for him first."
Sonnet: "I'll make you some god damned breakfast!"

Sonnet feeds Lucan. A cook's heartiest assurances:

Sonnet: "And it's not poisoned, either."

Picture this sweet exchange surrounded by gaping, appalled players. You'll begin to get the idea:

Benedict: "Anything made by your hand is simply delicious..."
Sonnet: "Be careful out there today."
Benedict: "I'm always careful."
Scott: "Benedict gets you when he's done, gives you a kiss. Goes to see Lucan."

A boy's first, rose tinted love:

Scott: "My girl and her pimp!"

We pride ourselves on our exquisite customer service:

Lucan: "Was everything to your satisfaction this morning?"
Benedict: "Yes. Things were fine."
Lucan: "Up to our usual standards, I hope?"
Benedict: "Quite."

Do you have MRTG to track that squeaking?

Lucan: "As always sir, we only give you the finest -"
Benedict: "Benedict pays him."
Lucan: " - yes, thank you. And I will talk to them about the squeaking."
Benedict: "Yes thank you."
Lucan: "We are not all as gifted as you are."

Explanations for gab, best of:

Cam: "It's the uncomfortable silence which you have to fill with strange fawning noises."

Obsequiousness, how-to:

Benedict: "Have a good day."
Lucan: "I hope it will be only a little bit less good than yours, sir."

Finndo, meanwhile, is a merchant in the city. Osric is a crimelord. Finndo is married, has sons, and had a small problem with a young whore. Osric solved the problem (poor kid), and Finndo is now in his debt. Recently, Osric was attacked last night, and has demanded new clothes of Finndo. Now, children, the truly able sycophant knows that there are many ways in which to be obsequious:

Finndo: "I fear that what I have to offer is far from suitable for folk such as yourself."
Osric: "That's fine."

Benedict, meanwhile, is the Captain of the local guard. You can take the Prince out of Amber but you can't put sense into the Prince:

GM: "You're about 15 minutes into your rounds when you notice a bloody mess on one of those walls; you know it's since the last slumbering."
Benedict: "All right; are there any guardsmen here?"
GM: "No, not here. Nearby, maybe."
Benedict: "All right, I walk into the alley to investigate."

Performance review:

Lucan: "I don't think he's happy."
Sonnet: "Happy? With you or with me?"
Lucan: "I don't think he's happy with anything?"
Sonnet: "How can you tell?"
Lucan: "I've had three before when you were at your best, Sonnet. I spent at least ten minutes fawning over him because I could /tell/."

Understanding one's place (well, the girl didn't want to marry, afterall):

Sonnet: "What did he ask for tonight?"
Lucan: "He didn't ask. He doesn't speak much. You know his manner."
Sonnet: "Yes, I know his manner, and then the door closes, and then I really know his manner!"
Lucan: "That is your work."

It's Lucan. He's STILL dressing her inappropriately:

Lucan: "I decided that for this evening, you will be wearing the sapphire."
Sonnet: "The sapphire, again?"

The little complaints that make the day go by:

Sonnet: "I had to work over that gem merchant for three hours - what, does he have a prostate issue? He kept going to the bathroom."
Lucan: "We are not discussing our clients, Sonnet."

Limits! Boundaries! Something! Please! (Folks, they are making this up as they go along. Ad-libbing. I am SO serious. Cam as a player is legendary for his ability to blather on the fly.)

Sonnet: "How about Eloise? She's not doing anything, is she?"
Lucan: "Because she's missing half her face!"
Sonnet: "Well, ever since the - she's in bandages, isn't she?"
Lucan: "They're very attractive bandages!"
Deborah: "OH FOR GOD's SAKES! Fred, make them STOP!"
Fred sticks his fingers in his ears. "Lalalalalala."

A man needs his small comforts:

Finndo: "As soon as they leave, I am locking the door behind them and violating the sacred tenets of the living flame and finding my secret stash of liquor."

Roles in society are very important:

GM: "Cyrus, you do see Benedict and a few guardsmen poking about where you know you were jumped. Do you skulk?"
Cyrus: "Oh no. Not with the guardsmen."
GM: "You move on, then."
Cyrus: "We are not here! We are merely Honest Citizens on our way to the Den Of SIN!"

You can saunter, but you can't hide:

GM to Benedict: "You do spot Osric; they're moving quickly and going to the den of sin."
Cyrus: "I am sauntering casually."
GM: "He's going a little fast. You do know his reputation."

Benedict garners Osric's attention and leads him, sans Cyrus (who has sauntered down a few feet to watch, unknown by Benedict), to the bloody wall in the alley. There are things you can say in this city and things you cannot. 'Because you're a crimelord, Honored Sir,' is apparently not a 'can say' sort of thing. Osric is perhaps the best fit to his new role:

Benedict: "Would you happen to know anything about this?"
Osric: "Not at all."
Benedict: "Would you happen to know who might have done something like this?"
Osric: "Guardsman, why would I?"

When all you have a is a hammer, or a look...

Benedict LOOKs at him.
GM to Benedict: "You definitely know that you can't say anything beyond that look."

Not to neglect Finndo, the GM asides to him. Not to neglect to Rob, the peanut gallery chimes in:

GM to Finndo: "You are SO drunk."
Shai: "Are there any girls there?"
Cam: "Are there any chaosians there? I wanna do 'em!"

Meanwhile, the Honest (relatively) Captain Benedict continues to interro- er, nicely inquire of the Honest Citizen Crimelord Osric. Interpreting an innocent question (think Godfather):

Osric to Benedict: "Do you have a family?"
Deborah: "Do you have a horse you like?"
Jarrod stares at Deborah.

Being helpful:

Cam: "He has a /whore/ he likes..."

Interpretation, Round II:

Scott: "I think he's young, so he has this position not through family..."
Deborah, helpfully: "I think he meant in terms of family to threaten, or a horse's head to leave in your bed."

The GM explains to Benedict that in this moderately corrupt (delusional, non existant dream) city, the law's job is not to uphold the law. Rather, the law is to not inconvenience the criminals and business. Peanut Gallery clarification ensues:

GM: "The very lawful justice people don't last long in your job; they get sent to the periphery where they can't make any trouble."
Cyrus: "Please Watch This Pond."
Rob: "The fish are very dangerous."

Insincerity with a Capital I:

Benedict: "Thank you for your time, honored sir."
Osric: "If I can EVER be of service to you, Captain, you have ONLY to call me."

I wept that I had no shoes until I saw a man without feet:

Deborah: "I'm dead!"
Rob: "I'm drunk!"
Deborah: "I went SPLAT!"

We all have our issues, but Shai pretty much wins this one:

Deborah: "I'm dead!"
Rob: "I'm drunk!"
Deborah: "Splat is bigger than drunk!"
Shai: "I boffed Benedict!"

When the GM says 'you're not dead', don't argue. Unless you're Deborah:

GM: "Sybil, you're floating."
Deborah: "I'm dead!"

Alternately, you can get your brain stuck in a loop:

GM: "You're floating. That's the first sensation that comes back to you."
Shai: "You see a bright light ahead..."
Deborah: "I'm dead!"
GM, agreeably: "It does jive well with your expectations of being dead..."

Meanwhile, back at the brothel, Osric has come to visit. Lucan goes into action - er, metaphorically speaking:

Lucan: "Worthy squires! WELCOME to the den of sii - sighs! May I please you?" He snaps his fingers. "Fluffers!"
GM: "Women exude from the corners of the room, and I do mean exude."
Shai: "These are the women who don't want to do anything else except... wave palm fronds."
GM: "Right, they bring you spiced wine; that sort of thing."
Lydia: "There is no tickling in the real city."

When in doubt, obsequiate:

Osric: "We need to talk."
Lucan: "Huge big shining smile."

Would honored sirs enjoy our discount whore, from our slightly imperfect line?

Lucan: "Well, I can offer you Eloise; she is currently off duty; she is injured, and quite hideous, but still quite adept."
Osric: "We will be happy to inspect them."
Lucan: "This way, sir.

Sybil, it resolves, is now a ghost. She has resolved, in fact, into a ghost in Finndo's home, where Finndo is still getting thoroughly drunk. Let's check the important details:

GM: "You see Finndo sitting there in strange clothing, hands wrapped around a bottle. Every few minutes he takes a slug."
Sybil: "And I'm still wearing film."
GM: "Yep."

Lucan meant messengers, but the GM felt a need to clarify. Look, I just take the quotes down; I don't come up with them:

Lucan to Osric: "Also, I often have a need for small unwashed boys -"
Deborah: "Of for GOD's sakes!"
GM: "Right, but you don't do that here, Cyrus."

If only project managers thought the way Lucan does:

Lucan to Osric: "I was going to arrange a meeting, but as you are always so kind and always so sensitive to my scheduling, you are already here and on time!"
GM to Osric, whose player looks dubious at best: "What a load of crap."
Osric: "Oh, give over."

On Timing:

GM to Lucan: "After he told you to shut up..."
Shai: "Sonnet makes an Entrance. With a capital E."

Addams Family Values:

Lucan to Sonnet: "Here. Sit down; you've been summoned."
Sonnet: "Sonnet blows him a kiss." She mimes this.
GM, proudly: "No two better people to play these roles..."
Jarrod looks soooo pained.

Some men drink. Some men actually mix their drink with their penance:

Finndo: "I mutter a brief prayer."
Lydia: "To the sacred flame!"
Finndo: "The flame warms me in the night," and he drinks, "it protects me from the creatures of the dark," and he drinks...

Sybil, now a ghost, tries to get Finndo's attention - initially by calling his name. On defining characteristics:

Sybil: "Finndo!"
Finndo drinks.
Sybil: "Do you think you're Cyrus now?!"
Finndo drinks.
Sybil, blinking: "Apparently you do."

Lucan is explaining to Osric. There have been... problems, but what's a girl to do? (You can take the girl out of Karm...)

Lucan: "Sonnet is my best and so unless we hire someone else, which I don't think is likely, since the last person I hired was Eloise, and as I have mentioned, she is now missing half her visage. I was going to train her up, but Sonnet not liking replacements..."
Sonnet, sweetly: "It was a dreadful fingernail filing accident."

How's that song go? ~Smart and coy, a little vindictive... the kind of face that starts a fight~:

Osric: "You now, I think I might have a bit of information: she is scaring them to death."
Lucan: "Some of my clients like that."
Sonnet: "Oh you two talk. I am as gentle as a dove."

Lucan sends a minion to tail Benedict. Clever conversational gambits not so much the specialty:

GM: "What do you tell the boy to say to Benedict if he gets caught?"
Cam: "That he's always liked him?"

Meanwhile, Sonnet preps for work. Only Sonnet could have made this an innuendo:

Sonnet: "What would you gentlemen like?"
Cyrus, cheerfully: "We have a list!"
Sonnet: "Oh I like lists."

A certain blase' attitude must be helpful:

Osric: "Lips are not as loose as they were?"
Shai: "Well, some lips are tighter than others. Would you care for something to drink?"
Rob: "And it just fell in!"

It's just that some of us can't manage the blase' attitude at all (check the top of the page):

Deborah: "Oh that was the most - I am going to have to rate my quotes for children."

No no no, it's plunder, pillage, THEN burn:

Finndo: "Now comes the guilt and the prayer."
Lydia: "And the vomiting!"
Finndo: "First comes the vomiting, and then the guilt and the prayer."

Sybil is still trying to get Finndo to notice her presence. Getting a bit drastic:

Sybil: "I yell his name, yell at him, try to kick him, seize the bottle, dance at him Sonnet style - that ought to get his attention."

Regrets, regrets, they plague me:

Sonnet: "If Sybil had only lived, we would have taken over this business by now."
Deborah: "It's nice to be missed."

Meeting your business's needs:

Lucan: "I need you to put the soporifics in this."
Sonnet: "You want to loosen lips? You know who they are!"

No dumb boy he, Osric has Cyrus play tester when served by Sonnet. Again with the details:

GM to Cyrus: "Seems fine. It's not alcoholic. You think."
Shai: "It's just coffee. And some soporific, but."

Making it up as he goes along, just a wee bit:

Lucan: "Gentlemen! You will observe I have new pants!"
Osric: "I am so pleased."

Notice that the Planning One has no idea what the Blathering One is blathering on about:

Lucan: "Now about revising our plans."
Osric: "Plans."
Lucan: "Yes, about revising the exchange and flow of information."

Now, mind you, Cam is not like this in RL. No, really, he's NOT:

GM to Jarrod (about Cam's Lucan): "Have you asked him about last night?"
Jarrod: "I've been trying to, but he won't shut up."
GM: "It is his way."

The captain appears less responsive over time to his bribe (Sonnet) to mind his own affairs (to wit, none of this investigating murders or blood on alley walls). Accountability must be had:

Osric: "You have local thugs."
Lucan: "I have local thugs?"
Osric: "Yes."
Lucan: "But I am sure I leave that all to you!"
Osric: "Hardly. Perhaps you are not paying the captain well enough."

Knowing when you're beat:

Lucan: "My apologies; I will see that he is paid more and there will be more woman for him."

Excuses, excuses:

Osric: "That would explain why your customers are not talking as much."
Lucan: "Yes, I keep losing women."
Osric: "Losing women?"
Lucan: "Yes, they come here and they are whores and women of the night and the unclean and then they find someone they like and they get married in the usual way and I have to arrange for them to be forgotten here; it's not very involved."
Sonnet: "And then there's the ones I kill."
Lucan: "And then there's the ones that don't make it."

Sybil is STILL trying to get to Finndo. Being a ghost, she goes through solid matter. All that waving about and slamming around and whisking through the house results in:

GM to Finndo: "The door to your prayer room is rattled briefly."
Finndo, praying more emphatically: "Oooooh..."

Sybil has discovered that she can influence objects to some small degree. She has left Finndo's home, come across Benedict, and is now trying to get his attention. An innocent enough question, a not innocent enough answer:

Deborah: "Does he have anything sticking out of him - OH GOD."
Shai, helpfully reminding: "That's Sonnet's job."

Sybil waves her hand through the sword back and forth. Second deadliest man in the kingdom and he can't even keep his sword on:

GM: "Nothing happens; he walks a few more paces and then the ties on the sword come undone and it falls to the ground."
Benedict: "That /never/ happens."
GM: "No. It doesn't!"

The man can scare the dead, apparently:

Sybil: "Yes! I work on his coin purse and wave my hands frantically!"
GM: "Your coin purse opens to the ground. Coins scatter."
Scott: "Ben goes PURPLE! Defcon 1!"
Sybil: "EEEP!"

Sybil learned to read and write to a minor degree during winter court. Sadly, she did not learn Gheneshi (which is what the dream city speaks, and thus the only language the lost Princes think they know). On the value of an education:

Sybil writes her name in the dust.
GM: "Symbols that are not Gheneshi appear in the dust..."
Sybil: "And an arrow towards Finndo's house."

Benedict fails to take the bait and, despite all the waving of arms and drawing of arrows, firmly goes the other way. Sybil _could_ take this in stride and cope. Or, well:

Sybil: "Stupid Amberites! Stupid stupid Amberites!"

Not one to give up, she keeps after Benedict. On assessing your demographic:

Sybil: "I draw arrows frantically in the dust."
GM: "She's going so hastily that lines just sort of appear but the dust is in the way -"
Benedict: "I kick up dust and I walk forward, very briskly."
GM: "What are you doing, Sybil?"
Sybil: "Ooooooh!!!! GRRRRR! Well, he's more useful than Wanna Be Cyrus back there, so I run ahead of him -"

Segues, smooth and otherwise:

GM: "There's a melon cart ahead."
Sybil: "I wave my hand back and forth through the support of the cart -"
GM to Benedict: "You /just/ walk past the cart when there's a click from a latch and melons roll free."
Lucan: "She's getting good at this. Speaking of rolling melons, I go find Sonnet..."

Religious icons, random, flailing and otherwise (follow the shoe! no, follow the gourd!). Hey, use what you have:

GM: "He has picked up the melon."
Sybil: "Is there dust on the melon?"
GM: "Yes, actually. It's pretty dusty."
Sybil makes arrow drawing gestures.
GM: "That actually works pretty well."
Lydia: "I have found the mystic melon..."

Using produce by way of dousing rod, pr problems with:

Sybil: "I clap in the melon."
GM to Benedict: "It's kind of like holding a gyroscope."
Jarrod: "God, I hope none of his people see him." He mimes Benedict holding out a melon, staring at it and turning this way and that.

By a game of hot and cold melon agitation and arrows, Sybil leads Benedict to Finndo (she is trying to reunite the brothers so they can get back to Amber). Just... accept and move on:

Benedict: "I knock on Finndo's door."
Sybil: "The melon gets very excited."

So. Benedict and Finndo have an opportunity to speak. Mind you, drinking is frowned on by the mosques. Excuses, the Gheneshi-Irish way:

Benedict: "Knockknockknock."
Finndo: "Who is it?"
Benedict: "The captain of the guard!"
Finndo opens the door.
GM: "He has a melon at his feet. And he smells of liquor."
Finndo: "Welcome, welcome. I fear I am not in a position to be the best of hosts; how may I assist your august personage?"
Benedict: "Have you been drinking?"
Finndo: "I regret that I did take a nip off some small amount of it that was in the house."

Sybil agitates the door until it shuts; she is trying to keep Benedict with Finndo. They're never paying ATTENTION when a ghost is just trying to tell them something:

GM: "The door slams shut behind you."
Finndo: "The man does not question Benedict's poor manners in doing so."
GM to Sybil: "Yeah, Finndo wasn't looking when you do that."
Benedict: "Benedict looks at the door."
Finndo: "Finndo is pouring coffee."

There is silence. Sybil looks between them as nothing happens and it is clear the brothers are not going to recognize each other as brothers, cast off their delusions and free themselves. Sexism is not limited to the living:

Sybil: "MEN! I should have gotten Sonnet."

Conversation made awkward by Sybil agitating the coffee pot:

Benedict: "Any odd disturbances of late?"
Finndo: "None that can report."
GM: "Coffee splashes out of the pot."

Small talk, Gheneshi style. One does not question Captains whose coffee pots assault them:

Finndo: "I look forward very much to my good sons supporting me in my old age."
Benedict: "Ah, yes, of course."
Finndo: "It is good to have strong sons."
Sybil mucks about; water spouts out of the coffee pot's spout.
Finndo: "Is your coffee too hot?"

Benedict, at least, has caught on. Only he associates it with Finndo. Rank Hath Its Privileges:

Benedict leans back, waiting.
Sybil knocks over his coffee cup.
Benedict: "Does this happen often?"

Being Difficult is more than just a lifestyle choice:

Benedict: "Whatever you are, stop it!"
Finndo: "I'm sorry captain, have I offended you somehow?"
Benedict: "Now. Watch." He puts out his pouch.
Sybil: "I can't resist. Nothing happens."

Oh, fine, I'll be a good poltergeist, not that they won't explain it away:

Sybil: "However, his robe..."
Benedict: "You seem to have a problem with your clothing, Master Merchant."
Finndo: "I dressed hastily this morning."

The good doctor sees where this is going:

Benedict: "I tie my coins back at my waist."
Jarrod to Scott: "You're going to lose your pants, you realize that, right?"

When frustrated, express your needs articulately:

Finndo: "I start praying."
Sybil: "BE QUIET!"

Cyrus, meanwhile, is 'investigating'. Methodology goes something like this:

Cyrus: "Do you have anything to tell me? No! BAM! Next!"

Lucan has informed Sonnet that she is to be accompanied in her work with Benedict that evening. Osric asked. Osric may regret that. Moments a la Grosse Pointe Blank:

Lucan: "She's recruiting women to be indifferent to her. She recruits by knife throwing; the ones who are brave enough to stand there past the first part of the test; the ones who don't show up aren't worthy; the ones who flinch have problems with their features and I wouldn't want them anyway."
Osric: "Do you have health insurance?"

I don't think this would stand up in Court, gentlemen:

Lucan: "They're not employed yet!"
Lydia: "I _am_ his health insurance!"

Benedict, plagued by arrow drawing apparitions, goes to see a specialist about them. Understatement of the day:

Benedict: "Master merchant!"
Psychic: "Yes?"
Benedict: "I am in need of advice."
Psychic shows him in, "Please."
Benedict: "I have noticed some strange disturbances today during my travels."

Lies, damned lies, and acronyms:

Psychic: "Strange how?"
Benedict: "Localized dust events, strange symbols being drawn - "
Jarrod: "Localized dust events? What are you, a meteorologist?"
Cam: "We call them LDEs!"

On bargaining, methods to cut short:

Benedict: "I am curious -"
Psychic: "You are haunted by a ghost, perhaps, or some other spirit. Or perhaps a demon."
Benedict: "Perhaps."
Psychic: "Demons are very expensive to get rid of."
GM: "Do you give him a look?"
Benedict: "Benedict gives him a look."
Psychic: "But of course for an honored man like yourself -"

Coin, truth. Very good friends in Ghenesh:

Benedict: "Do you have much experience with this?"
Psychic: "Well, of course, many - well not really. There are not many who would."
Benedict: "Do you know any who would?"
Psychic: "No, not really -
Benedict: "Coin on the table."
Psychic: "Well, no, they're very hard to -"
Benedict: "Coin on the table."
Psychic: "Well, perhaps my brother. Hazim! We have a client in need of special services!"

Summing up the quality of the establishment:

GM to Benedict: "And by special we mean real."

Hazim comes out from behind the curtain and replaces his brother the 'psychic'. Benedict has apparently associated money with the haunting; Hazim likely associates money with work. We all have our communication hangups:

Hazim: "Is it around you now?"
Benedict: "Benedict puts out his coin sack in front of him."
GM: "He seems to be trying to figure out if you're trying to pay him."
Benedict: "No."

A guy's gotta try:

Benedict: "Would you have any suggestions?"
Hazim: "That depends what you would have done with it."
Benedict: "To be honest, I wish it gone. It did a nice job of smashing up the household of a Master Merchant."
Hazim: "Oh. May I inquire as to its location?"
Benedict: "No."

Cyrus, while out, noticed shadows that shifted and did not seem to belong to anything. Conversational openers, Cyrus style:

Cyrus: "So. Boss. Notice any darkness?"

Conversational openers, Lucan style. The wackiness continues:

Lucan: "Ah, worthy sir!"
Benedict: "Are we alone?"
Lucan: "At present, yes. I am at present preparing dinner for Sonnet. Every once in a while, I reward my women with a fine meal.
Benedict: "Reward them you should.
Lucan: "Why is that?
Benedict: "I give him a Look."

When Lucan says surprise, WORRY:

Lucan: "Ah. Yes. I was concerned that Sonnet has not been pleasing in you as in the past; we will work on improving it even further. But such things will wait till later as a surprise, woo hoo!"
Benedict: "I think you should tell me now."

Answers a pimp does not want to hear when he says 'how may I help you':

Benedict: "I pick him up by the collar and slam him against the wall. 'You can stop interfering in my investigations.'"

I talk better when I can /breathe/, honored sir:

Lucan: "Well, now that you mention, perhaps I had some slight informants checking on your welfare, sir."
Benedict: "Why is that?"
Lucan: "Well, you're a very important client. Perhaps it would be best if you put me down."
Benedict: "Oh, yes. Right."

Understanding a man's needs better than he does is rule number one:

Lucan: "You're very out of sorts, sir. How may I be of assistance to calm you down? Perhaps coffee is not a good idea."

Understanding the threat to you is rule number two:

Benedict: "If I ever catch you interfering again, you will lose more than what you have already lost."

Back at Finndo's house, Finndo is praying. Oh, how the mighty have fallen:

GM: "You're checking one of those corners of your prayer room and the shadows are bigger than they should be."
Finndo: "I chase it with a broom."
GM: "It's growing."
Finndo: "I chase it with a broom and shout loudly!"

Shades of John Rhys Davies in Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade:

GM: "Your family comes in and sees this."
Finndo: "RUN!"
GM: "And it's spreading up a wall and the lights in the room are growing dimmer and your wife is gathering your children."
Finndo: "RUN!"

Common sense will out in the end - literally:

GM: "Your family leaves and now it's spreading across the wall."
Finndo: "Finndo starts praying very rapidly."
GM: "And now arms and legs come out of the wall; the fingers on these hands become knives."
Finndo: "And the prayer becomes a prayer on the virtues of running."
GM: "Do you follow your family?"
Finndo: "Yes! "

And at the local whorehouse - good kneejerk reflexes, there:

GM: "Scott, roll alertness."
Scott: "Legendary +1."
GM: "You hear yelling and cries of distress further away."
Benedict: "I leave. I run towards it!"

Now, Sybil had fastened on Sonnet, and Sonnet ran after Benedict, pulling Lucan around. So, gentle reader, picture this parade. All they need are some floats and balloons. Protection, Benedict?

GM to Benedict: "And you have a whore and a pimp following you."
Benedict: "I grab guardsmen."

What ails you, Master Merchant? Just the facts, ma'am - sir:

GM to Benedict: "You see Finndo running down the street with a broom."
Finndo: "Shadows knives arms legs knives house aaaaah!"

The guardsmen and Benedict surround the house; Benedict sends the guards in ahead. The result, when he himself follows, is not heartening:

GM: "You saw an extremely dark room and a guard is yanked up and there's a pool of blood in the room."

Sybil, despite the fact that she's dead, tries summoning a fire elemental (named Hakim) - what the hell, afterall (no pun intended). It works. After a manner of speaking:

Sybil: "Get that!" She points at the knife handed shadow.
Hakim: "That is the true darkness! You'd don't fight the true darkness!"

Well, FINE, let's redefine the parameters. This leads to awkward questions that can be taken several ways (Benedict, in his current delusion, does not recall ever seeing an elemental before). Ask a question, get an answer:

Sybil: "Protect him!"
Hakim: "Sir, I am here to protect you."
Benedict: "What the hell is that!"
Hakim: "That is the true darkness! I suggest you run!"

'That's not in my job description':

Benedict: "How do you fight that?"
Hakim: "You don't fight it; you - as my way of protecting you, you will run now!"

Agendas have changed since Amber:

Finndo: "MY HOUSE!"

Now, Benedict started out heroically facing the critter down, with Sybil between him and the shadow creatures (her idea, not his). ~When danger reared its ugly head, he bravely turned his tail and fled~:

GM: "It bats your saber out of your hand."
Benedict: "RUN! I run. Run!"
Jarrod: "He's advancing to the rear!"

A good sycophant siezes the opportunity:

Lucan: "We should - he's running. We're running with you! Sir, is there anything we can do to assist you: perhaps a moment of pleasure before the darkness?"

The psychic fed Benedict a vile potion that allowed Ben to see Sybil after a fashion; he also bound Sybil to a bottle and gave the bottle to Benedict. He did not trap her /in/ the bottle, per se. The effect had more to do with being tied to it by a string. Where that bottle went, Sybil had to go: it had her on a leash. So when Benedict skedaddles:

GM: "And Sybil," he mimes being dragged along.
Jarrod: "You're water skiing again."

At the local crimelord's office, a minion arrives with news. Sympathy 101 was an elective:

Minion: "Someone set Finndo's house on fire!"
Osric: "And?"
Cyrus: "We didn't do it this time!"

Doing the right thing for the wrong reason:

Minion: "I thought you would like to know!"
Osric: "_Someone_ should put it out, then."
Cyrus: "I'll go. Perhaps there will be something to hit."

Reality check moments:

Osric: "I have paperwork to do."
GM: "No you don't. You have paperwork to /forge/, maybe."

Cyrus has gone on ahead to fight the good fight at Finndo's house. Striking the dragon's tail:

GM: "You see a gigantic shadow with spiky hands stalking - you know that looks very familiar."
Cyrus: "Is it two dimensional or three dimensional?"
GM: "Two."
Cyrus: "This is a little bit bigger than something I was looking to hit."

Geeks, Bab5 freaks:

Finndo: "I am not letting go of this broom! This broom is all that stands between me and the darkness!"
Jarrod: "We sweep between the darkness and the light."

Benedict has booked. Cyrus has booked. The GM still feels a need to ask, and Lucan's player feels a need to be honest:

GM: "Lucan, Finndo, I assume you're running?"
Lucan: "No! Well, yes, but no - I was thinking of grabbing a lantern but then I realized I had no idea what to do so I ran."

Jarrod has been watching the carryingson. The GM mistakes aristocracy for concern:

GM: "I'm sorry; you wanted to do paperwork."
Jarrod: "No, I have staff for this."

Lucan, running through town, finds himself in what the GM terms Clientsville. Lucan is thinking of shelter; the GM is thinking of society:

Lucan: "Who's a good client that I would know -"
GM: "They certainly would not want you in their /house/."

This is just NOT what your employer wants to hear:

Cyrus: "Boss, there's a creature from the nether hells out and loose on the street!"

Durned pointy haired bosses:

Osric: "Of course there is!"

Keeping your eye on the ball:

Cyrus: "Boss, I don't think that's real good for business."
Osric: "I'm a bit short on dealing with creatures from the nether hells."
Cyrus: "Find a bright light!"
Osric: "I have torches..."

Civic minded folk, our local criminals:

Cyrus: "We need a street light fund."
Osric: "I'll get right on it."

A wee bit too much enthusiasm:

Cyrus: "I saw something!"
Osric: "When? What was it?"
Cyrus: "Well, it went away, but now we know what it is!"
Osric: "Right."
Cyrus: "So finish up your paperwork; I'll be out in the street!"

Cyrus has a clever plan, and as far as we can tell, he played hookie the day they handed out self preservation instincts:

Cyrus: "Cyrus is taking a bullseye lantern, going out and shuttering it, going to the darkest alley he can find, and opening it. "Come and fucking get me, you bastards!""

Finndo and his family have fled to the mosque, where they are praying frantically (as, incidentally, their house burns down). Lucan has followed them to the mosque and, being a good pimp, is siezing on the opportunity to recruit new ladies for his brothel. Lucan's sense of timing needs... work:

Lucan: "I'll find a young looking one [daughter of Finndo] and sit next to her. And I'll say to her, "In times of such crises, have you thought of the arts of pleasure?""
GM: "Finndo is getting up. He has a broom."
Lucan: "I move away."

Sybil realized that she can, in fact, still summon elementals. She hits on the notion of using the elementals to translate between her and the deluded Prince Benedict. She has the elemental explain to Benedict that he is, in fact, Finndo's brother in a place called Amber. A dubious defense of character:

Benedict: "That sniveling, whining merchant?"
Sybil: "It's forced on him! He's usually much more annoying!"
Osric: "I said counseling, not translate the other way."

Sybil persuades Benedict to gather all six of the comrades in one room where she can explain to all of them. Benedict summons a guardsman and gives orders; exasperated awkwardness at its best:

Benedict: "Fetch me Master Finndo, Master Lucan and the Lady Sonnet - yes, I know, I have a thing with a fez on my shoulder; just fetch them for me."

Gentleman Johnny Marcone ala Osric:

Scott to GM: "I assume I know that he is a criminal overlord of some kind -"
Jarrod: "I'm a simple business man."

Haunted by the paranormal, you say? That's old hat!

Benedict: "I find one of my contacts and ask him to have his master meet me."
Contact: "Of course, sir. Do you know you have a spirit on your shoulder?"
Benedict: "Yes, as a matter of fact, I do."

Loyalty binds two ways. Sort of:

Osric to GM: "I am in the very dark alley with my henchman."
GM: "WHY are you in the alley with him?"
Osric: "Because it's safer than not being with him in the alley. Cyrus, are you done having issues now?"

Never bullshit a bullshitter:

Lucan: "I have been considering -"
Finndo: "I would suggest against any atonement; hypocrisy in the face of religion is the greatest of sins."
Lucan: "What if I were to -"
Finndo: "What if you were to have a conversation elsewhere?" He lifts the broom menacingly.

Benedict has decided to host this meeting at Lucan's establishment. Conference rooms, orgie rooms: we serve all needs and all comers:

Benedict: "Is there a room in which we can all meet?"
Lucan: "The orgy room?"
Sonnet: "We can't go in there; it's being cleaned."

One little mishap and the man gives up on God:

Benedict: "Please remove all items offensive to religion from the room."
Lucan: "I tried religion; I found it to be very violent."

So Finndo, among others, comes to the whorehouse on request. The most polite 'what the fuck' ever:

Finndo: "I must say Captain; this is a most baffling event. I must inquire."

Scott describes the situation and adds a short description:

Scott: "Oh and Benedict has a little guy with a fez on his shoulder."
Jarrod: "Of coooouuurse you do."

When Finndo sees the little elemental on Benedict, he takes that Cyrus Wanna Be shtick a bit far:

Finndo: "STAND VERY STILL, CAPTAIN! I'll get it!" He rushes Benedict, broom raised.

Never trust a lawman, and especially not a haunted one:

Cyrus: "Boss, he's got a little guy with a fez on his shoulder."
Osric: "I noticed that. Watch EVERYTHING."

Benedict hands everyone a vile of the potion that allows them to see Sybil. Responses vary, but not all that far from paranoia:

Sonnet: "Are you sure about this? Have I displeased you in any way?"
Benedict: "No. Of course not. It's not poison."

And vary some more:

Lucan: "This is alarming. I'll take a drag on the hookah."

Someone had a Bad Cold Experience:

Cyrus: "I take the vial."
GM: "Of course, the employee does it."
Cyrus: "I sniff it."
GM: "It smells vile."
Cyrus: "What is it?"
Jarrod: "Nyquil."

Fatalism:

Cyrus: "The boss says I'm drinking."

Character Perspective drives points of view and agenda. For example:

Lucan: "At this point, I'm thinking: if I could get them all naked, I could make a lot on this."

Benedict and Sonnet have their heads together, and are keeping company quite closely. Sybil is alarmed at seeing this, and responds, er, negatively. Lucan not so much:

Sybil: "No touching! No touching! Don't touch her!"
Lucan: "Yes, touching, touch everything!"

Osric is the first to lock onto his true memories; unfortunately, he keeps both the real life and the false life in his head. Now, Sonnet is, inevitably, in the sapphire outfit that Lucan chose for her. Sonnet, historically, keeps ending up in Wildly Innapropriate Cover Art Garb. On recognition:

GM: "And, Osric, actually, what seems right to both your selves, is how she's dressed."

The discussion has devolved into whether to tackle the shadow creatures at Finndo's house or to tackle matters from a different angle. The trouble with meetings without a strong controlling agenda is that the results are chaotic:

Sybil: "It's a fake house!"
Osric: "We don't care about his house - "
Finndo: "Point of order!"
Lucan: "Touching! More touching!"

Benedict discovered that his 'unravelling' magic can undo the false memories - with varying success. Sonnet got stuck at 8 years old for a bit and is curled up on the floor, gibbering contentedly through her childhood. A good businessman keeps an eye on the contractual situation:

GM: "She's in her Karm childhood."
Sonnet: "Papa? Papa?"
Lucan: "That's not part of her arrangement."

Really, the only thing to add is 'GACK!':

Sonnet, in little girl voice, "Oh, so that's what you're doing, Lucan... Daddy's going to be very angry."

Benedict works his mojo on Cyrus to restore his true self. Defining traits of the True Cyrus:

Cyrus: "Anyone got anything to drink?"
Benedict: "Excellent!"
Jarrod and Deborah: "Oh he's back!"

Finndo, meanwhile, has been praying very hard, very rapidly and very loudly. Fraternal support vs bound support:

Benedict: "Do we have to bring him back? This is rather amusing."
Osric: "Yes, he is."
Sybil: "You have to bring him back. I'm bound to him."

Every little girl has her dream:

Sonnet: "I'll grow up and find a nice Prince and destroy his entire kingdom and we'll be married and live happily ever after..."

The delusional lives all took the best fit for each person; they reflected either their true nature or deepest wish. Finndo, long ago, had a true love; he lost her in a storm during Amber's naval war. Her loss destroyed him, and when he put his life back together, he did so through dogged duty. In the dream, he had a wife, and sons, and all the things the loss of his love had denied him. Having his real memory back took it all away again. Succinct medicine:

Finndo: "Finndo's prayer stops. He drops to his knees and his head hits the floor and he is _sobbing_."
Cyrus: "Yes. Where is the alcohol."

Lucan, bless him, is still trying:

Lucan: "Bring the alcohol. All of the alcohol. All of it. All."

Clinging desperately to the escape:

Scott: "I'm going to try Lucan. Fair."
GM points at Lucan: "Dude, you just lost your high."
Lucan grabs frantically for the hookah.

Of the broken Finndo:

Benedict: "Apparently I have unraveled him."

Aspirations are healthy:

Benedict: "We have got to get out of here."
Sybil: "Please can we go home."
Benedict: "And exact some revenge."
Sybil: "That would be nice, too."

Explaining _again_:

Cyrus: "Were the hell is your body anyway?"
Sybil: "How the hell would I know? I went splat! I'm dead! I fell, and I'm dead."

Cyrus tries to nudge Finndo into motion - surprisingly gently, at that. What makes Finndo who he is, and the Crown Prince:

Cyrus: "Duty calls."
Finndo: "Fuck that bitch."
Sybil: "Oh my god."
Osric: "Which?"
Finndo: "There is not a one of you who can give a pep talk to save their fucking life." He stands up, and walks out the door.

Everyone else is mostly back to themselves; Lucan is still a pimp and Sybil is still a ghost, bound to a bottle in Benedict's control. The bickering takes ten minutes to start:

Benedict picks up the bottle. To Sybil: "You see one of his rare smiles."
Sybil: "Benedict, you are giving me that bottle."
Benedict: "No, I'm not."
Sybil: "Or your pants are going to catch fire."
Osric: "SYBIL."

Finndo decides that the party is going to the oasis at the center of town. Not stopping for the niceties:

Benedict: "I grab Sonnet, and throw her over my shoulder."
GM: "Sack of potatoes."
Sonnet: "Papa, are we going to the games?"
Benedict: "Thunk. I knock her out. Sorry, Shai, but -"
Lucan: "What? My best -!"
Osric: "You're coming."
Lucan: "I havent been able to do that for quite some time."
Benedict: "Thunk. I cuff him."

We get to Ruustro's. The place is charred; there's a circle in the middle and a note in the center of the circle. When work takes over your life:

GM: "Lucan, you're starting to wake up, but you still believe you're a pimp."
Lucan: "Oooooh, costs, inventory, breasts."

What was that? Your transmission is breaking up - we're having equipment problems; so sorry we can't get your orders clearly:

Lucan: "Ooooh, Osric, we could never get you a woman. Why are you carrying me? I wish I was still high."
Osric looks at Benedict.
Benedict knocks Lucan out
Osric: "Not what I meant, but that will do."

Pay _attention_:

Sybil: "Does anyone have a plan?"
Cyrus: "We're stalking towards the oasis."
Sybil: "Oh. Why?"
Cyrus: "Someone might die in the center."
Sybil: "Have I done something wrong?"
Cyrus: "You already went splat. You're dead."
Sybil: "Oh Right."

When in doubt, bet on weirdness:

Lucan: "Please stop hitting me. I know you've all come across some interesting malady... and there are spirits in the air possessing us all..."

Family traits breed true:

Benedict: "I'm waiting to see what happens to them when they go in-"
GM: "You've lost sight of them."
Deborah: "You _are_ an Amberite!"

Through much finagling and cartomancy on Finndo's part, the party makes it through the center of the oasis and back into Ghenesh, the real city. Cyrus comes around first:

GM: "Something's nudging you, Cyrus."
Cyrus: "I try to wake up."
GM: "It's a plant. 'Hey, you awake?'"
Cyrus: "This is a familiar, friendly plant, or a new -"
Plant: "Have you tried to get me out of here yet?"
Cyrus: "Working on it. How did you get in here anyway?"
Plant: "I distressed the princes."
Cyrus: "The princes? How many of them?"
Plant: "I don't know, I'm a plant? Numbers, numbers, I used to know numbers - 6! The princes; I worked for the the the guy in charge the - Sultan! God, I have become a vegetable."

Sybil comes to in her body, whole, in one piece. Some people are just /never/ satisfied:

Sybil: "Oh, shit, I'm alive!"
Osric: "What an odd complaint."

Oops. We forgot to explain to the guest player what, exactly, he agreed to play. The summary gets more succinct and matter of fact every time:

GM: "You're back to being Lucan. True Lucan."
Cam: "What the hell does that mean?"
GM: "Shai, give him the rundown."
Lydia: "Furry in all the right places!"
Shai: "Furry in all the right places!"
Cam: "What?"
Shai: "Lucan was a child molester that much admired the young Sonnet, volunteered to be her bodyguard, her father said, we'll, that's the last promise you'll ever have to make, and for some reason they became the best of friends."
Cam stares.

A somewhat impatient Finndo:

Finndo: "Wake the hell up. It's a dream. You're not a plant. You're asleep. Wake up. It's all an illusion; it's their dream, if you can't handle it, then cope. We're off to kill everyone in this castle."

What are we going to do tomorrow night, Brain? The same thing we do EVERY night, Pinky:

Sybil: "Finndo? Do we have a plan?"
Finndo: "Yes."
Sybil: "What's the plan?"
Finndo: "Kill them all."
Osric: "Kill everything."
Sybil: "All right. Very good, then."

Tactics versus Strategy versus three wheeled cars:

Cyrus: "I feel obliged to point out in a rare moment of prudence that there may be political ramifications to slaying the entire royal family of Ghenesh."
Sybil looks confused.
Finndo just smiles.
Osric: "This isn't right."
Cyrus: "I'm just issuing a disclaimer."

A good GM adapts to his players' wackfulness:

GM: "Finndo's forward; first guy who comes up to him gets a quick jab with his -"
Finndo: "Broom."
GM: "Broom. So much for his kneecap."

Rationalizations are a personal thing:

Sybil: "Why are we killing the royal family?"
Finndo: "We might just wake them up."
Osric: "This is just a dream. This is their dream city."
Lucan: "They're enjoying a moment of regicide, that's all."

A brief explanation: The party has concluded that the royal family of Ghenesh is responsible for trapping them in a dream city with alternate lives where they could be hunted down by large, knife handed shadows. (Remember, the royal family made a bargain a long time ago to have the city of their dreams in exchange for giving up control of the real thing. Therefore, the royal family was dreaming Ghenesh; the party was trapped in the dream; the party decided that the royal family had in effect been responsible for trapping the Princes. In Amber speak, this means that Ghenesh's royals need to die. So our party has come back through the oasis in the dream city back to the garden in the center of Ghenesh's palace. Conveniently inside, they proceed to take out the palace's guards and hunt down the individual members - six of them - of the family. The first one they come across is the Sultan in his Hall:

Oh, yes, well, if you're going to bring /that/ up:

Sultan: "Stop."
Cyrus: "Who are you?"
Sultan: "I am the sultan."
Sonnet: "Where are your guards?"
Sultan: "You have killed them."

The party confronts the Sultan. Largely this consists of three things: Finndo sends off a royal flush of playing cards to find the royal family, Sybil summons a large number of fire elementals to wait on her command, and the Sultan gets bullied. Rob gets the Vast Understatement award for the evening:

Finndo: "Finndo moves his broom to his left hand, and parts the cards enough to reach through and grab the guy by the collar and pin him to the wall."
Lydia: "That's my move!"
Rob: "Finndo's not happy."

Why you don't sell X to Amber Princes:

Lydia: "Cyrus is all for fake happiness."
Osric: "Yes, yes he is."

Back to Finndo and the Sultan, whom Finndo is holding against the wall by his collar. Opening Diplomatic Channels:

Sultan: "What? Unhand me- ooof!"
Finndo: "The royal family made a pact with a demon of darkness and this is their dream. Where are they?"

Too many adventure serials as a kid:

Sultan: "I have no idea what you're talking about!"
Finndo applies pressure to his throat: "Think hard."

Cause and effect, ladies and gentlemen. The trouble with an open door policy these days:

Cyrus: "He might be telling the truth."
Finndo: "That is entirely possible, at which point he becomes useless to me."
Benedict: "And he becomes dead."

Stubborness looks like this:

Sultan: "Your kingdom can fall too, you know."
GM: "... and it's a different voice."
Finndo: "That is entirely possible. Think very hard."

I'm going to count to three, and if you're not behaving yourself... :

GM: "His head is inflating."
Finndo gives him a minute. "Are you done?"
GM: "He tries to bite you."
Benedict: "I am waiting, and at that point, flat of the blade across the head."
Finndo: "You're just trying to make me angrier, aren't you? Try again."
GM: "He's got long, pointy teeth."
Finndo: "Three, two..."

_Focus_, man. Focus:

GM: "Osric, you notice that Finndo's royal flush has taken off during this manifestation. It didn't hang around."
Osric: "Finndo, the cards are gone."
Finndo: "Oh. Sorry."

Finndo has the cards floating around him (rather than the royal flush that went to, er, flush out the royal family) shoot forward and cut the Sultan up. A certain job satisfaction:

Finndo: "Sybil, burn him."
Sybil snaps her fingers, "Make him toast."
GM: "The room is rapidly catching fire."
Sybil: "Just this room. Nothing else. Yet."
Elementals: "Anything for gold!"

Finndo splits the royal flush: Ace to Cyrus, King to Finndo, Queen to Osric, Jack to Benedict, 10 to Sybil, 9 to Sonnet. The party splits up and each member follows their card. Seeking one's basic truths:

GM: "Cyrus, you move fast enough and hard enough that the guards don't stand in your way for long. Eventually, the ace comes to a door."
Cyrus: "I kick the door down."
GM: "The lock holds fast."
Cyrus: "Fuck. Duh. I try picking the lock. Superb."
GM: "Lock goes."
Cyrus: "I open the door."

You were supposed to KILL the kid, not TALK to them:

GM: "There's a small child in there, maybe four, maybe six, young. She's cowering, looking at you."
Cyrus: "Who are you?"
GM: "Now I'm going to have to look at my notes; crap."

Cyrus has, among a long list of issues, a problem hurting small children - he won't even slap them down, let alone kill them. Oops:

Arissa: "I'm Arissa. Please don't hurt me."
Cyrus: "Where is your father?"
Arissa: "You killed him; I felt it."
Cyrus: "You felt it?"
Arissa: "I felt it, it hurt."
Cyrus: "How could you feel it?"
Arissa: "How should I know; it hurt."
Lydia: "I'm not allowed to beat up a small child; this is very bad."

Pleasantly efficient:

GM: "Finndo. You follow the card through a secret door and you see a short figure dart around the corner."
Finndo: "I send a storm of blades after him."
GM: "There's a scream around the corner."
Finndo: "I let the storm finish and then I check the card to make sure."

An upset Finndo is a rather machinelike Finndo:

GM: "The card is still hovering."
Finndo: "I go around the corner."
GM: "There's a small child, bleeding, huddled there."
Finndo: "Well, I crack open its skull."
GM: "It turns and looks at you, "No. I don't think so." And the shadows grow."
Finndo: "I make it very light in here."
GM: "It hisses and wails and diminishes."

You've got to be kidding:

GM: "Cyrus, have you figured out what you're doing yet?"
Cyrus: "I am making my best attempt at soothing noises."

You have to tip your hat to a man who keeps his eye on the ball:

GM: "Osric?"
Osric: "I am chasing a card."
GM: "The card jumps up several flights of stairs and then you're on top of a wall and you're chasing a preteen."
Osric: "I follow."
GM: "A series of arrows come in towards you."
Osric: "I am trying to gain; that's the whole point."

We use fate points as a mechanic that allows us to add dramatic impact to our rolls and direction for our characters if we need it. Some of us, uhm, tend to, er, horde them. The GM announced at the start of the game that the fate points were now currency: ten amber fate points were the equivalent of a blue fate point. A blue fate point could be spent on the fly for a Fair in a skill that we had forgotten to buy in advancement. For just such moments, actually, as this:

GM: "What are you doing?"
Osric: "Running like hell; I'll blow the ten on it."

Atmosphere, atmosphere, atmosphere:

GM: "There seems to be this large dark thing with hooks into the kid, growing behind him; you can't actually see it, you just have this general sense of -"
Osric: "General sense of doom."

Again with the linear thinking:

GM: "Yes. Kid's maybe ten."
Osric: "Kid's evil; he has to die."

Speaking different metaphors (it's better than shrieking 'Die, brat!'):

Osric: "You know what you have to do."
Kid: "No, what?"

This is what the gaming industry refers to as 'not a good sign':

GM: "Sybil."
Sybil: "I follow the card."
GM: "Hee hee."

Been there, done that:

GM: "Sybil, you and your small army, who are swarming after you, around a corner, around a corner again, and you clamber into a kitchen. And there's a kid, a boy, young teen, standing n one of the corners. He stands and looks at you. Are you ready?"
Sybil: "Are you ready to tell me the truth?"
Boy: "Yes. The truth is you die tonight."

Sybil starts out attacking the darkness before she rethinks that:

Sybil: "I'm summoning as much as I can." Result: legendary +4. "LOTS of light for the darkness."
GM: "There's such a confusion of brightness that it's blinding even for you -"

Who said a fae can't be sensible:

Sybil: "Run!"
GM: "And you get out of there and there are spikes of darkness and then there's a scream that elongates into that wail we heard before and the walls go molten..."
Sybil: "RUNNING! Oh boy."

Meanwhile, Osric is pelting his way along the wall towards his target while arrows rain down at him and someone else charges towards him from behind the target. That's Bond. James Bond:

GM: "You get up just in time for two of them to close with you. The guy comes up and he's about to strike you when the other one comes up behind him... and runs him through. He removes his blade and says, in Selm's voice, "We were wondering where you'd gotten to."

Let's not use those awkward, ugly connotative words that smack of, well:

Osric: "It's so good to see you. We need to get the boy."
Selm: "Mmm. Regicide, is it?"
Osric: "We need to get the boy."

Translation: 'It's only going to get worse, Selm old boy.'

Selm: "You have no idea how strange things are in this castle."
Osric: "Yes, we do. "
Selm: "I'll get the men."

What does a King do when his Princes go missing for several months? He could declare war, or he could send in his covert elite corps to find them. Selm has infiltrated the Ghenesh palace, placed his men among the guard, and worked on being very very prepared for the moment he found the Princes. Expressing affection, each their own way:

Scott: "Yes! Reinforcements!"
Rob: "See, I like Selm."
Deborah: "I'm going to end up with a crush on him at this rate."

Here's hoping:

GM to Benedict: "You discover they are guarding the armory, you slam the door open, and there's a slip of girl, maybe 14, 15. Guards around her."
Benedict: "I attack! Legendary +4."
GM: "Let's see how you do." Rolls. "Oh wow."
Benedict: "My name is Inigo Montoya?"

Here's coping:

GM: "And that's when the shrieking banshee of a girl comes at you with her blades clothed in blackness."
Benedict: "Legendary +3."
GM: "She comes at you, and her blade slices through your sword."
Benedict: "Oh, that's bad. But we're in an armory, aren't we?"
GM: "Yes."
Benedict: "Oh, that's good."

Benedict - and /only/ Benedict - determines to save the child possessed by the evil by killing just the evil. He takes his unraveling magic to the princess to disconnect the evil from her so that he may strike at just it. The trouble with being noble is that being noble is not about self preservation:

Benedict: "I'm trying to not unravel the blades, but the blackness from /her/..."
GM: "Okay. Roll."
Scott: "YES! Rolled a +4. Add a fudge point. +1. Legendary."
GM: "And she recoils and the blackness slides off the blades into her and she staggers and falls face down unconscious and out of her steps one of the blade creatures..."
Benedict: "And I run, looking for a torch."
GM: "This is going to suck."
Benedict: "Right."

Dance with the one that brought you:

GM to Osric: You see Sonnet go past chasing a card."
Osric: "We're still chasing -"
GM: "Yes."
Osric: "Keep going, then."

There are men who keep their eye on the prize, and then men who keep their eye on, well:

Selm, running: "Was that who I thought that was?"
Osric: "Yes!"
Selm: "Interesting outfit."

Sonnet is the only party member who tries deception. She (and Lucan) find guards layered through antechambers between themsevles and their quarry.

Sonnet: "Is everything all right?"
Guard: "What?"
Sonnet: "Is everything all right?"
Guard: "I don't recognize you."
Sonnet: "I'm part of the harem guard; there are fights going on in other parts of the castle; I'm trying to make sure everything is all right."
Guard: "The prince is safe. Go back to the other parts of the castle."

Time for Plan B:

Lucan raises his hand: "Excuse me, all of you? I just killed the Sultan. You'd better come get me."

Apparently the guards were trained by the Israeli for raw paranoia:

GM: "And at least four of them go chasing after Lucan."
Sonnet: "GET HIM!"
Guard: "No! Stand back!"
GM: "They're getting their swords out; they don't look like they believe you."

Well, that starts a fight - four guards versus Sonnet while Lucan runs off, chased by more guards. Fitting people into definitions:

GM to Sonnet: "They don't know what to make of one of this scantily clad woman with a scimitar who is holding her own against /four/ of them."
Sonnet: "Epic."
GM: "And you actually pierce the throat of one of them and they look down at him and at you, "DEMON!"

Why Sonnet keeps Lucan about, aside from the fashion sense and the witty rejoinders:

GM to Lucan: "Wow, you so totally lose them. Lucan, you actually manage to get behind one of the statues in exactly the same pose. They run past."
Lucan: "Then he comes out, looks admiringly at the breasts on the statue, grabs a sword, and runs back to Sonnet."

Conflict and confusion resolution, tidily handled:

GM to Sonnet: "You just behead one guy. The one left says, "Please don't hurt me."
Sonnet levels her sword, "Please run."
Lucan runs up.
Guard: "Hey, weren't you - "
Lucan punches him.

Suiting truth to fiction:

Sonnet yells to the door, knock knock: "Let me in!"
Inside, "NO!"
Sonnet: "They're dead out here! They're ALL DEAD!"
GM: "And the screaming starts. Blood pours out from under the door."

Sonnet and Lucan get the door down. Skipping the pleasantries:

GM: "And there's a guy maybe a year younger than you, levitating on a column of darkness, and the guards around him are impaled on spikes coming out from the bottom of this column."
Sonnet: "Good evening."
Boy: "Die."
GM: "And spikes come out at you."

What is it with Lucan and getting his leg hurt in a fight?

GM: "Lucan gets speared by one through the leg and he goes down and then he's being dragged back towards it..."

It's Sonnet versus impale-his-own-guards-and-use-them-as-whirliblades-Prince. Leading questions:

Sonnet: "Sonnet throws the torch in."
GM: "There's at least a rippling darkness as it parts for the torch and then it klunk klunk klunk seals and are you going to chase in after it?"
Deborah: "Does she look stupid?"

Life's little regrets:

Sonnet: "I get out of there! Lucan, go! FUCK ME!"
Lucan: "I didn't get a CHANCE!"

Sonnet runs for it; she slams the metal door shut between her and Whirligig-o-Evil Boy. A proper sense of urgency:

GM: "THUMP. That door is not long for this world."
Sonnet: "I set it on fire."
GM: "That's a big METAL door."
Osric: "Time to be going!"

Job description, short and sweet:

GM: "Osric, you and Selm get around another set of stairs. There are a bunch of guardsmen coming towards you - and they all salute."
Osric: "I have a posse?!"
GM: "Selm's guardsmen. Selm is known to have an elite group of people who do... something."
Lydia: "Pull princes' asses out of the fire."

GPS with a twist:

Rob: "Finndo is coming up out of the basement and his navigational system is going to be listen for trouble and head that way."

SPS (self preservation system) is optional on the Trouble Oriented GPS:

GM: "Sonnet, the doors fly open. The kid is so suffused with blackness that ripples in and out of his skin that he doesn't even look human at this point. He steps forward and howls; it's like the screams of other ones when they died, but it's a challenge; it's powerful."
Finndo: "Yes, Finndo is heading towards that."

Mmmm, THINKING:

Sonnet: "Are there mirrors? I'm going to spend clever to find them. I want a mirror and a torch."

S.O.S does not mean Go The Other Way unless you're Osric and Selm:

Sonnet: "I FOUND THE BIG ONE! "
Cyrus: "Help!"
Selm: "Perhaps we should avoid that one, my prince. Your card leads this way."
Jarrod chuckles, "I like the way he thinks."
Osric: "You know, everyone else is going to go after that one; I'll take this one."

You don't _say_:

GM: "You find a banquet hall, it's got that great hall kind of feel to it. Kid at the other end of it; he looks over at you and walls start Chunk chunk starting up; it's turning into a maze in front of your eyes."
Jarrod: "Really."

A finely honed sense of tactics:

GM: "You've got the sense of that presence wrapped around him, but you've also got the sense that it's not something that people can see."
Jarrod: "Great. How tall are these walls?"
GM: "There's not that tall and there are entrances but he might be trying to trap you or crush you or something fun like that."
Jarrod: "I'm not going through that."

GM: "Eventually, you get through large, architectural sounds, and the maze opens and you see the kid's back."
Jarrod grins.

Osric works his way around towards the Gheneshi Prince. When you can't dazzle em, sabotage em or infiltrate em, you're back to booting head:

GM: "You're going to charge him, Osric?"
Deborah: "Your name is /not/ Cyrus."
Jarrod: "What else am I going to do? Sneak up on him not so much."
GM: "You'll signal Selm what you're doing?"
Osric: "Three, two, one -"

It's good to want things:

Selm holds up a finger.
Osric: "What?"
Selm rolls up a sleeve and unravels a brace of throwing knives.
Deborah: "Oh god, Sybil would want this man."

And back to Cyrus who is STILL trying everything but smacking Arissa around. On desperately flat learning curves:

GM: "The kid is not buying your story, not at all."
Cyrus: "You have to believe none of this is real."
Arissa: "I can feel my brothers and sisters dying!"
Cyrus: "I pick up the kid and I go to the center of the garden..."

Finndo faces down the Whirligig-Evil prince that Sonnet and Lucan encountered. Finndo is out of patience:

GM: "You do hear a kid say in a voice that isn't his, 'We will come after your kingdom.'"
Finndo: "Are you STUPID?"
GM: "We are many."
Finndo: "Okay, we are half naked and we have fallen into your palace, trapped, and we have already killed four of you. You are NOTHING to us. What is your ISSUE?"

Sybil comes up on Finndo facing down the Gheneshi prince. Sybil has learned to prepare:

Sybil: "And I have my army of light, yes?"
GM: "Roll something to represent that."
Sybil: "Legendary +5."
Finndo: "Ah, Sybil, how pleasant."
GM: "And a hundred of the bright things, gibbering about avarice and riches and gold -"
Finndo: "MOUNTAINS of gold!"
GM: "Excellent! And they zhooooom in towards it."

Full circle back to dragging unconcious people out of the flames:

GM to Lucan: "And you grab Sonnet and with your leg bleeding you drag her out of this, limping."

Why do they put up with the fae? This is why they up with the fae:

GM to Finndo: "And the air is starting to ripple. This thing is batting at them and killing them by the score but Sybil keeps chanting and they keep coming. Finndo, your sense of self preservation is telling you to get out."
Sybil: "Sybil will take burns, but she'll stick it out, Finndo; you can go, she'll stay."
GM: "Yes, you're seeing Sybil go full nuclear here."

On calling cards:

GM to Cyrus: "You look up and see the wall start to glow and melt and sag."
Cyrus: "Ah, yes, that would be Sybil."

Satisfaction in payment for pain:

GM to Deborah: "You see all this happen and you just back away; you're in holy righteous smackdown mode. You walk away, bits of castle melting and falling down behind you."
Scott: "Yes. Keep the thermonuclear device happy."

The castle is, well, melting, now that the Gheneshi family is gone. The party is converging desperately on the center of the garden. Just not going to ask how he missed it in a melting castle:

GM: "Feel free to use your self destructive here."
Deborah: "I expect you triggered it when you stopped to try to be nice to the kid."
Cyrus: "Well I hadn't noticed that everybody else was eaten by darkness!"

Consistent character traits:

Cyrus: "My interest is not in fighting the kid; my interest is in getting to the center of the garden. So I will vault the kid if I have to."
Shai: "There's that self destructive..."

A little too consistent:

GM: "There's a THUD THUD and something seems to be feeding back to something behind you; it's difficult to perceive...
What are you doing?"
Cyrus: "I am running straight at it."

Cyrus is trying to get to the garden center - with the child. Who is now latched onto his back. Meet Cyrus:

GM to Osric: "You see a figure jump up; you see the figure wave his torch around, get knocked down, jump over it, something sticking to it, and he's still staggering forward, waving his torch around - it's got to be Cyrus. Nothing else is that insane."

The trouble with doing the right thing is that the wrong thing is usually more convenient:

GM: "There is only one member of the royal family who survived this, unfortunately, and that was the one Benedict was fighting."
Benedict: "I don't know if I'm happy about that or not."

Time to be going:

GM: "The castle is shaking and fading and going away..."
Finndo: "DOWN. Down. Run DOWN."

As close as we got to our requisite 'you dumbass' moment. More of a 'no shit, sherlock' moment, really:

Selm: "Shall we be going?" He gestures downstairs.
Osric: "Why, /yes/."

Osric uses the steps to get out of the door. Benedict does not. It is only logical to conclude that Cyrus would do something worse:

GM: "There's a thump thump as the sound of two bodies hitting the ground. One of them is a girl of 16, 17, lying on the ground, cut up, breathing but barely. And the other is Benedict, beaten badly."
Finndo: "Where's Cyrus?"

Why is it he keeps having these moments?

Cyrus is on his knees in the wreckage, holding this now snuffed torch, staring.
Cyrus: "Did I do that?"

She is a hero, not like you and me...

Finndo: "I lift the girl's head and check her wounds. In putting her head back down, I do it hard enough to crack it. I turn to Sybil and say, "This will not be spoken of."

I was never here, you never saw me, this didn't happen:

Finndo: "Selm!"
Selm: "Prince Finndo!"
Finndo: "It would appear that none of the royal family has survived this."
Selm: "This would not seem to be a good place to have been."
Finndo: "No, this was not a place we have been or will continue to be."
Selm: "Let's leave this country to sort itself out, then."

Legacies:

Finndo: "And Finndo is still carrying the broom. It is notched, it is singed, but it is still the broom."

************************************************************************

After Game Quotes:

Lydia described this as the darkest game Fred has run yet:

Rob: "Ow."
Sonnet: "Ow."
Lydia: "Ow."
Cam: "Ow."
Deborah: "Jesus Christ."