Newbie tune

The "Dish and the Fiddle" is a bar where the Lost hang out. Mortals who find the place are in one of two categories: either they're the enchanted companions of one of the patrons, or they were very definitely looking for some other place. It's a fairly common phenomenon for places owned, operated and frequented by the Lost. There's no way to know whether it's some kind of trade-secret Contract similar to the one that maintains Goblin Markets, or a not-quite-Noble bestowment, or just something that the Lost generate instead of dandruff.

A selling point is that there's an ever-changing cast of live music. No two acts are ever exactly alike, except for two things. The first is that they all tend to be some variation of folk music. The other is an unbroken tradition. The first time that any newcomer sets foot into the place, no matter who happens to be playing, the band immediately breaks out in the unofficial Newbie Anthem. You've heard it before. It's officially called "Mad About Me", though most non-Star Wars fans just call it the "Creature Cantina Theme".

I've heard some of the more literary-minded among the Lost describe it as the archetypal theme to "Crossing of the First Threshold" in the Hero's Journey. Most of the rest of us just say that it's like an announcement that "you're not in Kansas anymore, Toto". And damn if it isn't worth it for the looks some of the accidental tourists get on their faces. We all maintain our Masks, of course, and unless they come in with the means to see past such deception, the mortal visitors only see a strange cross-section of perfectly human demographics. It's still somewhat unsettling, though, because the "Dish and Fiddle" doesn't have a recognizeable 'vibe' that mortal barflies could 'tune in' on and use.

And that's the way we like it.

Possibilities and choices

Today's bit of fortune-telling is courtesy of "The Silicon Valley Tarot", an online reading of which is available at the Steve Jackson Games website. The thus-far-unnamed Hedge-hunter may well find himself on a character sheet sometime soon...

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Instead of an oddment, today I have found a Hollow, a portion of the Hedge that someone... or several someones... claims as their own. Ranging in size from a small campsite to a sprawling estate, these areas are rarely unoccupied, and certainly wasn't in this case. The motley of Changelings had set up a camp drawing on the images of a traveling circus of mdoest size. After talking my way past their embarrassed lookouts (easing their discomfort with a few extra goblin fruit I keep for such occasions), their leader insisted that I accept the wisdom of their "seer". Imagine my surprise when, after ducking into a six-sided pavilion tent, I found myself facing a pasty-faced Wizened in a lab coat, manipulating what could only be an actual Babbage Engine.

The somewhat androgynous person turned from the machine to face me, adjusting the lenses on his (her?) goggles. "Come to consult the machine?" she (he?) inquired. The voice gave no clue as to gender; I set the issue aside as irrelevant.

"Your colleagues in the rest of the motley insisted that I speak with you," I said.

The "seer" nodded and gestured at a worn Aeron chair. As I settled myself, the seer opened a large, portable bookcase and extracted a bundle of worn, blue-tinted punch-cards tied with what looked like magnetic tape. The seer untied the cards and presented them to me in the usual manner for Tarot cards. "Meditate on your question. Shuffle the cards, choose three, and hand those to me," were my instructions.

Having made my indecipherable choices, the seer ran them through the Engine and informed me of the results.

"First is the Firewall. Protection, fortification, civility, courtesy, protocol. You're well fortified against the barbarian hordes." It took me a moment's thought to realize that this seer drew upon the symbols of mortal technology. It made a certain amount of sense, given the technological bent to most of the decorations, and definitely piqued my interest for the rest of the reading.

"Next is the Flame War. Two pedants, locked in mortal combat, scorch each other with fiery words. Angry, aggrieved, they wield their righteous furies in rhetorical joust. Insult, invective, profanity - they will stop at nothing until one or the other is humiliated or banished. Quibbling, hair-splitting, dogmatism, nitpicking." I considered whether any of my colleagues or contacts back at my primary Freehold would meet this description and made a few mental notes.

"Last is Encryption, inverted. Beware of subterfuge, ignorance. Things are going on behind your back. Can you afford not to know?" I sighed. My forays into the Hedge and research into oddments were, by and large, meant to keep me out of the idiotic games that the Courts played endlessly. While this particular symbol was hardly unusual for anyone who was involved at all in any Freehold, the fact that it was brought to my attention did not cheer me.

The seer approached a chalkboard and began to scrawl with a singularly noisy piece of yellow chalk. "Jet-set betrayals," the seer said, after a moment's calculations. "Is that a Chateau Margaux you're pouring there, or is it your life's blood? The plusher it gets, the deeper the grave. You may be saved, but you'll have to wash dishes."

I carefully recorded the seer's words in a notebook, then gave my thanks. The rest of the motley thanked me for my visit, offering a few words of advice about the most recent goings-on in the Hedge and the location of a nearby portal back to the mortal world. Perhaps it was time to return to the Freehold for an extended period?