"The universe used to be made of matter in motion. Not much of that is left. What's left that matters are notions." - Baba Yaga

"The universe is made of stories, not atoms" - Muriel Rukeyser

"Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others." - Robert Louis Stevenson 

"Reading the world always precedes reading the word, and reading the word implies continually reading the world." - Paulo Friere

Life rarely unfolds chronologically, so why should stories? Middles precede beginnings, which follow ends, which fold back into new ends, prior to beginnings and other middles. And so it goes. The heroes trip over time and memory with little regard for sense as their stories pour forth. Water bursting from a fountain. Jennifer the amnesiac goblin agent of the Unspoken listens, slightly bemused, crunching biscuits and slurping tea the entire time. Nothing jogs her memory. Torryoog , the bookstore cat, reminds Jennifer of her new tattoo. She always gets one when she comes home forgetting parts of her journey. Her body is a canvas. This one is a kinori. A space whale. Jennifer calls for her books, and Torryoog obediently fetches a box of dog-eared Steal Fenris volumes. Jennifer uses them to begin something that at first seems like a divination ritual, but the heroes soon realize it is something so much more. She begins to recount her own hero's journey, and asks them each to do the same. The bookstore disappears in a swirl and becomes the Cradle of Creation - at once so familiar, and yet so foreign. Seething swarms of tentacled and slobbering "fihyr" defile a great steel stone auditorium, throbbing and pulsating around a central plinth upon which stands Luckums. She calls out to each party member. Reaches towards them. Shroktath recognizes that this is not their place and that they don't belong here. These are the Pathways of the Architects. The Corridors Between Worlds. The Blood of the Gardeners burns within him, and he drives great swaths away of them as he wades into their midst. Jennifer is there too. And each hero drives towards the plinth and their friend, fighting their own tales along the way. When they reach Luckums, it is Not Luckums, but a lie. A Great Fihyr that would devour them all. Jennifer reveals remarkable powers, drawing magic power from written words in books and hurling them at the creature. When at last the Great Fihyr is defeated and the swarm scattered, the Cradle fades and Jennifer is overcome with emotion...

"Blood of the Gardeners! It's all real! I almost didn't believe it, but it's true. The Architects! The Gardeners! All of it! My friends, do you know what this means? We are all of us made of stories!"

Despite the humble façade on its exterior, when you enter the Spine of Worlds Book Emporium it is immediately clear that you have been transported to someplace beyond your expectations. Someplace truly special. The interior is much, much larger than you would have expected. It seems to have at one point housed a theatre. 

There is a breathtaking stained glass skylight that casts glistening motes of colour on carved wooden reliefs of figures of every imaginable race that look inward upon the main showroom. The air is thick with the smell of old parchment and leather bindings. Every possible nook and cranny, and a few impossible ones, are filled with wooden bookshelves and the occasional lumpy armchair. The shelves are overstuffed. Haphazardly filled with multi-coloured tomes of every shape, size and binding, and surrounded with stacks of books. They are like sentinels, gathered around as though browsing themselves. A dozen wooden arches lead into hallways – which are, of course, lined with books – that spiral off in every direction from the central auditorium. 

A large humanoid cat uncurls from its place on a cozy chair hidden in a pillowed nook next to a brass brazier that emits a warm and friendly glow. The creature stretches, yawns and puts on a pair of glasses to survey you before saying, “I imagine you are here to see Hooper? He told me to expect you at some point, though I must say, I’m quite grateful that you took as long as you did. I’ll tell Chepo to put a kettle on.”

The room is dimly lit, with warm, flickering candles casting a soft glow over the space. The furniture is a mismatched assortment of comfortable armchairs and worn-out couches, all draped with cozy blankets and cushions in rich, earthy tones. You do not so much as sit on the furnishings as you sink into them.

HOOPER/JENNIFER is happy to see you but still no closer to remembering who you are. 

Once the characters are settled. CHEPO locks the door, and with an affable nod, JENNIFER removes her HOOPER persona. He ambles out of the room.

She smiles… “I still don’t know who you are? Isn’t that just my luck, hmm?”

“You could start at what you think of as the beginning, though it seldom is…”

Ask the players to recount the story so far for Jennifer. Give the 90 to 120 second each. 

Torryoog has been half listening as she moves about with the tea.

JENNIFER: “So, you say that we were friends?” That this Luckums and I had a special bond? The mere fact that I trusted you to dig me up… and to give you the Resurrection Code…” (i.e. “There Are More Worlds Than This”) “I wish I could remember you… you must have been very important…”

TORRYOOG: “Don’t you have a new tattoo? You always get one of those when you erase your memory.”

·   Her body is covered in tattoos

·   Hidden Knowledge, spell embedded in a tattoo of a Kenori, a space whale. They migrate inside the Shattered Sphere, even leave

“That seals it. It’s the final clue. I must have found something extremely important to arrange to ship my dead body back here in a coffin after having erased any memory of why.”

“Torryoog, would you be a puss, and bring me the books.”

Torryoog leaves and comes back carrying a box of dog-eared paperbacks. She places them on the low round table at your knees where your tea cups are cooling.

There are eleven. You’ve seen some of these before.

“There are hundreds of Steel Fenris books,” she explains “But only twelve were written by the woman who invented the character, Thellonia Froop. Her originals are incredibly hard to track down.” Jennifer reaches into Hooper’s tweed jacket and pulls out a twelfth, “Steel Fenris and the Missing Sphere”. She shows you the cover. “These books are valuable beyond measure.” She flips through and rips out a sheaf of pages.

Then, to your dismay she does the same with the others.

She arranges the sheafs on the circular table. Torryoog works to get the tea cups out of the way.

She places a folded section from each of the books on top of each torn out set of chapters, then stands up in the middle of the table to survey her masterpiece.

“My new friends, or, as you claim… my old friends… I give you Steel Fenris and the Heroes’ Journey.”

She begins by saying, “We are each of us the Hero of Her Own Tale…”

My Oma used to say that, “Once you leave the village and travel beyond the hills, you will never know happiness again…”

That’s not entirely true. That’s not entirely wrong.

• Something to READ: Read the EXAMPLE of the Hero’s Journey shared here… Context is King, and that sovereign will be crowned on Tuesday

• Something to WRITE: Follow the MODEL and the EXAMPLE to tell your character’s first steps into a larger world. If you’ve already told that tale as part of your background, then build on it… tell of another cycle in the Hero’s Journey through which your character passed on the Road to Becoming that we have not yet heard. I haven’t given you much time, and the important thing is that  you not take too much time. Preparing this tale should flow quickly and naturally from the model and the example.

• Something to SHARE: Each of you will be asked to share your story on Tuesday night in “the Great Oral Tradition of Our People” (i.e. the Table Top Gamers)

JENNIFER begins her story by saying, “We are each of us the Hero of Her Own Tale…”

Ordinary World: A goblin pup who grew up in a small Dwarven fishing village in Bithal on Lake Dakar as part of a large litter. Her mother was a travelling merchant, her father a fishmonger with close ties to the Dwarves. She never knew how unusual her situation was.

Call to Adventure: Her mother was out of town when her father was killed by drunken adventurers who were passing through the village. The village Jarl decided to move the family to Riot’s Gate for their own safety.

Refusal of the Call: It wasn’t a month before young Jennifer was back in the village, trying to work her father’s old job. The Dwarves treated her with kindness and kept returning her to her brothers and sisters without so much as a scolding.

Meeting the Mentor: During the long rides back to Riot’s Gate by billy goat cart, the head of the fisherman’s guild, who had been her parents’ closest friend would sit in silence, but for the end of the trip. When he would utter a single sentence to her about her father or mother. Something she had never known. In this way, she began to get a notion of how rare her parents were amongst her kind, and much rarer still the relationship they had with the Dwarves of her village.

Crossing the Threshold: The last time she arrived in te village, she went straight to the house of the guildmaster, their little pantomime long since having played out. However, she found the abode empty. He had perished during a storm on Lake Dakar three weeks earlier, not long after the last time he’d returned from taking her to Riot’s Gate. As she turned to leave, she met the Jarl who gave her the guildmaster’s leather satchel, which he had put aside for her for when the time had come. It was filled with wonders. She took it, and began what the Hobbits call a yondering.

Tests, Allies & Enemies: For ten years, she travelled the length and breadth of the Federation and beyond. She faced many tests and made many enemies, but fortunately, even more friends.

Approaching the Trial: She joined the Earlier Errants, helping slaves to escape the River Baronies, and in Selunaport, her path collided with the Unspoken.

Facing the Ordeal: Her long-time handler, an old Hobbit, would say it was never clear who’d recruited who. However, there was no question that joining the Unspoken transformed her life, opening her eyes to the full size of the world.

Seizing the Treasure: It wasn’t long before she was more than just an agent, but an operative herself. Running her own jobs, fighting the shadow wars against the Federations’ enemies both on and off Sentar.

The Road Back: This is what set her on the path back to Bithal where she would begin her work on the Embassy of the Lunar Elves at Sunfalls, before it fell to the Horde…

 Resurrection: Before the first time she died out in the Shattered Sphere and the Lunar Elves brought her back. (in story terms, this isn’t always a literal death and rebirth, for Jennifer of the Unspoken, it was)

Return with the Boon: Before she realized that the Federation was blind to one of the greatest threats it faced, in the form of the Ylfen Imperyion that sought out a way for its fleets to reach Sentar and the Nested Sphere. Not just because of their will to conquer but because of what they both represented.

By the time she’s done, you have a feeling entirely like that you experienced when you exited the Chronoverse for the first time, after witnessing the great weaving together of the timelines of life. When you mention this to her, she smiles and responds that the Chronomancers aren’t the only ones who know a thing or two about the threads of fate and the passage of time. “Luckums would have understood this,” she adds, surprising you all. Her eyes glisten. “You always bring a piece of the Chronoverse back with you, no matter how you get there.”

“So, who’s next?” 

Ordinary World: This hero’s story begins with an infant found by forces of the Temple of Hieronius. They attacked a tribe of orcs that had been plaguing the hinterlands of the Winedark Coast  for years - raiding, taking slaves, etc. It was a brutal battle to take the camp down, and in the aroused bloodlust that followed almost all of the helpless among the orcs were put to the sword, but not the infant - hidden away, found, and saved.

Call to Adventure: As a young charge of the temple, Shroktath never really fit in, to put it mildly. In desperation, the temple turned to one of its leading and most experienced Paladins - the formidable Illeyesar - the leader of the exposition on the orc camp years before, and the one responsible for sparing Shroktath-as-infant too. It was partially his responsibility, and partially his punishment to try and bring the unruly young half orc around.

Refusal of the Call:The relationship did not go easy, at first. They fought. It was a tough love that Illeyesar brought. Shroktath had always felt, at best tolerated, at worst despised by everyone he’d met. So it wasn’t easy for Illeyesar to establish any kind of productive relationship with his young and angry charge. The two fought for months.

Meeting the Mentor: Finally, Illeyesar took Shroktath out of the temple and out on a dangerous mission. Just the two of them - scouting behind enemy lines. There was no longer much for Shroktath to rail against. In fact, to survive, he needed to learn to trust or at least work with Illeyesar. And the more he did, the more he saw the kindness, and love buried deep within his Paladin mentor. The two came back to the temple with Shroktath fully devoted to Illeyesar, and growing by leaps and bounds as a being and as a budding young warrior.

Crossing the Threshold: The growth got a little bumpy. Kicked out of the temple for a failure to control his temper and off struggling on his own. Shroktath eventually almost “fell” into the Sunterran Army. Ups and downs continued, and Shroktath regressed as a person. But he grew as a warrior. Most importantly, he eventually fell in with exactly the right crew. A group of fellow soldiers that would come to be his friends, his home.

Tests, Allies & Enemies: It was almost at their meeting that the group got tested. Captured by Slavers, and taken into Wildspace - it was also a rupture with the past. The group bonded as they managed to turn the tables on their captors, and as strangers in a strange land they increasingly became aware of a larger story of which they were to play apart. The Y’lfe - the Spheres - the Architects - the battle of a stifling, oppressive order vs. the unpredictable and irrepressible wildness of life.

Approaching the Trial: As the group tried to figure their way through Wildspace, and make contact with about the only friendly face they’d met in Wildspace - the Unspoken agent, Jennifer - the group grew in their competence and connection. This was both welcome and unsettling for Shroktath. He’d only known warmth and affection from one being before - Illeyesar - and Shroktath had lost that bond by losing control. He worried that he would do so again, somehow lose control, turn on his new friends, and be rejected.

Facing the Ordeal: It was on board the ghost ship, the derelict Y’lfen warship the Cygnet Terrace, that Shroktath was forced to face his fears. The spirits on board tried to crush him with his nightmares. But somehow, his inner warrior spirit shone through. His spirit KNEW the simple, powerful truth. You don’t win every fight, but you fight like hell anyway. If he was to somehow lose control and turn on his friends, it wouldn’t be because he didn’t fight with everything he had to stop it and protect his friends. What else could he do, but his best?

Seizing the Treasure: Freed of his fears, Shroktath began to feel something awaken within him. Some strange, vital force that had always been there - had this been behind his fierce temper as a youngster? - but buried. He found he could heal others. He could sense the life forces around him even if he couldn’t see them.

The Road Back: He struggled with these strange new powers and odd feelings within him. It was scary - and he was loathe to be scared - but he didn’t know what was going on or why. Had he been infected with something, was it dangerous to himself or his friends. In vain he sought answers from religious figures in Brahl and was rudely disappointed.

Resurrection: And then the truth was revealed, and by Brahl itself. In Shroktath flowed the blood of the Gardeners. Shroktath was more deeply connected to the story and the spheres than he thought. The story of the Gardeners - left by the architects to protect life in all its messy glory - would continue and partly through him.

Return with the Boon: It had been building for a while, but deepened still further with this knowledge - a calm confidence in the young half-orc warrior. But much more than a warrior; part of the story of the spheres.

The Ordinary World

Khalid ibn al-Walid ibn al-Mughirch; even his name defines him.  Son of a farmer who was the son of a farmer.  Defined by his family farm Jendouba, a farm like so many others surrounded by nameless and endless vineyards, ranch animals and forests themselves monotonously surrounded.  Jendouba, a gilded cage.  The youngest son of five, never to inherit and instead continue the endless cycle of farm chores.  Perhaps one day to marry unremarkably but for only a small advantage to the family.  He was not even motivated to leave the farm since his family of brothers and sisters was mostly kind but mainly disinterested.  Even the distain of his childhood peers was disinterested and distant.

Call to Adventure and the Refusal of the Call

The cage was beautiful, comfortable and large enough that activities that seemed like adventure were easily within his grasp.  Machines, alchemy and free time were available to him once his barely important chores were completed.  The duties of farm and family were light enough to pad the cage.

Meeting the Mentor

His journey out of the cage was initiated by his father, a master of that which grows.  His father arranged an apprenticeship to Malik Ambur, the crippled gunslinger hero of Independence.  Even al-Walid knew that some plants need transplant to grow, cows need new fields for forage and birds need to migrate in the autumn.  Malik was not the provider of easy sunshine and regular irrigation because that was not what Khalid needed.  From the outside many would nod that Malik’s provided the strict discipline and focused attention to detail that Khalid needed.  In truth, Malik built a valve inside Khalid’s heart that allowed violence to flow when it was needed but was no more complicated than what one would find in a water pump.  Malik taught him that Khalid needed to strike from his very center.  Certainly, the eye saw and the hand grasped the weapon, but it was his heart that struck. 

Crossing the Threshold

It was again his father that pushed him across the doorframe.  He gained him a commission in the 57th Independent Regiment and put him on the horse.  His mother did not even cry when he left; why would she?

Tests, Allies & Enemies

His father freed him from one duty as a farm hand into another as a squaddie.  Then the death of Khalid’s first squad at Bithal freed him again.  He no longer followed Drott but was forced to become some kind of shadow of that dwarven hero. Now Khalid fears not being as smart as al-Walid or as cunning as Malik or as strong as Drott.  

Approaching the Trial

In that dark room on the Cygnet Terrace, Khalid was unmade, crushed.  No squad, no light, no hope.  On reflection, perhaps he was reborn that day, but now without father, teacher or mentor.  He was thrust into being a father of a misfit family floating among the stars.

Facing the Ordeal

Luckily, he had brothers and sisters again.  He could turn his clarity of purpose, his channelled violence and his will to win towards their collective success.  He had a family that supported him as much as he supported them.

Seizing the Treasure

The Inordinate Amount is a scowl barely held together by physical effort and it held a crew that could not even articulate its own nature or purpose.  But they trusted and worked for each other when it mattered.  The Second Battle of Algail was the first success.  The Battle of the Patch, the Defeat of the Bugbear Ambush and the Freed Y’lfe Fire Riot all proved it.  Their treasure is shared blood and purpose.

The Road Back

Even the loss of his hand at the Slave Liberation of Yesyr is not an end, just a change.  A missing hand cannot stop his heart from speaking through any weapon he wields to secure victory.  A wonderous gun placed into his hands by a mermaid queen after it had sat under an ocean for millennia is only a footnote in his story.  The replacement of his severed limb by a magical and armoured automation too is just a footnote.

Resurrection and a Boon

After losing three fingers, Malik Ambur was able to apprentice an insignificant and awkward farm boy who went on to traffic with living machines, ogres, the talking brain of a planet and time travellers in hopes of saving creation itself.  Perhaps Khalid can guide these misfit heroes to greater heights since he has lost and gained so much more. 

I admit, I was pretty excited. It’s hard to explain why, really. I just get this really good feeling every time I’m around Jennifer, any time I have a chance to talk with her. I never had a family growing up, but it almost feels like she’s my big sister or something? Best I can imagine what that feels like anyway. So when we came into the Spine of the World Book Emporium to meet her, I had this kinda weird wriggly feeling - halfway between a laugh and a cheer? - as we waited while Chet and his crew of cat and baboon helpers served us tea and snacks and went to get Jennifer. While we waited it was hard to keep from browsing through the incredible number and range of books piled up in stacks and rows. I caught sight of one - The History of the Yessyr Slave Market - and dove in. 

I didn’t get far, though, before Jennifer came into the room. She seemed happy to see us too, but still couldn’t remember our history together before we - for real - brought her back from the grave. She asked us about ourselves, what led us here, and at first we struggled to tell her. We misremembered things, jumped about in time, forgot points, sometimes came back to them… As messy as a knocked over gujamellon cart in late summer. But then Jennifer jumped in and told us her journey - a hero’s journey. It was so cool how from such humble beginnings, she’d made such a meaningful and interesting life. She turned it over to us, and it’s like her story had “fixed” us. Our stories now not only held together, but they told of our journeys in a way that held me in awe. I learned more about Khalid - his coolness under fire, and where that came from, his mentor and earlier than that, his busy days on the farm with a busy family. I learned more about Basile - his intelligence and integrity leading him into trouble in his first crack at digging into a crime, and the events that led him to the army.

Jennifer got all excited as we laid out our stories, and she furiously shuffled around some Steel Fenris books - the original and genuine twelve by Thalonia Fruk, mind you - and shocked us by ripping pages out, scribbling, circling the text, and laying them out in patterns on the table between us. At the end of our stories, she would point and show us how the elements of our stories were there in Steel Fenris. She was very excited. 

And then - I don’t quite know how it happened - it’s like the stories became a vision, the vision surrounded us, and we were no longer in the Spine of the World Book Emporium, but some odd cave. The walls were made of steelstone (!) and with a shape that reminded me of a heart. We were each positioned on opposing entrances to the “heart,” which was swarming with these tiny, writhing, menacing critters that reeked of fear. And, in the centre of the cave on a pedestal.. was Luckums. I caught my breath, and I felt the tears come. Luckums! My old friend! I didn’t even care how she’d come back to us, I just felt joy. But it quickly changed to concern as I noticed she was clearly frantic, seemed scared, and silently seemed to beckon us. I had to get to her!

I saw that Khalid had already started to fight his way through the swamp of fear critters, but it clearly wasn’t smooth sailing. He hacked around him, but still the swarm clawed, and grasped, and nipped at him, slowing and wearing him down. But that stench of fear reminded me of the Cygnet Terrace, and in an instant, I knew. Like that ship, these creatures weren’t supposed to be here - intruders, invaders, unwelcome guests. We WERE. This was our home. This was my garden. I called upon the spirits to protect me from the swarm’s evil, and strode into the room, laughing in the sureness of our triumph over these sad little fears who scattered before me.

Had I seen Luckums grimace, as she turned her attention from Khalid to me? I shook my head. My friend needed me, and I was going to get to her. But the situation had gotten more complicated. Khalid’s mentor - Malik - arrived from behind Khalid to my left. He called out to Khalid, using a nickname for my comrade I’d never heard - “Turnip” - and called out to Khalid to fight by his side. Jennifer had arrived on the scene to my right, and she too was trying her best to get to Luckums, and in her progress came to my side. I could see Basile using some magic trick to climb up the walls and over the mass of tiny fears. (Imagine that - Basile coming up with some smart way AROUND a problem) Jennifer was almost bursting with excitement as she came closer to me. “A gardener!” she exclaimed, “I get to fight alongside a gardener! And in the cradle of creation!” I didn’t exactly have the time to think about this in the moment, but it sure stuck with me. I remembered Havelock talking about the Cradle - I think it might be the place where the Architects created the spheres? It’s definitely connected to the Architects. I admit. I can’t stop thinking about this and the Steel Fenris books and what it all means.

I scooped up a willing Jennifer, jumped up onto the pedestal with Luckums to help her, only to find that I’d been had. It wasn’t Luckums at all, but some demon that had used our love for our comrade to try and lure us to our ends. I admit, I lost my temper. The prospect of a reunion with Luckums snatched from my grasp. And the foul trickery behind it. And the beast before me now attacking me. I saw red - I was going to end the creature behind such cruelty. But it was landing some shots on me first.

Jennifer was amazing in the melee that followed. I’d never seen anything like it. Slinging words from books like throwing stars, tearing through the remaining fears like pebbles thrown through paper. Khalid was throwing out fireballs into the mob of little fears, blowing holes in the wriggling mass (I think one caught poor Hazel). And then the fight took a nasty turn. Khalid’s mentor - “Malik” - revealed its true form. Some huge monster that started taking swipes at Khalid, and, I could tell, stealing something of Khalid’s life force from him with each blow. I could see my friend flagging. 

I left my attack on the Great Fear that had posed as Luckums for a while, and turned to Khalid beside me. I channelled my life force to protect him from evil, but to no avail. The monster kept attacking Khalid and kept wearing him down. Thankfully, Hazel reached his side and with his powerful divine magics healed Khalid, and from the corner of my eye I could see the colour return to his skin and I relaxed a bit.

Maybe too much? The Greater Fear landed more blows, and as it did, it’s like I could feel it playing on my feelings, my anger… and I gave in. It’s been years since I felt such a blind rage. I no longer cared about defending myself. I no longer cared about skill or tactics. I was going to destroy this thing.

Which I did. A flurry of blows later, and I sensed it was near its end. I leapt up with a dark glee, and ran it through with a mighty blow from my spear, like some demon shishkabob. Khalid guns rained destruction upon the scary monster that had attacked him.

And as the melee drew to a close, Jennifer got all excited again. She was almost singing about the power of stories - to tell deeper truths, to develop ourselves. It was quite inspiring, really. Gives me goosebumps just thinking about it. There was a lot to think about after that experience, but the thing that stayed with me the most was seeing Luckums again. I mean, I know it wasn’t Luckums, but my heart didn’t know that at the time. Such joy. It was nice to have felt that, even if it couldn’t last.

I could see Basile - my pack leader - deep in thought. I couldn’t quite read him, but I felt worried. I reached out my hand quickly to rest it on his shoulder, let him know that I was there for him. He smiled, and let me know that he was glad but not to worry. There was just a lot from that experience to chew on. No doubt.