CtL Kith and Kin pdf

50 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors help them fulfill it. For short-term Aspirations, the event may resolve the Aspiration completely. For long-term ones, the event marks the next step in a longer process, such as securing funding for an expedition or finding a mentor’s lost diary. Exceptional Success: The changeling also learns the name of someone to whom he himself has an established connection who would be immensely helpful to the target’s goals. He may choose to make a favorable introduction, warn that person about her target’s shortcomings or do nothing with the information. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The target suffers a setback in the pursuit of their goal and blames the changeling for it. Alternatively, they succeed despite the changeling’s attempts and know he tried to sabotage them. Darkling: The Mountebank manipulates events from the shadows, gaining the Informed Condition about his subject’s Aspiration. Ogre: The Bruiser isn’t interested in being coy. He encourages his target to be bold, suggesting actions they might otherwise be reluctant or too timid to take. His player adds +2 dice to his roll to convince them. Loophole: The changeling lets an opportunity toward fulfilling one of his own Aspirations slip by within the same scene. Shooting Star (Common) Fame is a fickle thing. For just a moment, the target’s star burns bright, then fades away. Whether their song captivates the coffeehouse audience, their painting makes waves in a small-town art gallery, or the popular kids at school all post their new dance move to social media, the creator’s art resonates deeply whenever encountered by anyone. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One chapter Effects: The changeling targets someone who brings creative works to fruition, regardless of the quality of their work. They gain 1 dot of the Fame Merit (Changeling, p. 122) for the Contract’s duration; if this would increase their Fame beyond 3 dots, they simply gain +1 die to the Merit’s Social bonus instead. All changelings harvesting Glamour from those affected by the target’s Fame gain +1 to the harvesting roll. Beast: Displays of physical excellence inspire crowds, too. The Courser may instead target someone who performs feats of physical excellence, such as a local baseball player, the neighborhood gym rat who runs every morning, or the aspiring figure skater who practices on the nearby pond every winter. Fairest: The Muse’s player gains +2 to rolls to harvest Glamour instead. Loophole: The changeling completes his own Build Equipment action to make a creative work within the same scene. Beasts may instead succeed at an impressive feat using Athletics. Retrograde (Common) The changeling tells a story about a person in his presence. When he describes actions taken by the person within the story, he makes a counterclockwise gesture. Chaos descends on the target’s life: they miss their train, they lock their keys in their car, they overdraw their bank account, they say the wrong thing at the worst possible time. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: Presence + Expression + Wyrd vs. Resolve + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: One chapter Roll Results Success: Routine matters that normally go smoothly for the target go wrong; a routine matter is any action the target takes that doesn’t require a roll. For example, their signal cuts out whenever they try to make a phone call, or they can’t find a parking space at their destination. While most often affecting matters of communication, finance, and travel, the Contract’s effects reach those arenas. Exceptional Success: In addition to their minor misfortunes, the target must roll every roll twice and take the worse result. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The changeling’s own luck sours instead. His player suffers –2 to all actions for the chapter. Darkling: The Mountebank names a number of specific routine matters up to her Wyrd rating to go wrong for the target. If the target changes their routine and doesn’t take an action the Darkling predicted, they suffer no additional consequences. For instance, if the changeling chooses “can’t find a parking space at work” but the target stays home from work that day, the choice is wasted. Elemental: Inclement weather thwarts the target at every turn. The Torrent’s player declares an environmental or personal weather-based Tilt to affect the target for the Contract’s duration whenever most inconvenient, at the Storyteller’s discretion. For instance, torrential rains pour down after their tire goes flat, or a snowstorm slows their commute to a crawl. Loophole: The changeling spins around widdershins while he tells the story. Frozen Star (Royal) The changeling traces a likeness in the stars of a person, place, or object of which he knows the current location as

New Contracts 51 though drawing a constellation with his finger and speaks a person’s name aloud. The Wyrd temporarily imbues the new constellation with vast importance to the target. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: Intelligence + (Empathy or Persuasion) + Wyrd vs. Resolve + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: Until the next sunrise or subject touches target Effects: The Contract pulls the subject toward the traced target, even from long distances; he cannot name himself as the subject, but he can trace himself as the target. For example, if the changeling traces the outline of a car headed in the opposite direction and speaks a Huntsman’s name, the Huntsman follows the car and the changeling can get away; likewise, if he draws the café where he met his wife and says her name, she stops in for a cup of coffee later the same day, a powerful bout of nostalgia guiding her steps. The changeling must be able to perceive the subject he names, and the traced target must be somewhere they could reasonably reach before the next sunrise. The changeling cannot trace anyplace impossible for the subject to reach or objects expressly intended to cause harm to the target. Roll Results Success: The named subject immediately drops whatever they’re doing and travels toward the traced target. When the Contract expires or they come into physical contact with the target, whichever happens first, the effect ends. The subject suffers the Shaken Condition, as they have no recollection of why they pursued the traced target. Exceptional Success: The Contract doesn’t end when the subject touches the target; the effect persists past that first touch, addicting the subject to the target’s presence and inflicting the Persistent Addicted Condition. The subject may resolve the Condition normally, but otherwise it fades without resolving at the next sunrise, granting no Beats. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The Wyrd misinterprets the changeling’s tracing; the nearest agent of the True Fae knows his exact location at the time he failed to invoke the Contract and becomes drawn to him as per the Contract’s effects. The changeling suffers the Hunted Condition. Darkling: The Mountebank’s Contract inflicts the Spooked Condition, filling the target with a sense of impending doom and driving him to reach the subject as soon as possible. Fairest: If the Sovereign traces himself as the target, he becomes entitled to the subject’s attention; the target also gains a point of Goblin Debt for every scene they aren’t in the changeling’s presence. Loophole: The changeling is in physical contact with a piece of the target or the target itself when he traces the subject in the stars. Light of Ancient Stars (Royal) Looking at the stars is looking deep into the past. By the time their light reaches Earth, it’s traveled anywhere from a handful to billions of years. The changeling lets that ancient light shine on her and listens to the music of the spheres. From it, she gleans wisdom and insight — about the world, the Kindly Ones, or strange and ancient events. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: Instant Effects: If the changeling has a personal connection to a past event, she may ask questions about it equal to her Wyrd rating; the Storyteller must answer truthfully. The Wyrd defines personal connection as knowing someone involved more closely than as an acquaintance: her Keeper, a sibling, or a member of her motley. Alternately, she may ask about a known event that occurred in a location she previously physically visited (a True Fae’s court, the tavern where her freehold’s first Court formed.) Darkling: Nothing escapes the Bewitched’s notice. The character gains the Informed Condition about the event. If this Condition doesn’t resolve before the end of the chapter, it fades without resolution, granting no Beats. Wizened: The Shrewd receives a clear image of an item (up to Size 3) present during the event. His player gains +2 on any roll to create a facsimile of that item. He may only see simple objects without moving parts with this benefit, and regardless of the original’s supernatural qualities or abilities, he crafts a fully mundane facsimile. He can accurately reproduce any writing or simple diagrams present in the image he receives, but he gains no insight into translating or interpreting it. Loophole: The Lost sings the names of the stars in a constellation currently in the sky. Star Light, Star Bright (Royal) The night sky is full of wished-upon stars. The changeling plucks a wish from the heavens and acts as the star’s intermediary, granting his target’s desire. How the Lost interprets and grants the wish is up to him. He may be a kindly benefactor, returning runaway puppies and putting winning lottery tickets in his target’s hands; or he may wield wishes like weapons, showing his target the downside of getting exactly what they wished for. Cost: 1-2 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: Instant Effects: Spend 1 Glamour point to invoke this Contract.

52 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors Wandering Stars Changelings whose durances and explora- tions take them to the Outer Hedge (see p. XX) may discover different themes and Contracts within the Star Regalia. The night sky changes the farther from Earth you get. Familiar constellations hang slightly off-kilter or don’t exist at all, setting portents and fortunes askew. How do you find home when the star that always guided you there moves or disappears? Work with your Storyteller to determine how your changeling’s travels through the Outer Hedge and beyond affect the Stars. What insights do they gain by seeing the world from an entirely different perspective? What Contracts might they discover along the winding paths of the Wishing Roads? The player may replace one or more of their character’s existing Stars Contracts with the new ones if they travel to the Outer Hedge in play. These adjustments should complement the other Contracts in the Regalia, rather than diminishing them or penalizing the Lost who uses them. Changelings excel at adaptation. The changeling learns a wish his target has made within the last month. If he doesn’t specify a target, he learns the wish a random person made within a mile of his current location. The changeling determines how he fulfills that wish, but he must fulfill it; failure to do so by the end of the story, inflicts the Persistent Oathbreaker Condition upon him. For an additional point of Glamour, the changeling may attach a drawback to the wish he grants. For example, a winning lottery ticket heralds calls from bill collectors. Though the changeling’s own abilities constrain him, he may take artistic license within those bounds. He can’t bring the dead back to life, but if his target wishes to talk with their deceased brother and ask his advice, the changeling may create an eidolon in the brother’s image, bringing the two together in dreams. Ogre: If the target is non-fae, the Bruiser’s player gains +2 to one attempt to harvest Glamour from them. Wizened: In addition to learning the wish, the Shrewd gleans the driving force behind it, such as the target’s fears, financial difficulty, regret, etc. Loophole: The changeling coaxes the target into making the wish in her presence within the same scene. Pinch of Stardust (Royal) The Lost understand how their Keepers fashioned their fetches from discarded ribbons, twigs, fishing line, and whatever else laid at hand. They set these constructs loose in the changelings’ lives with no one the wiser. The act likely filled the changeling with horror when first uncovered, but he also learned from it. He creates his own entity out of star stuff and scraps, and when his target lays eyes on it, she feels as if she’s known it for years. She remembers good times spent in the creature’s company, holds warm feelings toward it and trusts it with their secrets. The simulacrum becomes one of her guiding light — her North Star, her Touchstone — and she suffers when its brief existence snuffs out like a shooting star fallen. Cost: 3 Glamour + 1 Willpower Dice Pool: Intelligence + Crafts + Wyrd vs. Resolve + Wyrd Action: Instant (willing) or Contested (hostile) Duration: One chapter or when Delusional resolves Effects: When the chapter ends, the Touchstone crumbles into its component parts. Changeling targets risk Clarity damage as though they’ve lost a Touchstone. Non-changeling supernatural beings follow rules for Touchstone loss according to their supernatural type; all others suffer a breaking point with a –1 modifier. Roll Results Success: The creature acts like a fetch, gaining Echoes (Changeling, p. 236) equal to the changeling’s Wyrd rating. Attach the creature as one of the target’s Touchstones. If the target isn’t a changeling but may have Touchstones, follow the usual rules for their supernatural type. For a target who has no access to Touchstones, the creature becomes a mentor, close friend, or other important part of the target’s life. The target suffers the Persistent Delusional Condition regarding the entity; the Condition fades without resolution or granting Beats if not resolved before the end of the chapter. The changeling may target himself with this Contract, but for its duration he doesn’t remember invoking it, believing the simulacrum real. Invoking this Contract constitutes a breaking point with three dice, or four if targeting a changeling (including himself). Exceptional Success: The exceptionally well-constructed creature becomes difficult for suspicious and well-meaning friends to remember as not real. It becomes embedded in the memories of the target’s closest real friends and loved ones, although they don’t become Delusional and evidence of the creature’s falsity makes them suspicious. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The changeling puts too much of himself into his creation, which becomes his ill-intentioned double, acting as a second fetch that knows it’s a fetch.

New Contracts 53 Darkling: The Bewitched made the creature’s right ear out of a tin can and string, and kept the can attached to the other end. When the target whispers a secret to the creature, the Darkling hears it. Wizened: The Domovoi knows how to make perfect clockwork automatons and flawless mannequins; by spending an additional point of Glamour, her creation lasts until the end of the story. Loophole: The changeling adds something of himself to the creature’s hodgepodge of parts: a lock of hair, three drops of blood, fingernail clippings, etc. Thorn Thorn hides under a changeling’s Mask. Like a stunning rose, it pricks those who come too close. Thorns pierce and irritate, punishing fools who transgress. It cares not for Sword’s aggression or Shield’s protection; Thorn evokes weapon and bulwark both, the unseen barb putting out the eye of a trespasser from either direction. Legends say Contracts like Thorns and Brambles, Hedgewall, and Prince of Ivy once fell within the purview of Thorn. The pacts that formed other Regalia stole them away, however, and Thorn hungers for their return. Briar’s Herald (Common) The changeling taunts the target to their face, promising to become the thorn in their side. The Thorn enforces her promise, but failure is tantamount to breaking it. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: Manipulation + Larceny + Wyrd vs. Composure +Wyrd Action: Instant Duration: One chapter Roll Results Success: Whenever the target comes into the changeling’s presence, nothing goes right for them, and they know somehow it’s her doing even with no reasonable evidence. If the changeling is within 100 yards/meters of her target, said target loses the 10-again quality on any roll their player makes, and every failure becomes dramatic without granting Beats. The changeling knows every time the target fails a roll regardless of whether the target is currently within range of the Contract’s effects, though she doesn’t automatically know the details. Exceptional Success: Whenever the victim’s player fails a roll while in range of the Contract’s effects, the victim suffers one point of lethal damage in addition to the dramatic failure consequences. Failure: The Contract fails; the changeling suffers one of the minor effects of a broken seal (Changeling, p. 210), chosen by the Storyteller.

54 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors Dramatic Failure: The changeling suffers one of the major effects of a broken seal instead. Darkling: Each time the victim fails a roll, no matter the distance between them, the changeling may whisper one message to them no longer than 37 words, and the victim may reply once in kind. Only these two hear each other’s messages, even if someone is close to them when they whisper. Wizened: The changeling may specify a clause that ends the Contract prematurely. The conditions may be simple (“stay home from work tomorrow”) or elaborate (“help me bust the Goblin Queen peddling Arcadian cocaine on 1st Street”) but must be expressed in a single short phrase. The victim has no obligation to comply, but becomes subconsciously both aware of the terms and that fulfilling them would end their suffering. Loophole: Directly or indirectly, the changeling causes a thorn, needle, or similar small, pointed object to prick the target, drawing at least a drop of blood. By the Pricking of My Thumbs (Common) The changeling pricks her thumb on a plant’s thorn, an offering of blood repaid by the surrounding vegetation with kinship, at least for a time. Living plants allow her to use them as her eyes and ears for the Contract’s duration. Most Lost assume this Contract borrows its name from Shakespeare’s Scottish play, but the phrase and the superstition represented predates the Bard, as does the Contract itself. Freeholds all over the United Kingdom take it as evidence the Weird (or Wyrd?) Sisters were a real group of changelings who inspired the playwright — three court monarchs, perhaps, or a legion entitlement, whose further secrets may still lie buried somewhere beneath the moors. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One scene Effects: The changeling extends her senses of hearing, sight, smell, and touch into any living plant she can perceive. She can only occupy one plant at a time. She can shift her senses from one plant to another, from a plant back to herself, or from herself back out to a plant again as an instant action. The changeling still perceives her body’s surroundings and can take actions while extending her senses but doing so is confusing; her player suffers a –3 to all actions she takes unrelated to perceiving through the plant while her senses ride one, as well as to her Defense and Initiative. Beast: A cousin to the wild, the Grim may use the plant she inhabits as a natural melee weapon. These attacks utilize the Beast’s Strength + (Brawl or Weaponry) and deal bashing damage. If the plant bears thorns or needles, upgrade the damage to lethal. These attacks don’t take the penalty for perceiving in two places at once, but the changeling may still only take one instant action per turn. Darkling: The Bewitched may occupy a number of plants up to or equal to her Resolve simultaneously; an instant action used to switch from one plant to another only shifts one of these simultaneous extensions at a time. Thus, it takes multiple actions to fully return her senses to herself unless she ends the Contract early. Loophole: The changeling brews a potion of poison ivy, newt, and thistles within the same scene; she peers into the potion, extending her senses into nearby flora. Thistle’s Rebuke (Common) The changeling refuses to allow others to get close to her, sprouting thorns to keep them at bay. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One scene Effects: Thorns grow from the changeling’s clothing or armor, increasing its general armor rating by two. They also tear the flesh of anyone who gets too close to the changeling, inflicting one point of lethal damage on anyone who touches her or engages her in melee. If grappled, her opponent takes two points of lethal damage per turn for the grapple’s duration, in addition to any other damage done by maneuvers within the grapple. Additionally, the changeling can fire the thorns from her armor at a foe within 50 yards/meters, although doing so negates the Contract’s other bonuses for the turn as the thorns grow back. They’re ranged weapons with a damage rating of 2L. Elemental: Forces of nature bow to the Torrent’s whims; she may take a reflexive action to retract the thorns or extend them again. Anyone touching her when she reflexively extends them takes two points of lethal damage. Fairest: Presenting herself as the rose rather than the thorns, the Unicorn can make the effects of this Contract invisible even to those who can see through the Mask. Loophole: The changeling drinks an entire glass of water just before invoking this Contract. The Gouging Curse (Common) The changeling issues a dire warning to her victim, whether as an explicit curse (“If you violate my privacy, you will suffer grave misfortune”) or a veiled warning (“It would be unwise to participate in tomorrow’s rap battle”). If her warning goes unheeded, the Thorn follows through on her threat. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: Manipulation + Occult + Wyrd vs. Composure + Wyrd Action: Instant

New Contracts 55 Duration: One chapter Roll Results Success: The changeling chooses an action she wants to forbid her target from taking. It should be specific and something they could do within one instant action, such as visit a particular location, use a specific object, or play a certain song over the store’s retail radio. If the target performs the act before the chapter ends, they become cursed with one of the following Tilts of the changeling’s choice: Arm Wrack (one arm), Blinded (one eye), Deafened (one ear), or Leg Wrack (one leg). Barbs and splinters pierce the chosen limb or organ until the Contract ends and the Tilt fades; even if the afflicted removes them all, more take their place. Exceptional Success: Triggering the curse also inflicts the Guilty Condition upon the victim. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The changeling falls to his own curse instead, unable to consider the consequences of her actions and suffering the Reckless Condition. Fairest: The Fairest may specify another action within the same parameters as the forbidden one; the victim may take this action to end the curse early. If they do so, they suffer the Persistent Awestruck Condition regarding the changeling, amazed at her magnanimity. Ogre: If the action the Terrible forbids would cause harm to one of her allies, this Contract’s duration becomes one story instead. Loophole: The changeling makes an agreement with the victim, allowing them to specify an action she cannot take. If she violates these terms, she must immediately pay the Glamour cost and take a point of lethal damage, or the Contract ends. Embrace of Nettles (Common) The Hedge’s perilous Thorns await those who wander off the beaten path, but often, the Thorns hide the Hedge’s greatest treasures. The changeling embraces the pain and everything it promises, allowing the Thorns to gain purchase in exchange for greater power over the Hedge. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Reflexive Duration: Instant The changeling invokes this Contract while in the Hedge’s Thorns in response to the Hedge shifting itself. Choose one of the following: • If the changeling deflects, she changes the target of a single Hedgespinning shift she observes. This permits her to steal a beneficial effect or shunt a harmful one onto someone else. She only gains a Beat from an adverse paradigm shift if she actually suffers the adverse effect. • If the changeling defers, she negates up to half her Wyrd, rounded down, of the Hedge’s shift successes. These successes don’t disappear; instead, add them to the Hedge’s next successful Hedgespinning roll, which becomes immune to this Contract. If the Storyteller rolled an exceptional success, the Hedge’s shift remains an exceptional success if even one success remains after deferral. • If the changeling chooses double-down, she adds Hedgespinning successes to the Hedge’s roll, up to half her Wyrd rounded down. In exchange, she gains the same number of additional successes on her next successful Hedgespinning roll within the scene. The additional successes do not count when determining whether she achieves an exceptional success. No matter which option she chooses, the changeling cannot choose it again within the same scene until she has also used both other options. Darkling: When the changeling defers, she may negate successes up to either her Manipulation rating or half her Wyrd. Fairest: When the Unicorn doubles-down, she may apply the additional successes to an ally’s next Hedgespinning roll within the scene instead of her own. Loophole: The changeling leaves behind a meaningful personal effect for the Hedge to consume as she invokes this Contract. She can never personally recover the object: if it returns to her by some other means, she accumulates 2 Goblin Debt points. Acantha’s Fury (Royal) Mortals know the story of how Apollo pursued Acantha and changed her into a plant as punishment for rejecting his advances. The Lost tell a different tale: once, a Keeper with a green thumb stole Acantha from her home. After years of servitude in its garden, she bargained with her fellow captive greenery; they rose up, unleashing their collective fury upon their jailor. Changelings who knew of her heroism named this Contract in her memory, enacting it in the hope every changeling finds freedom one day. Cost: 2 Glamour + 1 Willpower Dice Pool: Presence + Survival + Wyrd vs. Stamina + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: One scene Success: With a wordless cry of rage, the changeling points at her target, who begins to transform into a thorny or prickly plant of the changeling’s choice between Size 4 and 12. The metamorphosis takes place in stages over several minutes once she invokes the Contract. The target progresses through transformative stages at a rate of one per minute for a total of eight minutes after invocation. As each stage occurs, the changeling must offer

56 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors her target a choice between allowing the transmutation to continue and promising to complete a task as delineated by the changeling. The target must be able to complete the named action within a single scene and can’t be asked to complete an impossible task or one harmful to them. It also must be something the target can complete with the resources and information they currently possess. At each stage, the changeling may repeat the same offer or choose a new one. If at any point the target agrees to the promise, they regress one stage per minute until they return to normal. However, the promise binds them; if they fail to accomplish it before the chapter ends, the transformation begins anew. If they can’t contact the changeling before they’re incapable of doing so, they’re out of luck for the scene. The stages progress as follows: • Anytime the target is not in direct sunlight, they become sluggish, taking a − 2 penalty to all non-reflexive actions, Speed, Defense, and Initiative. • Target’s flesh turns to plant matter; they decrease their Stamina by 2, to a minimum of 1, decreasing their Health accordingly. • Over the next four stages, the target’s limbs become stems or branches one by one, inflicting the Arm Wrack or Leg Wrack Tilt on one limb per stage. • Roots grow from the target and dig down where they stand, inflicting the Immobilized Tilt. These roots grow into any surface as burrowing into fertile earth. The target can’t roll to break free until their progress has receded back to this stage. Treat them as though they’re held by an item. • Target’s transformation completes; they become the chosen plant, and cannot take any actions, speak, or move in any way. They still perceive their surroundings as normal and take purely Mental actions not requiring movement. Once the transformation completes, the target must wait out the Contract’s duration; they return to normal once the Contract expires. Any damage done to the plant, such as plucking off leaves or slicing a vine in half, has no effect on the victim when they are no longer fully transformed; any removed pieces of the plant vanish once the Contract ends. Invoking this Contract constitutes a breaking point with a pool of four dice. Exceptional Success: When the target successfully carries out a promise, the changeling regains a Willpower point. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The changeling’s hubris spells disaster, her declaration of fury attracting the eyes of her enemies. She suffers the Hunted Condition. Elemental: The Unbound may target a number of characters up to her Wyrd with a single invocation of this Contract. Handle each target’s progression or regression separately, although the changeling may offer the same promise to all of them at once. Wizened: Without paying Glamour, the Wizened may seal (Changeling, p. 210) the target’s statement of intent when they accept the promise. Increasing the seal’s severity costs 1 Glamour instead of 1 Willpower. Loophole: The changeling holds in her hand a fresh clipping, no more than one day old, from an actual plant of the same type as the transformation she intends to inflict. Awaken Portal (Royal) Any unguarded entrance invites trouble through its gate, from the obvious front door to the most elusive hidden passage. The changeling gives such an entrance the means to protect itself, just as roses guard their beauty with thorns. By smearing her own blood upon the portal or arch for a dormant Hedgeway, or upon any entrance to a Bastion or Hollow, she uplifts it into a goblin who serves as her eyes and ears while she’s away. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One chapter Effects: The portal gains temporary sapience. While it cannot move or take either physical actions or those requiring speech, it perceives its surroundings as the changeling would; blocking the entrance inhibits its vision, and a complete seal also inhibits its hearing. The hobgoblin portal can mentally communicate with her over any distance, so many changelings use this Contract to gather intelligence and blackmail material. The changeling may use her kenning (Changeling, p. 107) from the portal’s point of view rather than her own, but she loses the ability to see her own environment while she does so. Beast: The portal goblin also becomes a great, toothy maw capable of reflexively extending its many fangs to bite intruders before retracting them afterward. It may attack anyone passing through. The attack has a damage rating of 2L and uses a pool equal to the changeling’s Presence + Intimidation. If the portal successfully bites a target, it spits them out forcefully, shoving them back 5 yards/meters. If more than one character attempts to pass through simultaneously, the portal makes one attack, applying its full successes to each intruder’s Defense separately. Elemental: The portal goblin possesses an additional two-dot Influence in the Sprite’s chosen element. Loophole: The changeling takes at least 15 minutes within the scene where she activates the Contract to clean, repair, or spruce up the entrance and its surrounding structure prior to awakening the portal.

New Contracts 57 Awakened Portal Attributes: Intelligence 2, Wits 2, Resolve 5; Presence 2, Manipulation 1, Composure 2 Skills: Occult 2 (Hedgeways); Intimidation 3 Merits: None Wyrd: 2 Glamour/per Turn: 7/2 Willpower: 7 Virtue: Protective Vice: Stubborn Aspiration: Defend the portal Initiative: 3 Defense: 0 Armor: 3/3 Size: Varies Speed: 0 Health: 10 Frailties: Only cold iron Contracts: Overpowering Dread, Thorns and Brambles Dread Powers: Influence (Brambles) 2, Know Soul Notes: The portal goblin appears as a mundane entrance unless identified as a magical entity by an appropriate type of supernatural perception. When invoking Thorns and Brambles, the portal never need contend with his own Contract’s effects. Crown of Thorns (Royal) The changeling writes down an act she wishes to forbid her target from performing, then delivers it to them anonymously via any indirect means — by mail, pigeon, text message, a messenger, etc. Should they defy her wishes, they feel the thorn’s prick in their heart and endure the punishment of the defiant. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: Presence + Occult + Wyrd vs. Resolve + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: One story Roll Results Success: The changeling chooses a specific instant action — such as speak to or attack a particular person, enter a particular building, or take a bite of the changeling’s lunch currently in the employee lounge fridge — she wants to forbid her target from taking. If the target performs the act before the end of the current story, they suffer the Comatose Condition and one point of lethal damage from invisible thorns. Non-changeling targets can’t resolve the Condition unless someone enters their dreams to convince them they’re dreaming, or another supernatural power wakes them after winning a Clash of Wills with the changeling. Victims who can normally dream lucidly may take a −2 penalty to any roll they make to resist being convinced they’re in a dream. If the target remains Comatose at the story’s end, this Contract ends and they wake up on their own; the Condition fades without resolving, granting no Beats. Exceptional Success: The Condition must resolve properly and does not fade at the end of the story. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The changeling becomes Comatose instead. Beast: The Beast sends nightmares to torment the target’s slumber; they lose one Willpower point each night they remain asleep, and cannot regain Willpower through rest until the Condition resolves or fades. Darkling: While disguised or unnoticed, the Darkling achieves an exceptional success on three successes for rolls to manipulate the target into taking the forbidden action. Loophole: The changeling weaves an actual crown of thorns out of prickly vines and branches and sets it upon the target’s head within the same scene. Shrike’s Larder (Royal) Butcherbirds famously immobilize their prey upon thorns so they can easily tear up their meal. The changeling scatters thorns, needles, barbs, or similar small, prickly items in mimicry of the bird. The spines grow beneath the victim’s feet, slowing her enemy to a crawl. Cost: 1-3 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One scene Effects: This Contract grants three different effects a character can stack upon a single target for one point of Glamour each. • The spines trip up the victim, making them stumble at the worst possible moments. While in a chase, they suffer a –2 penalty to all movement-related rolls and cannot possess the Edge. They may spend 1 Willpower to power through the pain and ignore these effects for one turn.

58 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors • The spines dig themselves deeper every time the victim moves, painfully distracting her from matters at hand. She suffers a –3 penalty to Initiative. • Spines pierce the victim’s joints, immobilizing them and making all their movements rigid. Halve the victim’s Speed (rounded down). They may voluntarily take one point of bashing damage ignore this effect for one turn and force themselves to move faster. Beast: The Coursers gave this contract its name when they first imitated the shrike’s hunting techniques. When the changeling harvests Glamour from the victim during the Contract’s duration, he regains 2 Glamour points for each success he rolls instead of 1. Wizened: The Hatter may target a vehicle instead, inflicting the chosen effects upon anyone operating it or riding as a passenger and flattening its tires, if any. Loophole: The changeling impales an effigy representing the target upon a thorn. While brambles are traditional, any small piercing object works, such as barbed wire, sewing needles, or a live porcupine’s erect quills. Witch’s Brambles (Royal) The witch knows the secret to turning illusions real and sees the magic in the mundane. Mortal echoes of the Thorns — clumsy and unsubtle — become much closer to their fae counterparts in the changeling’s hands. Traditional invocation of this Contract utilizes roses and brambles, but artificial objects — shards of glass and barbed wire — work just as well. Cost: 2-3 Glamour + 1 Willpower Dice Pool: None Action: Reflexive Duration: Instant Effects: By spending 2 Glamour, the changeling can perform limited manipulations of the mundane world as though Hedgespinning, so long as she calls upon the fear and fascination of the Thorns. She invokes this Contract while performing any mundane action utilizing a Size 1 or smaller object capable of piercing flesh in a precise fashion. A dagger, its blade broad and indiscriminate, cannot elicit the strange allure of staring at a pricked finger and watching the tiniest drop of blood emerge, but a safety pin, small cactus, or a cat’s (or vampire’s) fang would work. The action the changeling performs suffers a –3 penalty as the mortal world resists such wanton change. The player can spend any excess successes on subtle shifts, following the Hedgespinning rules (Changeling, p. 204). None of the other usual effects or consequences of Hedgespinning occur. If the changeling achieves an exceptional success on the action this Contract enhances, she may pay an additional Glamour to enact a paradigm shift instead. Using this Contract in the Hedge or any other otherworldly realm has no effect. Beast: The Beast may invoke this Contract to instead enhance a bite attack dealing lethal or aggravated damage. Darkling: Add one success to the result of a successful action when the Darkling chooses to enact only subtle shifts but subtract one success when she chooses to enact one or more paradigm shifts. Loophole: The changeling pierces her own flesh with the pointy object she uses while invoking this Contract. Independent Contracts The following Contracts exist independent of any Regalia. Some once belonged to Regalia long lost to memory while the Gentry made others as-is for a singular purpose. The Good Cousins stole powers from other entities, filling those powers up with their fae essences until they became unrecognizable. The deals the Fae made to create them still give them potency even after the destruction of their Regalia. However, the full scope of their origin (and original context) now exists only as forgotten knowledge found on far-flung Wishing Roads in a ruined Bastion, deep in the Hedge with the last hobgoblin of its kind, or as part of an entitlement whose token sank to the bottom of the sea. Those who learn these Contracts — without knowing the attendant history — sometimes stumble into age-old baggage. Using Contracts from forbidden or destroyed Regalia might bring assassins to a changeling’s doorstep or put him in contact with a secret organization seeking knowledge of the old Regalia. He may attract attention from those wishing to learn — or steal — the Contract from him or find out the hard way its central role in an oath binding its wielder, and thus binding him. These situations should serve as interesting story hooks rather than ways to dissuade players from seeking independent Contracts for their characters, so the Storyteller should work with the troupe and decide whether such complications fit the troupe’s story. Coming Darkness (Common) Contracts calling upon darkness and shadow flourish among the Gentry. Each one seems separately created rather than part of one coherent Regalia as far as the Lost have determined to date. Some scholars think the negotiations for these Contracts were never finished, leading to an incomplete set scattered across Arcadia. Others believe these Contracts all belong to different Regalia, related in concept but independent of each other and rising from competing deals made by rival Fae. Others contend that the Kindly Ones who barter for them deliberately do so as one-offs, jealously guarding them from each other. The changeling reaches down to his feet and yanks his shadow away from himself, casting it out and blanketing the world in darkness. Cost: 1 Glamour

New Contracts 59 Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One scene Effects: The changeling creates an area of complete darkness centered on himself with a radius equal to (his Wyrd x 5) yards/meters. The darkness falls so abruptly, everyone in the area suffers the Stunned Tilt unless they make a successful Wits + Composure roll or can see clearly in the dark. Characters within the darkness or who enter it during the Contract’s duration suffer the Blinded Tilt (both eyes) until they leave the area or the Contract ends, whichever comes first. The changeling is unaffected by his own darkness. Mundane light sources in the area are not extinguished but simply obscured; turning on additional mundane lights within the affected area does not penetrate the darkness. Attempts to create light via any magical means provoke a Clash of Wills. The changeling does not have a shadow for the Contract’s duration. If he leaves the area or the Contract ends prematurely, his shadow remains missing. Observers may notice lack this by rolling Wits + Composure, contested by the changeling’s Manipulation + Stealth. If he remains without a shadow and outside the darkness when the Contract ends, he must hunt down his wayward shadow, take it into the Hedge, and reattach it via a subtle Hedgespinning shift requiring four successes. The shadow has no traits and takes no rolled actions but may cause mischief simply by existing independently and visibly. Beast: The Beast may selectively bestow clear night vision upon a number of characters up to half his Wyrd (rounded down) within the area when he invokes the Contract. Darkling: The Darkling may create an area of darkness with a radius up to his Wyrd x 10 yards/meters. Loophole: The changeling extinguishes a flame as he invokes this Contract. Pomp and Circumstance (Common) A Good Cousin called Nightmare Spinner stole this power from the concept of Hospitality after seeing how respectful mortals were to gracious hosts. They wanted that respect for themselves, but wrapped the pilfered power tightly into a cocoon for safekeeping, hiding it from sight so they would be the only good host in the land. A changeling can use this Contract to hide his gatherings from prying eyes by delimiting a perimeter and walking around it widdershins three times. Cost: 1 Glamour, or 1 Glamour + 1 Willpower Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One scene Effects: For 1 Glamour, the changeling chooses an area with a radius of up to (his Wyrd x 10) yards/meters. It must have visible, clear physical demarcations of some sort: perhaps existing walls or fence, or perhaps chalk or a line of stones or salt created by the changeling. Uninvited guests cannot enter the area, although anyone within the defined area may allow someone access by inviting her in. Attempts at mundane spying on the area or tracking any characters within fail automatically. Supernatural attempts to circumvent any of these effects provoke a Clash of Wills. If the changeling spends a Willpower as well, no Huntsman or True Fae can find the area, even if they track someone directly to the location. It simply doesn’t exist to their senses, whether mundane or magical. The changeling and everyone inside the area must uphold a set of individual, specific guidelines numbering up to his Wyrd. He clearly specifies these rules when invoking the Contract. From that point on, anyone entering the area automatically understands the guidelines whether they heard them explained. The guidelines often describe the gathering’s etiquette, such as refraining from violence, insulting others deliberately, or eating; they may also require specific behaviors, such as speaking only in coded whispers or keeping one’s eyes closed. If anyone breaks the guidelines, the Contract ends immediately and everyone in the area suffers the Demoralized Condition as the Wyrd punishes all for the transgressions of one. Beast: The Grim’s awareness of her refuge extends beyond the marked boundary; he can detect anyone who passes by or intrudes close to the hidden area from up to (his Wyrd x 20) yard/meters away. Wizened: The Hatter may apply any dots he possesses in the Safe Place Merit (if the location is in the mortal world) or Hollow Merit (if it’s in the Hedge) to the location during the gathering, even if the space is nowhere near the place to which the Merit applies. This works even if multiple motleymates share the Merit in question, but the changeling must be one of them. Loophole: The changeling lays out an unbroken ring of poppies around the area earlier in the same scene as the Contract’s invocation. Shadow Puppet (Common) The Oaken Warrior motley first uncovered this Contract in a Goblin Market when they encountered a seller made of nothing but a hobgoblin’s shadow. That hobgoblin soon returned, claiming they stole the Contract from their Keeper when they were a changeling. The motley doubts the tale, but happily accepted the Contract in trade anyway. The changeling uses his fingers or any part of his body — up to and including the entire thing — to create a crisp shadow puppet on a wall under a bright light. That shadow comes to life and acts on its own, under his command. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: None Action: Instant

60 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors Duration: One scene Effects: The shadow puppet the changeling creates takes substantial form, appearing as a fully realized version of whatever shape the puppet takes, but made of shadow. For instance, if the changeling makes the head of a stag with his fingers, this Contract creates an actual stag colored entirely in shades of gray and black, fuzzing at the edges. If he uses his entire body to create the shadow, the puppet becomes an identical shadow twin. This puppet functions as a Retainer (Changeling, p. 125) with a dot rating equal to half the changeling’s Wyrd and a basic intelligence. It follows the changeling’s instructions and may act in an action scene, taking the character’s turn and acting on his Initiative. For purposes of the Retainer Merit, the changeling chooses a Specialty he possesses as the shadow’s area of expertise. The player assigns one goblin Dread Power (Changeling, p. 253) to the puppet. The shadow being possesses Wyrd 1, a maximum Glamour pool of 6 and has one Health box; it perishes immediately if that box fills with lethal or aggravated damage. A destroyed shadow puppet takes its part of the changeling’s shadow with it; the stag head represents a small fraction of her shadow, but a full double takes the whole thing. A changeling without a shadow must go to the Hedge to reattach it as a subtle Hedgespinning shift requiring four successes. Beast: If the Beast gives the shadow puppet an animal form, it also gains either +3 to perception-based rolls, the ability to fly, or an unarmed attack with a damage rating of +1L. Darkling: The Darkling’s shadow puppet also gains the ability to spend 1 Glamour to vanish into a shadow and step out from another shadow it can perceive as an Instant action; this ability doesn’t work in complete darkness or when the lighting casts no shadows. Loophole: The changeling performs a shadow puppet show for the entertainment of an audience of at least three people lasting at least five minutes within the same scene. Dread Companion (Royal) The Rider Through Dawn once haggled with Dominion itself to gain power over all Hedge denizens, but another of that Gentry’s Titles — the Countess in Repose of Bonestadt — wanted to usurp its power and intervened in the negotiations. The Contract resulting from their feud grants only dominion over Hedge ghosts. The changeling offers a bounty in return for a Hedge ghost’s service, and if it agrees, he makes a bracelet for himself out of Hedge brambles, tethering it to himself in a mutually beneficial symbiosis. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: Manipulation + Occult + Wyrd vs. Resistance + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: One chapter Roll Results Success: The changeling becomes an additional Thread for the Hedge ghost. When he asks it to perform an action for him, doing so counts as affirming its Thread. The changeling can ask the Hedge ghost to use any of its powers, Numina, or Influences on his behalf, though it may pay 1 Glamour to refuse. The two entities remain bound for the Contract’s duration, unable to stray more than (the changeling’s Wyrd x 10) yards/meters from each other. The Hedge ghost may take Glamour from the character without touching him to fuel powers it uses on his behalf. Likewise, he may use the Hedge ghost’s Glamour pool as his own on actions benefitting them both. In the mundane world, the Hedge ghost suffers no deleterious effects while tethered, and the changeling may extend his Mask to his ethereal companion and make it appear human. Exceptional Success: The Hedge ghost cannot refuse the changeling’s requests unless doing so would put it in danger. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The failed negotiation angers the Hedge ghost; it immediately attacks the changeling. Darkling: While the Wisp is bound to a Hedge ghost, she gains access to the Dematerialize Numen (Changeling, p. 250). Fairest: This Contract’s duration becomes “Until the Unicorn leaves the Hedge” instead. Loophole: The changeling has caused the Hedge ghost to affirm its own Thread within the same scene. Cracked Mirror (Royal) Once, long ago, this Contract belonged to the Mirror Regalia. When a desperate changeling fled to mirror space to escape a band of privateers, she broke a promise to the mirror people, and they in turn cursed her: the next Mirror Contract she invoked would shatter, ruining her magic and giving her seven years of ill fortune. The Contract she invoked cracked and broke, falling away from its Regalia but persisting in pieces littered throughout mirror space. If someone hunted down the shards and cobbled them back together, perhaps they could restore the magic to its original state. The changeling fogs up a mirror and writes his own name in the condensation. When he wipes the moisture away, he finds his fetch looking back at him rather than his reflection. Cost: 1 Glamour, or 1 Glamour + 1 Willpower Dice Pool: Manipulation + Larceny + Wyrd vs. Stamina + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: One scene or until the changeling enacts a switch

New Contracts 61 Roll Results Success: For 1 Glamour, the changeling attunes the mirror to spy on his fetch as though he stood a few feet from them and followed them around. For the rest of the scene, he can see their surroundings clearly and listen to any sound they can hear, but the fetch automatically knows their changeling counterpart tried to watch them and eavesdrop even if the changeling fails her roll. By paying an additional 1 Willpower, the changeling may switch places with his fetch, tricking the mirror into mistaking one identity for the other. It draws them both briefly into mirror space before spitting them back out in opposite locations. If the changeling does so, the Contract immediately ends; if he wants to come back the way he came, he must invoke it again. A willing fetch who cooperates with the changeling need not contest the invocation roll. Exceptional Success: The process disorients the fetch, inflicting the Confused Condition. Failure: The Contract fails, but the fetch knows the changeling made the attempt. Dramatic Failure: The fetch knows about the attempt and may pay 1 Glamour to immediately invoke this Contract on the changeling without a roll, including the option to spend a Willpower to switch their places. The fetch need not possess the Mimic Contract Echo to do so. Cracked Mirror doesn’t count as faceto-face contact for purposes of that Echo if the fetch possesses it. Listen with the Wind’s Ears (Royal) No one knows where this Contract originally came from. The first time anyone saw it in recorded Lost history was when Detroit’s Chrome Court Queen stepped out of thin air and smote a motley speaking ill of her. The changeling makes a sacrifice to the wind, allowing it to carry something into the air — a piece of paper, a leaf, dandelion seeds, or anything else light enough to blow away. In return, the wind whispers to him whenever it hears someone speak his name. Cost: 1 Glamour, or 2 Glamour + 1 Willpower Dice Pool: None Action: Instant Duration: One scene, or until used to teleport Roll Results Effects: For 1 Glamour, if the changeling’s name is spoken within a radius of (his Wyrd x 2) miles, he immediately senses it and may eavesdrop on the conversation from a distance for a single turn with a successful Wits + Investigation + Wyrd roll contested by the speaker’s Composure + Wyrd. While he listens in on that conversation, he becomes deaf to all speech in his vicinity (but not other sounds). If a power (such as Pomp and Circumstance, p. XX) protects any of the speakers from scrying or eavesdropping, it provokes a Clash of Wills. The Contract only activates when the wind hears the changeling’s real name, not a nickname, deadname, or alias of any kind. If the changeling achieves an exceptional success on the contested roll, he may listen in to the conversation for turns equal to excess successes rolled instead. While the changeling successfully eavesdrops on a conversation, he may pay 1 additional Glamour and 1 Willpower to teleport to that location as an instant action. He does not portal, simply steps from one location to the other as the Wyrd uses the sound of his name to summon him. He doesn’t know where he’ll arrive until he gets there, nor does he know who spoke his name unless he recognizes the voice himself. Once active, this Contract lasts for the scene or until he uses it to teleport somewhere, whichever comes first. Beast: The Courser doubles his Speed for the scene after arriving at the speaker’s location. Fairest: The Fairest may drag the one who spoke his name to his location instead. Loophole: The changeling has introduced himself by his real name to someone he’s never met before within the same scene. Momentary Respite (Royal) Legends among the Lost tell of the very first pact the Gentry made after they conquered Arcadia and made it their own: an agreement with Time to vacate their realm and never return. During this negotiation, one of the True Fae tried to cheat, introducing a loophole allowing it to wield a Time Regalia the spirit of the pact. But Time was too powerful an entity to fall for such a ploy and destroyed the latent Regalia — and the cheater’s Title with it. All that remains of that Title and the power it attempted to build is this Contract. No one knows whether this tale is true, but most changelings are superstitious about it and recite a traditional rhyme when invoking Momentary Respite to ward off Time’s retribution. The changeling smashes a timekeeping device, such as a wristwatch, hourglass, or LED clock display. This symbolic act allows him to temporarily exist within the liminal space between moments, pausing the progression of time on his body and mind. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: Stamina + Survival + Wyrd Action: Instant Duration: One scene Roll Results Success: For 1 Glamour, the character may choose one option per success rolled: • End one personal Tilt currently affecting him (can be chosen more than once) • Ignore all wound penalties without healing the damage

62 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors • Ward his rightmost unwarded health box from any aggravated damage (can be chosen a number of times up to the changeling’s total Health) • Ignore the effects of one toxin or disease currently affecting him (can be chosen more than once) • Ignore the effects of one Persistent Condition currently affecting him; he can’t resolve it or earn Beats for the duration (can be chosen more than once) If he wards a health box after it has already filled with aggravated damage, he simply ignores that damage’s effects for the duration, although it doesn’t heal. For the duration of this Contract, the changeling cannot heal damage naturally, regain Willpower via rest, regain Clarity via spending time with Touchstones, or spend Experiences. He also doesn’t age. At the end of each consecutive scene after the first in which the changeling invokes or benefits from this Contract, he suffers a breaking point with a pool of one die + the number of consecutive scenes the Contract has been active. Because this Contract pauses time for the changeling’s body and mind, he may pay 1 Willpower at the end of the scene to extend the Contract’s duration for another scene without invoking it again or having to suffer the return of the inflictions he chose to ignore. He may do so indefinitely as long as he has Willpower to spend, but if it’s active for longer than a year and a day, Time takes notice of the abuse of stolen power and takes retribution in a way chosen by the Storyteller. Scholars who know of Momentary Respite whisper cautionary rumors about the monarch of the Wreath’s Encircling Arms freehold who kept it active for an entire decade and ended up a Geas (see p. XX). Exceptional Success: Additional successes are their own reward. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: Time pauses for the changeling, but not in the way he wanted; he suffers the Immobile Tilt indefinitely, until he or someone else can break Time’s curse with a successful Clash of Wills against the changeling’s own pool for Clashes. Elemental: The Elemental adds the option to ignore the effects of one Environmental Tilt currently affecting him to the list of available options; it can be chosen more than once. Ogre: The Brute may invoke this Contract for another consenting character. He still pays all costs to invoke and extend the Contract and suffers the consequences of extending it himself. He may only have one instance of this Contract active at a time; if he invokes it again while it’s already active on someone else, the first instance immediately ends. Loophole: The changeling hugs or wraps himself up in an item of comfort that represents rest or sleep, such as a blanket, a pillow, a live sheep, or a favorite stuffed animal. Steal Influence (Common) Once upon a time, a hobgoblin warlock wandered into the Sorcerer Duke’s court hoping to impress the Arcadian Lord. The Sorcerer Duke marveled at how a mere goblin commanded fire, joy, and death with such delicate finesse, and demanded the hobgoblin reveal its secrets. The hobgoblin stood confused and silent, for its magic came to it innately rather than as a teachable Contract. The Duke offered to show the goblin his magic instead and swallowed one of its hairs. In an instant, the Duke learned everything and left the hobgoblin with nothing. Since then, the Keeper’s captives learn this Contract in his service, spreading it from court to court upon their return. Cost: 1 Glamour per Influence dot Dice Pool: Wits + Larceny + Wyrd vs Resolve + Wyrd Action: Contested Duration: One scene Roll Results Success: The changeling touches a creature possessing an Influence and, for the Contract’s duration, steals one dot of it per Glamour spent. If the target possesses multiple Influences, the changeling steals one of his choosing; he may not split the spent Glamour to steal some dots of one Influence and some of another. The victim cannot use the stolen Influence dots while the changeling possesses them, and the changeling can activate the Influence at the dot rating he paid for by spending the appropriate amount of Glamour, even if it would normally require another resource to use. Exceptional Success: The changeling can purchase the stolen Influence for 2 Experiences per dot, up to the number of dots he took. If he does so, he retains use of the purchased dots even after they return to the victim. Changelings may possess a maximum of half their Wyrd in dots of a single Influence, just like Hedge ghosts. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The target may use the Influence the changeling tried to steal as a reflexive action, with a cost discount equal to the Glamour points the changeling spent to invoke this Contract. For instance, if the changeling spent 2 Glamour to steal two dots, the target may reflexively use the Influence to strengthen or manipulate at no cost, or to use effects of a higher dot rating at a discount of −2 Glamour. Darkling: The Wisp may split the Glamour he spends to invoke this Contract on as many different Influences as he chooses. Elemental: The Unbound may transform as many dots of the Influences he steals as he likes into another, thematically similar one when invoking the Contract. For example, an Elemental who takes three dots of Influence (water) may transmute any number of those dots into Influence (rain), Influence (ice), or Influence (ocean). If the changeling spends Experiences to keep the Influence after the Contract ends, all transformed dots revert back to their original type.

New Contracts 63 Loophole: The target has dealt at least one point of lethal or aggravated damage to the changeling within the same scene. Earth’s Gentle Movements (Common) A motley in the Heart’s Home Freehold in Warsaw, Poland discovered a pair of Contracts allowing control over earth and soil. They refused to say where or how they learned the Contracts, leading their fellows to believe they stole the pair directly from a True Fae. The freehold argued for days about allowing the motley to stay, lest the Contracts’ original owner came looking for them. The monarch eventually evicted the motley when a huge earthquake nearly destroyed the freehold’s headquarters. The changeling rubs a handful of dirt or soil between his hands, allowing him to move and shape the earth at his whim. Cost: 1 Glamour Dice Pool: Strength + Crafts + Wyrd Action: Instant Duration: Instant Roll Results Success: The changeling reshapes an area of open land centered on himself with a radius of 1 square yard/meter per success rolled. He may not affect any area upon which structures, paving, or other artificial constructs stand, but may create a sinkhole, build flat land up to create an earthen wall or small hill, or send a pillar of earth reaching into the air as long as the total area remains the same. He may even reshape it into more specific forms, such as a pillar shaped like himself or a flat expanse with ruts that form words when viewed from above and can change the consistency of the earth. For instance, loose soil could become packed earth, sand, or mud, but never stone. He can eject any additional materials in the earth if he likes, such as minerals added to soil for planting or bones and insect carcasses. Anyone in the area of the shaping when it happens must succeed on a Dexterity + Athletics roll or suffer the Knocked Down Tilt. Once the changeling invokes the Contract, his changes are permanent, barring any later reshaping. Exception Success: The changeling’s player may split the successes on the invocation roll for the changeling to create two different effects within the designated area. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The earth below the changeling’s feet resents his attempts to control it and swallows him up, shallowly burying him and inflicting the Immobilized Tilt; treat it as though he’s restrained by an item to represent the need to fight his way out (or be rescued). Elemental: The Elemental may target an area of up to 2 yards/meters per success instead.

64 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors Wizened: The Wizened may target an area of natural, unshaped stone instead. He can craft it into a useful form such as stairs, create hand- and footholds in a sheer rock wall, or whip up an artful sculpture. The Domovoi’s shaping must be constructive, not destructive. Change the Contract’s roll to Dexterity + Crafts instead if he invokes this clause. Loophole: The changeling places a pebble under her tongue. Earth’s Impenetrable Walls (Royal) The second in the pair of Contracts discovered in Warsaw, Earth’s Impenetrable Walls allows the changeling to raise a fortress of stone from the earth at his feet. He places his hands flat upon the ground and calls it to arms, declaring himself its commander and building a stronghold. Cost: 2 Glamour Dice Pool: Strength + Crafts + Wyrd Action: Instant Duration: One chapter Success: The changeling chooses an area of open land centered on himself containing no structures, paving, or other artificial constructs. With an instant action taking five turns to complete (or 30 seconds outside action scenes), the changeling channels his will into the earth to build a fortress of stone centered around him with a Size of (his Wyrd x 10). During this time, the Contract inflicts the Earthquake Environmental Tilt on the area; the changeling himself is immune to its effects. The design of this fortress is up to him; he may create a simple, square bunker with battlements, a single tall tower, a pyramid, etc. and may include as many or as few rooms as he likes within the allowed area. The fortress counts as a Safe Place (Changeling, p. 125) with a dot rating of half the changeling’s Wyrd, rounded down, and its walls have Durability 2. The player chooses an additional benefit per success beyond the first rolled to invoke this Contract; available benefits include: • +1 Durability; can apply multiple times • +10 Size; can apply multiple times • Immunity to all natural Environmental Tilts for walls and interior; supernatural ones provoke a Clash of Wills • Stocked with enough provisions to provide adequate sustenance to everyone inside • If invoked in the Hedge, the structure created by this Contract also counts as a Hollow (Changeling, p. 116) with dot rating of half changeling’s Wyrd, rounded down Exceptional Success: Additional successes are their own reward. Failure: The Contract fails. Dramatic Failure: The changeling inflicts the Earthquake Environmental Tilt, to which he is not immune, on the area for five turns (or 30 seconds outside action scenes) without building anything. Fairest: If the Fairest invokes this Contract within the Hedge, the fortress also comes with a temporary Staff Merit (Changeling, p. 125) with a dot rating of half his Wyrd representing hobgoblin followers; their types and Skills must make sense in the context of a fortress, such as soldiers with Weaponry, scouts with Stealth, or doctors with Medicine. Ogre: Subtract successes equal to half the Ogre’s Wyrd from any Hedgespinning action another character takes to enact shifts on the fortress or any part of its interior. Loophole: The changeling has successfully defended himself or someone else from an attack within the same scene. Regalia Manifestation The bargains the True Fae struck with the central concepts of their Regalia came with a caveat. The Gentry must keep physical representations of those pacts, called manifestations, as reminders of the promises they made. A manifestation’s form takes its inspiration both from the concept itself (leadership, luck, protection), and the individual Title calling upon it. The Warrior with a Thousand Scars carries a buckler made from a massive oak tree, for example, while a towering glacier acts as the bulwark before the Hailstone Prince’s icy keep. Both Shields protect the True Fae and their servants. Sometimes, the manifestations the Gentry carry act like tokens, not only representing their power but also behaving as magical tools. The Lost have learned how to manifest their Arcadian Contracts this way as well, as a way of externalizing their power. She imbues tokens or other significant items with the themes of one of the Regalia whose Contracts she knows, reinforcing her connection to it: an Arrow always flies true or makes those whose hearts it pierces betray their true love; a Ring tightens on an oathbreaker’s finger; a Throne shows the changeling those places in her domain in need of her help when she sits upon it. Wielding a Regalia manifestation brings with it additional benefits beyond the original token’s effects. As a representation of her will and the themes defining her power, the changeling may use it to guarantee her safety or survival. A Darkling fills a Chalice with bitter wine and locks it away in a golden cabinet. For the next week, any wounds she suffers seep wine instead of blood, insulating her from harm. Such manifestations can bolster her Clarity, grant her authority over matters involving the Regalia’s themes, and alter how its Contracts work for her.

Regalia Manifestation 65 Manifestations also constitute a point of weakness for the Gentry. The items aren’t simply status symbols — the Good Cousins invest a significant part of themselves in these objects. This shores up their identities and Titles but simultaneously makes them vulnerable. Likewise, while getting one’s hands on a changeling’s manifestation can’t destroy her, it gives the possessor power over her in other ways, such as turning her hidden protection into a vulnerability or making her susceptible to dramaturgic magic (see p. XX). Wise changelings go to great lengths to prevent their manifestations from falling into enemy hands. Once she’s created a manifestation, the Regalia’s themes seep into the character’s mien. Her mirror-like eyes reflect the world around her. Hoofbeats sound when she walks. The metallic scent of old coins clings to her. These features don’t break through the Mask, though some changelings choose to adorn themselves in the manifested Regalia’s symbols as well. Creating Regalia Manifestations Manifesting a Regalia only happens as a conscious, deliberate choice. The Lost imposes her will on the world and creates a tangible symbol of her magic and conviction. She creates these items by investing her power in a token holding symbolic or emotional significance related to the Regalia’s themes. She may even imbue a Touchstone or her fetch with this power or conjure a manifestation token from an important eidolon or prop in a dream. The item must represent the chosen Regalia’s theme somehow and must contain a certain threshold of power. She might create an actual object of that type, such as a coin, sword, or mirror. Perhaps she opts for a more abstract representation: a compass for the Star, a garland of spring flowers for the Crown, a horseshoe for the Steed, or a spindle for the Thorns. The changeling may create a manifestation from a token she already owns via the Token Merit or choose a mundane object with particular emotional or symbolic significance and turn it into a token using any of the available methods (Changeling, p. 222). To create the manifestation once she possesses an appropriate token, the changeling spends time with it, keeps it on her person, and makes it part of her identity by affirming her Needle while using it. A Gargoyle affixes the arrowhead to its shaft as he convinces the Summer Queen to pursue his agenda instead of her court’s. The Fairest Helldiver grins at her reflection in her compact’s mirror before following the Loyalist down the alley; she approaches her revenge with eyeliner as perfect and sharp as her teeth. Though its Mask doesn’t change, the manifestation’s mien transforms to reflect its elevated status. A glass bauble takes on the finely-cut facets of a precious gem. A mirror’s plain wooden frame transforms into one covered in silver filigree. A simple ring becomes a royal seal. New Merit: Regalia Manifestation (• to •••••) Prerequisite: Token (•••+), minimum two Contracts from one Regalia (at least one must be Royal) Your character has invested the power of one Regalia from which she possesses Contracts into a token. It’s both a symbol and an item conferring extra benefits upon its wielder. This Merit must be tied to a Token Merit not shared by a motley. A character may possess a maximum of one dot in this Merit per two Contracts known in that Regalia. You may purchase this Merit multiple times to reflect different Regalia, but you may only have one manifestation for any given Regalia. Alternative Regalia Manifestations Less commonly, a changeling invests a Regalia manifestation in another character or an Icon rather than a token. A changeling may make one from a Touchstone or her fetch if they embody the chosen Regalia’s themes. Her best friend acts like a Mirror, reflecting the changeling’s best qualities back at her when self-doubt drags her down. Her fetch embodies the Shield, protecting her family ever since her Keeper stole her away. Doing so not only grants the changeling the benefits of a Regalia manifestation, but also confers some power upon the character in whom she invests part of her power. If the Lost has sworn a pledge on an Icon (see p. XX), thus giving it a physical presence outside the Hedge, it can become a Regalia manifestation. Any pledges she’s sworn on it remain intact; breaking them risks losing both the Icon and the manifestation. Finally, a changeling may temporarily invest her power in a mundane object or an important eidolon or prop from a dream. Changelings often do this as an act of desperation, such as a last-ditch effort to save herself from a deadly situation or a hasty show of power in a rival’s Bastion. Chased by briarwolves, a changeling clutches the pendant she wears and makes of it a symbol, burying it and marking it with a rune. The briarwolf catches her in the end, but can’t kill her unless it first digs up and destroys the pendant. Manifestations made this way are short-lived, rendered forever mundane when they lose their potency. Manifestation Systems A character may only manifest a Regalia from which he knows two or more Contracts, at least one of which must be Royal. To turn a token or oathbound Icon into a permanent Regalia manifestation, it must be thematically appropriate for the intended Regalia, and the character must first use the object in an action allowing her to regain Willpower through her Needle a number of times equal to (11 – her Wyrd) and spend 1 Glamour each time. Finally, she must

66 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors Wyrd-Bound Tokens A token bound to a changeling’s Wyrd (Oak, Ash, and Thorn, p. 54) may also serve as a manifestation, but putting all her eggs in one basket this way makes a changeling particularly vulnerable if the item escapes her possession. sacrifice a dot of Willpower to complete the transformation of the object into an effigy linked to her Contracts. It retains whatever powers or memories it already possessed. To create a temporary manifestation, the changeling chooses a Regalia meeting the above requirements and performs a ritual evoking the Regalia’s themes. This takes one turn (six seconds outside action scenes). For example, a Beast cuts his hand and coats the blade with his blood to evoke the Sword, or a Wizened collects her own tears in a plastic cup to call upon the Chalice. The player rolls Presence + Wyrd + the number of Contracts the changeling possesses in the chosen Regalia beyond two. Roll Results Success: The item becomes a temporary manifestation. It possesses one manifestation power (below) and disintegrates at the end of the scene. When it does, the changeling gains 2 Goblin Debt points. Exceptional Success: The item possesses two manifestation powers instead. Failure: The attempt fails. Dramatic Failure: The item disintegrates immediately and the changeling gains 2 Goblin Debt points, but no manifestation benefits. A changeling may only have one permanent and one temporary manifestation at a time. Manifestation Powers Following are example benefits a Regalia manifestation can possess; players and Storytellers may also work together to create new ones. A permanent manifestation has a number of powers equal to its Merit dot rating, and gains another each time the player increases its rating. While most of the benefits work with any Regalia, the way they work should reflect the chosen Regalia’s themes and motifs just as its Contracts do. For instance, a manifestation of the Shield might absorb damage by literally drawing attacks to itself, while a manifestation of the Coin might cause the absorbed wounds to bleed nickels rather than blood. A manifestation’s powers function only when the character has it on her person, unless otherwise indicated. The Storyteller is the final arbiter of whether a given action aligns with the manifested Regalia’s themes. • Choose one Contract the changeling knows from the manifested Regalia normally requiring an invocation roll. If the changeling pays an additional Glamour to invoke it, the player’s roll for that Contract gains the 9-again quality; 8-again if he pays two additional Glamour; or the rote quality if he pays three. The changeling may change the chosen Contract once per story. • Once per story, spend Glamour up to the character’s Wyrd rating. For each point spent, the manifestation absorbs one point of bashing damage the changeling would otherwise suffer or converts one point of lethal damage to bashing. The effect wears off when the item absorbs or converts its maximum allowance of damage or at the end of the story, whichever comes first. • Once per story, spend 2 Glamour and 1 Willpower. The changeling hides his Regalia manifestation and performs a short, thematically appropriate ritual over the spot where he hides it; this takes an instant action. Though he can still suffer injury or become incapacitated, he cannot die unless the item is destroyed. The effect wears off at the end of the scene in he activates it. (Doesn’t require having the manifestation on hand.) • The changeling may attempt a kenning roll with any amount of Clarity damage as long as he currently suffers no Clarity Conditions, but if half or more of his Clarity boxes contain damage he can only see results strongly related to the manifested Regalia. • The changeling regains a Glamour point whenever he puts himself at personal risk in a manner befitting the manifested Regalia’s themes. • Whenever the changeling hits a target with a physical attack, he may spend 1 Glamour to impose a personal Tilt on them matching the Regalia’s themes in lieu of dealing damage, without taking a dice penalty for a specified target. • The player gains one additional success to spend on shifts when making a Hedgespinning roll for an action that thematically aligns with the manifested Regalia. • (Touchstone manifestation only) Once per story, heal mild Clarity damage up to the Merit’s rating by targeting the Touchstone with a beneficial Contract of the manifested Regalia or using one for their benefit or on their behalf. • (Touchstone manifestation only) The changeling always knows when the Touchstone is in danger, and his player adds the manifestation Merit’s rating in bonus dice to rolls defending the Touchstone.

Regalia Manifestation 67 Proceed With Care Though some aspect of the Keepers’ power over the Lost is always at the heart of the characters’ stories, please keep in mind that abusers in the real world often threaten people or objects meaningful to their victims to control them. Be mindful of the way pursuing a storyline like this might affect players at your table and communicate with them before doing so. Refer to p. XX of this book and p. 302-304 of Changeling for advice on keeping your game a safe experience for your players. • (Fetch manifestation only) The changeling invests more than just his Contracts’ power in his fetch, who gains one additional Echo that aligns with the manifested Regalia as long as it remains a manifestation. (Doesn’t require having the manifestation on hand.) • (Fetch manifestation only) As long as his fetch has the manifestation on its person, the changeling can spend 1 Glamour and share its senses for minutes equal to the manifestation’s Merit rating, perceiving everything the fetch can as well as his own surroundings; he can’t end this effect early. Any action requiring focus or undivided attention suffers a −2 dice penalty while doing so. (Doesn’t require having the manifestation on hand.) Drawbacks A changeling displaying his power so boldly draws attention from those in the know. Choose one of the drawbacks below when creating a manifestation. Whenever the character uses one of its powers, she suffers the drawback. • Anyone searching for the character enjoys a +2 on rolls to find him for the scene. • The character gains an additional minor frailty for the chapter. • The changeling suffers a Condition appropriate to their Regalia’s themes, chosen by the Storyteller • One of the player’s rolls of the Storyteller’s choice becomes a dramatic failure within the next full chapter. • Whenever the changeling participates in a Hedge navigation chase for the next scene, the Hedge itself always has the Edge. Nothing Without Risk Possessing a Regalia manifestation comes with its share of risks in addition to their individual drawbacks. Some manifestations act as beacons to Huntsmen in the Hedge whose liege’s Title resonates with the manifested Regalia. Privateers or goblins may steal the items and sell them for profit or use them as tools to capture their owners. BridgeBurners or overly cautious freeholds set on destroying a Regalia want to eliminate every last trace of its power, and may not care who they harm in the process. Changelings don’t need to keep a physical representation of their Regalia the way the Gentry must; they may choose to do so. The Wyrd views the effort the Lost puts into physically manifesting her Regalia as a pact-in-miniature, binding her more tightly to its concept. When a True Fae made its ancient bargain with a powerful entity, the promises and powers attached themselves to — or possibly became — one of the Kindly One’s myriad Titles. Destroying a Title’s Regalia manifestation weakens the Title, and controlling one might help force the Fae to break its word. This may destroy the Title, but not the Name behind it; though the loss still constitutes a devastating blow, the Gentry loses only a portion of itself. Those Lost who similarly invest deeply in their Regalia only have a single self to risk. Thus, controlling a changeling’s manifestation gives the bearer power over her, and harming it may hurt or weaken her. Systems Anyone who gets their hands on a changeling’s manifestation may attempt to steal control of it, whether to gain its benefits, weaken its creator, or both. With the token in their possession, the usurper swears an oath upon it, prompting a Clash of Wills. (See p. XX for expanded oath types.) If the oath succeeds, the Wyrd witnesses the change in the manifestation’s ownership. It symbolism acts oddly: reflections in the mirror move a heartbeat behind reality, flaws appear in the heart of a jewel, a porcelain cup develops cracks. Even so, the Wyrd remembers. The Lost maintains her connection to the token for the rest of the story and can regain control over it if she proves her dedication via a series of difficult, thematic tasks equal to the manifestation’s Merit rating, chosen by the Storyteller. Example feats include chasing her enemy through a mirror-maze in their dreams and catching them, correctly guessing the names of 100 stars along the Wishing Roads, or usurping control of an organization or hierarchy to which she doesn’t belong. She has until the end of the current story to perform the deeds. The original creator loses the manifestation’s benefits while someone else possesses it, but its drawback remains in effect for the rest of the story or until she wins her token back, whichever comes first. Sanctity of Merits applies as usual to the manifestation’s Merit. If the changeling manifested her Regalia in an Icon and loses it to a rival, he also suffers the Icon Shard Condition

68 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors (p. XX). Additionally, his enemy gains the Informed Condition about him. By their nature, other fae creatures can’t make oaths with a Touchstone. However, a rival Lost who swears an oath with a character’s detached Touchstone can engage in a Clash of Wills to win them away. If the changeling loses, his relationship with the Touchstone sours. He can’t heal Clarity damage by spending time with the person, nor can he reattach them as his Touchstone until he performs the deeds. Upon losing the Clash of Wills, the changeling suffers the Demoralized Condition. Investing Regalia into one’s fetch essentially replaces your name in a binding contract with your fae-fashioned twin’s. When a rival swears an oath with the fetch and wins the Clash of Wills, the character suffers an immediate breaking point with a +3 modifier. The changeling also suffers the Oathbreaker Condition. Losing control of her Regalia manifestation also opens the changeling up to dramaturgical attacks (see p. XX). While contact with iron obliterates regular tokens, but hardier Regalia manifestations require prolonged contact to destroy — a chapter for one- and two-dot versions, a story for five-dot tokens. Additionally, at 3+ dots, the changeling who created the item must also act against his Regalia in some way, either by breaking an oath or going significantly against his Needle. Sample Regalia Manifestations The following examples show how a player might tailor a Regalia manifestation to her character. Each has the original token’s catches and drawbacks, plus benefits and additional drawbacks from the lists above, adjusted to reflect the chosen Regalia. Closer than They Appear (••, Mirror) This token appears as the rearview mirror from an older-model car, a rectangle of silvered glass in a cheap plastic frame. When activated, it reveals a secret from the recent past of whoever sits in the car’s back seat, playing out a soundless scene in the glass for the beholder. Catch: The Lost states something true about herself that she’d rather not speak aloud. Drawback: The user can’t unsee the disturbing truth the mirror revealed; she suffers the Distracted Condition. Manifestation benefit: Mirrors present things from a different angle, revealing what the observer missed on first glance. This mirror always reflects the presence of magic that targets a person to the changeling via kenning as long as she suffers no Clarity Conditions. Manifestation drawback: Mirrors are used for signaling. Problem is, anyone looking can see the flash... and Huntsmen are always looking. Anyone searching for the changeling gains a +2 bonus on rolls to find her for the scene. Lucky Coin (••••, Coin) To the mundane eye, this tarnished bronze coin bears a vague visage made unidentifiable by time. When activated, it glimmers gold and shows the changeling’s own face on one side, sans Mask; the other side shows a symbol representing the Thorns. Flipping the coin brings one of two outcomes: the changeling gains the Inspired Condition if she calls the correct side, but suffers the Shaken Condition if she calls the wrong one. Dramaturgy A Huntsman peers into the iridescent glass of an Icon, and in it sees brief flashes of his Lost prey. A changeling drapes herself in magnificent golden jewelry as she calls down the wrath of Helios, using the guise of the sun to convince the Wyrd woman and star are one and the same. A hobgoblin peddler weaves the lock of hair for which they bartered into a new promise, forging a crude Contract that thrums with hirsute potential. The magic of the fae often rests upon such binding threads and subtle connections, deals sealed with statements of identity that anchor the Wyrd’s balance. The Lost call this sympathetic power dramaturgy. Dramaturgy is the magic of transference and correspondence. It’s in the warp and weft of the Wyrd, tracing the threads of pledges and bargains back to their root or tampering with the tapestry’s bigger picture. It’s the force that keeps account of identity and qualities. Through dramaturgy, Brianna’s fingernail clippings are more than just discarded bodily waste. They’re Brianna, and they’re sharp and claws and scrabbling for purchase and clinging so tight the skin breaks and blood flows and she’ll never let go of Maggie no matter what. They’ve absorbed the changeling’s identity, her desperation, and her perceptions of both. And that? That has a power all its own. To mortals, dramaturgy is the examination of dramatic composition, the means by which a play turns from mere words into a profound experience acted out upon the stage. Changelings see it similarly, but with magic as the performance, sympathetic threads as the props the actors use, and the Wyrd itself as the audience the changeling must convince to suspend its disbelief, if just for a little while. The magical arts drawing on dramaturgy lean heavily into trickery, mimicry, and false faces. Through dramaturgy, a changeling might convince the Wyrd that she is, in fact, her hated enemy. A hobgoblin might draw out the violent symbolism in a bloodied weapon, soaked into its steel through so many cruel performances. Those Lost who delve most deeply into this art for its own sake are dramaturges, particularly talented in exploiting it. Such exploitation comes with risks. Clarity suffers when a changeling dramaturgically cowls himself as others so often that he loses track of his own self, or begins to see objects

Dramaturgy 69 only in terms of the meanings and connections they have acquired. Worse still, when a dramaturge pushes the Wyrd too far, it punishes such duplicity, levying a harsh tax on the one arrogant enough to try to deceive it. Flower Chains and Masquerades All changelings are familiar with several basic forms of dramaturgy, although they don’t necessarily conceive of them as such. Most of the Lost rarely distinguish between dramaturgy and the Wyrd’s greater balance, and dramaturges are loathe to divulge their secrets for fear of such tricks being used against them in turn. Nonetheless, sympathetic magic plays an important part in Contract Loopholes, Icons, and the creation of fetches. All three manifest through the usurpation of identity and the pretense of a particular role, preparing the stage just right to convince the Wyrd one thing is, in fact, another. Loopholes, the collection of tricks and knacks used to pull off Contracts without paying their dues, appease the Contract’s patron through dramaturgical mimicry. Presenting the props or acting out the role associated with the Loophole briefly aligns the changeling with the force at work on the Wyrd’s scales, and for that moment, the Wyrd sees the changeling as indistinguishable from the effects she invokes. Thus, she needs pay no toll of Glamour, for the persona she dons inherently holds the right to wield such power. This form of dramaturgy is limited because the changeling must work through props or actions sharing a general quality with the Contract but lacking a true connection to the patron’s identity. Some stories persist, though, of Lost who manage to get their hands on treasures belonging to the great powers behind these Contracts, maintaining the lie to draw on nearly limitless magic or opening surprising new Loopholes with unpredictable effects. An Icon — literally a piece of a changeling’s identity torn away from her body — makes a potent example of dramaturgy. The Icon expresses a dramaturgical manifestation of this lost bit of soul via its sympathetic form, and it presents a terrible vulnerability through the lingering connection. As well as pursuers who might use an Icon to track a changeling down, dramaturges prize these scraps of selfhood as the most powerful kind of prop for working their mimicry magic. Icons also pose a temptation for kithless Lost (p. XX) desperate to mend the hole in their own identities. Only the Gentry practice the dramaturgical art of creating fetches, but those terrible masters do so with casual ease belying the sheer power involved in the act. A fetch represents perhaps the purest manifestation of such sympathetic magic, not merely establishing a role in the play but creating the actor performing it from whole cloth, a shadow woven into personhood through the sympathy of the victim’s memories. Another piece of dramaturgy wielded by the True Fae via innate talent is the creation of baubles (Oak, Ash, and Thorn, p. XX). Each bauble forms from a little piece of a dream a Gentry stole from a sleeping mind, valuable for the way it blurs the lines between reality and oneiromancy. That potential comes from the dramaturgical threads still connecting the dream-stuff to the victim; the lingering sympathy leaves the dreamer particularly sensitive and vulnerable to its effects. New Changeling Merit: Dramaturge (•••) Prerequisites: Wits •••, Expression •••, Subterfuge ••• Effects: Your character is a practiced dramaturge and mistress of loopholes. When she fulfills the Loophole of a Contract while in possession of an object with strong dramaturgy thematic to that Contract’s specific purpose (Brianna’s fingernails for Thorns and Brambles, for example), she can either apply one additional seeming benefit she does not already possess or change the Contract’s invocation to reflexive without spending additional Glamour. One can only pull the wool over the Wyrd’s eyes so many times; an item loses all dramaturgical connections to any Contract after three uses for a Common Contract, or one use for a Royal one. An Icon used this way allows the changeling to apply both additional effects at once, but after a single use, the Icon is destroyed. You also gain 9-again on rolls to perform a galoshin (p. XX). New Changeling Merit: Understudy (•••) Prerequisites: Dramaturge Merit, Expression •••• Effects: Your character weaves dramaturgical threads between herself and another, allowing the two to symbolically switch places. As an instant action, she can don or brandish an item dramaturgically representative of a changeling present in the scene or whose Icon she possesses. For the remainder of the scene, if she or her counterpart would meet the Loophole criteria of a particular Contract, the other character also meets them, even if the first does not invoke or even possess the Contract in question. If her counterpart uses a Contract via Loophole, the dramaturge may copy any effects only targeting the Contract’s user onto herself as well. The link lasts until the end of the scene, or until the dramaturge chooses a new counterpart. Trade and Favor The principle of dramaturgy underpins goblin magic, encompassing the witchcraft and conjurations through which hobgoblins weave new Contracts, fashion Hedge knick-knacks, and follow through on their deals with wondrous acts of service. The Wyrd shuffles the beads of Goblin Debt back and forth upon its occult abacus, but the means by which hobgoblins accrue debt in the first place derives from the dramaturgy inherent to their liminal state.

70 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors While changelings practice dramaturgical arts of trickery and deception, hobgoblins possess an innate capacity to draw upon the transference of qualities enabled by sympathetic magic. A cackling trader, all hair and gnarled joints, values the loose tooth he just bought from a mortal as much because of what it represents — the pain and discontent of deep-set toothache, the crack and crunch of things breaking between jaws, or the envy behind the punch that knocked the tooth loose — in addition to the link it holds to the fleshand-blood person who sealed the deal. He can use those qualities as their own currency when he makes the miraculous happen. With such a tooth, a hobgoblin might scrape together enough dramaturgy to trade perfect dental health to another mortal, plant the tooth in the Hedge and hurry its transformation into a nasty little trinket or use it to pay his debts for the time he had nothing at all to eat and had to barter for sustenance. A wedding ring traded to an elegant grotesque might serve to create a Goblin Contract or token dealing with matters of love or romance. The Hedge merchant who buys old clocks and watches possesses the necessary elements to forge a Contract manipulating time, or to give a desperate petitioner the stolen hours they need to do a week’s work in but a day. Even the way the hobgoblin acquires such a prop influences its potential uses. A gift given freely could well be used to escape some binding pledge or fetters, while a trinket stolen overflows with the symbolism of larceny and cunning. Shrewd bargaining over a petty trinket etches that negotiation’s intensity into the prop, and thus a hobgoblin easily accrues the little treasures needed to fuel deals for fortune and wealth. Anything given to a hobgoblin to pay off Goblin Debt holds all the more worth for him when he pays to pay his own debts. Systems Much of how hobgoblins use dramaturgy lies below the abstraction layer of game mechanics. There’s no hard list of exactly how many well-worn soles and hammers a hobgoblin must gather to fill a cobbler’s shop with fine new shoes overnight, or just how potent a Goblin Contract of perception one could create with a dripping, fresh eyeball donated voluntarily by a desperate customer. These are narrative decisions for the Storyteller to make. A hobgoblin can use an acquisition with dramaturgical significance to hasten and control the creation of a token. Rather than needing to leave the item in the Hedge, the hobgoblin can keep the token-in-the-making with him and turn it into a token of any rating he chooses. The process this requires varies from goblin to goblin. One may drop the token into a bubbling cauldron and work an incantation over it, while another stabs a stolen tooth in among his own gnarled fangs and ‘feeds’ it the taste of strange delicacies. This takes at least one full chapter, but some hobgoblins (and some tokens) need more time depending on the nature of the process. Furthermore, the hobgoblin can directly determine the main power of the resulting token, although not the catch or drawback. However, this enhanced form of token creation only results in powers directly relating to the dramaturgical qualities of the prop. A hobgoblin could turn a bartered wedding ring into a token of love or loyalty — or, if the changeling who handed it over had a broken marriage, of jealousy or betrayal — but he couldn’t turn it into a tool of battle or elemental energy. Likewise, hobgoblins need dramaturgy to create new Goblin Contracts. A hobgoblin cannot spin a new Contract out of nothing; he requires the latent symbolism imbued in something via sympathy. This is unlikely to be the cost the hobgoblin attaches to the Contract itself. More probably, he draws upon whatever trove of meaningful treasures he already possesses and adds whatever the changeling pays to his cache for future use. A hobgoblin bereft of all possessions and debts due has no capacity to create new Goblin Contracts and little ability to perform marvels beyond his Dread Powers. Galoshins A panicked changeling, desperate to throw a Huntsman off her trail, performs a charivari in a motley-mate’s coat, betraying her friend to save her own skin. A clever infiltrator hunches his shoulders and ostentatiously jangles the keys he’s stolen from a True Fae’s goblin jailer; the action forces the Wyrd to see him as that loyal hobgoblin and he successfully crosses a warded boundary. A conman switches stolen masks in a mimicry of bian lian, working a scheme to shift his onerous Goblin Debt onto an unwitting victim. The Lost know these feats as galoshins, stealing another’s identity in the most notorious form of dramaturgy. A galoshin is a dramaturgical performance to deceive the Wyrd, but that’s all it does. It doesn’t alter the changeling’s appearance or convince a hobgoblin who can see her that she is, in fact, someone else entirely. Nothing stops a changeling from supplementing a galoshin with costumes, props, or other magic, but the crucial effect of a galoshin rests in befuddling fae sorcery and the magic of pledges. As far as the Wyrd can tell, the changeling performing a galoshin becomes, ever so briefly, the person she pretends to be. Undertaking a galoshin first demands a sympathetic link to the intended dupe. The changeling needs a prop with dramaturgical symbolism, whether a vial of blood, used handkerchief, or the lingering touch immediately following a kiss on her own lips. Garments make highly effective tools for this ritual mummery, the more concealing the better. A galoshin’s performance must take place in the liminal space of the Hedge. A galoshin always has one specific purpose, and the changeling must weave her purpose into the persona she dons like a mask during the portrayal. Trying to create a galoshin allowing her to both toy with her Goblin Debts and break her oaths pushes the facade too far, and it falls apart.

Dramaturgy 71 A dramaturge always needs at least one fae accomplice to perform a galoshin. Someone touched by the Wyrd serves as the audience stand-in, and the larger the audience, the more powerful the dramaturgy. These witnessing fae become complicit in the falsehood, playing their own role by firmly pronouncing they see the truth. This forms a flaw in every galoshin, if pulled, that thread unravels everything. If any of the audience at any point admit they saw a galoshin, not reality, it immediately comes undone. Many changelings view the practice of galoshins with suspicion at best, if not outright hostility. This magical identity theft often scapegoats a victim. Too many stories tell of one of the Lost who stole the Icon of another to mislead a harrying Huntsman, leading to tragic consequences for the hapless mark. Changelings can also perform this kind of dramaturgy with more altruistic aims, placing themselves in harm’s way when the Wyrd’s debts come due by donning the mantle of the one they wish to protect and becoming them just long enough to suffer the displaced consequences. Systems To perform a galoshin, a changeling needs a dramaturgical link to the target via a personally significant possession, bodily material, or recent meaningful contact in either the current scene or the immediately preceding one. The changeling chooses a Persona from the list below, and must gather at least three fae beings — i.e., any creature who possesses a Wyrd trait other than fae-touched — to witness the portrayal. This audience doesn’t necessarily need to know they’re enabling a galoshin specifically as long as they never acknowledge the falsity of the guise the changeling assumes, but the nature of activating it makes it obvious to anyone who knows what a galoshin is in the first place. The changeling weaves and performs a scene, placing herself in the target’s role and acting out what she intends to do in either literal or exaggerated fashion. Galoshins commonly appear caricatured or parodying, performed as a dramatic tale of the results the Lost wishes to achieve rather than a realistic rendition of what is to come. Attempts to interfere with the galoshin via Contracts or other magic prompt a Clash of Wills. Should a dramaturge utilize a galoshin in an effort to steal the identity of the same character more than once in a chapter, the target gains the 8-again quality on subsequent Clash rolls. The dramaturge’s player may accept caveats that cause the Persona to drop if breached to add dice to the roll. The player and Storyteller can work together to come up with others if the example caveats below do not fit the current story. • +1 die: changeling cannot enter the target’s presence while the Persona is active • +1 die: changeling must loudly recite a catchphrase the target uses often at least once per scene while the Persona is active • +2 dice: changeling must remain in-character while the Persona is active • +3 dice: changeling cannot leave the target’s presence while the Persona is active The changeling may also subtract five dice from the roll to extend the galoshin’s duration to one chapter. Any changeling can perform a galoshin, but those who possess the Dramaturge Merit (p. XX) enjoy the 9-again quality on rolls to do so. Attempting a galoshin is always a breaking point against Clarity with a pool of three dice. Dice Pool: Manipulation + Expression + Wyrd vs. Composure + Wyrd. Cost: 5 Glamour Action: Instant (takes half an hour) Galoshin Circumstantial Modifiers CIRCUMSTANCE MODIFIER Prop is the target’s Icon +3 Prop is a cloak, coat, mask, or other deliberately concealing garment +2 Audience of 15 or more +2 Audience includes a True Fae or one of their agents +2 Prop is particularly symbolic for the intended Persona +1 Audience of five or more +1 Prop is fleeting, such as a recent kiss −2 Changeling does not have a proper stage −2 Audience of only three −2 Changeling suffers the Oathbreaker Condition −3

72 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors Duration: One scene or one chapter Roll Result Success: The changeling successfully takes on the chosen Persona for the galoshin’s duration. The changeling suffers the Notoriety Condition when the effect ends; even the finest dramaturge cannot entirely dupe the Wyrd, and it strains to find some way of balancing the books even if it’s not quite certain what she’s done wrong. Exceptional Success: The changeling’s performance convinces each witness so deeply, they must each spend a Willpower point if wishing to acknowledge the ruse’s falsity. Failure: The galoshin fails, and the changeling suffers the Dissociation Condition. Dramatic Failure: As failure, and the changeling gains four Goblin Debt points for trying to cheat the Wyrd, which will likely spend the points immediately for a punishing Condition or Tilt. Once a Persona sits firmly in place, the changeling relies on the audience to maintain the facade. If any audience member admits out loud to witnessing deception anytime during the galoshin’s duration, or anything even implying in any way the changeling isn’t the target, the Persona immediately drops even if the speaker stands on another continent or in another realm from the dramaturge. A galoshin’s target never counts as a witness, even if present during the performance. If the Persona drops for any reason other than reaching the end of the galoshin’s duration, the dramaturge suffers the Dissociation Condition, and the player rolls the changeling’s Resolve + Composure. Failure causes her personality’s fracturing splinters catch in the Hedge, where they form a Wyrd 1 hedge ghost out of her memory’s shreds and tatters; dramatic failure creates a Wyrd 3 Hedge Ghost instead. This patchwork specter believes it is (or needs to be) the dramaturge, eagerly spilling any secrets inherited by its tattered memory to anyone willing to listen. Galoshin Personas The changeling chooses one of the following Personas when she activates a galoshin: False-Swear: The dramaturge can break an oath to which she and the target are both parties, and the target suffers the consequences instead for as long as the Persona remains. As soon as it ends, the consequences snap back afresh on the dramaturge. Alternatively, if the target was present during the galoshin’s performance, the dramaturge may swear a new oath in the target’s name while the Persona is active. If she does the latter, her actions do not count as the target’s for breaking that oath; instead, the oath immediately applies to the target from the moment she swears it. The target doesn’t immediately know all the terms of this oath, but witnessing the performance clues them in to at least the basics, since it describes the intent. If this Persona drops for any reason other than completion of its purpose, the new oath becomes null and void. Prey-Me-Not: This Persona can only be invoked if the changeling uses the target’s Icon as a dramaturgical prop. The Wyrd directs any attempts to supernaturally track or hunt down the changeling onto the target instead — even if the pursuer has the changeling’s own Icon. A Huntsman using Kindred Spirits to gain insight into the dramaturge receives information on the galoshin target instead, and if he attempts to steal Glamour from the changeling via Hungry Heart, it instead drains power from the galoshin target. The target immediately becomes aware of the changeling’s identity and the Persona’s effect upon activation, and that the perpetrator used their Icon to do it. Scapegoat: Any penalties or effects the target would suffer due to breaking pledges, or the Storyteller spending Goblin Debt, instead applies to the dramaturge. For all intents and purposes relating to such matters, the dramaturge is the target, and so a True Fae coming to claim servitude from her victim due to him having transgressed against an agreement must take the Scapegoat instead. Even when this galoshin benefits the target, they must still contest the activation roll, as they instinctively resist surrendering their identity. Swindle-Tongue: Whenever the dramaturge acquires any Goblin Debt, it shunts onto the target instead. This can never raise the target’s Goblin Debt above 9. If it raises their Debt to 9, the next time the target interacts with any of their hobgoblin debtors, both indebted and debtor immediately become aware of the target’s precarious position. Watch-Me-Not: For the duration of the galoshin, the dramaturge becomes the target for the purposes of fae magic intended to detect intruders or present obstacles. A door ensorcelled to open only for the target unseals for the dramaturge. Targeting the master of the grounds with WatchMe-Not permits a dramaturge to pass through the master’s gate without incident, never tripping the bell intended to rouse his briarwolf guards. If the dramaturge trips a Hollow’s magical defenses that whisper the names of intruders to its owner, the magic whispers the target’s name instead. Expanded Pledgecraft While changelings most commonly enact sealings, oath, and bargains to enforce their societal bonds, they also make use of the Wyrd’s capability of enforcing any kind of agreement or declaration. Sometimes pledges even take more concrete forms. This section provides more information and options for pledgecraft. Example Oaths These examples demonstrate the kinds of personal and hostile oaths changelings make with one another and systems to go along with them; for examples of motley oaths,

Expanded Pledgecraft 73 see p. XX. The example names here serve simply as indications of the oath’s purpose, rather than codified terms the changelings themselves necessarily use (although some might). Oaths based on one of these may vary in terms and mechanics depending on the changelings involved and circumstances surrounding its swearing. Use these examples as basic starting points to create your own, specific to your game and its characters. Any oath can involve any number of participants unless otherwise indicated. When designing oaths, keep in mind: exact verbiage matters less than the intention behind the words. The Wyrd recognizes and enforces the spirit of the oath as understood by its participants. Oath of Friendship Changelings swear this personal promise to support each other regardless of circumstance. Terms: Your concerns are my concerns. Your needs are my needs. You are my true friend, and I will be there for you from now until the end of my days. Beat: The changeling abandons a task important to her in order to fulfill an obligation to her friend. Willpower: The changeling sacrifices her own safety or wellbeing to ensure the safety and wellbeing of her friend. Benefit: Once per scene, when a participant invokes a Contract targeting herself, she can extend its benefits to her oathsworn friend at no additional cost. Consequences: A changeling who breaks this oath suffers a −2 when invoking Contracts affecting only herself for the rest of the chronicle. Breaking this oath often leads to friends becoming hated enemies, and might lead to an Oath of Nemesis or Exile. At minimum, the friendship ends and the changeling gains the Oathbreaker Condition as normal. Oath of True Love Lovers often swear this oath as a formal proclamation of marriage, though multitudinous other uses exist, and even declared marriages take all forms. Terms: You are my sun, my stars, and my moon. My love for you overflows and I could not bear a life without you. I would rather die than see you harmed and would rather suffer torture than betray our love. Beat: The changeling confesses a secret to her lover which endangers someone else she cares about. Willpower: The changeling acts in her lover’s best interests regardless of the harm this inflicts on her or someone who depends on her. Benefit: Participants can always find each other, regardless of the distance between them or whether they’re even in the same realm. This doesn’t affect the time or ordeals required to get there, but they can perfectly track one another without a roll. Consequences: All participants present suffer a −3 to all Social rolls when the oathbreaker is in the same room or general vicinity as any other participant, regardless of who broke the oath. Such heartbreak inevitably leads to bitterness or sorrow. Ex-lovers may do everything in their power to spite the other, causing unending setbacks and upset, or may sink into deep melancholy and express their shattered feelings dramatically. Oath of Nemesis The changelings agree they cannot settle their vast differences with words alone, and instead choose to fight to the death under the specific terms of this hostile oath. Terms: Your life is forfeit, and I will do everything in my power to end it as soon as possible, or die trying. Beat: The changeling’s enemy wounds him or inflicts a Tilt in combat. Willpower: The changeling inflicts aggravated damage greater than his enemy’s Stamina on them in one hit, or delivers a killing blow to them. Consequences: Breaking this oath means abandoning the attempt to kill the other participants for more than one full chapter, or taking actions rendering the killing much more difficult (such as swearing another oath not to harm them, or traveling to another country). When a participant breaks an Oath of Nemesis, she suffers the Cowed Condition whenever she perceives, interacts with or is in the presence of any other participant. These changes of heart usually only affect only one nemesis, who usually lays down her life when she breaks this oath. Occasionally, all participants accept the title of oathbreaker to prevent a needless loss of life. Oath of Exile Changelings swear this oath as a lesser form of hostility. They agree on their mutual hatred but do not wish to fight to the death, choosing instead to exile one another from their lives. Terms: You are no more to me than a mote of dust or a bothersome insect to brush away with ill regard and disdain. I promise not to seek you out, and if our paths cross, to immediately flee or make it so unbearable as to force disengagement. Beat: The changeling crosses path with her enemy, who causes a setback for her. Willpower: The changeling causes a major setback for her enemy. Consequences: Should one or both parties break the oath, at least once per scene thereafter spent by the participants in each other’s company, some mild but alarming, humiliating, or highly inconvenient misfortune befalls them all, no matter how improbable. Perhaps they all drop their mobile phones into the sewer or end up obliged to dress up

74 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors as clowns for a child’s birthday party and suffer pies to the face. Changelings often break this oath when a situation forces them to work together, like protecting the freehold or some other greater good. Sometimes they find the reasons for their enmity no longer valid and break the oath deliberately. Rarely does only one participant break this oath; usually, all parties break it simultaneously, or one pesters the others until all break the oath in quick succession. Touchstones as Pledges A changeling shares a special bond with his Touchstone, his island in the rocky waters of fae life. This level of reliance and vulnerability creates a type of pledge between the changeling and his Touchstone, albeit one the Touchstone may have no idea they’re part of and can never fully understand. The Wyrd recognizes the give and take of a Touchstone relationship and encourages each party to honor their role in it. Bargains between a changeling and his mortal Touchstone reinforce their importance to each other. When the changeling makes a bargain with his Touchstone, the Touchstone’s attachment on his Clarity track moves leftward up to two steps until the Obliged Condition resolves, at which point it returns to its original spot. If another Touchstone takes up the original spot, this shifts the second Touchstone one box to the right, which also pushes any other Touchstones beyond it rightward. An enchanted (p. XX) Touchstone gains +2 to resist breaking points resulting from exposure to the supernatural. A changeling’s bond with her Touchstone grants a modicum of protection against fae meddling. No other fae creature can enter a bargain with a changeling’s attached Touchstone. If another fae creature swears a bargain with a changeling’s Touchstone while it’s detached, reattaching the Touchstone does nothing to negate that bargain. The importance of a Touchstone in the changeling’s emotional life permits her to can swear a vow (p. XX) upon them. She takes a risk when doing so, as if she breaks the vow, she loses the Touchstone completely. The Wyrd conspires to take them out of her life one way or another, and if they remain alive, she can’t make them a Touchstone ever again. Swearing a vow upon a Touchstone makes them count as an oath-forged token as well, granting an additional benefit: Once per chapter, when the changeling takes a risky or dangerous action in service to fulfilling her vow, she clears one point of damage from Clarity track as though she spent meaningful time with her Touchstone in addition to gaining a Beat. New Pledge Types A changeling’s life revolves around promises, pledges, and deals. While Changeling starting on p. 209 presents the most common types of pledges, the Lost swear many varieties of oath. Pledges take different forms: in some circumstances, choosing the agreement type poses merely a semantical matter, in others, it determines the cost those involved pay. Changelings may make all these additional types of pledges. Curses and Hexes These pledges fall into their own category of antagonism separate from hostile oaths. When a changeling wishes to create inconvenience, pain, and suffering for her enemy, she curses or hexes them. While a hex or curse may lead to a declaration of war between two parties, a this alone doesn’t constitute such, merely a willful act by one changeling to make the other’s a living hell. The Wyrd recognizes curses and hexes as two similar yet separate types of pledges, but changelings often use the words interchangeably. Few consider the difference when calling down consequences in a moment of rage, but hexes cause brief, minor inconveniences, while curses create major burdens sometimes lasting a lifetime. Benefits The changeling herself gains no supernatural benefit from curses or hexes, only the reward of making her enemies suffer. Consequences All hexes contain an action the hexed character can take that triggers the hex’s effects and ends it: either an action the changeling wishes to forbid that activates the hex when undertaken, or a loophole in the pledge the victim exploits to free themselves from the hex. For instance, the changeling may forbid the victim from visiting a certain place or talking to a certain person; doing so anyway triggers the hex’s effects. Conversely, the victim may suffer the effects until they perform a relevant action. Curses come with similar stipulations, but the changeling herself must sustain its effects by either maintaining a certain circumstance or avoiding a particular action. The Wyrd keeps the books balanced by providing a loophole here, as well; the victim can always bring about the curse’s end by some clever action. If the changeling really screws up, she sometimes ends up cursing herself instead. Systems A hex inflicts the Hexed Condition (p. XX) upon the victim. When the changeling makes the pledge, she must spend 1 Glamour and state the terms, which the victim must be able to perceive and understand. They need not necessarily know exactly how to interpret them, though; the changeling can play with wording to mislead them and hope they miss her misdirection and can’t call her out.

Expanded Pledgecraft 75 The Hexed Condition cannot become Persistent; the action which resolves it must be possible for the victim to accomplish within a single story. For example, a changeling hexes one victim with blindness until he returns something he stole from the changeling, while another victim suffers no ill effects until he speaks to the Monarch of Morning. Conversely, the Cursed Condition is always Persistent. Its Beat criteria revolve around making the victim’s life hell; its resolution requires the changeling to keep up a particular routine or situation the victim could disrupt. For example, a victim cursed to suffer terrible nightmares whenever they sleep grants their player a Beat whenever the fears or disturbed sleep cause setbacks for them. The curse ends when the changeling stops sacrificing one child per day to a greedy hobgoblin — the victim can rescue one of the children or stop the changeling and goblin from meeting on just one day. A curse always ends immediately upon the changeling’s death, even if the required circumstance persists posthumously. Examples of effects the changeling can inflict via hex or curse include: • The victim must spend an additional Glamour when invoking any fae power. • The victim can’t regain Willpower by sleeping. • All failed rolls the victim’s player makes for a specific type of action become dramatic failures; the changeling’s player declares the cursed action at the time of the pledge, it must be narrower than a Specialty. Examples include making melee attacks against mortals, attempting to open Doors in Social maneuvering against a specific person, or investigating a particular kind of crime. • The victim suffers a minor (hex) or major (cures) frailty currently also suffered by the changeling; if they already suffer one or more frailties, this simply adds another. • The victim suffers a Personal Tilt constantly for the duration which doesn’t become a Condition in nonaction scenes, only affecting them when relevant. HEXED A spiteful changeling has temporarily inconvenienced your character. If the changeling forbids the action required to end the hex, this Condition does nothing until your character takes that action and resolves it. The consequences last for one chapter thereafter. If the changeling sets a quest as the required action which breaks the hex, your character suffers its effects until the quest’s completion.

76 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors As a pledge, the Wyrd itself negotiates the hex, not with the victim. If the changeling sabotages her own hex, for example by accidentally or deliberately enabling your character to break it, they suffer a detrimental temporary Condition of the Storyteller’s choice. A character may only have one instance of Hexed at a time. Resolution: Your character takes the action the changeling specified when she placed the hex. CURSED (Persistent) A vengeful changeling has burdened your character with a curse, which only resolves when the changeling either stops maintaining a particular routine or performs a particular action. If your character brings about the changeling’s failure to maintain the curse, directly or indirectly, gain an additional Beat when this Condition resolves. If the changeling’s player dramatically fails on a roll directly related to attempts to maintain the curse, the changeling suffers this Condition with all the criteria and caveats of the original, where they make sense. If they don’t — for instance, if the ill effects don’t apply to changelings — then the Storyteller assigns applicable consequences as close as possible to the curse’s original intent. A character may only have one instance of Cursed at a time. Beat: Your character suffers a significant setback directly due to the curse. Resolution: The changeling fails to maintain the required state of affairs or perform the specific action as defined when she places the curse. Feuds When two changelings cannot get along with one another to the point of enmity, they swear a hostile oath to settle their conflict. Hostilities which spread beyond two individuals with irrevocable differences escalate into a feud. Like any other hostile oath, a feud oath declares enmity between two or more sides of the disagreement. A hostile oath which expands to encompass a group — a motley, freehold, or court, for example — becomes a feud and must be sworn anew. Often, one changeling speaking for each side swears the oath, though sometimes all members of two feuding motleys swear it in unison. A feuding group doesn’t need to be previously oathsworn; a feud oath counts as both hostile and societal oath at once. When one member speaks for a group, they don’t need the group’s permission if a societal oath binds that changeling to the group; by default, that oath grants them the right to swear more on the group’s behalf. Acting against the oath in protest after the fact without having agreed to its terms still constitutes a breach. If no previous oath binds the group, such as a ragtag bunch of Lost working together to revolt against a band of privateers, the feud oath binds both sides into a collective, all oathsworn to each other. Feuds occur between two groups of any size. If the feud involves more than two groups, each group swears the feud oath to every other party independently. A court can declare a feud with a motley, a motley can declare one with a freehold, or a freehold can declare one with a privateer crew of much smaller size. It doesn’t matter as long as each side consists of more than one changeling. Courts and freeholds engage in feuds rarely, only declaring them in extreme circumstances or when they can find no other path to resolution. The Freehold of Milk Roses declared a feud against their own Autumn Court for harboring loyalists who endangered the whole freehold and left many dead. The freehold denied access to all local trods for three weeks before the court surrendered the changelings responsible. Any type of conflict between groups can result in a feud, including rivalries, cultural conflicts, and Hedgefire wars, as described on pp. 9-10 of Oak, Ash, and Thorn. Systems Feuds work like other hostile oaths, except that the oath lasts either until one side gives in to the demands of the other, or the last surviving member of either group dies. When new members of a feuding group swear the relevant societal oath, the Wyrd automatically extends the feud oath to them. A court could recruit like mad to replenish their numbers before their enemies kill them all, for instance, or a very stubborn freehold might pass a feud down through the ages. Once per chapter when a member of the opposing group harms or significantly inconveniences her character, the player gains a Beat. If one member of a feud breaks the oath by defecting to the other side or violating another societal oath binding them to the group, she becomes an oathbreaker, but the feud oath doesn’t break for the other members. However, if more than half the members in one feuding group violate the oath, it breaks completely, marking everyone on their side with the Oathbreaker Condition, regardless of their involvement (or lack thereof) in the violation. Unlike other hostile oaths, feuds rarely lead to immediate bloodshed. Changeling society constructs common ceremony around the feud with only minor differences between freeholds, wherein all members of both groups or their representatives come together in neutrality to agree upon the terms, and this neutrality lasts until both sides retreat from each other for at least a scene. In the rare in-

Expanded Pledgecraft 77 stance when someone violates this traditional neutrality, the oath doesn’t break, but they find few allies thereafter. The well-known tale of the Giantsbane motley passes between freeholds: the motley declared a feud against the Hedgeskippers, besetting the other motley the moment the two groups finalized the swearing. While they won the feud by ambushing and killing the entire opposed motley, their freehold exiled them for their perceived betrayal of necessary custom. Not all feuds erupt into bloodshed, but brutal Hedgefire wars often explode when they do. Whether waged between large groups or motleys, some Feud oaths fuel shadow wars lasting for years, decades, or centuries as the members continually redraw battle lines and strategies. Rules of Engagement Most people abide unspoken social contracts dictating how they interact with one another. Society shames anyone who refuses to get along and breaks them, but nothing binds anyone to these contracts; only the desire for acceptance motivates individuals and groups to behave themselves. Sometimes, the Lost must define rules of engagement not by unspoken social norms, but by clear etiquette sealed with Glamour. Changelings make pledges for rules of engagement under specific circumstances. Their terms delineate how individuals and groups interact, the responsibilities of all parties, as well as permissible and forbidden actions, setting up concrete expectations for gatherings or confrontations. The rules stay in place for the event’s duration, although freeholds and courts often make such pledges recur for repeating events. For instance, one city’s Summer Court may establish standard rules of engagement for duels or tournaments, while its Spring counterpart does the same for the required etiquette when attending court with its monarch. Benefits Rules of engagement ensure everyone at the event knows their role and keeps proceedings on their rails. Terms usually include a list of dos and don’ts for participants, a rundown of the expectations levied on various roles, and general accepted behaviors under various common circumstances. Rules of engagement also outline the conditions necessary to declare one side the winner or loser of any competitions taking place at the event. Conscientious changelings who wish to refrain from angering attendees make the rules available ahead of time. Those who would rather entrap someone or sow chaos may keep the pledge’s terms to themselves. Changeling society generally considers doing so a serious breach of trust; if anyone breaks the rules out of ignorance, those who created the pledge (whether they concealed the rules or not) may find themselves losing Clarity. The intimate familiarity of most changelings, springing from their durances, with the experience of violating unspoken or incomprehensible makes inflicting such a thing on one’s fellows a major transgression. Changelings innately understand making the participants feel safe and secure as the primary purpose of rules of engagement. Consequences Rules of engagement define how participants should act and how participants mean for events to play out in each situation. Violating them constitutes almost as much of a breach as setting others up to fail; if just one person defies expectations, it shatters everyone’s trust. The pledge’s terms lay out the consequences, always punitive and designed to match the breach’s severity. If the Wyrd deems the pledge’s agreed-upon consequence too mild or too damning for the violator’s actions, it may take matters into its own hands. Systems The Lost make rules of engagement pledges for any discrete event intended to involve more than two individuals, from battles and duels, to court meetings and parties, to contests and informal gatherings. At least two changelings carrying responsibility for running or initiating the event must collaborate, agreeing on rules and writing them down. Each spends a point of Glamour to seal the deal thereafter. No party may add additional terms after the fact, so the Lost generally evidence meticulousness in these very thorough discussions. When more changelings sharing this responsibility spend Glamour, the rules gain a stronger hold over participants; in return, all of them must follow through on their part in holding the event. Any who fail to do so suffer the consequences as though they’d violated the rules themselves. Rules of engagement may dictate anything from prescribed or forbidden actions to clauses applying special privileges or limitations to one or more participants, to the requisite criteria for participants wishing to end the event. All such pledges must include the location within which the rules hold sway, when they should go into effect, and — if no terms specifically define the engagement’s end — its intended duration. Once the rules take hold, they continue to apply until the specified duration or end criteria transpire, regardless of the desires of those who made the agreement. Such pledges require a clear and concrete location and duration, no matter the subjectivity of the remaining terms. “Within the Freehold of Fallen Ash’s territory” works just fine, but “wherever a member of the Court of Stars walks” doesn’t. Specific locations work, whether as simple as “this circle we just drew on the ground” or as elaborate as “the first 20 square feet of the British Museum’s entry hall, excluding the space between this specific statue and that bench.” A duration such as “three hours” works, as does “until we finish building this house.” The duration may also recur, such as “for the first three days of June each year.” A vague duration like “until the sun no longer rises” rests upon too distant and unknowable a conditional future time to serve as a proper duration.

78 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors A rules of engagement pledge is largely a punitive one, not a beneficial one. Whenever acting in line with the rules causes a character within its purview harm or a major setback, her player earns a Beat. Breaking the rules levies consequences consistent with breaking a formal agreement she made with the Wyrd, even if she didn’t know the boundaries of her behavior or even that any existed in the first place. Make the punishment for violating rules of engagement commensurate with the event’s gravity and the attendees’ investment level. The Wyrd enforces even punishments the hosts themselves could easily mete out themselves; for instance, disqualification from a foot race might remove a runner’s ability to spend Glamour, lower her Speed, or ensnare her in a bramble cage until the event ends. After the pledge’s effects expire, the hosts may not retaliate against the offender further; doing so constitutes a four-die breaking point. Other participants or those not in attendance may retaliate however they like. The penalties for violating the terms of a sporting or entertainment event, such as a charity race or Spring Court fete, apply only for the duration of the pledge’s effects. Examples include disqualification from a contest, getting kicked out of the event, or losing the ability to speak. The penalty for violating the terms of a serious — but not dire — event, such as a business meeting or heist, should remain relevant beyond the bounds of the event but terminate naturally or be easily reversible by the end of the story at the latest. Examples include public humiliation, confiscation of valuable belongings, loss of an ability until the violator makes amends, or short-term indentured servitude or imprisonment. Keep in mind that imprisoning someone constitutes a 4-die breaking point (Changeling, p. 106) Make the penalty for violating terms with lives on the line, such as an important peace negotiation with another freehold or a duel to the death, much steeper and have permanent (or at least chronicle-long) consequences. Examples include irrevocable exile from a court or freehold, the loss of a hand or eye, or erasure of important memories. A violation serious enough to directly put other people in great danger or cause them significant harm could cause the Wyrd to decide upon a penalty of death no matter the original terms. However, the Storyteller should check with the players to positively affirm this as an acceptable outcome to the entire table; if not, choose something else. Enchanted Bargains Changelings make ordinary bargains to help them feel like they belong in the mortal world and keep them safe from Faerie. Making a bargain with a human grants the target knowledge of the changeling’s true nature, but their engagement centers in comfortable mundanity; he fits better into their world, not the other way around. A changeling can instead make an enchanted bargain, one blessing the mortal with impossible favors or allowing them to accomplish something unachievable without his assistance. Most Lost do this to protect or aid someone important to them or a valuable ally. The changeling acts as a guardian and enabler rather than a servant and undertakes magical tasks rather than mundane ones, like using Contracts for the mortal’s benefit or bestowing tokens upon them. Some changelings make enchanted bargains to subtly bribe or inspire a mortal to do something for them with the magic they grant. Others do it to help the downtrodden out of bad situations or encourage someone with potential but no opportunities. An enchanted bargain contains more danger for both parties than an ordinary one, but it can also accomplish more for them. Systems A changeling enchants any bargain by spending an additional Glamour, either when enacting it or at any time while the pledge remains in effect; the process remains otherwise identical. The enchanted bargain bestows the usual benefits of shielding him from fae discovery, but replaces the Obliged Condition with the Enchanted Obligation Condition (below). Once Enchanted Obligation resolves and the enchantment ends, the changeling may repeat the bargain with the same mortal again. If he wishes to continue playing faerie godparent for them, he must strike a new bargain with different terms. Each subsequent enchanted bargain struck with the same mortal within the same story costs +1 Glamour and requires the mortal to follow increasingly more strenuous rules or limitations to keep it going. ENCHANTED OBLIGATION Your character has made an enchanted bargain with a mortal, providing fae miracles in exchange for safety and peace of mind. This Condition duplicates the effects of the Obliged Condition (Changeling, p. 343), but is not Persistent. In addition, while the enchantment lasts, the mortal can automatically see through the Mask of all fae beings and objects unless strengthened with Glamour. Your character gains the ability to hear the mortal whenever they call him by name and ask or wish for aid, no matter the distance between them; the changeling has no obligation to respond to the call. His player gains a +3 to rolls to harvest Glamour from the mortal. The changeling’s half of the bargain requires using fae magic to aid the mortal in some dire task or in escaping a dire situation the target couldn’t otherwise handle themself. He can invoke Contracts or use his seeming or kith blessings on the mortal’s behalf, give them tokens and clearly explain their catches, or any other type of fae magic he possesses; however, he may not simply perform the task or rescue the mortal themselves. They must utilize the mag-

Expanded Pledgecraft 79 ic on their own and rescue themself. The mortal’s half requires following a specific and strict rule or willingly laboring under a particular limitation. For instance, they may accept a curfew by which they must be inside their home and stay there until sunrise, or a rule forbidding them to deliberately tell any lies. If the changeling solves the mortal’s problem himself, this Condition ends without resolution or granting a Beat. It likewise ends if either party takes on another enchanted bargain while this one remains in effect; enchanted bargains accept no competition. If the mortal doesn’t achieve the task or escape they bargained to accomplish by the end of one full chapter, it also fades without resolution. The enchantment’s effects are obvious to those who know how to look for them. Anyone who can see through the Mask simply perceives the supernatural obligation the mortal carries without a roll or other contest. The player of any character who previously noticed the enchantment gains +4 to locate or track the mortal by any means. This magical trail carries distinct tells revealing the changeling’s identity to anyone who has previously seen his Mien; if they see it afterwards, they recognize it instantly. Resolution: The mortal accomplishes the task or escapes the situation they made the bargain to achieve, or either party fails to uphold their end of the bargain, triggering consequences for one or both. When this Condition resolves, the changeling’s player and the mortal’s each earn a Beat. Deed Vows Unlike most pledges, enacted between two or more characters, a changeling makes a deed vow to himself: this personal pledge declares a changeling’s promised course of action. Someone must witness his vow for him to seal it, and the path he chooses may pertain to others, but the pledge binds only him. Changelings liken it to a stronger version of a sealing they inflict upon themselves. The changeling pledges to fulfill a particular goal in a specified way. For instance, he might vow to rescue his motley from privateer captivity without killing, or to claim his court’s crown by exposing the current monarch’s dirty secrets. He swears his deed vow on a possession of great personal value, offering it up as collateral should he fail to keep his word. Benefits A changeling makes a deed vow to prove his dedication to his goal in a defining moment, affirming his freedom to forge his own path. With such singular purpose, he sheds his uncertainty and finds his conviction. The Wyrd recognizes his deed vow and rewards him for sticking to his word; all other Lost who see him know he acts with resolve. Freeholds traditionally grant respect and leniency to those under the auspices of a deed vow, even if the vow’s purpose opposes the freehold’s interests. Most changelings consider getting in the way of a changeling driven enough to invite the Wyrd to keep him accountable a self-destructive transgression in no one’s best interests. Consequences A changeling who breaks his word to himself doesn’t become an oathbreaker in the same sense as one who fundamentally changes his relationship with another. Instead, he risks losing whatever he swore his deed vow upon. He may offer even an intangible possession such as his own life or a loved one’s memory, though these more esoteric possessions entail equally strange circumstances around their loss. Systems The changeling spends 1 Glamour and chooses one of his current Aspirations, making it his dedicated goal. He declares this goal and the method by which he promises to achieve it or a method he forbids himself to use in its pursuit aloud to at least one witness who understands the supernatural significance of the pledge. The changeling must make his vow upon a possession of his choosing with great personal significance to him; pledging on a newly purchased car or a weapon he uses for purely practical purposes don’t do the trick. Common deed vow possessions include tokens, irreplaceable keepsakes, the changeling’s own life or that of a beloved pet, the memory of a deceased loved one, an Icon, or a Touchstone. He can’t vow upon someone else’s life unless he ‘possesses’ them in some way, such as someone under his legal guardianship, someone who swore an oath of absolute servitude to him. The possession in question must be present; however, not even living possessions count as witnesses. The significance of the collateral determines the vow’s benefits, as follows: • A replaceable, tangible item, such as a token with a 1-3 dot rating or purchasable wedding gift: once per chapter, when the changeling puts himself and/or his motley in danger in service to fulfilling his deed vow, he regains a Willpower point. • An irreplaceable, tangible item, such as token with a four or five dot rating or photo album containing photographs he cannot later reprint: as above, and the changeling regains two Glamour points as well as Willpower. • An intangible possession, such as a deceased loved one’s memory or grave, or a Touchstone or other personal relationship: as above, and once per chapter, the changeling may gain a bonus to any one action in service to fulfilling his deed vow equal to half his Wyrd rating.

80 Chapter Two: Wonders and Terrors • An irreplaceable possession of unique significance, such as an Icon or the changeling’s life: as above, and once per chapter the changeling may reduce the dice pool of a Clarity damage roll suffered in service to fulfilling her deed vow by one. Breaking a deed vow destroys the possession. If the changeling named a Touchstone, he loses that Touchstone permanently as though the person died; the relationship sours or becomes distant. If he swore upon an intangible item, the Wyrd inflicts the loss in stranger ways. A broken deed vow sworn on his dead mother’s memory may erase his most important memories of her, while one sworn on her grave might raise her ghost to haunt him. A deed vow sworn on the changeling’s own life may require him to atone in a way the Wyrd (and the Storyteller) chooses or swear an oath dedicating his life wholly to someone else (such that they now ‘possess’ him, for purposes of their deed vows) within a fortnight, or he dies. The character fulfills the vow when he achieves the chosen Aspiration in the specified manner, granting a Beat as normal. The Wyrd considers him to have broken it when he violates the method he swore to use, fails to achieve the Aspiration before the end of the story, or definitively fails in a way rendering the Aspiration either impossible or irrelevant. A broken vow also grants a Beat, but the player must replace the Aspiration at the end of the chapter. If the changeling fulfills his vow, he retains the possession and may swear further vows upon it. Doing so with a mundane object counts as swearing an oath upon it for the purposes of creating oath-forged tokens. Icons Swearing an oath or deed vow upon a changeling’s own Icon is dangerous. Pledging on a scrap of his own soul is akin to offering himself up as a sacrifice to the Wyrd if he fails to uphold it, but until then, he’s its favored child. Swearing a pledge on an Icon requires first recovering it and must be done while the Icon remains in material form — that is, before the changeling leaves the Hedge with it. A changeling can only swear a pledge on a particular Icon once. Systems Using an Icon to seal a pledge confers quite a few benefits. Even if she doesn’t swear a deed vow, she regains a Willpower when working towards the pledge in a dangerous fashion. Additionally, while under the effects of a pledge on her Icon, the changeling rolls one fewer die on Clarity damage rolls resulting from actions taken in service to the pledge. Additionally, while actively working towards this pledge, either to accomplish a goal or uphold one of its stated agreements, the changeling ignores wound penalties during the scene she receives the wounds in question. After the action concludes, the character suffers the highest wound penalty she would have suffered for the next scene, even if the damage has been healed. A changeling can never truly break a pledge she swore on her Icon. This doesn’t mean she can’t forsake the pledge or break her word, only that she can always reconcile and fix her mistake. A pledge upon an Icon binds the changeling’s soul to the Wyrd, and just as if she broke a deed vow, she loses the Icon if she breaks her pledge. However, she can win the Icon back and reinstate her pledge. Therefore, a changeling does not gain the Oathbreaker Condition when she breaks a pledge made upon her Icon, instead gaining the Icon Shard Condition. She also loses the Icon, meaning she loses the Clarity box and memories gained from incorporating the Icon until she reconciles her broken pledge. If she’s still in the Hedge and hasn’t incorporated the Icon yet, the Icon literally turns into the doppelganger in front of her. ICON SHARD (Persistent) Your character broke her word sworn on her Icon. Doing so has infused the Icon with the Wyrd’s wrath, giving it a semblance of life. A changeling’s Icon is a part of her soul; as such, the Icon shard becomes a rough imitation of her darkest and most sinister thoughts and urges. The Icon shard acts as a semi-sapient doppelganger with the sole purpose of tormenting the changeling for breaking her word. Icon shards count as hobgoblins (Changeling: The Lost, p. 252) with a Wyrd rating equal to the changeling’s; use the rules given for creating goblins to give the shard traits and powers, all of which should in some way reflect its origins. Instead of a Virtue or Vice, the shard has a Needle and Thread, chosen as dark mirrors of the changeling’s. It gains Aspirations in direct opposition to the changeling’s Needle and Thread and uses them to disrupt the changeling’s life. For example, a changeling with a Protector Needle finds her doppelganger attacking the people she loves; her Friendship Thread causes the shard to focus on ruining all her relationships. The Icon shard targets only the changeling and those connected to the changeling (if doing so serves the purpose of tormenting her). If she kills the shard rather than reintegrating it, she destroys it forever, losing access to the memories and Clarity it once brought, constituting a Clarity attack with a dice pool of four. Beat: The Icon shard’s actions impair or hurt the changeling or someone she cares about, or actively prevent her from gaining Willpower through her Needle or Thread. Resolution: The changeling must kill the Icon shard or make up for breaking her word. If she made a vow, she must complete it or fulfill its terms. If she made an oath, she must

Expanded Pledgecraft 81 reconcile with the others involved to their collective satisfaction. The others involved in the pledge may exonerate her wrongdoing by resealing the pledge in blood. Everyone involved must suffer one lethal damage and spend a single Glamour to reinstate the pledge’s bond. If she cannot reconcile the oath — perhaps the other parties died, for example — then the changeling must reconcile with the Wyrd instead; this should be the focus of a story, and the particulars are up to the Storyteller. When this Condition resolves, the Icon integrates with her immediately, unless she destroyed it.

Those Without Kith 83 “Be faithful to that which exists nowhere but in yourself — and thus make yourself indispensable.” — André Gide Arcadia changes people. The Thorns of the Hedge tear away the fragile veneer protecting psyche and soul and lay bare the tender truths beneath. Most changelings hold on to the core of their identity, but all the rest — flesh and bone, thought and dream — are the malleable materials upon which metamorphosis imposes itself. Sometimes, the dire will of a True Fae sculpts a changeling to match its bizarre desires. Other times, the changeling orchestrates her own transformation, whether through conscious intent to become the tool of her own escape, or via instinctive urges to find or claim a role. These changes are kiths, connecting the Lost through shared experience and purpose, mutually understood traumas and terrible prowess. This chapter presents a broad selection of kiths that exist among the Lost, expanding upon those offered in Changeling: The Lost Second Edition. It also examines the process behind creating new kiths and gives options for those changelings who leave Arcadia without any kith at all. Those Without Kith From time to time, a changeling escapes Arcadia without her body or mind conforming to a kith’s template. Perhaps her Keeper abandoned her to wallow in captivity without purpose, or she escaped too swiftly for her soul to adapt. Perhaps she embodied the platonic ideal of her seeming so thoroughly that no kith suffices. Some changelings who do have kiths end up losing them or shedding them deliberately. Those without a kith fall into one of three categories: the broad, varied kithless; the disruptive and isolated scissors; or the unraveled, caught in a countdown to dissolution. Kithless Many kithless never gained a kith in the first place. The Keeper had no particular purpose in mind, promptly forgot about her, or discarded her and left her to her own devices in Arcadia’s wide wonderland. She never obsessively swaddled herself in a single, transformative means of coping, never turned the tools of her durance onto herself out of desperation or inspiration, and thus avoided Faerie’s strangest phenomena. A changeling might also lose her kith or part with it willingly. A sharp, sweet dream drifting in from the stars hungrily laps at her mind and magic, drinking down the power that underpins her kith. She drives a hard bargain with a wily goblin, trading away a part of herself to be free from the reminder of her durance. Amid the Thorns, she scrapes her kith out of her soul in a painful metamorphosis, gaining an altogether different kind of power. She knows what it is to have a kith, but now that aspect of her is gone. Lack of kith does not make the Lost any less of a changeling than her peers. Without a kith’s guiding purpose, however, her seeming remains broad and conceptual. Rather than being Fairest because she possesses the majesty of a dragon or a wondrous luminescence, she is simply Fair — the undiluted idea of glorifying the self and leading others. She becomes an exemplar of what her seeming represents. An Elemental personifies the sheer drive to shape the world not easily defined by a single natural force. A Beast demonstrates the instincts and fierce tenacity of all animals striving for survival without the specifics of predator or prey. A kithless changeling’s mien reflects her seeming’s generalities — sometimes melding all its various facets, sometimes presenting her seeming’s core as an abstract avatar.

84 Chapter Three: Kiths Systems: A kithless changeling chooses one Attribute from the same category as her seeming’s bonus Attribute dot; for example, an Ogre may choose any Power Attribute. Whenever she rolls a dice pool with that Attribute, she may spend a Glamour point before rolling to achieve an exceptional success on three successes rather than five. Once per scene when using a Contract from her seeming’s favored Regalia, she may count the Contract’s Loophole as if she fulfills it even if she does not actually meet its requirements; doing so does qualify her to then spend Glamour to render the Contract reflexive if she desires. No single mechanical way to shed a kith exists; doing so is a matter of narrative events, and should require significant effort or paying a steep price, at the Storyteller’s discretion. Scissors Once, folklore claimed iron scissors warded newborn children from the fae. Maybe there’s something to that; maybe the bulwark of iron and the metaphorical weight of a shearing edge to cut the Wyrd’s threads really do hold the Gentry back from snatching such infants. Some humans stolen away into Arcadia sit uneasily within that realm’s gullet, a disruptive presence sharp and cutting at a conceptual level rather than physical. Faerie ulcerates around them, treating them as invasive entities who shear through the fabric of Fae Titles wherever they go. The Lost call these changelings scissors: prickly, destructive, and frightening, like the iron tools of old. Just being near a scissor makes another changeling’s skin itch with phantom cuts and the sense her very presence cuts them to pieces, snip, snip, snip. It’s unclear what sets someone at odds with the Wyrd’s warp and weft. Some claim rival supernatural forces protect scissors, perhaps even Iron itself. Others spin wild notions of humanity evolving to match the Fae threat, of a new kind of human mind honed to cut through Glamour’s tantalizing marvels. Scissors suffer terrible isolation. The Wyrd’s magic frays around them. Their metaphysically barbed nature keeps friends distant and pushes other changelings away. It’s a cold, lonely life, but some embrace their fate. Scissors are made to cut, so that’s what they do. As outsiders to the freeholds, scissors sometimes make names for themselves as bounty hunters or troubleshooters capable of really hurting the Gentry’s agents, thus maintaining a mutually beneficial — if tense — equilibrium with other Lost that never quite resolves into trust. A scissor is still a changeling, though, whether she likes it or not. Instead of bristling with sharp edges to ward off the Kindly Ones, she can let her guard down and embrace a reconciliation of her conflicting natures. By seeking and taking on a kith, a scissor weaves herself into the Wyrd’s tapestry until those sharp edges blunt. This voluntary selfshaping offers control over who she becomes, granting her acceptance in exchange for the dagger she holds at the Wyrd’s throat. Systems: A scissor’s cutting presence causes havoc for fae power. Whenever any character suffers a failure on an action that would affect the scissor with fae-born magic, whether helpful or harmful, it becomes a dramatic failure instead. A scissor may reflexively spend a Glamour point to be treated as iron for the purposes of fae defenses and magic (but not the cold iron bane) for six seconds, or in action scenes until the beginning of her next turn. While a scissor can take on a Mantle and use pledgecraft, her nature chafes at these bonds over time. By default, she cuts herself free of all oaths she’s sworn — including societal oaths binding her to court, freehold, and motley — of her player’s choice after one full story, suffering all the usual consequences for breaking it. If the oath enabled a Merit such as Mantle, it’s subject to the Sanctity of Merits (Changeling, p. 111). She can postpone this inevitability by turning her blade upon herself, suffering one point of mild Clarity damage at the beginning of the new story for each oath she wishes to maintain. Doing so does not prevent her from breaking oaths in other ways during the story. Unraveled Tales abound of mortals caught by Fae trickery, whisked away to unearthly banquets and delights only to perish once they return to the human world. Perhaps the fae food they ate gave no true sustenance, or years passed in what seemed to them but an afternoon, and once freed from the otherworld’s magic, all that time and hunger comes due at once. Any changeling can see her durance reflected in these stories but unraveled live them. An unraveled Lost doesn’t merely leave something of herself behind amid the Thorns; a thread of herself snags on the edges of Arcadia itself, and each exertion of her independence pulls loose a little more of what makes her her. Unravel enough, and she’ll come apart completely. No single snarl of Thread or burr of Needle serves as unraveling’s singular cause. Various circumstances sink cruel hooks into the spun fabric of a changeling’s soul, snagging helpless Lost upon them. One held back her Keeper’s influence with constant, unwise promises of her time. Once the feasts came to an end, those promised years started to peel away from her skin as crackling, crisp leaves. Another thought to avoid the Thorns’ vicious price as she fled her Durance and willingly paid a wounding of herself to the grasping claws of some Hedge denizen for safe passage. She didn’t realize the creature who dug her Icon out of her would demand such visceral interest on her payment. Yet another simply suffers from addiction, body and soul caught by lethal cravings for some substance or concept of Arcadia never intended for human indulgence. Most unraveled, though, unwittingly tie themselves to Arcadia by coveting something of that place and its wonders which they cannot bring themselves to give up. Perhaps they crave ownership of a certain beautiful place, fiercely want one of their Keeper’s treasures, or need a lost lover desperately.

Acquiring a Kith 85 Their genuine and powerful longing or avarice kept a part of them entangled when the time came to flee their durance. Other changelings don’t cause this unraveling, only the impossible desires of Arcadia itself. As the unraveled slowly comes apart, her collapsing state cannot maintain the shape or identity of any kith she may have once possessed. She can patch the damage through acquiring a new kith, which she uses to mend the fabric of her wounded self, knitting her identity back together. A clever unraveled can also stitch herself up with swatches of Goblin Debt, continually bartering to repair the damage, although she can’t create a lasting solution from these pawned pieces of power. Others undertake a graver choice: unable to give up on their desires or desperate for the pain to stop, they seek a permanent return to Arcadia. Systems: An unraveled takes a point of aggravated damage at the beginning of each chapter. She may unravel herself further as a reflexive action whenever she would regain a point of Willpower from her Needle or Thread, suffering a point of aggravated damage but regaining all expended Willpower instead. She may also accept a point of aggravated damage to automatically win a Clash of Wills against a source of fae magic. Her tether to Arcadia draws her easily back; her player adds half her Wyrd to dice pools to navigate the Thorns, and she automatically recognizes dormant Hedgeways without kenning. Nothing can heal or remove damage from unraveling except goblin magic. The changeling may convert her rightmost aggravated damage point suffered through unraveling to lethal damage that heals normally by accepting three points of Goblin Debt. This requires spending at least one scene in the Hedge interacting with hobgoblins, but she can accept up to nine Goblin Debt points at once to convert up to three points of aggravated damage to lethal, as long as doing so wouldn’t increase her total Debt beyond nine. Becoming a Hedge Denizen through Debt incurred another way puts the unraveling on hold, but it resumes as soon as that Condition resolves. If the unraveled gains a new kith, she’s entirely safe from unraveling and any damage she suffered from it heals naturally. If she ever loses that kith, she begins to unravel again. If her rightmost health box fills with aggravated damage from unraveling, her body evanesces in a manner appropriate to her mien. She might come apart in a flurry of snowflakes, unspool as if made of spun yarn, or disintegrate into dust as lost time catches up with her all at once. Acquiring a Kith Changelings who lack a kith may desire one, whether for the power it offers, the sense of belonging it grants, or simple survival. The Lost know of three paths to gain a kith, each within the mercurial realm of the Hedge. Upon gaining a kith, a changeling loses any benefits and disadvantages associated with kithlessness. Icons The cruelest way to gain a kith is to acquire and absorb another changeling’s Icon. The kithless one must take something personal from the Icon’s owner, something allowing her to mold the Icon’s raw edges to match the wound in her Thorn-ripped sense of self. While physical items sometimes suffice, a lock of hair only works if that hair forms a key part of the victim’s self-identity; more likely theft targets for this purpose include precious treasures or beloved mementos. Abstractions also work, such as a catchphrase learned and spoken, a mannerism copied, a friendship stolen, or a dream broken by the perpetrator. The changeling obviously needs to track the Icon down as well. With the personal key from the owner and the Icon itself, she can now leech its power — which could involve eating the Icon, pressing it into a literal wound, meditating upon it, or performing some other symbolic act appropriate to its form. This vulture mysticism leaves the changeling sick and giddy with a rush of stolen memories and mannerisms from her mark. While she suffers under a sense of dislocation from this hijacked spiritual completion, that temporary agony cannot compare to the consequences of Lost society discovering her transgression. System: Absorbing the Icon is a Hedgespinning action requiring five successes. Once the changeling succeeds, her body and mind shift and morph over the course of about a minute to take on her victim’s kith, although it need not manifest in exactly the same way; for instance, a Playmate Beast’s mien might resemble a golden retriever, but the Fairest who steals their Icon and becomes a Playmate herself may look like a round-cheeked cherub or painted porcelain doll. The changeling’s player should decide the effects on her mien as if she’d taken the same kith at character creation. Absorbing another changeling’s Icon always counts as a breaking point with a pool of five dice, which achieves exceptional success on three successes instead of five. The process destroys the Icon, and the Icon’s original owner thereafter gains the rote quality on Empathy rolls against the changeling, although they don’t necessarily understand why they feel so in tune with the emotions of the Icon thief. Ordeals More benignly, many kithless undertake an ordeal, a kind of psychodrama personalized to the changeling in question. She concentrates on the desire for a particular shared identity or personal purpose and enters the Hedge with her mind focused on finding a kith. She needn’t know ahead of time which kith she seeks, and even if she has a specific kith in mind, she may not find exactly what she’s looking for. Her player, however, chooses the kith that comes to her unless they want the Storyteller to decide for them or randomize the choice. The changeling’s journey toward further definition forces her to face down the unvarnished, raw truths behind

86 Chapter Three: Kiths her desire — an honesty of self that can be deeply painful but also a revelation. She may not consciously know what kith she wants or needs at first, but the ordeal shows her. The ordeal’s nature depends on her personality, seeming, and the kith in question. A Beast on the path to become a Hunterheart ends up on the trail of strange, previously unseen breeds of briarwolf. She must navigate their bramble-tangled tracks, tussle with ferocious beasts, and perhaps show compassion for a wounded wolf — or maybe crack its jaws open, tear out its heart, and gulp the bloody organ down. A changeling ready to become a Bright One finds her road snaking through smoking, fume-filled places in the Hedge where the blackened branches scratch the sky over rumbling earth, eventually coming to a place of lambent light where she catches aflame and must stand firm until it sears her soul. Each kith-seeking changeling undergoes a different and unique process. As well as an arduous and extensive journey, wherein the changeling faces various threats and situations not as they seem, the ordeal always includes one scene related directly to her Thread and one related to her Needle. These moments of respite between trials permit the changeling to affirm the core of her identity and strengthen her will to face what lies ahead. Such danger present during these moments suits the changeling’s nature. The Bon Vivant stumbles upon some hobgoblins sharing a feast who invite him to participate — as long as he doesn’t overstay his welcome. The changeling motivated by Honor faces a temptation, the Hedge and Wyrd engineering a chance to demonstrate his steadfastness. A changeling undergoing an ordeal gains the Kithseeker Persistent Condition (below). The Storyteller should create trials to match the character undertaking them and be mindful of the player’s own desires and Aspirations, giving her opportunities to let her show off how the trials change the character while shining a light upon her unchanging core. Upon successfully resolving the Condition, the changeling gains a new kith. KITHSEEKER (Persistent) Your character undertakes an ordeal in the Hedge to seek a kith that matches her soul’s calling. During the ordeal, she must face five trials, each of which comprises roughly one scene. Her motley and others can help her, but if someone else resolves a trial for her, she refuses to engage with a trial, or she leaves the Hedge, the Condition ends without resolution. Resolution: The character overcomes five trials and gains a new kith. Beat: The character endures significant adversity or learns something new about herself as part of a trial. Bartering Finally, a changeling might gain a kith through bartering with one of the few and far between hobgoblin merchants who possess such prizes. A changeling might get lucky and find one at a Goblin Market, but more often she must undergo an arduous journey through the Hedge to find whatever remote fastness a reclusive collector dwells within. A kith never comes cheap. Hobgoblins know the value of these scraps of purpose and potential and always demand high prices. The kith’s appearance reflects its nature; the Snowskin’s snowglobe stirs itself to flurries in a changeling’s presence, or the Notary’s bundle of curling parchments requires signatures and seals. Such kiths-for-trade come from somewhere, of course. Some changelings willingly sell a portion of their selfhood out of desperation or because they want to shuck some transfiguration the Gentry forced upon them. Others fall victim to some ghastly Hedge horror or a brutal balance of debt and Wyrd that rips away their kith. Kiths bought by barter come with one final caveat emptor. Sometimes, a portion of the former owner’s Goblin Debt remains attached — indeed, that’s precisely what drives some Lost to part with them in the first place. The new owner inherits the Debts. While rarely too onerous an obligation, these Goblin Debts come from utterly unknown creditors. Fashioning Kiths When building a chronicle, kiths provide players and Storytellers the opportunity to make characters unique. Not merely professions that define a changeling’s daily grind, the connective thread of a kith binds a changeling’s history, personality, and theme together. One of the Lost isn’t just a hunter or a doctor; she’s the predator whose eyes gleam between the trees in the dark forest, or an untouchable beekeeper mystic whose bees make honey capable of curing the deadliest illnesses. When choosing or creating a kith, remember they always represent the mythic and iconic. Even if the changeling herself remains unaware of this fact, by escaping Arcadia’s clutches, she became nothing short of exceptional, and her struggle to rebuild her life cultivates her individual uniqueness. Kith selection communicates or foreshadows a changeling’s strengths and flaws as well as the kind of story she might experience. Mechanically, it defines the powers she develops as she adapts to an old reality made new again. On a personal note, it expresses why her peers should treasure her — and why she should treasure herself. Most importantly, picking a kith should be fun. Kiths should inspire and energize players and Storytellers alike! One of the joys of playing Changeling: the Lost comes from finding ways to sculpt kiths into character concepts and vice versa: a player might begin with Airtouched (p. XX) and create a winged unicorn Fairest, turn a conceptual satyr into an Absinthial (p. XX), or design a Doppelgänger (p. XX) into a kitsune. Changeling gives players and Storytellers the op-

Fashioning Kiths 87 portunity to tap into deep, rich wells of folklore from across the world, becoming the iconic, powerful creatures dwelling within those tales. The same advice applies when designing new kiths. A kith most importantly inspires great stories, enabling players to create exactly the character they want to play. The Changeling core rulebook presents guidelines for kith design starting on page 304. This section accompanies rather than replaces that one, discussing the thematic and narrative aspects of kith creation, and considerations for choosing or crafting a kith for a character. Kith Themes A kith reflects how a changeling views herself alongside her fellows and in the context of Lost history. Two Venombites (p. XX) of different seemings may have little else in common, but their kith binds them together though shared instincts and worldviews. Kiths also connect changelings to fairytales and folklore, which represent their relationship to the Hedge, the freehold and its courts, and the mortal world. They contextualize metaphors and symbols in the changeling’s life, helping her secure her identity. This makes folklore the best place to start when creating a new kith. Consider the themes and stories with which the kith is associated, along with how those can influence a changeling’s place in the world. One Helldiver (Changeling, p. 53) may mirror Orpheus’ journey to Hades in a chronicle focused on tragic love, while another reflects Hanuman’s search for Rama’s missing ring in a story about loyalty. When creating a new kith with a specific character in mind, consider also the changeling’s durance. Why did a Kindly One abduct this changeling in the first place? What did the Gentry do with her, and how does she feel about the role foisted upon her? A kith should capably encompass a multitude of character concepts beneath the same thematic umbrella: a Beast transformed into a rabid dog and an Ogre serving as a medic in a warped World War I reenactment can both end up Plaguesmiths (p. XX), for instance, despite their disparate experiences. Changelings are nothing if not diverse, and the ways they take on their kiths reflect that diversity. How does a changeling tricked into becoming a Valkyrie (p. XX) differ from the one who sought out that identity? How does one who stole a Cloakskin’s (p. XX) Icon react when the Selkie Queen, the original Cloakskin’s Keeper, decides to claim both as her runaway property? These kiths make a changeling’s history stand out, forcing them to confront their past triumphs and mistakes by virtue of their present identity. Kiths also reflect humanity viewed through a dark, cracked mirror. Passion becomes a burning flame, sorrow chills a frozen heart, and tragedy weaves into a gossamer cloak. Kiths express mortal highs and lows in more vivid and iconic terms, isolating bits and pieces of the human experience and viewing them through a fae lens. Finally, a kith forces a changeling to wear her heart on the outside. Others may have no context for her appearance and role, but her kith displays her inner turmoil and personal growth to the world for those who know how to look. Indeed, some changelings rid themselves of their kiths to avoid the mortifying ordeal of being known. Repurposing Not every kith needs brand new mechanics or themes. One may choose to simply mix and match two existing kiths. For example, a Darkwhisper kith may combine the Hunterheart’s exceptional success blessing (Changeling, p. 55) with the Uttervoice’s unique power (p. XX). Thematically, this gives voice to unspoken fears, paralyzing anyone who hears a Darkwhisper’s insidious promises — a role fitting under either original kith, but captured by neither perfectly. Another easy way to create a new kith comes from reskinning an existing one. A reskinned kith uses all the same mechanics as the original but tweaks details and context to fill a niche or express a character concept in a more personal way. Changelings of a Spiritsoul kith, for instance, may have served their durances as the Kindly Ones’ envoys to Shadow. The kith’s mechanics remain identical to those of the Ghostheart (pg. XX), but all references to ghosts change to spirits instead, and the presence of a Spiritsoul in the chronicle clearly adds a different dynamic and different narrative opportunities than a Ghostheart. Approaches Consider whether your new kith represents a broader archetype or a particular mythical creature, or whether that question has no clear-cut answer. The Bright One (Changeling, p. 52) can represent a changeling emulating a will-o’- the-wisp among many other concepts, but a new kith focusing more specifically on leading victims away and leaving them lost and confused can represent the same. Both approaches are valid ways to turn the concept into a character, and which to choose is simply a matter of player preference. Changeling rulebooks provide kiths flexible enough to appeal to a wide range of players and encompass legends from many cultures, so every chronicle contains a broad base of appropriate kith choices. However, this shouldn’t discourage anyone from making kiths with tighter niches. When narrowing a generalized kith into a more specific form for stronger ties to a particular place, culture, or mythology, reskinning myths becomes a valuable tool. Instead of playing a Draconic changeling (p. XX), Nadia wants her character’s kith to represent a Persian Azi. The mechanics don’t need to change, but the narrower focus distinguishes Nadia’s character from other dragon-based changelings. They experience greater kinship with other Azi, which extends to changelings whose (non-Draconic) kiths also draw on Persian mythology, such as peris and manticores. Apply the same considerations to newly created kiths; each one comes with its

88 Chapter Three: Kiths own unique relationships and perspectives, and leaning into those makes each character feel more unique and real. Not every changeling has or needs a more refined kith. Sticking with the more general Draconic kith doesn’t make a character generic, just connected to a wider spectrum of diverse changelings. Through their shared kiths, these changelings support each other through hard times, act as diplomatic back channels between courts and seemings, and celebrate the myriad one-of-a-kind ways their shared story manifests. Example Kiths The plethora of additional example kiths below expand upon those given in Changeling. Their division into sections based on the six most common Regalia (followed by miscellaneous example kiths at the end) exists as only a thematic grouping for ease of organization and access; a changeling need not belong to the Regalia’s associated seeming nor possess any of its Contracts to be a member of any of these kiths. Crown The kiths presented in this section hew thematically to the Crown, representing archetypes excelling at diplomacy, command, and imposing their will upon others. Absinthial “Drink it up. Drink it all up. What, you don’t like the taste of your own medicine?” Arcadian brews share the strangeness and wondrousness of the True Fae who consume them: Wines so dry they leave a mortal gasping for water, smoky whiskies setting the tongue aflame — and of course, absinthe, the green fairy. As with all things fae, the green fairy encompasses both greater simplicity and complication than first apparent. Absinthials brewed fae absinthe for the Gentry. Taken for their imaginations and the places their dreams wandered, their Keepers forced them to brew these dreams into the most potent beverage on either side of the Hedge. After their escape, they report seeing their captors in the throes of visions caused by the bright green liquid. Most Absinthials escape during these fits of fae ecstasy. They might have sacrificed dreams for those brews, but they retain memories as intact as any changeling’s. Some continue to brew draughts in the mortal world, whether craft beer, bathtub gin, or goblin fruit draughts: these Absinthials constantly try to recreate the potent absinthe only brewable in Arcadia. Others find a thin contentment in rendering others paralyzed by their presence alone. Fickle, perfectionistic, and creative, Absinthials generally insist on doing things their way. They convince themselves of their greater wisdom and don’t take criticism lying down. The Absinthials may have brewed the green fairy, but they also are the green fairies, and those who forget that often wind up on the wrong end of an Absinthial’s wrath. Fairest: Her blond hair, green eyes and mischievous smile remind you of nothing so much as a pixie from the Lang color fairy books. The bar she runs overflows with the best gossip — and when someone gets too far out of line, why, she just leaves them out back until they wake up in the dirt the next morning. No harm, no foul. Wizened: Some say his brews force the speaker to tell the truth. Others say he’s just really good at getting people drunk. His favorite saying is “In vino veritas” and he never passes up a chance to prove it. Kith Blessing: When crafting anything consumable — beverages, meals, potions, etc. — with fae ingredients using Crafts, an Absinthial’s player achieves exceptional success with three successes instead of five. Green Fairy’s Curse: Once per scene, an Absinthial may spend a Glamour point and touch her target, inflicting her intoxicating visions upon them. Her player rolls Presence + Crafts contested by the target’s Composure + Wyrd; success inflicts the Insensate Tilt (Changeling, p. 330) on the target, as they’re paralyzed by beautiful dreams or brain-freezing nightmares. Once the Insensate effect ends, the target suffers the Confused Condition (Changeling, p. 335) as they slowly come back to themselves. The curse does not work on True Fae or Huntsmen. Climacteric “It’s your move. I’m sorry, were you not prepared?” Time flows strangely in Arcadia. The hour a changeling spends there might last 10 years back on Earth, or perhaps the day and a half her family lived through during her absence amounted to a hundred thousand years of torture at Faerie hands. No one really knows the metrics between the mundane world and the unearthly, hellish paradise of the True Fae — just as well, for there aren’t any, until there are. Climacterics served as environmental stewards, stage managers, and ersatz calendars back in Faerie, living timepieces wound to their Keepers’ specifications. She held the responsibility to pull down the night for a beautiful candlelit ball while he raised whatever sun his Keeper’s demesne boasted for a dramatic dawn duel between two Gentry. Much of the performance in each realm springs from a mix of a Keeper’s whims and her Climacteric’s memories of weather and time, producing fantastic, dramatic, and sometimes deadly results. For example, the changeling’s recollections of Florida summer deluge and her Keeper’s opinions of an ideal thunderstorm blur together in a vivid dance. Escaped Climacterics represent both immense value and incredible danger for any given freehold. Their blessing allows for near-complete battlefield control, but use of said blessing serves as a glaring beacon to Huntsmen searching for escaped changelings. Some freeholds believe any Climacteric is a lure, a Loyalist sent to collect escapees, and so do not even allow them access, let alone citizenship. For their part, Climacterics often quietly keep to themselves. Many take great joy in planning for the long run and

Example Kiths 89 Arcadian Absinthe Changelings of the Absinthial kith brew true Arcadian absinthe: a mix of wormwood, fennel, peaches from the groves of Arcadia, and the Absinthial’s own dreams. It tastes much sweeter than mortal absinthe, suffused with a bright green glow. When consumed, it renders True Fae Insensate and all others both Insensate and Poisoned, per the Tilts (Changeling, p. 331). Arcadian Absinthe is impossible to brew in the mundane world. Brewing it in the Hedge requires a fivesuccess paradigm shift on a Build Equipment Hedgespinning action (Changeling, p. 196). Dramatic failures induce Bedlam as usual. games of strategy. Few ever freely admit that having control over the time and weather of a Faerie demesne intoxicated them, and they struggle to replace that heady sensation. Some become oneiromancers, trying to recapture that feeling of power without the soul-crushing abuse. Beast: Tall and proud, his mane resembles that of the lion in the clock of Messina. Only his blinking gives away his kith: one-two, one-two, thirty times per minute. Wizened: Short and pale, they wind their long dark hair up into an elegant bun. They only dress in neat black coats and pants, and the pocket watch around their neck attaches to the base of their skull with a simple gold chain. Kith Blessing: When attempting to identify patterns (behavior, aesthetic, writing, timing, etc.) with Investigation, the Climacteric’s player achieves exceptional success with three successes instead of five. En Prise: Climacterics retain a sliver of their original power, even if they cannot control as much as they’d like. Whenever a Climacteric is present when anyone rolls for Initiative, she may spend a Glamour point to choose one character to automatically act at the top of the Initiative order without a roll; she can’t choose herself. Concubus “May I put my arms around you? Thank you. Try to relax. Listen to the rain. Your nightmares will be gone before you know it.” She couldn’t quite call it a dream — do Fae dream? — but being in the mind of a True Fae taught her all she needed to know about the dangers of oneiromancy. Here, in this strange realm, she organized her Keeper’s mind, fended off assailants, and spun beautiful mirages. Her childlike Keeper crafted her into a rufous stuffed bear and wails for her at bedtime, hungry for the cotton-candy dreams she weaves. A rival Gentry immerses himself nightly in a still, clear pond distilled from a blue-eyed young man; freshly bathed, he slumbers with one hand trailing in its calming waters, beneath the arching branches of a sighing willow. Yet another commands a faux therapist to hypnotize her to sleep at night, beneath the swinging brass dish of a censer twisted out of a middle-aged mother, spilling thick frankincense to sweeten her Keeper’s dreams. The word “concubus” means “to lie with,” and whether they literally lie down next to their Keepers, they spend their nights with their captors. The Fae take Concubi as companions, whether for the sparkle of their eyes, the softness of their skin, or the smell of their hair. During the daylight of her durance, her Keeper left the Concubus to her own devices, alone in her Keeper’s realm and isolated from other changelings. Whether chained to the bed or the hearth, put away in a cupboard at daylight, or simply swaddled in bandages until the next night’s lightning-storm, the next experimentation session, all Concubi share deeply intimate nocturnal exchanges with wildly alien minds followed by desperate stretches of diurnal loneliness. She might have shared this duty — this codependent cycle — with other Concubi, who became her only companions save her Keeper, or she might have defended a True Fae who chose to sleep by herself. At night, whether she wrapped her arms around her Keeper’s form — no matter how squamous or awful — climbed up on the experimentation table of her own accord or curled up at the foot of the bed like a good, faithful hound, together she and her captor plunged once again into a shared madness. Few changelings other than Concubi ever experience what pass for the dreams of the Gentry, and few Concubi speak about their experiences. A superstitious fear passes through the kith that chronicling a Gentry’s dreams brings the Wild Hunt down on freeholds. Being let into the inner workings of a Faerie mind is a privilege most terrifying and alien but also something of a privilege, to be allowed somewhere so vulnerable. Some hardline changelings consider Concubi little better than privateers or other loyalists. Indeed, some miss their former role so much that they return. Many, however, decide their own Bastions more worthy of defense than their Keepers’, and find work as therapists, courtesans, and oneiropomps for their fellow Lost. Beast: She stuns with dark eyes, dark hair, and — when you get past her Mask — dark wings that trail behind her like a feathered cloak. Don’t let her get too close; you might be overwhelmed by the scent of lavender and jasmine. Darkling: Scars cover his emerald skin, mixing in with tattoos trailing up his strong arms. While louder than most Darklings — and larger, too — sometimes he’ll sing you a lullaby, soothing you to sleep — for a price, of course. Kith Blessing: When breaking into a dreamer’s Bastion (Changeling, p. 221) with Empathy, a Concubus’ player achieves exceptional success with three successes instead of five.

90 Chapter Three: Kiths Valerian and Violence: When a Concubus gains the Dream Assailant Condition by sleeping next to the target for six hours and interacting with his dreams, the Concubus can remove one non-persistent Condition affecting the dreamer mentally or psychosomatically (Confused, Cowed, Deprived, Fatigued, etc.) as a paradigm shift costing three successes. Resolving one Persistent Condition (Amnesia, Broken, Delusional, etc.) requires three consecutive six-hour shifts of sleeping next to the target, the Dream Intruder Condition, and performing both subtle and paradigm shifts inside her Bastion. Draconic “How many times have I told you, don’t touch other people’s shit without asking? You’re going to get hurt someday.” Once upon a time, a dragon guarded a princess in a tower. No knight dared to rescue her for fear of being torn to shreds. The princess liked it that way, for she loved her dragon, and the fear that dragon instilled in their enemies. One day, the dragon flew away. No one ever asked her how she felt about her princess. The Gentry model Draconic changelings on the mythic beasts of Faerie, making them fearsome to behold in full mien. Thick horns blossom from her brow, scales line her sharp cheekbones, and her back bears heavy, leathery wings. While she can no longer breathe fire or crush buildings with a single whip of her tail, a Draconic still makes for a breathtaking sight. Perhaps she guarded a princess’s tower from smitten fae knights, haunted a deep and dark forest, or protected her Keeper’s hoard of treasures, but all yield the same result — a grand, scaled, avaricious beast of Arcadia. Draconic changelings find themselves too big for the world: too loud, too present, too much for those around them. They do not fit into soft spaces, have little volume control, and can accidentally intimidate to even the most experienced Summer soldier. New Draconics struggle not to see everything as either a threat or part of their collection; some build hoards and collect things that make them feel safe. Others join motleys and protect people they care about, though this sometimes requires patience from other changelings as the Draconic fusses over their well-being. Once she settles in and learns to relax with a motley, though, Draconics make wonderful friends. They guard their people and hoards with unparalleled ferocity; her people and things provide her love and stability, and woe betide those who would disturb her sense of home. Fairest: She never needs highlighter, for her cheekbones are lined with scales the size of glitter flecks. Her mirrorbright horns need no care. The only thing unpleasant about her is her temper, which explodes over everyone in the room like wildfire at a single misplaced word. Ogre: Her legs bend backward and end in wicked claws. Her massive, cracked horns mark her hard durance. With fearsome might, she protects her Hollow and anyone under her hospitality from the cruelty of knights and princesses alike. Kith Blessing: Choose either Brawl or Weaponry. When the Draconic defends a person, place, or thing she cares about with that Skill, achieving three successes counts as an exceptional success. None Dare Resist: The Draconic may spend an extra point of Glamour while scouring her Mask and roar, flex, or perform some other clear demonstration of dominance and force to inflict the Frightened Condition (Changeling, p. 339) on all opponents who can perceive her. If she’s in the Hedge or another place where she has no Mask to scour, she simply needs to spend one point of Glamour as an instant action and make the display. Additionally, she may spend a Glamour point as a reflexive action to take to the air and fly freely for a number of turns equal to her Wyrd, with a flight Speed of 60; if she charges (Changeling, p. 184) from the air, her player gains +2 to the attack roll. If she’s still in the air when this effect ends, she glides harmlessly down to the nearest surface. Flowering “Oh, it’s so nice of you to say that! I didn’t even know you’d noticed me…” Famous for its gardens and woodlands, Arcadia bursts with strange and beautiful flora found nowhere else. The air hangs heavy with the scent of blue lilies and beating hearts strung on glowing vines all wrapped around the pillars of some True Fae’s portico. The Flowering blossom among these flowers, the changelings from whose pain new flowers grow. Some changelings believe the common misconception that the Gentry crafted all Flowering into actual flowerbeds. While true of some, others fled a life of gardening, flowerarranging, or perfuming their Fae masters. Trained by their durances to make others look good, many Flowerings find it difficult to readjust to a life where they are their own masters. Because of this feeling of depersonalization, a new Flowering tends to find others to serve after escaping their durance. While some become Loyalists, others work to become the trusted confidantes and viziers of court monarchs. Many simply dote on motley-mates or attach themselves to courtiers they find particularly alluring. Flowering come in many varieties and temperaments, each more bizarre and beautiful than the last. While often perceived as soft and sweet, the hypnotic scent of a Flowering poses a danger to those who spend time in her company as their well-being becomes reliant upon her. Some abuse this power, steering their courts toward ruin. Others try to keep the freehold’s best interests in mind, even if they slip up sometimes. Still others seclude themselves, perceiving their power’s poisonous potential and worrying about unduly influencing others.

Example Kiths 91 Elemental: Her long, graceful arms and dark neck, covered with bark-like scars remind you of a willow tree. She lingers quietly in the corner of meetings, always weeping, weeping, weeping… Fairest: Do they lace flowers into their hair or do those locks sprout blossoms at whim? Their constant presence at the Spring Court monarch’s side causes rumors to blossom, too: lovers, or merely the best of friends? Kith Blessing: When convincing someone they need her with Socialize, a Flowering’s player achieves an exceptional success at three instead of five. Seductive Fragrance: Every Flowering emits a different perfume, something akin to a Faerie garden at midnight. The changeling’s player spends a Glamour point and rolls Presence + Empathy. For the scene, any character in her presence or who enters her presence must roll Composure + Wyrd to contest the result. Those who fail suffer the Leveraged Condition (Changeling, p. 342) regarding the Flowering. She cannot end this effect early. If she spends another Glamour point at any time during the scene, she may also inflict one of the following Conditions on a Leveraged target: Frightened, Reckless, or Swooned. Ghostheart “You can’t see them because you’re not looking.” An oddity among the Lost, Ghosthearts fulfilled deeply unpleasant tasks during their durance: preparing and disposing of the dead of Faerie. Changelings don’t like remembering that those left behind might actually die under the Gentry’s tender mercies; Ghosthearts serve as painful reminders of the human bodies buried beneath the seas and forests of their Arcadian nightmares. Wishes are not enough to bring them back. Before their durance, Ghosthearts truly saw the world around them: perhaps they simply possessed uncanny situational awareness, or maybe they encountered the supernatural. The True Fae delight in sweeping up Avowed and turning them into Ghosthearts, too. Their observational ability meant the Gentry, those masters of illusion, saw the danger from these changelings and did not keep them in their glimmering, gilded courts. Instead, they gave Ghosthearts the truest of tasks — burying, burning, sinking, or cooking the dead. The Fae might lie, but the dead never do. Through their contact with the dead, the Ghosthearts began to see what they became: ghosts who wandered the Hedge and Arcadia, never resting. Shunned by other changelings, enslaved by an inhuman Keeper, the Ghostheart found companionship among the echoes of the unquiet dead. It was these dead that led her out, that found her the keys or distracted her Keeper or led her to the great gates of Arcadia. She brought these ghosts with her. Other changelings often find Ghosthearts creepy at best. At worst, their peers actively exclude Ghosthearts from freehold functions — but this never goes well for them. A Ghostheart has many ephemeral friends who are happy

92 Chapter Three: Kiths to harass and make life difficult for people who hurt her. Ghosthearts gravitate strongly toward the Autumn and Winter courts and sometimes assist in freehold defense, so long as the freehold isn’t shunning her. Ghosthearts cling tightly to memories of times past, and to the memories of those around them. They have seen what awaits people who die in Arcadia. Most do not wish this fate on anyone — though some lead unsuspecting mortals into the Hedge to create more ghosts for their service. Ghosthearts make excellent record-keepers, spies, and couriers. Some few have become diplomats, treating with creatures beyond the warmth of changeling society. Their unusual perceptive abilities have only been heightened by their time in Faerie, and a clever monarch knows just how to use a loyal Ghostheart. Darkling: If you look at her out of the corner of your eye, she looks translucent, a person-shaped wall of smoke. Looking at her straight on, you see her dark eyes, darker than any eyes should be, and her sharp fingernails caked with blood and dirt. Ogre: He’s rarely ever out of the Hedge, but when he does come to freehold gatherings, he bears boxes of oddments and the bones of long-dead fae creatures. His veins bulge from his neck and his hands are as large as shovels. Kith Blessing: Whenever a Ghostheart makes a perception-based roll with Wits + Composure to see manifest ghosts or other Twilight entities (including Helldivers), her player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Friends in Strange Places: Every Ghostheart starts play with an extra three dots of Allies. These dots represent ghosts she controls or with whom she’s close. These can be three one-dot ghosts, one two-dot ghost and one one-dot ghost, or one three-dot ghost. Each ghost starts with one Numen of the player’s choice (Changeling, p. 249) other than Clarity Drain, Entrap, and Keeper’s Calling. A Ghostheart may buy more Allies dots to represent more ghosts, but she may only choose the Numina for the ghost Allies granted by this kith. Moonborn “‘Crazy’ is an insult. It’s used to lock people in institutions and dismiss survivors of abuse. The word you’re looking for is ‘mad.’ And if you’re not mad, you’re not paying attention.” Sometimes, the Fae don’t want to get caught up in their own passions. Sometimes, a feeling is just inconvenient. Sometimes it’s fun to inflict changelings with a certain feeling and see what they do next. Moonborn are the changelings who were the favorite targets of their Keepers’ emotional games. Kept in a constant state of Bedlam with their feelings at fever pitch, the Moonborn who come back through the Hedge are easily set off by the smallest things. They tend to form attachments extremely quickly and break them with just as much ease. To be a Moonborn is to struggle for companionship. Being run through thousands of emotions in quick succession means that she has no basis for comparison. How should she feel when she’s acknowledged by her Court monarch: embarrassed, proud, angry? Does her lover actually love her, or is this another Fae trick? Every piece of stable emotional footing a Moonborn has, she’s fought for and won with her own blood and brain. Moonborn do not usually gravitate toward leadership positions in freeholds, but if they do, it’s to help new Lost find their own feet in this strange new existence. Many assist in Hedge expeditions, freehold defense, and other important Lost business. Some Moonborn are Bridge-Burners, and it pains their fellows to punish them for starving everyone else. A scant few exist outside of freeholds entirely, stirring up the Bedlam among unsuspecting victims that was stirred up in them in Faerie. After all, according to these particular Bridge-Burners, if they were tortured like that, shouldn’t others be forced to suffer the same fate? Darkling: She looks like a normal thirty-something human: straight black hair, freckled skin, glasses. Behind those glasses, though, her blank silver-white eyes stare without irises or pupils. Wizened: Never still, he is well-known throughout the freehold for his kind voice, his gentle hands, and his overwhelming empathy. Those who have seen him in peacetime have a hard time reconciling that with the absolute terror he projects onto enemies in battle. Kith Blessing: Choose Empathy or Intimidation at character generation. When changing someone’s emotional state via the chosen Skill, a Moonborn’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Full Moon Catharsis: A Moonborn carries the passions the Fae inflicted on her within her soul, and sometimes it’s too much. Once per chapter, a Moonborn can Incite Bedlam in a number of targets equal to her Wyrd by spending a Glamour and rolling Manipulation + Expression, as she screams, sings, or simply recites the story of her worst memory yet again in excruciating detail. Her targets contest with Composure + Wyrd. She may inflict one of the following Conditions on all targets who fail the roll: Competitive, Frightened, Reckless, Lethargic, or Wanton. Uttervoice “You really don’t want to hear about that…” Old stories and newer urban legends are rife with tales of people following a voice only they could hear into dangerous and impossible situations. Most changelings attribute this to True Fae. The Gentry find this terribly amusing, and so they have created the Uttervoice kith. Uttervoices come from the same sort of people as Nightsingers (see pp. 56-57 of the Changeling: The Lost): artists or those with a creative will. The difference is that the Uttervoices let their frustration get the better of them. When they

Example Kiths 93 were taken, they were at a stalemate with themselves, feeling unable to make anything, let alone a masterpiece. An Uttervoice’s Keeper takes that frustration and shapes it into a weapon to point at her enemies. Instead of a masterpiece painting, her voice is a claymore, cutting swaths through the armies of other Gentry. Once free of their durance, Uttervoices have wildly varying reactions to their power. Some refuse to speak above a whisper, or at all unless it’s particularly important. Others speak normally but take care to remind others what weight their voice carries. Uttervoices struggle with fitting in and feeling at ease, especially right after their escape. Fear and anger come naturally to them. When her primary mode of communication contains an act of violence, how else should an Uttervoice relate to those around her? Beast: She has colorful feathers speckled throughout her brown hair, resembling a peahen. You know her for her ability to drive like a Formula 500 champ, but others say she cut down a True Fae simply by screaming at him until he broke in half. Elemental: Their hair swirls around them like a sunbeam. and their mouth is a little too big for their face. When they open it their hair crackles like a lightning bolt. Kith Blessing: When using their voice to Intimidate someone, an Uttervoice’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Scream of Agony: The Uttervoice spends a point of Glamour and screams — whether an incantation, a threat, or just wordless howling — and makes a contested Presence + Wyrd roll. Everyone who hears the scream makes a Composure + Wyrd roll; her agony does not differentiate between friend and foe. Failure inflicts one point of bashing damage; an exceptional success on the part of the Uttervoice upgrades this damage to lethal. An Uttervoice can scream continually (utilizing her instant action every round) until she runs out of Glamour; her scream also ignores any Durability score (p. 191 of Changeling: The Lost) lower than 2, and shatters glass instantly. Uttervoices find this power difficult to control, though — any time the Uttervoice makes a Presence roll, her power accidentally activates if she benefits from the 10-again rule. Jewels The Jewel kiths embody physical perfection, or at least the impression of it. A changeling of these kiths may not always appear lovely or gloriously terrible but their power is that of creation, temptation, and avarice. Delver “How about I take a lump of coal and shove it someplace uncomfortable for you, and then I can look for diamonds with my boot?” The wealthy hide their precious things in hard-to-reach places, oceans swallow ships whole, and the earth holds deeply buried riches in her embrace. The True Fae seek out clever individuals, luring them into Arcadia with hints of power, wealth, and opportunity. In Arcadia, the Fae constantly push their Delvers to mine out the next sparkling bit of gemstone or raise lost treasures from the ocean. Eventually, Delvers literally lose themselves in their work: their transformation into Delvers centers on leaving behind unnecessary pieces. Most lose their voices in some lonely tunnel, leaving them unable to speak. Delvers operate with a surprising degree of apparent freedom from their keepers in Arcadia. Their pursuits are often solitary but occasionally they can hear a tap-taptapping in the depths that isn’t an echo of their own work. Sometimes it is another Delver working a vein in the same mine, hoping to reach out and connect with another soul, but stranger things exist in the hidden pits of Arcadia too. A Delver fiercely guards her precious sources, whether a valuable vein of gold in the mine or a backdoor hacked into the BriarNet, are fiercely guarded secrets. Their keepers may take the lion’s share of the treasure but scraps an enterprising Delver gleans are carefully bargained and traded. The common myth, secretly tapped out in coded messages among members of this kith in Arcadia is that the only way to escape is to find the pieces they lost in becoming a Delver, or perhaps to find what they’d come to Arcadia looking for to begin with. Most rediscover their voices before coming home but one silent Beast dug for bones in his keeper’s back yard. He eventually dug up his wife’s old wedding ring that he’d been looking for when the Fae took him. After returning to the mortal world, Delvers form a natural community achieved by few other kiths. After all, while a Delver may communicate with anyone via Tappingspeak, only another Delver — or someone with appropriate supernatural means to answer her — can carry on a full conversation. Many achieve considerable success in the mortal world; their durances taught patience, persistence, and an instinct for qualities and skills valued by employers in highlevel employees. Darkling: Her skin shines like the point of a fresh drill. Her back is twisted and hunched into a compact form when she sits still. Most in the freehold never give her much thought, but her queen keeps her close and knows the value of her advice. Elemental: The changeling’s skin appears pebbled, but his fingers are thin and muddy water flows over the rocks of his knuckles. He doesn’t speak aloud but runs an enormously successful business as an antiques vendor and research consultant. Kith Blessing: Delvers have a sixth sense for uncovering hidden things. When making Investigation rolls to find what was lost or hidden, a Delver’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five.

94 Chapter Three: Kiths Tappingspeak: A Delver may encrypt and decode messages tapped out against a surface connected to the earth. She spends a point of Glamour and declares her recipients, sending a message travelling to them as vibrations through the ground within (the Delver’s Wyrd) miles. She may direct this message to any number of people at once within range, and the glamour’s encryption allows them to innate and reflexive understanding. Other Delvers and even exceptionally sensitive seismographs or other means of detection may intercept messages not intended for them, though non-Delvers require supernatural means to decode them. Delvers may spend a point of glamour and make an Investigation roll to decode any message conveyed through the earth. Glimmerwisp “Won’t you spend a little bit of time with me? It’s so cold tonight...” Horror fandom popularized the mist which suddenly spreads through towns, carrying silence and monsters. Sometimes, the townsfolk themselves become the monsters, acting on their worst impulses. After all, a mist can serve to hide any creature’s worst excesses. Glimmerwisps took the place of these storied fogs and mists in Faerie. The Fae crafted many of them from mortals who, for whatever reason, feared getting into trouble. The teenager with the overly strict mother, the wife whose spouse’s “love” depends upon how closely she hews to impossible and ever-changing rules, the first responder with skeletons in his closet: all could easily become Glimmerwisps. They threw protective gauzes and glimmers over the Gentry’s atrocities, traveling with them and enabling their worst excesses; some Glimmerwisps even came to have a taste for the work. After all, it helps other changelings not to see what their Keepers are really doing, right? It’s not that the True Fae can’t behave themselves or hide their own actions. The Glimmerwisps who escape come to see this quite clearly. The Gentry are essentially the small gods of their own domains — as far as any Glimmerwisp can tell, the only reason they take changelings to cover up their own actions is because they want to. It brings a Keeper a perverse sense of joy to know that one of their changelings has the sole job of covering up their cruelty. It’s good to have a loyal servant like that. Many Glimmerwisps who escape do so because of the careless brutality of their masters. Some, however, figure that they could be more powerful outside of the grasp of the True Fae, where the only cruelties they’re hiding are their own. It’s easy enough to escape as a Glimmerwisp — simply breeze through the Hedge. She’s already committed the unforgivable sin of escape, and she’s covered up a thousand graver sins than that in her Durance. Elemental: Her ash-blond hair always blows around her dark face in a nonexistent breeze. You’ve never seen her open a door for herself; she always just seems to be there, especially if there’s shouting or blood. She likes blood. Wizened: She’s the fastest ambulance driver in the city, and always seems to be present just as someone goes into shock from sepsis or blood loss. Her colorless eyes never focus on any one thing. She always seems to be assessing whatever room she’s in. Kith Blessing: When using Persuasion to direct another character’s attention away from something horrible or wonderful, the Glimmerwisp’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Concealing Mist: The Glimmerwisp spends a Glamour to fill the room (or an open space up to 10 yards/meters) with a perfumed mist that hides characters taking actions which they would be ashamed of, or which cause them to hit breaking points. The Glimmerwisp’s player rolls Manipulation + Persuasion + Wyrd, which each character within the mist contests with Resolve + Composure. Characters who lose the contest can’t see the wrongdoing of anyone else within the mist. The mist lasts until the end of the scene. Gremlin “Gentry damn you, can’t you get anything right?” Though the name “gremlin” didn’t emerge until the 1920s, Gremlins have always been part of the elaborate tapestry that makes up the Lost. Aviators thought wicked little creatures were sabotaging their planes. They weren’t wrong, exactly, but it was never just planes, or even machines. Anything with even the tiniest flaw was subject to a Gremlin’s dismantling. Gremlins feel the push and pull of perfection and obsession, twin impulses with the same outlet: destruction. A Gremlin sees no point in doing something unless they get it right the first time, and if they don’t, time to wreck and rebuild. Miss a stitch? Rip the nearly perfect thread out. One wrong line of code? Delete the entire file. This doesn’t just apply to their own work; someone else’s error prompts identical outcomes. More than one Gremlin only gets to remain in their motleys only because of their identically quick hands and minds. Many changelings only weather Gremlin meltdowns by remembering her promise of a perfect machine. Before their durance, Gremlins were brilliant minds in fields that could appreciate their perfectionism: engineers, newspaper editors, sculptors, chefs. They shared workaholic tendencies, and spent hours caught in their own narrow foci, sacrificing work-life balance and personal relationships so that they could feel the fleeting joy of perfection. Gremlins usually didn’t need the Gentry to violently abduct them; they just had to be promised a workshop, and glory, and appreciation for their brilliance. Of course, the Gentry then tore their work apart with far more gusto than the Gremlin ever did. Ogre: He should be clumsy, with his huge hands and hulking frame; he should knock over every table he squeezes past, crush the piping bags he uses to decorate wedding cakes

Example Kiths 95 to pulp. But his stature belies his delicacy. No one has ever seen cakes as elaborate and beautiful as his. Even the ones he throws away in anger every time he so much as jolts the piping bag in the wrong direction are lovely beyond belief. Wizened: The woodworker’s studio doubles as living space and workshop and is so cluttered it’s hard to tell whether any given tool is for her craft or for her life. Is there a difference? She doesn’t seem to think so. Now get out, you’re ruining her focus. Kith Blessing: When making a Crafts roll to fix a broken or flawed item, the Gremlin’s player achieves exceptional success with three successes instead of five. Nightmare at 20,000 Feet: When pressed for time, a Gremlin can spend a point of Glamour to turn what would otherwise be an extended action into an instant action, as long as, at some point in that action, something needs to be torn down or destroyed. This ability can be used once per scene. Manikin “Yes, I know I have hooves. They are still more in this year than those hot pants…” Every grand painting has a canvas and Manikins fulfill that role for their Keepers. They are the graceful but faceless models who walk the runway to display the latest fashions, the animatronic creatures entertaining at an endless birthday party filled with the delighted laughter of the Gentry’s children, and old straw filled scarecrows left to rot in a field. Manikins are strange beings. Some are painstakingly selected and adored according to obscure and arcane criteria while other Gentry shape dozens of Manikins into identical caryatids supporting a roof. In their durance, Manikins are often relegated to the bottom of the pecking order among the Gentry’s servants. After all, a Manikin is little more than a tool and canvas for others’ ideas. Successful Manikins are elegant, poised, and focused on their purpose. One model turns to catch the light with a crystal ball just so while their razor-sharp platform shoes overflow with blood. Another stands as a training dummy for their keeper’s soldiers and is knocked down only to stand up to do it again without complaint. Many Gentry keep a wide variety of Manikins, making them quite a common kith. When they move on to their next great work, these Fae dump some into Arcadia’s dark corners and forget them with the rest of the trash, while others escape from dusty storage areas. A few manage to steal themselves away, taking with them prized art, other changelings, or valuable artifacts their Keepers wish returned. Wizened: Her skin is smooth canvas marred with narrow black ribbon stitched into her that mark the design lines of a dress. Countless tiny rust-colored flecks stain her where pins jabbed into her again and again. Fairest: The thin man has golden hands and an auctioneer’s compelling voice. He’s always perfectly dressed and handsome without being flashy enough to distract from others around him. Kith Blessing: Manikins know how to present themselves advantageously and inoffensively. When using Socialize to fit into any situation, a Manikin’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Gold From Straw: Spend a Glamour point and roll Presence + Crafts to hide an object’s flaws for a scene. The Manikin gains the successes rolled up to a +5 bonus on social rolls. When this ability is used on an object to help adjust an impression in a Social maneuvering situation, the impression level is raised an extra step. In terms of fashion, no matter how cheaply made or inappropriate an outfit is, a Manikin can pull it off to rave reviews on the red carpet. When used on a chef’s sinking souffle or a rusted gun, it doesn’t actually improve the quality of the bake or firearm — but social rolls associated with their appearance benefit. Oculus “One more hand. Seriously, I mean it this time. I’m good for it.” Pyrite and gold look the same from afar. The wrong prescription lenses can show you a different world entirely. A crystal ball can blur the future. So can the Oculi, who are very much non-clairvoyant but have a gift for persuading people to see things their way. Many seasonal monarchs keep an Oculus by their side, though who’s influencing who is a valid question. Oculi made good diplomats in Arcadia, mediating negotiations between different Gentry, but they also made good traitors to their own kind. A Keeper sensing an uprising on the horizon sent Oculi out to staunch rebellion so they wouldn’t lose all their good little servants. The first thing Oculi learn during their durance is that everyone has a price, even the people who think they don’t. If you find it, you win. Expert bargainers, Oculi rarely abandon negotiations no matter how poorly they fare. They bet on anything they can influence, and even some things they can’t. Doesn’t matter that the Wyrd binds them to all their bargains, nor that that they see more luck than misfortune: an Oculus’ rare misstep can send ruling Courts to ruin. Fairest: He wears quite a lot of diamond and gold jewelry for someone who has never once bought gold or a diamond for his own use. Ask him, and he’ll say he gets a great deal, killer even, thanks to his work down in the Diamond District. But if you follow him out of town, you’ll spot him at one of those tourist-trap mines, picking up crystal and fool’s gold by the pound. Wizened: She doesn’t speak much, so when she does, it tends to carry greater weight. It doesn’t actually matter how wise her words are. Because she seems so thoughtful, the court thinks she is. It’s a very Emperor’s new clothes situation, except that so far no one has seen through her.

96 Chapter Three: Kiths Kith Blessing: When an Oculus uses Persuasion to get someone to consider her own point of view, her player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Amaurosis fugax: By spending a point of Glamour and making a Charisma + Persuasion + Wyrd roll contested by Resolve + Wyrd, an Oculus obscures all physical paths save hers. Whether via literal clouded vision, magically obscuring everything else in the target’s field of vision, or a mental block when the target considers options, the Oculus guides her target’s destination. Polychromatic “Come back tonight, folx, it’s a new show every time!” Creatures as fickle as the True Fae need constant entertainment. They thrive on conflict, but they also thrive on flash and beauty and the way one shade of blue fades into another. The Polychromatic kith was born of this constant need for stimulation. Whether the Gentry find them soothing, peaceful, or something else, many Keepers have one around, just for show. Some, however, brought them to large unknowable events as a sort of emotional modulator, making sure the party didn’t get too riotous and no fights broke out. Before they were taken by their eldritch masters, Polychromatics were the sort of people who looked to care for the emotional well-being of a room. They might have intervened in fights or tried to play the role of a neutral, mothering wise figure to mediate heated discussion. Their ability to work with the shades of emotions displayed in around them turns into a wondrous physical display of colors on their miens. Other changelings might refer to them as “living mood rings” or “Arcadian lava lamps.” The Polychromatic kith’s wonder lies in their incredible inoffensiveness. Even as beautiful, brilliant rainbow colors flash and course throughout their skin and hair, that safe beauty demands little of others. Some Polychromatics just walked out of the front gates of Arcadia, flashing their signals of safety, while others convinced hobgoblins to spirit them out. Even in the mortal realm, they make excellent negotiators, mediators, and crisis counselors. Whenever a freehold or motley needs a soothing voice to restore order, sooner or later, a Polychromatic show ups, ready to help. Beast: He looks a bit like one of those stuffed collectible toys from the 80s. You can’t quite place which one. His voice puts you in mind of Saturday morning pancake breakfasts and nostalgic cartoons from your youth. Fairest: When she’s not helping new escapees from Arcadia, she works downtown as a singer at one of those overpriced bougie jazz clubs. Her sonorous voice pulls in patrons from all age groups, and she knows how to rake in the tips. Old men say that her voice makes them feel young again, and perhaps that’s true.

Example Kiths 97 Kith Blessing: When using Empathy to soothe someone’s nerves or temper, the Polychromatic’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Prismatic Heart: Once per chapter, a Polychromatic may spend a Glamour, causing her mien’s colors to swirl in a bright, beautiful display of light and hue. All other characters in the scene must spend a point of Willpower or suffer the Swooned Condition (Changeling, p. 345). Swooned characters become emotionally overwhelmed by her display and for the remainder of the scene take an additional −2 penalty on all rolls made to resist the Polychromatic’s use of the Empathy Skill. Veneficus “Do try a bite of my famous casserole! I made it with a secret ingredient…no, it wasn’t love. Or blood, thank you very much.” Cooking is a miraculous alchemy. Fire and salt transform inedible roots into something delicious; puddles of oil soften and soothe bitter buds into sweet. Tales are told of glamoured faerie feasts, but one doesn’t need magic to engineer one of the worst betrayals: when one bites into something that looks delectable but tastes like dirt, or consumes a dish meant to heal that poisons the body instead. Magic certainly helps, though. Venefici might have toiled in the kitchens of the Gentry or struck out into the woods to gather ingredients for feasts the likes of which mortals have never seen. A Veneficus who sees two identical plants knows which is toxic and which will heal an ulcer, and they can use either one to imbue a dish with special properties. One might make the most comforting chicken noodle soup you’ve ever eaten thanks to a sprinkle of chopped amaranthine; another’s specialty is tea she brews with Mab’s mugwort, which she claims is just a special blend of herbs...that happens to make you tell the plainest truth for the next six hours. In their mortal lives, Venefici believed in the healing power of food, though they didn’t necessarily work in any related industries. A Veneficus just as likely worked as an engineer as a cook or barista. But they all used food as a balm for themselves and for others: instead of saying sorry, they bought coffee; instead of telling a friend they loved them, they baked a cake. Venefici still want to take care of the people they love. They can just have more of an effect now. Elemental: They founded their farm-to-table restaurant barely a year ago and have already built it into one of the most beloved businesses on this side of town. The herb garden out back especially impresses the staff, not only with its hardiness but with the raw taste of the parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme. Whenever someone compliments the owner’s green thumb, they just say, “I know.” Wizened: She’s always in the community garden, plucking and pulling at her plants, and she brings a green salad to every neighborhood potluck. Most people come away full and happy. The one time a teenager who had recently thrown a ball through her window complained of stomach cramps, no one took him seriously. When he ended up in the hospital, they still didn’t know it was the salad. Kith Blessing: When the Venefici rolls Survival roll to identify Goblin fruits, her player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Waste Not, Want Not: By spending a point of Glamour, a Veneficus can reflexively make a toxic plant edible, or vice versa. Witchtooth “Don’t you just love a nature walk? I can hear it all now: the rush of the wind through gnarled branches, the twigs that snap under your feet, the quiet footsteps that dog your path… Isn’t it so restorative?” Witchtooths don’t eat mortals, but you’d be forgiven for thinking they do. The most famous of their ilk are said to have a taste for mortal flesh: Baba Yaga, Black Annis, Muma Pădurii. The stories and translations got it wrong as mortals passed them down over the years, twisting until the truth of the Witchtooth was lost, and the one-dimensional horror remained. What Witchtooths know that mortals no longer do is the power of wild land. Many live in ancient forests, but you can find Witchtooths in windy coves, salt flats, abandoned housing projects, and shrublands, too, though you may wish you hadn’t crossed their paths. Witchtooths make their homes in any abandoned places, and some move into populated places with the intent of spooking everyone away. They couch it in a concern for the environment, but in reality, most just enjoy scaring travelers and passersby. It’s a simple way to harvest Glamour, and they delight in knowing they have the power to uproot others as they themselves once were. Before their durance, the mortals who became Witchtooths shared a sense of constraint. Overwhelmed by their powerful, enormous, and devouring emotions, they tamped themselves down and built a shell to contain their true feelings. Inside, their emotions ran wild; outside, they showed deference and overt generosity, trying to make themselves smaller, to go unseen. Durance teaches a Witchtooth she need not restrain herself, that solitude fulfills her, and fear can sustain her as well as love. The barrens make as good a home for their wild hearts as any. Despite stereotypes, Witchtooths form strong attachments to their motleys and to freehold; they just don’t want to be beholden to anyone. They prize freedom above all, but what use is their knowledge without an apprentice? Witchtooths have a great deal to offer in their role as teachers to the worthy, helping the Vasilisas and Ivans in their lives understand that all chains break, and the ancient woods always wait for them. Fairest: So beautiful it’s scary, that’s what he hears all the time. His hair might have been black once, but now it’s saltwhite, and all that does is highlight the terrifying perfection

98 Chapter Three: Kiths of his face. When he comes to freehold gatherings, conversations stutter and stop as the smell of briny air stings noses and the roaring of wild water crashes down. Wizened: She looks every bit the classical hag, a real Baba Yaga type, and she takes full advantage. She makes sure to smile real big at the children she hobbles past in the market, showing them her pointed, yellowing teeth; she touches helpful cashiers’ hands, knowing her callused fingers bite like a thornbush; and she gathers her harvest without purchasing a thing. Kith Blessing: When a Witchtooth targets a mortal with Intimidation, her player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Nibble, Nibble, Little Mouse: The Witchtooth knows her land so well that she can transform its appearance at will, all the better to terrify lonely stragglers. By spending a point of Glamour and making a successful Resolve + Intimidation roll, she can reshape the land within one square mile to look how she wants it to. The effect lasts for a number of turns equal to her Wyrd and deals a −1 die penalty to any Survival rolls. Mirror Kiths of mirror reflect truths not wholly their own. They reveal, they conceal, and when you least want them to, they unveil. Bricoleur “You’ve heard that old joke, haven’t you? A girl asks the wrong person to make her a sandwich, and she gets turned into a witch made of sand. Clever, isn’t it? That’s what I did to my fetch.” Bricoleurs trade in symbolism. The kith has existed for as long as the Gentry have kidnapped mortals, but the name is more recent, deriving from the concept of mythmaking as bricolage.  Bricoleurs have a gift for seeing the potential links between disparate, unrelated elements; by drawing these connections, they can create a unifying whole. Bricoleurs are the fairy tale heroes who block their pursuer’s way by throwing combs behind them that become mountains built of teeth or spitting on the ground to create an ocean. Their durance was transmutative: these changelings realized that language is not a rule, and they used it to escape. While not necessarily a writer or an artist before the Gentry took them, a Bricoleur reveled in creative thought, avoiding literalism in favor of something fresh and new. Once through their durance, they find it difficult to think in straight lines, which sometimes makes them difficult to befriend. Many Bricoleurs become overly enamored of their own cleverness; even the quieter ones often give off the impression of not taking other perspectives as seriously as their own. This favoritism extends to their fellow Bricoleurs, making it not uncommon for these changelings to compete, each showing off her transformative prowess. Though sometimes irritating, Bricoleurs are valuable allies. They’re good at thinking on their feet, and most spend a lot of time studying, preparing for competition or for danger. Some can get obsessive, spending days buried in a dictionary to feel like they’re ready for anything — as if they don’t know that the very nature of their lives means anything can, and will, happen. Darkling: This clever Wisp spends her days sifting through dump sites and thrift shop collections, looking for trash to turn into treasure. She always seems a bit distracted; if something or someone isn’t useful to her now or later, she isn’t interested. Wizened: Odd tools dangle from the tiny hag’s belt: a comb, a vial of salt, a bouquet of forget-me-nots and wormwood. She’s a good listener, although it’s probably so she can always be prepared to use your words against you. Kith Blessing: At character creation, choose a specialty in either Crafts or Expression. When rolling the designated skill and specialty, a Bricoleur’s player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Creatio Ex Nihilo: By spending a Glamour point and making a Wits + Persuasion roll, the Bricoleur can change a core truth about herself. It might be minor, like hair color; it might be major, like her age. Everyone else will believe this too, for a number of days equal to the Bricoleur’s Wyrd. She must have an item that relates in some way to the myth she is making and is appropriate to its power. Most Bricoleurs will be unaware that the same change happens to their fetch — only that transformation is for keeps. Cloakskin “When I was a kid, I always said if I had a superpower, I’d want invisibility. If I knew that I’d actually end up with a superpower, I’d have picked something else.” Have you ever seen something out of the corner of your eye, only to turn and realize nothing was there — just shadows? Perhaps that was a Cloakskin. These changelings are shadow people, visible to fae eyes but not to mortal ones. Perhaps their visage offended their Keeper, or the Gentry wanted to experiment with invisibility. Whatever the inspiration, the end result is the same. Cloakskins vary in their mien just as any other Lost do, but their Masks share one important trait: someone who cannot see through the Mask cannot look upon a Cloakskin. Even in brightest sunlight, they see nothing but the changeling’s shadow. This never changes, though there are rumors that if a Cloakskin kills his fetch, his Mask will once again be visible. Those same rumors say the only mortal who can see through the invisible Mask is the changeling’s own fetch. Wherever you go, there you are. Many Cloakskins were wallflowers before their abduction, avoiding any and all attention, unwanted or otherwise. The Gentry taught them the lesson that sometimes you get

Example Kiths 99 exactly what you wish for. Upon their return, being invisible to mortals gets old quick, and for most it’s impossible to return to their old lives. As a result, they tend to be more nomadic than other changelings, traveling between freeholds and sometimes striking off entirely on their own. Cloakskins crave mortal interaction more than most Lost thanks to their invisible Masks. Those who don’t want to socialize solely with other changelings turn to the internet, where no one has to see your face. A Cloakskin making her way through the modern world could be a freelance essayist or an Instagram poet, even an activist engaged in letter campaigns and prison correspondence. It’s both easier and harder than ever to create a false online identity. What does she do when the moment inevitably comes when her friend wants to see her face? Beast: She regrows long, twisting caribou antlers every year, and when the velvet falls off, they’re carved with moving art. With a smile, she says they represent the secrets she’s learned this past year. Is that your face there, on that nub? Darkling: Even his mien seems invisible, the boundaries of his body defined by ever-shifting, slippery shadows that climb up his frame and only sink back long enough to reveal his dark eyes and darker mouth. He’s friendly but shy, like he’s afraid to speak without express permission. Kith Blessing: The Cloakskin receives a +1 bonus die to all Social rolls. Now You See Me: By spending a Glamour point and making a Presence + Stealth + Wyrd roll, the Cloakskin’s mien disappears from sight for one scene. Others nearby can hear, touch, and smell them, but not see them; cameras will not record them. In mechanical terms, Perception rolls to detect the Cloakskin based in sight fail and those reliant upon all other senses suffer a -3 penalty. Doppelganger “No, dear, I’m not your mother. Come sit with me, and we’ll wait for her to come back.” The annals of human fear teem with stories of doubles, people who look exactly like you but are not you. How can your true love, your brilliant child, even your loving parents pick you out of a crowd of faces that don’t just look exactly like yours — that are yours? A Changeling with a fetch lives this nightmare when she escapes Arcadia for the mortal world. If her Mask still looks like her old self when she fights to get her life back, she drags the people around her into the battle. Changelings often despise their fetches, viewing them as lowly parasites, but Doppelgängers have more in common with fetches than anyone’s comfortable admitting. When they escape Arcadia, Doppelgängers come back with a new trick. They don’t look exactly like someone, but they can look just enough like them to keep everyone off-kilter. Ephemeral sensations evoke powerful recognition: you couldn’t name your grandmother’s favorite perfume for the life of you, but when you catch a passing whiff, you think of her. You meet a new neighbor who really looks nothing like your best friend, but he has the same crooked smile, so you trust him implicitly. Doppelgängers use these subtle characteristics to their advantage. It’s often a twist on how the Doppelgänger wound up in Arcadia. He heard his mother’s voice calling him. She thought she saw her missing brother and chased after him. They didn’t know the truth until it was too late, and then they became the Keeper’s pawn. Before their durance, Doppelgängers believed that if they just changed one thing someone would finally love them. If she had that movie star’s violet eyes, if they had that singer’s gravelly voice. Keepers take advantage of that, only for both Gentry and Lost to learn the hard way that every person is an individual. Darkling: He’s unassuming, keeps to himself, and you couldn’t say what he looks like because you’ve never had a good enough look to say. It’s like your gaze just slides right off his face. Ogre: She looks normal, but you feel off around her, like she reminds you of someone. Maybe a convicted murderer you saw on the evening news, or the mean cafeteria worker at your school? You can’t put your finger on it, but every time she smiles at you, you’re chilled to your core. Kith Blessing: When the Doppelgänger uses Empathy to gain someone’s confidence, her player achieves exceptional success at three successes instead of five. Sea-Witch’s Bargain: The Doppelgänger may steal a target’s physical or auditory trait as a temporary part of her Mask. The Doppelgänger’s player spends a point of Glamour and makes a Presence + Empathy + Wyrd roll contested by Resolve + Wyrd. If the roll is successful, the Doppelgänger’s target loses a trait for a number of days equal to the Doppelgänger’s Wyrd. Stolen traits can include hair (color and style), eye shape and color, voice, height, a limp, or a stutter. The Doppelgänger must assign a task that returns the stolen trait early. Examples include disrupting a Court’s annual ball or stealing a treasure from another motley. Lethipomp “Tell me again about the first time you kissed me. Don’t leave anything out.” Once upon a time, a Keeper wondered what it would be like to have an abductee who did not fear him, who did not tremble when he approached, who did not howl in pain when cut. The Keeper went to a river nearby and spoke his thoughts aloud, then collected water. He gave it to his captive; she eyed him with suspicion at anything resembling kindness, but drank deep. Then he struck her. She did not flinch, she did not cry, she did nothing but gaze at him with calm, unworried eyes. The next morning, she was gone. Lethipomps do not suffer pain or anxiety — they don’t feel much of anything at all. Whether that’s a side effect of being walking oblivion or something they’ve schooled themselves to is unclear even to them. The end result is the same: