DRYH: At The Crossroads - Setting Details

The Crossroads

The Crossroads may appear anywhere two ways meet. At an intersection where roads cross one another. At a ford where river and road meet. On the threshold of any window or door. And in any Crossroad the Dealmaker may be summoned or may appear.

The Crossroads Nightmares

Old Scratch - Pain ?

Old Scratch appears as a shrewd, dark haired fellow with amber eyes, perfectly white teeth, and a finely groomed goatee. He is always seen in an impeccable white shirt, and matching vest and trousers of dark worsted wool and a fobbed pocket watch at his belly. His black leather shoes shine like glass.

Old Scratch is known as the Dealmaker and is often encountered during the Thirteenth Hour, and he will typically only talk Deals. He wastes little time on anything else. He offers no goods or services, only asks what is desired, then names a price to obtain it. Scratch never fails to fulfill a bargain. But he also never fails to collect its price.

Old Scratch's Pain rating is not known.

The Devi - Pain 3 [5 At The Crossroads]

It is rumored there are seven of these temptresses beholden to Old Scratch. They appear in whatever form is most appealing to the one they appear to and ply virtue and vice alike. The Devi are Scratch's collectors and enforcers.

The Hound Master - Pain 4 [6 At The Crossroads]

The Hound Master is a tall gaunt man with the image of a skull painted on his dark face and a green glint in his eyes. He always manifests shirtless in a tattered black suit with tails and top hat. Two great Black Dogs accompany him at all times, increasing his effective Pain rating to 6. The Hound Master commands the Black Dogs of Hell and can summon as many as he likes at will.

Special: The Hound Master has a terrible reputation both in and out of the Mad City. Minor Nightmares will avoid the Hound Master and his Black Dogs, fleeing from his presence for dear life. Lieutenant level Nightmares not directly allied with Old Scratch will viciously and immediately attack him on sight. When being attacked by other Nightmares, the Hound Master's Pain increases by 2 (+ 1 for each additional Nightmare beyond the first) to a maximum Pain rating of 12.

If a major Nightmare attacks the Huntsman, he can blow his Horn to summon Old Scratch himself.

The Hound Master's Horn: The Huntsman bears a bronze bugle etched about with runes that seem to devour any light that touches them. At need he can blow this horn to summon Old Scratch. It is rumored that his ability to add pain against other Nightmares comes from this Artifact.

Black Dogs - Pain 2 [3 At The Crossroads]

Massive black hounds with slavering jaws and glowing green eyes, Black Dogs hunt at the behest of the Hound Master. They can scent guilt and fear and track their prey tirelessly. When they have brought their prey to ground, their Howls call the Hound Master to their location.

Willow Women - Pain 1 [6 During A Forced Gaze]

Lithe and flexible and tall, the Willow Women are fair skinned with extremely long limbs and hands and feet and toes and fingers, and their hair drops down all about them in a curtain of fine pale braids, like the hanging branches of the willow tree, hiding their faces and most of their form. The Willow Women will not willingly move aside their braids and look directly on another being and tend to keep their heads down and their faces hidden, but if someone were to part those pale braids, stark black eyes with no color or whites would stare back. Anyone caught in that naked gaze faces Pain 6 in a confrontation that cannot be avoided. In this special encounter all 6s rolled for Pain count towards Madness instead when determining dominance.

Not only do the Willow Women never speak, they have no mouths to do so.

Special: The Willow Women typically do not engage in conflict, but if defeated they (each) add one madness die to the character's next roll, whatever that roll may be, at which time the Willow Woman passes from existence forever. This die does not count against the total madness dice allowed to a character, but any madness dice that come up six during that roll count as two sixes for the purpose of determining strength. Further, any madness dice in the pool when the Willow Women were defeated do not fall off until the end of the next roll. These dice do count against the character's allowed total since they are his own dice, just hanging around for one more roll.

If other characters added dice to help the main protagonist defeat the Willow Women they share his fate on the subsequent roll as well.

---

Paradox Square

Paradox Square is an open triangle of ground at the center of the Mad City. It is here that Sheriff Tock enforces the Rule of Law and makes examples of those who would break it.

The Gallows

In the center of the three sided Square stands the Gallows. It always has at least one arm and noose assembled and standing on the platform even when justice is not being meted out, but it also always has just enough arms and nooses to accommodate the number of souls set to hang.

The Clock Tower

The Clock Tower acts as the Headquarters for Sheriff Tock and his Coppers but also doubles as a maze of cells and dungeons that go deep into the earth below. Set in the corner of the Square, the Tower is topped with a giant clock that chimes the Thirteen Hours.

Paradox Square Nightmares

Sheriff Tock - Pain 6/8/10/12

Sheriff Tock is a figure in functional coat and pants with a simple shirt and sturdy boots, but his face is a clockwork parody of a giant stop watch with endlessly turning gears that give the impression of grinding teeth in a smiling mouth and eyes constantly whirling with sinister intelligence. Sheriff Tock carries a blunt revolver in his belt and wears a shiny star on his lapel.

Outside of Paradox Square, Tock has a respectable Pain rating of 6 but certain conditions can increase that rating. He gains 2 pain for each of the following. He is in Paradox Square. He bears a Warrant of Arrest for the Awakened he is confronting. It is the Thirteenth Hour.

Coppers - Pain 4

Coppers are clockwork policemen made entirely out of gears and struts of copper and act as Tock's Lieutenants.

The Headsman - Pain 5 [7 On The Gallows]

The Headsman performs all Lawful Executions in the Mad City. Appearing as a burly shirtless man in simple wool pants and a black faceless hood, the Headsman is only encountered during a Lawful Execution or when summoned by Tock. Though Executions in the Mad City are done exclusively by hanging, the Headsman is never seen without his massive black axe.

---

The Labyrinth

The Labyrinth makes up the bulk of the Mad City, with it's twisting streets and shady districts and towering peaked roofs that block the stars. Virtually the whole of the Mad City is stuffed into the labyrinth.

The Narrows

The streets of the Labyrinth are tight and twisted and not easily navigated. These are the Narrows.

The Peaks

The peaked roofs of the Labyrinth is at once a playground and a hunting ground. Up among the crooked rooftops and canted windows and broken balconies where the stars can be seen by all, Nightmares dance and leap and fly.

The Theatre

A rundown building that takes up a whole block, the Theatre is the demesne of the Blood Queen and her brood.

The Silent House

An Opium Den of some repute, the Silent House caters to every vice known in the Mad City and the City Slumbering both. Here there are no rules. But there is a ruler.

The Tower of the Moon

Home to Mistress When and her Menagerie, the Tower of the Moon is not a neutral place for Nightmares, but outside the Bazaar it is the most neutral-ish. It's Mistress has no laws against violence or duplicity in her Tower - so long as those things aren't turned against her - but the Nightmares who frequent the Tower of the Moon have, if not an actual truce, at least an understanding.

Hammerwall and Tinkertown

Tinkertown is a district of crafting and dark sciences on the very edge of the Labyrinth hard against the Hammerwall that divides Rattown from the city proper.

The Labyrinth Nightmares

The Blood Queen - Pain 3/6/9

The Blood Queen is first and foremost the Nightmare to Nightmares.

In all her incarnations she appears as a bloodsoaked female. In the First Watch [from the first through the fourth hour] she manifests as a little girl [Pain 3]. In the Middle Watch [from the fifth through the eighth hour] she manifests as a stately woman [Pain 6]. In the Last Watch [from the ninth through the twelfth hour] she manifests as a gnarled crone with jagged nails and teeth [Pain 9]. No one even whispers about what she becomes during the Thirteenth Hour or what Pain she brings then.

Blood Gift: Any Human who drinks of the Blood Queen's blood is instantly transformed into a Vampir Nightmare with a Pain rating 2 less than the Blood Queen's own Pain rating at the time they drank from her - 1/4/7 during the twelve hours of the Watch or higher if created during the 13th Hour.

Special: Vampir created during the Thirteenth Hour are not in thrall to the Blood Queen or subject to her commands.

Special: The Pain Rating of Nightmares who come within sight of the Blood Queen drops two points and remains reduced while in her presence. Only the Raven and Mistress When are known to be immune to this effect. The Blood Queen's Vampir add one pain to their rating in her presence and tend to congregate near her unless ordered to do otherwise.

Vampir - Pain 1/4/7

Vampir are pale humanoid Nightmares created by the Blood Queen from raw human stock and conform closely to the Vampires of popular human lore. Vampir of Pain 1 are rare, usually created in emergencies and afterward given to higher pain Vampir as servants or destroyed outright. Vampir follow a close hierarchy based on pain rating (further delineated by age within each pain rating).

Two Vampir of higher than 7 pain are known to exist. They do not answer to the Blood Queen, but there is nothing to say they would refuse her either.

Journey Men - Pain 6

Bare wisps of lean, tall, man-shaped shadows in shadowy finery, the Journey Men are the emissaries of the Major Nightmares, carrying messages between them and seeing to tasks involved when two Major Nightmares must meet on neutral ground. It is whispered that the Journey Men act as Assasins when the Major Nightmares do not want their own hand seen attached to a thing.

Special: Physical barriers are no obstacle to the Journey Men. They are able to flow up and over and through cracks to get where they are going. They are, however, unable to enter the Bizarre Bazaar.

The Barber - Pain 5

The Barber appears as a shrewd muscular man with a bald pate and a massive handlebar mustache in simple clothing and always carrying a wicked looking straight razor. Little happens in the Narrows that the Barber is unaware through his network of Urchins.

Urchins - Pain 1 1/3

The vast majority of Urchins are child sized, rumpled and anonymous. They move singly, in pairs, small groups, in their constant spy game. Urchins will rarely act directly against an Awakened so long as their perceived routine is not interrupted or hindered in any way.

Special: Urchins bring one extra pain die to their total Pain rating for every three of them present. This trumps the normal rule for adding pain for groups of Nightmares.

Rag Girls - Pain 1

Rag Girls are pretty little orphans with pock marked faces in tattered dresses made from scraps and old rags dragging a little rag doll in one hand as they skip and dance about chanting vile versions of Ring Around the Rosie that seems like it might be as much about various venereal diseases as plague.

They seem mostly harmless until they are right upon their marked prey, whom they will follow for blocks with no hint of threat. But when they draw nigh their rag dolls dissolve into wickedly sharp tools of rusted metal in their grubby little fists and their faces become something translucent that shows the sharp and empty outline of the skull beneath the skin.

The Night Callers - Pain 1

The Night Callers crowd the rooftops of the Peaks, leaping from one to another, shouting to one another as they go through their constant game of motion. They are of a size and shape with little children but have the faces of birds and beasts and might have fur or feathers or tails to match the face, though their main limbs remain more human than beast. For instance while one might have feathers on it's arms that hang down like wings, they are still arms, not actual wings. Not that that makes them any less mobile as they flit about from rooftop to rooftop.

In particular, when the Night Callers spot one of the Awake in their domain, or other surface dwellers climb up, they let out an odd warbling cry that brings more of their kind.

The Haj - Pain 7 [9 in the Silent House]

The Haj is the Lord of the Silent House and appears as a massively built man in broad silk pantaloons and sash with the massive head of an elephant with gilded tusks and three eyes [with the third set high in the center of his forehead] that glow a flickering amber.

Special: The Haj is able to cause complete silence and complete darkness to blanket everything within the Silent House at will.

The Rakshasa - Pain 4

The Rakshasa resemble tiger headed men of massive stature and keep the peace in the Silent House acting as the Haj's guards and enforcers.

Special: When there are more than one Rakshasa in an encounter the first two are counted at Full pain rating if they are within the Silent House

Mistress When - Pain 9

Mistress When is a shaper of flesh and seller of souls, a striking beauty whose features match the expectations of whoever gazes upon her. Considering her position, most expect exquisite.

The Menagerie - Pain 1

What happens to Nightmares who grow up? In the Mad City, where Time is sluggish with paradox and reluctance, they never should. But in Mistress When's capable hands, they do. The Menagerie is what happens to the Night Callers who leap too close to her tower. The girls anyway. The broken remains of the few boys who do survive her malice can be found scattered throughout the Mad City tormenting broken Denizens and wishing for death.

The girls are another story. They remain mostly young but grow tall and straight where they ought and plumply curved where she demands. Their animal faces become idealized porcelain masks of the same animal, but can never be removed. Tails and feathers and fur become part of a costume made more of skin than anything else.

This is Mistress When's Menagerie, traded, loaned, even gifted to Nightmares to do with as they will, to butcher and harm, to flay alive and subject to all manner of torture until the clock chimes the Thirteenth Hour, at which time the contract ends and the Menagerie returns to Mistress When, broken but terribly, terribly whole. Ready to be given to new Nightmares at the chiming of the first hour.

The Wretched - Pain 3

The Wretched are women of the Menagerie who have grown beyond their station to become Mistress When's Lieutenants. The Wretched always manifest as gaunt women in proper modest garb with their lower jaws ripped away and black blood constantly seeping out of the wound that remains. All animalistic aspects from their time in the Menagerie are gone, but a twinkle of mad lust and invitation remains in their eyes.

The Broken Ones - Pain 2

Male Night Callers who survive Mistress When's tortures flee, broken in body and spirit, their animal flesh torn away, never to regrow, open wounds exposed to the air, faceless faces terrifying to behold. Beast shaped masks of blood. Gone are the nights leaping between the Rooftops of the Peaks. The Broken Ones live only to visit the same torture that was visited upon them on others, though they are often too weak to manage it effectively.

The Eyeless - Pain 0

As their name implies, these men and women have no eyes, but sallow amber flames flicker in their empty sockets and their skin seems waxy and almost fluid.

The Smith - Pain 5

The great convex face of the Hammerwall that bulges into the Labyrinth is a hive of industry and metalwork. It is here that the Smith of the Hammerwall plies his trade. Stout and bearded The Smith is a construct of every known metal meshed together in clockwork perfection, the Smith is fearless when wielding his great hammer.

In any conflict with the Smith, should Pain dominate, regardless of success or failure and in addition to any other applicable complications, the Awakened is considered Armorlocked. One or more limb is encased in a thick sleeve of iron by the Smith's hammer and immobile.

The Alchemist - Pain 7

Tall and gaunt, the Alchemist is a faceless figure in dark robes who wields unparalleled power in the form of potions and darting wisps of light. The Alchemist can transmute any substance into any substance he chooses.

Cogs - Pain 0

Denizens of Tinkertown, Cogs are clockwork people who assist the Smith and the Alchemist in their endeavors.

Scampers - Pain 0

No one has ever seen a Scamper, but many have heard them, their little feet skipping or dragging across the cobbles, childlike laughter or sobs ringing out from the gutter, the alley, the next street over, the alcove just passed. Investigation will never turn up a Scamper, but will instead lead to a toy set in the middle of a street or gutter or alleyway siting in the middle of its own little puddle of light all alone as if under a streetlamp that just isn't there.

The toy might be anything - a teddy bear, a doll, a jack in the box - battered and well loved and oddly compelling. Picking up the toy will have one of two effects; characters with Discipline equal to or exceeding their current Exhaustion dice immediately lose all exhaustion. If, however, the character's current Exhaustion exceeds their Discipline, the toy summons a Nighmare whose Pain rating equals or exceeds the Awakened's current Exhaustion dice.

Regardless of the effect, the toy immediately fades away.

The Fallen - Pain 0

Many who meet their end in horrible circumstances find their way into the Mad City just before that last moment, escaping one horrifying end for another.

Special: No matter how hard you kill them to death, the Fallen always get back up.

---

The Catacombs

Beneath the Labyrinth of the Mad City lies the Catacombs, a warren of sewers and tunnels that burrows deep beneath the Mad City and plays host to fiefdoms that do not recognize Tock's authority above.

The Nethers

The Nethers are shadow districts squirreled away in the catacombs. There are literally hundreds of them, though the best known are the Shadow Nethers and the Straw Nethers. These confederate kindgoms don't particularly seek dominance so much as strive to remain independent of the rule of others. The rules Above don't apply within.

The Catacombs Nightmares

One Eyed Jack - Pain 8

The Jack is a wispy black figure with one eye that glows like embers in the skeletal head that floats above his shoulders, the other socket dark and empty. Brands tattoo every inch of his hide, glowing and fading like red-orange coals, echoing his every breath.

The Jack bears no weapons, and for all that his form takes on the vital aspects of a spectre, he has never been known to directly assault any. A confrontation with the Jack is a confrontation of subtlety and magics. Whispers of the mind, a snort of breath, a flick of his fingers; the elements of earth and ice and fire are the Keeper's to command.

Special: It is said the Keeper is able to come and go between them without need of the Portals and Ways.

The Hartshorn are the Keeper's sworn Lieutenants.

The Naga - Pain 8

The Naga appears as a gigantic black snake with the head of a woman. The Naga is subtle and silent, prone to trickery and deceit.

The Hartshorn - Pain 6

Three shadowy human figures in rugged tasseled buckskins, tall and lean, with the skulls of great stags hovering where their heads should be, wander the Catacombs. Tricks of the mind are the demesne of the Hartshorn, weaving the mists and damp into illusions of loss and pain in the minds of their prey.

The Protean - Pain 5 [7 When Enraged]

The Protean is a large man whose dead grey skin is a mapwork of intersecting scars. Standing head and shoulders above most men, the Protean is powerfully built and carries a perpetually mad look in his eyes. When he is enraged, his scars glow the color of old blood. It is unclear whether the Protean is an actual Nightmare or a very old Awakened.

Inklings - Pain 1

Denizens of the Shadow Nethers, inklings resemble children in form but with huge hands and feet and great grinning maws full of shadowy teeth. Inklings are three dimensional in form, but being made of the stuff of shadow they are somewhat translucent, except for the inside of their mouths beyond their shadowy teeth. That is black as never.

Silent as death, Inklings are never seen unless they wish it, but they are everywhere, watching from the shadows and seeing everything that happens beneath the the Mad City.

When Inklings attack, they attack in swarms. And though they are utterly invisible while they are ensconced in shadow, they do have to leave the shadows to attack. Their hands have no grip and their teeth have no bite if their bodies are in shadow.

Only during the Thirteenth hour are Inklings truly vulnerable, taking on the form of mute children wandering derelict. During the Thirteenth Hour an Inkling's Pain rating drops to zero effectively turning them into mere Denizens. For better or for worse, Inklings caught in this state within the confines of the Bizarre Bazaar do not revert back to their Nightmare form at the end of the Thirteenth Hour.

Scarecrows - Pain 3 [5 When Burning]

Scarecrows hail from the Straw Nethers and appear as their namesakes, lanky human figures of straw stuffed into tattered clothes with heads of wood or gourds or old skulls. Scarecrows are territorial, and while it is rare to see one they typically will attack on sight.

Special: If a Scarecrow is lit on fire it is doomed, but it's Pain rating jumps to 5 while it still lives.

---

Rattown Wharf

Rattown Wharf is a jumbled shanty town of taverns, shipwright shops, and low slung warehouses clustered on the edge of the black sluggish harbor upon which the Mad City is built. Ships of questionable seaworthiness come and go, loading and unloading even more questionable cargo in the hours of eternal night.

Just beyond the docks and piers and jetties the bones of sunken vessels make passage out into the deep all but impossible, but somehow the tattered ships make it in and out of that jagged labyrinth, though only their captains and crew might have any idea how.

Not even for the Thirteenth Hour does activity in Rattown abate.

Rattown Wharf Nightmares

The Raven - Pain 9

A lean figure swathed in black robes and turban, The Raven never leaves the Wharf and shuns the company of others, keeping to himself, his only company the great black raven on his shoulder. What his motives might be none have guessed, but his inherent power is undeniable and Nightmares give him his space.

The Catspaw - Pain 4

Slinking humanoid figures with feline heads, tails, and claws, the Catspaw function like an organized gang, collecting 'protection' and hassling transients for tolls of passage through their tattered fiefdom. On the other hand, they mercilessly root out any other criminal element in the Wharf and will fight off encroaching Nightmares and Awakened alike if they feel they are a threat.

The Catspaw can leap great distances and always land on their feet.

Plague Rats - Pain 2

Smaller than the Catspaw, Plague Rats are even more ratlike than the Paws are catlike, but still move mostly upright and have some humanoid characteristics. Though they do not actively provoke the Catspaw, Plague Rats have no interest in order, shakedowns, or protections. They simply do as they wish and slink away into the shadows.

The Rats are not terribly brave unless they know they have numbers or their prey is otherwise helpless.

Special: Should Pain dominate in an encounter with Plague Rats, one Pain die lingers with any characters involved in the encounter. That pain die is added to the Pain rating the characters face in their next confrontation.

Barnacle Boys - Pain 2 [6 When Being Skinned]

Vaguely shaped like small boys but covered head to toe in a carapace of thousands of living barnacles, the Barnacle Boys hang out on the docks and piers and jetties collecting information for the Catspaw and the Night Callers alike, as well as for any Awakened that can pay their price.

When crouched down against a piling or the base of a dock or storefront, Barnacle Boys all but look like a bit of crumbling foundation. They are also very agile and adept, able to use their bony growths to quickly shimmy up pilings and walls to the rooftops of the Wharf and even up to the Peaks.

If attacked and defeated, Barnacle boys break and get smaller, but as long as one barnacle remains, they live and will regrow.

Barnacle Boys have a vicious unreasoning hatred for Plague Rats and will attack them on sight.

Special: The barnacled hides of Barnacle Boys are worth much in trade to certain factions within the Bizarre Bazaar. It should be noted, that removing a Barnacle Boy's hide is the only way to actually kill it, so they tend to be alive and screaming throughout the process. Pain 6 to skin one.

Drowned Men - Pain 0

The dripping, salt crusted forms of those lost at sea, the Drowned serve as stevedores and longshoremen on the Wharf, mindlessly ignoring everything but their given tasks. At need, however, they will immediately take orders from any Catspaw, and will even follow the directions of Barnacle Boys if there are enough of them to physically herd the Drowned in the requested task.

---

The Bizarre Bazaar

The Bizarre Bazaar is an Aladdinesque jumble of cloth booths and tents and spread carpets and blankets offering all manner of exotic things for trade. Nearly any goods or services can be found within the Bazaar if the Price can be paid. It is thought that the Bizarre Bazaar is the only constant feature throughout all the ages of the Mad City.

Rather than being it's own Quarter, pieces of the Bazaar can be found in every Quarter of the Mad City (except Paradox Square).

Once a character is in the Bazaar, however, it springs whole, its jumbled pieces coming together in a cohesive, if still utterly chaotic realm unto itself. Characters within the confines of the Bazaar will not wander out of those confines until they actively decide to do so. Though it is still anybody's guess which Quarter they will find themselves in upon exiting - unless they have a means of choosing their destination - such things are available at a price.

Note: There is no guarantee that a character can re-enter the Bazaar at the point they left it, nor is it likely they will find portions of Bazaar in the same place twice within the Quarters. That's just part of how the Bizarre Bazaar keeps itself safe.

The Bazaar is busiest during the Thirteenth Hour and more pockets of itself will bleed out into the Quarters to attract custom in that Hour than any other.

The Bizarre Bazaar Nightmares

Haggler King - Pain 6/1

The Haggler King is the uncontested Lord of the Bizarre Bazaar. Nothing is bought or sold in his Bazaar that he has not approved it. The Haggler King manifests as a bearded, turbaned old man with weathered skin and gold rings on every finger and hanging from his ears. His eyes have been torn from his skull and his mouth is stitched shut.

In his right palm is set a single darting eye and in his left a mouth with a forked tongue full of vicious pointed teeth.

Within his demesne the Haggler King wields considerable Pain. Outside the Bazaar he commands a Pain rating of only 1.

Raggle Taggles - Pain 1

Mischievous denizens of the Bazaar, the Raggle Taggles flit about the crowds in scraps of colorful billowing silks and sashes, never stopping long in any one place, and are ubiquitous simply by virtue of the fact that they are literally everywhere. Though newcomers to the Bazaar might be tempted to worry about thievery, the actual purpose of the Raggle Taggles is more subtle, and often more dangerous. Anyone entering the Bazaar with even one current exhaustion die is subject to become a target for their antics.

Converging on their mark in packs to gain the cumulative affect of their Pain, the bulk of the Raggle Taggles act as a whirling distraction while one of their number places a stolen item on the protagonist's person. Infused with the bizarre madness unique to their kinds, the rightful owner of the stolen item immediately knows who has it and believes that they stole it.

Special: The First Rule of the Raggle Taggles is Do Not Talk About the Raggle Taggles. Any attempt to describe these ubiquitous denizens of the Bazaar will be met with amused disbelief and appreciation for a fine tale that might earn a mug in a friendlier place than the Mad City. Despite the fact that they seem to be everywhere, apparently only the Awakened are actively aware of them.

Hagglers - Pain 0

More self aware and independent than most of the Denizens of the Mad City because of their lack of a major Nightmare actively directing the form and direction of the Bazaar, Hagglers are probably the most adept vendors of information and resources available to the Awakened. There is still a price. Always there is a price. But there is little that cannot be had here, and the Hagglers are the ones to provide it. Hagglers often adopt the form of Nightmares and other oddities but they have no Pain rating.

Clockwork Insects - Pain 0

Delicately wrought of copper, brass, and iron to perfectly resemble and mimic actual insects - flies, roaches, locusts, centipedes - Clockwork Insects can be found in abundance everywhere within the Bizarre Bazaar, flitting about, examining everything, suddenly there and suddenly gone. But it is when they are spotted outside the Bazaar that they are most valuable. If a Clockwork Insect is seen outside the Bizarre Bazaar it means that a hidden entrance to the Bazaar is close at hand. The Awake can use these sightings to enter the Bazaar. This does not require a dice roll, merely a willingness to follow the Clockwork Insect where it leads.

---

Portals and Ways

Between the Mad City and the City Slumbering wind the Ways, paths in the earth that can be traversed between the two realms in any but the Thirteenth Hour. Ways may have multiple openings at either City or only one, but each opening is covered by an artifact known as a Portal. A Portal might be a window or a door or a drain pipe or the mouth of an ale mug. The only way into a Way is to find and handle it's Portal.

The Awakened always recognize a Portal if it is near but Portals don't connect to the same Ways or anchor themselves in the same places in either City.

---