The Candle and the Coin
The Candle and the Coin
Read Aloud
A brass bell rings from an empty market stall, and every painted sign flips to show one of your names. Three fey lean over the stall, laughing as the crowd begins addressing you by titles you have never heard. The tallest one raises a ledger and says, "One honest answer each, or the city keeps the names we gave you."
The Scene
NEUTRALFey negotiation under public embarrassmentBase DC 17Stakes The party's identities become legally and socially false throughout the fey city, while Bram's sister may remain erased.
20 to 30 minutes
Make the party publicly admit that names are labels other people can misuse, then use the spectacle to embarrass the city clerk into helping Bram's sister.
The party can expose that the city clerk authorized the prank, promise to challenge the memory tax, or force the fey to admit their rules before witnesses.
- Answer a question with a literal truth that makes the prank absurd.
- Offer to carry Bram's complaint to the city court.
- Catch Sáli changing the rules and make the crowd repeat the contradiction.
- Use a character's reputation, title, or sworn name as proof of identity.
- Threaten the ledger without damaging it. The fey fear losing the city's oldest records.
- Ask each fey to state the exact rule they are using.
- Turn the crowd against the prank by naming a likely victim.
- Offer a better public game with a clear end condition.
- Refuse to answer while loudly describing the fey's own embarrassing habits.
- Separate the ledger from its holder without destroying it.
- At 1 success, the fey stop changing signs and listen seriously.
- At 2 successes, Sáli offers one true name back in exchange for a funny but harmless confession.
- At 3 successes, Oruvaina arrives and confirms the memory tax dispute.
- At 1 failure, the crowd starts chanting the false names.
- At 2 failures, the fey add a new rule: one character must answer for the whole party.
- At 3 failures, the ledger closes and the false names become official.