113. Call of Duty

Broken Flight has been broken, but not defeated.

***"Sometimes there's only one goal in mind: make another player act the way you want them to."***

Outside Sybil's Tenderness, a standoff: with some of Broken Flight's leadership destroyed, the remaining members are facing off against Braum, Patches, and Sophia. The sidhe, standing on the roof of the freehold, is radiating pure Glamour after having Unleashed, and is terrifying beauty incarnate. When the members of Broken Flight try to leave to regroup, she snaps at them, wondering why they would walk away now when an end to conflict is at their fingertips. Patches calls out the group's leaders as would-be assassins, and a robed figure in the crowd claps back: "We thought you were different, but you're nothing but the monarchy's dog!" "At least we don't Rhapsodize," Patches growls back, recognizing the figure as their old friend Alnek, who rushes her with daggers drawn! Patches pulls her chimerical zipgun and fires into his abdomen, taking him down: although not dead, he is pretty injured. The motley senses that the crowd seems to be unsure how to proceed, and Braum takes the opportunity to try to inspire them. "If Broken Flight is an organization dedicated to preventing the Long Winter, I want to join!" he shouts. At this moment, Kyoko, back in the guise of High Queen Lenore, emerges from Sybil's Tenderness and has Braum announce that Broken Flight will surrender themselves. By proceeding to the Chateau Frontenac, Faerilyth will take them into custody but treat them well: the radicals, inspired and cowed, lay down their weapons and proceed to surrender themselves. "This is a place of blood," the false Queen tells them, "but we can share words when no one is ready to spill it."

The crisis averted, Sybil is able to direct her wrath towards Braum, slapping him across the face for allowing harm to come to her freehold, before taking Patches aside to suggest some "upgrades" that the nocker could design for her. The motley prepare to return to The Spark, but Braum is worried about Kyoko's state of mind: she berates him for undermining her disguise with his language, telling him that "they're always watching". Once back at the Spark, the troll and the pooka go back to her room to rest, and simply be together. When Braum announces that he has good news, Kyoko tells him to save it for when she can appreciate it.

Meanwhile, Patches and Sophia have some darker business to attend to in the dungeon. They head down and find Incisor, having started trying to get information out of Boli, but finding him to be a "tough nut to crack". When the two ask Halleah to whom she is oathbound, the troll still cannot reply, but when they ask point-blank if it's Boli, the troll has only silence for them. Returning to the blind boggan, they ask him to relent, to let those under his influence be free of their oaths, but Boli has only contempt for them: as far as he's concerned, the fight is not yet over. Sophia tells him that they don't *want* to hurt him, and inflict upon him the suffering he inflicted upon others, but when he refuses, Patches follows through on the threat, playing on his deepest fear (as discovered by Kyoko). Pretending to fire her gun next to his head, she uses Lost in the Mists to make him believe that he has lost his hearing as well as his sight, which causes him to start whimpering. Sophia is upset about the torture they're putting him through, but Patches is adamant that it's the right thing to do in order to "break" him.

Out in the garden, Sophia and Sir Xaeron confront each other over her use of Sovereign. She had promised that he would be her first target when using new Sovereign cantrips, but she broke the rule "out of necessity" in the Dreaming, in order to capture Boli. He's disappointed, of course, but applauds her for making the "right" decision to disobey him. She leaves, and Xaeron commiserates with Braum for a time: the sidhe works every day, he tells his friend, to earn the love and honour of those around him. He wonders aloud whether it makes him "weak" to have known in advance that he would forgive Sophia for the use of Sovereign.

Sophia receives a surprise visitor: Jack from the Crystal Circle! They need her help with deciphering a musical puzzle of sorts… in Hawaii! Sophia is taken aback, and is quick to point out that she can't really leave Montreal at the moment, until Jack counters with video of her in Quebec City in all her Glamorous glory. Her Autumn Sidhe nature attracted mortals to her, it would seem, and a number of them took video of her "performance" on the roof of Sybil's Tenderness. Knowing how dangerous it would be to be exposed to media attention with some members of Broken Flight still on the loose, Sophia agrees to disappear with Jack and the Crystal Circle for a while. Patches calls Duke Granville, who sets up a dinner date for her, and Braum encourages Sophia to see Xaeron before she leaves. Heading out into the garden one last time, they admit that they will miss each other: "A Queen can threaten a knight, and a knight a queen… but they can dance forever."