Chaos could take many forms. This time, it had rushed onto the scene in the form of a ramshackle, rambling skeleton, which burst through the council doors on trembling tibias, knee joints creaking, each hollow ring of bone echoing throughout the chamber. As the adage went, 'desperate times called for desperate skeletons.' 

This skeleton, so as not to be confused with other skeletons, wore a bowler hat, covered in a film of dust, that favored the right side of his skull. Accompanying said hat was a pair of linen trousers, rolled up to show perfectly bleached ankles, alongside a wrinkled shirt, sleeves hovering around the skeleton's elbow joints, the buttons undone so that the overhead lights caught and reflected in its clavicle. His ribs, as seen through the shirt, all present and accounted for.

He huffed, though, being able to see quite literally all of him, he didn't appear to have any lungs, as his knees buckled and he clattered onto the floor. His bowler hat slipped from its station and tumbled not long after the skeleton had fallen, stopping inches from Peneloper's shoes.

She took it, dusted it off, walked over to the skeleton – who seemed to be out of sorts as he gathered up a rogue femur and ratcheted it back in place – and offered him his cap.

The skeleton, being what he was, did not have flesh or muscle or blood. He did, however, have a most glorious moustache, which curled up at the tips and conveyed the warmth that all good smiles had. "Thank you, madam," the skeleton said, taking the hat with bony fingers and placing it atop his head. He turned to the Council, and his eye sockets narrowed. "Esteemed Council of Four--"

Was that their official title? Peneloper thought. Council of Four? Not Council of Magic? Or Keepers of Magic? The absurd Order of absurdity – and also Magic?

Somehow, her thoughts seemed to pull Crispen from whatever emotional state he'd stumbled into because he said, "That last one seems like something they'd consider. Don't—" He looked at her sternly, though, unmistakably at her, finally, "don't add that to the suggestion box outside when we leave. Or bring that up when they send you an email asking you to rate your experience here."

She shook her head and whispered, "They don't have my email."

"They'll make you one," he countered. "And then they'll spam your inbox relentlessly."

"How ruthless," she concluded, and this, these two throw away words, caused Crispen to smile.

Daring rose up inside her, grabbed its drumsticks and pounded away on the skins, alerting all of Peneloper's hibernating emotions that is was okay to be felt, and to resume functioning as normal. 'The Boy of Crows Smiles at Last,' read the headline across The Peneloper Auttsley Times.

He had forgiven her emotions for existing and though that was far from being the acceptance Peneloper craved, she'd accept it. At the very least, Mr. Heavensley and her could carry on while looking at each other. The normalcy restored between them, precarious and brittle as it was, caused Peneloper to flush as inside herself, her happiness gave a girlish, embarrassing squeal.

"Council of Four," the skeleton continued, after glancing at Peneloper and Crispen and giving him, what she perceived as the skeletal equivalent of stink eye, which involved a lot less eye and far greater imagination, "I come bearing dire news."

Kelpner Finn stood and motioned for the skeleton to approach. The skeleton's very moustache hairs shook, and after a dismal attempt at standing, which caused the skeleton's right tibia to shoot from his body and pierce Quinceton's cap through its center, pinning it to the wall behind him, where the cat in one of the motivational posters found itself sporting a new, dapper appearance.

The skeleton, obviously in too much disarray to make the rest of the trek to the Council desk, got permission to relay his information from where he huddled.

"I'm Barnabones Jones, bartender at the Dead Man's Song."

Kelpner nodded as if this was common knowledge. Peneloper turned to ask Crispen if this was common knowledge, but he shook his head. Her eyebrows raised. Something Crispen didn't know? Well, at least something had come out of this nightmare meeting.

Mr. Jones continued, his bowler, having now slipped off his head again, was gripped tightly in his fingers, "Mr. Darquish had been frequenting the establishment for a while now."

Rayburn, who'd been mostly tuned out of the conversation in order to follow a fly as it zipped along the room, tuned back in. His eyes narrowed. "For how long?"

Kelpner swatted the air, as if swatting away the line of questioning. "It doesn't matter," he said, motioning toward Barnabones. "Continue, Mr. Jones."

"Always had a few nooses—"

"And nooses are?" Peneloper asked.

The skeleton blinked, his eye sockets closing and opening with the scrape of bone on bone. He stammered, "Coc-cocktails, I believe you call 'em in Reason." Having attained the jist of what he was saying, she nodded, and let her myriad of other questions, cool, harden and drop back into the depths of her mind, "The boy always paid his tab. On time, too," he squeezed the brim of his hat, "A rarity in those parts given those who frequent the Refinery."

Kelpner nodded.

"I was tending when he walked in with a handsome fellow – all tan and long limbed. Bronzy and picturesque. One of those chaps that got the faeries all up in a titter. Never seen him before. Mr. Darquish always come alone."

Quinceton rubbed his chin, a pointed thing, that if sharpened might be considered a deadly weapon. "Mr. Jones," he said, looking down the bridge of his nose to gaze at the skeleton. "Forgive my interjection, but the Council's time is limited and we're in the middle of—" He turned toward Welda, "another possible world ending?"

Welda nodded and let her tongue roam free of its mouth corral, lapping up the air in aggressive circular motions.

Barnabones jaw shivered. The ends of his moustache drooped. "I promise what I have to say is worth wading through."

"Please continue," Peneloper father's said, eyes glued on the skeleton.

Barnabones nodded, took a breath, though for what reason Peneloper hadn't discerned. "They took up a corner booth, one of em least lit and capable of discretion."

"Where all bad guys went to do their shady dealings," Chant whispered in Peneloper's ear. She nodded but refused to comment. That poor skeleton had been interrupted enough already. She didn't want to be another reason for its bones to rattle.

"I served them. I very much liked the boy's companion. Kindly and very proper. Had an odd array of weapons on him. Some large knife, and a gun – " he grimaced, "I'd seen a few of those in my lively days. The boy paid me as usual." At this sentence, Barnabones riffled through his pants' pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. Sweat made his cheekbones glisten like alabaster marble. "'A secret for the ages,' he'd said." The skeleton's shaking turned to riotous rattling.

He thrust the paper at Peneloper. "Dear girl, would you mind giving this to them? 'Fraid I'm still a heap."

Peneloper nodded and took the slip of offered paper. Though lightweight, it felt heavy in her hands, the coarse texture pressing against her fingertips.

"Once I read that," he nodded at the paper as Peneloper walked it toward the Council, "I took off. Left before the—before the—" Barnabones looked down, his vertebrae clacking against one another, "before the perverting." He shuttered his eye sockets closed. "Mr. Pale's establishment a target of such foul magic." He tsked, though his vocal chords and tongue had long since rotted. Come to think on it, how exactly was he talking? "The worst it was," he finished.

Peneloper reached the Council table and slid the paper across to Kelpner. She felt relieved at no longer being in possession of the note, as though her holding it any longer might burn her skin, though nothing on it had been corrosive. Kelpner took it from her and flattened it out in front of himself.

Behind, Peneloper, she heard Barnabones whisper, "We only allow verified, vetted secrets at the Song. Them words, much as I might want them to be, more than anything else, false, are true."

A loopy, elegant cursive of black ink permeated the paper in purposeful strokes. Welda hissed. Quinceton's monocle fell from his eye. Kelpner exhaled, his breath tickling the corner of the paper and turning it so Peneloper could make out what it said.

I am the Fourth.

Her father slammed his fists onto the table and sent the piece of paper flying. Nothing, since its inception, had rocked the Council more.