Banality, the loss of their faerie magic

The Winter Ball is in full flow as the dancers swirl around the courtyard of the manor, resplendent with banners and uniforms. A flirtatious glance, a dropped kerchief and a snarled oath and, of a sudden, two face each other over drawn swords in the Danse Macabre.

With a satisfied grunt, the boggan smith dowsed the blade in a hiss of steam and smiled. This would serve its purpose well, now it was a matter of ensuring that the Guild did not find out what he was doing in his spare time.

The Thorns of Splendour creaked at its moorings on the Royal docks, it's sails flapping in the fitful wind. The King's flagship was a-bustle with activity but all stopped and looked skywards as the long shadow of the dragon darkened the dock causing a shudder amongst those watching.

Bedlam, the loss of their mortal reason.

In an almost deserted tavern, a thin and pallid figure passes over a slip of paper to the masked sidhe sitting opposite. With a satisfied smile, and a gleam of red from behind the mask, the sidhe slides back his chair and departs. It is an hour before the body of the sluagh is noticed.

You lead a double life, alternating between reality and fantasy. Caught in the middle ground between dream and wakefulness, you are neither wholly fae nor wholly mortal, but burdened with the cares of both. Finding a happy medium between the wild, insane world of the fae and the deadening, banal world of humanity is essential if you are to remain whole.

You stand alone in the mundane World.

Although your faerie self is ageless and eternal, your mortal body and mind grow older and less resilient as you move through life. Sooner or later, nearly all changelings succumb to one of two equally terrifying conditions; Banality, the loss of their faerie magic; or Bedlam, the loss of their mortal reason.

"But is this fate inevitable? Can you retain your childlike wonder while fighting against the frigid Banality that seeks to numb your mind and steal your past? Can you ride the currents of the Dreaming without being swept away in the maelstrom of Bedlam?

Appreciate what you are.

"You stand alone in the mundane world. No mortal will ever understand the depth of your alienation, strangeness, and uniqueness. Only those with faerie blood will see, understand, and appreciate what you are.

"An exile among exiles. Lost among the lost. The stranger in every crowd.

"Hail, fellow traveller- welcome to the Dreaming."

-Introduction, Changeling: The Dreaming