An Overview of the Contracts with Professor Hand’s Museum of Wonders and Wishes

Over the course of the previous Baronial Feast, a Carnival known as Professor Hand’s Museum of Wonders and Wishes came to Travance. The Museum gave offers of employment to any that desired to join, promising that a person’s wishes would be granted upon joining. Those who wished to join signed contracts with the Museum.

After the Finale, an individual claiming to work for The Jester attacked the town searching for Professor Hand. This individual said that The Jester desired a Djinn working for Professor Hand as part of the Circus. It was uncovered at this time that the wishes promised in the contracts of employment were granted by this Djinn.

Through hours of the study and work within the Dragon’s Claw Inn of a group consisting of Starling, Seneschal Lois Maxwell, Sindarion Sinclair, Nemuth, Squire Cara Freeman, Sir Caelvan Renaith, and myself, we were able to both ascertain certain information regarding the contracts, and to accomplish certain goals, specifically:

Information:

1. We were able uncover that the contracts themselves, while not supernatural in nature, were empowered by the original contract signed between the Djinn and Professor Hand (hereafter referred to as the “original contract”). As such, the contracts themselves did not radiate or possess any latent supernatural capabilities.
2. A contract exchanged an individual’s eternal body and soul, as well as performance/services, for their wish and monetary compensation.
3. A contract was instantly enacted upon the signing of it, but the wishes would not be fulfilled by the Djinn until services for the Museum were started.
4. A contract could be nullified through two means: written agreement between both parties, and the destruction of the physical document, but through the power of the original contract, doing so would instantly kill the signer.
5. A contract could be enacted by anyone representing the Museum, not just Professor Hand.

What Was Accomplished:

The nullification of all contracts signed with The Museum within the borders of Travance.

In order to nullify all contracts signed by Travancians, thus freeing their Eternal Bodies and Souls from Professor Hand, the following path was taken:

1. I declared myself a member of The Museum, and signed a contract with no witness declaring myself a Promoter, and immediately performed said services for The Museum. While this contract did not go into effect, and thus not grant me any wishes, it did, under the supernatural means of the Djinn’s original contract, empower me to act as a witness on the behalf of the Museum.
2. Squire Freeman signed a contract, also declaring herself a Promoter, which I signed as a Witness, and immediately performed said services for The Museum. Her Wish, which was fulfilled upon completion of services, was the nullification of all contracts signed with The Museum within Travance. The wording attempted to also nullify her contract, but as that would prevent the remainder of the wish from being fulfilled, this portion was not granted.
3. Because her wish removed me from being a member of The Museum, and therefore her contract could not be nullified in writing, Squire Freeman destroyed her own contract, thus nullifying it and sacrificing her own life in the process. Because her wish was not granted in full, the magic of the Djinn’s contract did not force her spirit to need to be returned through the Phokus, and Sir Maxwell and Seneschal Maxwell reanimated her.

While we were fairly certain this plan would work, a number of individuals involved in the process were willing to put their life on the line in the attempt to free the souls of those entrapped for the betterment of Baronial subjects.

I would also like to commend a number of individuals who approached us to help try and find additional loopholes in the contracts, most notably Brigitta Drexel and Nemuth.

To prevent questions regarding this, a couple of clarifications:

There are two reasons why the group elected to specify contracts signed within Travance. First, there was a “seniority clause” which stated that the wishes of those with longer work history with The Museum could take precedence. Since those who signed within Travance had not yet rendered services to The Museum, the method we used made the nullification wish take precedence over any of theirs. Second, as we did not know the language of the Djinn’s original contract with Professor Hand, we did not want to attempt to alter it in any way, as it likely contained language preventing exactly that occurrence. As such, our priority needed to be to the subjects of Travance.