Much as Doctor Strange would have liked a quick magical solution to a magical problem — and it’s very evident that the Orlesians very much wanted the same, a sorcerer snapping his fingers being much faster and more convenient than this physical solution — but the servants go scurrying dutifully off to gather rope and bedsheets. One nobleman, lurking by the doorway but not caught up in the gravity inversion, seems content to skulk away from getting involved, before Strange adds, sharp, “Best make yourself helpful, no?”

For his part, Strange slides a chair over and steps onto it, then hopping up onto a sturdy white-cloth dining table. (Inevitably getting the tablecloth dirty, but whatever. There’s bigger problems at hand.)

“We’ve seen anomalies like this before,” he explains, to the majordomo or just anyone who’s willing to listen. There are spires of stone jutting into the ballroom, and it looks so very similar to the Crossroads. “It seems the Veil has thinned here; it looks like this might be an incursion from the Fade. Gravity’s always a bit wonky in the Fade. You could go walking along a ridge and suddenly find yourself in the sky, looking down on where you were. This is similar.”

Best not to explain why Riftwatch has such casual experience with the Fade, that’s confidential— but it does the task of making him sound blasé and experienced, comfortable with the outré and unusual, unfazed by the glitch in reality. This is what they called Riftwatch for.