The Third Way

The clerk looks little more than a jumble of bones in tattered rags. The remnants of thick bushy eyebrows and a wispy comb-over stuck in ragged clumps to what remained of the skin on his thin head. Sullen eyes look up from the weighty ledger on the desk and meet you, unblinking.

“Name?” Ink-stained and grave-soiled fingers hold a quill poised in readiness “…Papers?”

“Indeed, I should have assumed as much” The clerk gives you a wry smile and hands your papers back. Turning the thin parchment to the correct page a grubby finger points to the last line of the page.

“Your name, or mark, yes, goes at the bottom, just there…”

Spidery handwriting fills every inch of the tome, much of it illegible. You make your mark. The clerk looks at you and smiles, coldly.

“Third door on the left. No smoking, magic or ball games.”

With that, a door opens behind the small counter, and you are ushered forward. The queue reforms behind you, and another takes your place before the clerk. “Name? Papers?”. And the doors shut heavily behind you.

The corridor is musty and damp, the paper peels from mildewed walls. You count the number of doors as you walk down the passage. One, two, three on the right. One, two on the left. Retracing your steps several times along the threadbare carpet yet still you fail to find the elusive third door on the left.

“Ahem” a voice clears softly behind you as you trudge the dim corridor again. “I believe the third-door-on-the-left is this way”. Turning swiftly you see a young blood elf. Her armour glints and reflects the guttering oil lamps. She smiles broadly.

“Oh, yes. You’ll do. The third-door-on-the-left is just here…” The elf steps aside lithely and a mailed Orc fist coalesces in mid air, grabs your shirt and pulls you through an unseen portal.

When we come to a junction in a road. When we come to gates barred and doors locked. When we reach our time to stand or fall. When we are given a choice; one way or another.

We choose The Third Way.

We walk the path beyond the third door. We hunt the places inbetween.

We are The Third Way.


Down and down the staircase spirals. The Orc infront moving quickly, the elf behind smiling as she follows. Past doors to either side. Two locked, one open. Two locked, one open. Down and down. Two locked, one open.

You see figures as you pass, shadows and sounds. Rooms full as libraries, books from floor to ceiling. Rooms in which eldritch lights dance and play across the walls. Rooms where the clamour and clang of battle ring loud and clear.

And down you go. Down and down. Two locked, one open.

“Ahem” The elf again, “here you are… inside.” She gestures towards the door.

The third door on the left. Two locked, one open.

Nothing is past. The present is a lie. Our futures are unwritten.

We are The Third Way.

Your memories, just stories and songs. Deeds of another time and place. Things that might have been. Things that never were.


A room, three walls. Each wall, three doors. Two locked, one open.

Three figures cowled and hooded. They speak in unison.

“Let us tell you why you're here. That which you’ve felt your whole life. That which you have always known, but never understood. That which you have always felt, but feared. The cloud inside your mind. The doubt at every crossroads. The cracks in your reality. You know of what we speak?”

You answer. The figures nod, silently, then continue.

“The Third Way. The Way beyond. Everything and nothing. A way to understand the truth.”

You look from figure to figure, unsure.

“You are nought but a slave. A prisoner of that which you do not perceive, but which surrounds you. Caught in the trap within your mind. Whatever you believe imprisons you.”

“We hold the key to your shackles. We are the open door. We are The Third Way.”

The figures flicker before your eyes, the forms become less corporeal.

“The choice is yours. The door is open. The Way is clear.”

“You are The Third Way”

You awaken. And the World has changed.