This page used to be very different. The sequence was Phil’s, but I took a stab at it because Phil was taking a while, which kind of spurred Phil to do it right. :-)

In my initial version, Best’s reintroduction would have been one caption: “I wasn’t born to this life. I wasn’t trained. I was chosen.” As it is, this is the third and last of our (early) chapters that begins with a character writing the story out for us. Best will mention later that he’s composing a musical autobiography, and these musings feel like they’re half for the benefit of that work’s future audience and half heartfelt in the moment.

The first of these vignettes summarizes his print-only adventure. The other three are not shown anywhere else, and we never mention sirens or basilisks again. At one point in the series’ development, when we were thinking sixty chapters instead of fifty, we thought our heroes might have spent more time wandering after they became fugitives, on some kind of journey that probably would have included time at sea. Under those circumstances, we might’ve brought sirens back.