In Chapter 8 of Spokelore, we find out that Annie has not gone MIA, but is simply and suddenly…so tired. Her bones and joints ache, her energy is gone, and she feels increasingly isolated in the house without Linnea. But lonely though she may be, she also has a sneaking suspicion that once again there may be another presence in the house, and this time it is a decidedly unfriendly one. Meanwhile, Nikki’s magical and romantic entanglements come to a climax (heyo). A stop at a handsome mechanic’s shop to treat Bartleby’s ongoing petulance results in a masculine standoff and a surprise romantic dinner with Neil. And as Nikki and Neil find themselves stranded together in a snowstorm, Annie receives a fresh burst of inspiration (despite her recent descent into Victorian waifdom) that impels her to finish her book. But when Nikki begins to read Annie’s manuscript, she finally realizes that something is indeed very, very wrong, and she must get to Annie before something terrible happens.

 

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

Chapter 7 of Spokelore reveals what we all knew to be true: there were totally skeletons behind that locked cave door. After Annie successfully performs the soul-binding ritual, Linnea's response to her newfound freedom is a little less grateful than anticipated. But incorporeal communication remains spotty as ever. Annie performs another seance via telegraph machine, in which she learns that she has inadvertently freed more than Linnea's spirit from the house... there is something dark and dangerous that has been let back into the world as well. Meanwhile Nikki’s food truck shenanigans continue apace, but with sadly only mild interference from Neil the wandering folklorist. Though she resolves to limit her culinary antics to small magicks, she finds herself yearning for the wild and unpredictable faerie feasts that set her heart alight.

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

In Chapter 6, Nikki and Annie find themselves fraught with magical imposter syndrome, prompting some choices that turn out to be, well, pretty ill-advised. Nikki's magic escalates to unfortunate heights when a mishap with goblin fruit induces a Christina Rosetti bacchanal of orgiastic proportions. As she is saved yet again from the gluttonous masses by her mercurial folklorist, Nikki is suitably chastened and shunned by Bartleby and Squonk. Meanwhile, Annie finally stumbles upon the key to her ghost's sea cave and finds within its dripping walls a swoon-worthy workshop of magical artifacts, as well as a journal with a possible solution to free Linnea from her dismal afterlife. But Annie also finds something else in the cave that she didn't expect--a door containing something that Linnea has kept hidden for over a century, and which every instinct tells her not to open...

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

Chapter 5: Annie finally performs a successful séance with the assistance of some circling context, Internal Family Systems applications and, perhaps more controversially, just a lil’ bit of low-key possession. The two begin to bond over a shared appreciation for Patrick Swayze’s hotness in Ghost and Annie is somewhat gratified to know that her knee pain is  equally unpleasant for the possessor as the possessee. As Annie ponders the utility of spectral validation for chronic pain sufferers, Nikki has a rather adverse reaction to these events; she’s not jealous of her friend’s new ghostly roommate, certainly not--nope, not at all. She’s just feeling a little lonely and bewildered by her own forestalled arrival. Meanwhile, Nikki arrives in Nashville, where she inadvertently brews up some of Odin’s mead of poetry, prompting hillbillies to start spouting Eddeic odes to barbeque sauce and other absurdities. And when ripped t-shirt guy makes yet another appearance, his warnings about the unforeseen consequences of culinary magic are not well received. After all, where's the harm in leaving a town full of dubious poets in your wake?

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

Chapter 3: Nikki continues to be driven around the country by her sentient food truck, newly dubbed “Bartleby” for his “I would prefer not to” energy. She encounters a mysteriously tragical creature out in the woods,  whose buckets of tears prove useful in cleaning up all remaining raccoon poop. Meanwhile, Annie learns that her haunted house was once owned by a sea captain who disappeared without a trace. Tiptoeing around malevolent clams and escalating haunting antics, Annie resolves to perform a circling seance so that she and her ghost can work on their communication.

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car
*Special guest appearance by Neil Dunton as Squonk

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

In Chapter 2 of Spokelore, Annie finds herself locked out of her new seaside Victorian manor, which has turned out to be rather more temperamental than she'd bargained for. Surely it's nothing that a little relational mediation can't fix? Meanwhile, Nikki flees her Jersey AirBnb for forests unknown, whereupon she gets lost, collects mushrooms that are most assuredly edible, and finds herself strangely drawn to a forsaken food truck sitting abandoned and alone. But all is not well with Annie, as her writing begins to take on a voice not her own…

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Support the show

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.

Chapter 1 of Spokelore begins with best friends Annie and Nikki at a crossroads between the mundane obligations of capitalism and the lure of unseen mystical forces. In a fit of breakup-induced mania, Annie has bought an abandoned Victorian house on a remote island in the Pacific Northwest, one that she's never seen but feels compelled to possess. Nikki is returning from a disappointing year spent researching mythical stories in Scotland, resigning herself to a humdrum existence in New Jersey--until a call from Annie changes everything. Tune in to find out how the story unfolds…

Credits
Annie: Annie Wylde
Nikki: Nikki Van De Car

Spokelore is written, edited, and produced by Annie Wylde and Nikki Van De Car
Credit song: Cryptid (Mothman) by Ratwyfe (Spotify / Bandcamp)

Further Spokelore misadventures can be found on Instagram and Patreon.