Gavin is summoned to a meeting in Seattle, and upon arrival is escorted to Alex Abel's house by a cold-eyed man. It's clear that this man could and would kill him if it became necessary. Abel remarks on Gavin's reputation, but says that there are signs that he has changed recently. A female assistant does a reading from the money in Gavin's wallet, and pronounces him changed, "a bargain." Abel welcomes Gavin into the Inquisition, but warns him that he will be watched.
The next day people begin to arrive at the Portland AIDS Hospice. The Strausses are the first to arrive, a little confused by the name of the place. AIDS? Is it a cover for the place, or are they supposed to pretend... Dan the proprietor greets them and shows them their room upstairs. They note that Dan seems to have somewhat of a strained relationship with Dave (and won't be the last to note this over the course of the day).
Gavin arrives next, followed by Esteban and his sister Tina who is the most shocked of anyone about the AIDS bit. Esteban assures her that it's just a cover. Dan then gives everyone a tour, including the lab in the attic for Alexandra and the firing range, workout room, and infirmary downstairs. Horace the security guard is introduced, as is Sra. Bathazar who handles the housework. Her husband and also Dr. Staadler are out today.
The rest of the day is spent settling in, with the Strausses setting up the lab and Esteban and Gavin exploring the house. Dan also takes the time to give everyone a box of goodies, explain the operation of a hush-puppy pistol, and generally expound upon their role here as D clearance members of TNI. Esteban also checks out the car and apartment that have been provided for his special needs.
The next day starts with a FedEx delivery of a videotape and some instructions. The tape is off the Portland Evening News, and has a strange anomaly in a report from the scene of an accident: a weird sigil floats in the air for a few seconds. The team heads to the scene and discover that the sigil was probably floating in front of either an antique store, a used book store, or a health food store.
The Strausses check out the antique store and discover some interesting antiques but little of relevance. Gavin and Esteban try the used bookstore, and Gavin proves himself to be not much of an interrogator. Esteban also has a close encounter with a strangely intense man carrying a package. Once Gavin has headed over to the natural food store for an encounter which while informational isn't actually useful (among other things resulting in the purchase of a dime bag), Esteban wanders around the bookstore and finds milk dripping from something... a poster tube. The milk vanishes again, leading Esteban to open the tube which has a motivational poster of a prairie dog and some papers. For five dollars he purchases them - they're from a playwright named Helmann Turner who died recently. The intense man just purchased most of the stuff, but missed the poster. The man's name was Montiago.
The team returns to the hospice to check out the papers. They prove to be a few xeroxed pages of a play and some scribblings. Dan also comes to help and is able to talk some about Helmann Turner - he was a bit of a one hit wonder with his play "Unnatural Acts" four years ago, and died/vanished a month or so ago.
After much inspection and a phone call to "Dragon Palace Chinese Food" the notes seem to indicate a couple of things. First, that Turner was pretty odd. Second, that the invisibility spell in the play fragment might actually work. Third, that he had a copy of the whole play in bound version. Finally, Gavin suspects that the sigil, which might be called the yellow sign is associated with an Avatar of some kind. Alexandra tries the spell and in fact turns invisible, startling Gavin. It takes perhaps twenty minutes for her to become visible again, worrying her husband greatly. Dr. Staadler (Renee, as it turns out) examines her and finds no ill effects.
In the afternoon, the Strausses go to a library and turn up that there was a French play (regarded as apocryphal) named "The King in Yellow" and also some more information on Turner's career.
Esteban and Gavin go cruising looking for Montiago and get lucky, finding a guy who knows a guy who Montiago has purchases heroin from in the past. Later that night, Esteban is able to find out from the dealer more or less where Montiago lives. Apparently no one much likes him and they're willing to sell him out to someone who looks right.
The team descends on Montiago's apartment and after an attempt to talk to him over the intercom to get him to sell the book, they decide to break in. Thielo is able to pick the locks easily. They enter into the apartment, Gavin in the lead, and some cutlery flies at them without much effect. As they come through the apartment they hear a door open and close a couple of times. In the bedroom, it seems to have been the closet door, but a close examination finds nothing in the closet, and in fact no invisible man lurking anywhere. Where has he gone? The apartment is pretty bare, but they do loot his bookshelf, turning up some pretty forgettable books on the occult and a copy of "Invisible Puppeteers", a small print-run book on the Invisible Clergy that Gavin recognizes as pretty expensive.