Into The Nest

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

Brack fell to the ground, blood gushing from his neck, and I ran up to Spare him from Dying. Remy starts shooting at something above my head and I duck to cover Brack’s body. Next thing I know, I’m getting stabbed, too, and there are crossbow bolts coming out of windows around us. Klyce runs up beside me and chokes out a guy that I didn’t even see, and Remy keeps shooting. Glancing up, I see a ghostly shadow leaving the body in front of me, and I scramble back, but it flees. I join the fray, Catapulting some rocks up at the men in the windows, but every time one falls, a grey shadow flees the scene. Nat manages to get a Mindspike on one before it gets too far, just as the battle ends.

Gerhardt patches me up, and then wakes Brack up. He has had enough of our dangerous life, and heads back to his shadowy one. Nat quickly searches the dead, they still look slippery, like all those years ago in the Bronx sewers. They have no identifying features, no prints, no blemishes, nothing, except a brand at the base of their neck from the Mageocracy. Assassins! What? Why? I, self-consciously, check the back of my neck, but there’s no sudden appearance of a brand there, thank the Dawnmother.

We chase after the spiked shadow demon, all the way down to Little Italy. It is about 150 feet below us, so we head back into the familiar sewers of New Gnosis. This is nowhere near the location of the Nest, but we have to check it out. When we finally get close, it appears to be a Magia hideout. No! Nonono! We do not have time for That entanglement. So, we head back up and out. Once outside, Nat does sit down to take a look inside, but only finds an old dusty room.

We head off to find a map and do some triangulation of all the abduction sites. They find a spot in Brooklyn, near some dockside warehouses, and about 200 feet downward. Okay, I can do this. I know where we’re going, I have some demon bones and the cultist’s necklace. I gather everyone around me, and close my eyes. Transportation magic hurts a heck of a lot more than I thought it would. Getting shot didn’t even hurt that much. I hold on tight to the lightning, and we make it through to the ritual room Nat has described to us several times.

There are footsteps in the hall outside, and the girls hide behind the altar, while the boys stand to meet whoever comes. Two robed figures carrying torches enter. Someone says, We just want to talk, but they start shouting instead. We’ve been found! To Arms! Bullets and spells begin flying, as they summon two bone devils to help. I manage to get a Storm Sphere off, thanks to some countering of a countr by Remy. The room fills with spells, bullets, claws, and lightning.

One of the men disappears, and Remy starts shooting down the hall. Dalish flies after the invisible man, but he gets attacked by a charging man in armor. Once the devils are down, we all move toward the hallway, and eventually take down the fake knight after Gerhardt dispells all his charms. Dalish captures his soul, while Maribeth defaces the symbols around the altar. A wall of fire erupts at the end of the hall, and Remy starts swatting at invisible things all around him.

We all retreat back to the room, while Dalish uses the captured soul to look ahead. There are six mages waiting for us in a room at the far end of the hall. Remy is trapped in a mental prison, and we have to wait a minute for him to be free. The mages do not advance during that minute, so we settle in for a ten minute Prayer of Healing to get people pumped back up a little bit. Dalish is watching them, so they send an Arcane Eye down to watch us, too. Nat puts up a Telepathic Bond so we can communicate more easily, and we make a plan. We’re going to go up to the turn in the hall. Gerhardt is going to cast his Sphere, and we’re going to use it as cover to attack the mages. Klyce will head in and take them on physically, while the rest of us stay back and lob spells.

When we’re all ready, Klyce, still in crocodile form, did I forget to mention that? He’s found a new favorite. Anyway, Klyce, carries Gerhardt and Nat down the hall, with the rest of us following behind. Dalish stays a ways back from the group because he’s keepig an eye on the room still. Before we can get there, they pop out and cast two fireballs on the whole group of us. I fall immediately.

I wake up in a different hallway, in Dalish’s arms. Unconscious girls can’t be choosers, I guess. The group is investigating a set of double doors at the far end of this hall. These doors lead into a mess hall. Remy and Nat head in to check the doors at the far end of this room, and find a kitchen, cold room, and bathroom. Doors on the right side of this room lead to an empty barracks, where we find a couple more phials of mana, as well as some magical items, which we promptly steal: A dagger, a sling, a ring, and a shield. Nat claims the dagger, I claim the sling, Klyce grabs the shield, and we put the ring away until we can identify it.

Heading through the doors on the left side of the mess hall, we find a training room, complete with straw dummies. As Nat and Dalish search around this room, four devils teleport in. Two covered in chains, and two armored females that remind me a little too much of the succcubi. The fight begins, and I pull up my Storm Sphere. One of the ladies doesn’t like this, and immediately puts me down. This time I wake up in the freezer with everyone sitting around identifying the magic items. Except mine. That’s okay though, it’s just a sling.

When we’re ready, we head back through the training room quickly, and Remy can see some extra layers of protect ahead. We pass through them, as though through a veil, and are confronted by ten more mages in the prison wing. Porter is there, and he calls out to Maribeth, as though she was her Grandfather, saying he won’t let him win. We shout back that she’s not Grandfather, we’re here because he’s been kidnapping and murdering people, including our family members. He says that’s Grandfather’s doing, and he can explain everything, but not down here. He’s trying to stop Grandfather summoning the horrible, huge, evil thing.

Then a sword appears through his chest, and Grandfather is standing right behind him, looking like Maribeth. He thanks us for finding this place for him, he was having all sorts of trouble with that. Then a bunch of demons teleport in among us all!

Meetings and Mistakes

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

We head to Brooklyn, to meet the publisher of the penny dreadfuls that alerted us to the kidnappings of homeless throughout the city. There is a sign above a door in a narrow alley that simply reads: The Eager Eye. Remy offers to let me take lead on this one, so I knock. Repeatedly. And there is no answer. We head inside anyway, to find a dusty reception room with dead plants. A couple people say they can hear soft noises from deeper in, so we head down the hall to the next room.

The printing room is dark with tiny windows. The machine nearly fills the space with whirring and printing and paper, but even I can hear the muffled sounds of distress. So, we press in further and find a man buried under a fallen stack of papers. We dig him out and he introduces himself eagerly, thinking we are fans. Archibald Warren is a middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair and bright blue eyes.

I tell him we’re here because of his stories. They caught our interest, and we just had to come speak with him. He immediately grabs one up and signs it for me, very excited to meet us. Dalish pipes up helpfully, asking if we could perhaps get a preview of the next issue. He says that a ginger goes missing in Xingtown, but doesn’t give a lot of details. Obsessed with creating a narrative and using literary devices to get at the truth. Not to mention protecting his source. I try to press for more information, but he then takes off on a new story about a man raised on a deserted island.

I’m at a loss, he is not interested in spoiling the story. Remy then steps up to bat, asking how he writes the stories, physically. Archie says he uses a typewriter, and Remy begs to see his name typed by him. He makes us swear to keep his secrets, and we do. He takes off and we follow him back through the machinery, and Remy whispers that he has a magic item in his pocket as we follow.

Up a rickety old ladder to a tiny attic apartment that can barely fit us all. Marybeth asks him about the stories he wrote a few years ago, and he fondly remembers the Magia stories. Some heat come down on him, though, and he had to stop, but Truth has a voice of its own. Remy asks about his inspiration, and Archie says he is inspired on the streets, and with a passion for the pursuit of truth. He offers to use Remy’s name in his next story, and make him a hunter who comes to the island. Then he sits down and starts typing it up.

Remy starts motioning towards the pocket, so I message Nat to try and get the item so he can look at it with his magic eye. Only I don’t say that, I just ask her to get it. Nat then plays at her blindness, stumbling a bit, and pulls the object out, passing it off to me. I slip it into my pocket until I can figure out how to get it to Remy. Then someone, might have been Nat, I was too distracted at this point, asks again if he can give us more information about the abductions. So we can stop them happening.

This sets something off in his head. He realizes then, that we are detectives, and not fans. He is upset by this revelation, even as Remy tries to assure him that some of us, especially Dalish, have enjoyed his work very much. That his work has indeed saved lives by our reading them. Marybeth throws in about how his search for Truth has helped guide us. He insists again, that he cannot tell us more without revealing his sources. Remy mentions that his parents are among those who were taken, and we want to rescue them.

This pulls Archie out of the abstract, and he apologizes. He gets his information from the homeless on the streets and in kitches or shelters. Marybeth pushes for more, and he mentions that he has a tool that helps him find the truth. The object in my pocket, I realize, and try to pull them out, as though I found them dropped on the floor. Only, I trip, and fumble the glasses and they fall. Shattering on the floor.

I stare, stomach in my toes, heart clenched tight. The others are talking in an uproar. All I can hear is my father yelling at me for being clumsy. Archie is sobbing. I blink and stand up, mumbling apologies that don’t matter. I can’t stop staring at the floor. Archie is explaining that they let him see inside things, into people’s minds, and into the past. Dalish must have identified them because Klyce is asking about someone named Percival, and Archie says it was an old friend of his who willed him the glasses when he died. Dalish offers to figure out how to repair them after we stop the attacks and save New Gnosis.

Then we’re outside and Klyce is yelling. He’s right. Marybeth is chiding him for yelling. I can’t look at either of them. Klyce is right, it was all my fault. I ruined another life with my carelessness. Eventually everyone stops yelling and we head to the church of the One God.

I just follow Marybeth around as we search for the dark magic. When we head inside, the construction works are not happy to see us. Klyce stands toe to toe with them, by they do not want us messing with the stones to get below. We eventually decide on Arcane Eye from Nat, but that only gets us to what used to be the locker room, the door down is too solid and tight. So, we head off little ways and discuss next options.

I can Dimension Door myself and one other down, but then we’d be split up. Splitting up is bad. Nat offers to just look into the room instead with clairvoyance. Giving this a try gets strange results. She isn’t looking into the refinery, she’s looking into what looks like the Arch Deacon’s apartment. He notices her looking and waves away her spell. I wonder aloud if he’s the Red Knight, but get shot down. Apparently lots of people who aren’t official mages can do that.

It’s getting late, so we head home for our meeting with Rictus. Not knowing what else to do with myself, I make everyone dinner. I spent a lot of time with the cook, much to my mother’s chagrin, so it is at least a passable meal. I set a plate for Rictus, but he doesn’t show up for another couple hours after we’re all done. Out of Dalish’s shadow, because no one uses the door, apparently.

Dalish explains what we know and about Porter manipulating Wiest. Rictus asks for proof of such a big accusation, so Nat hands over the orb from the office. After he inspects it, he asks if there are more, and people just go ahead and tell him about the three from the mansion. He asks for one of those, as well, and Nat obliges. He agrees to cut off Porter’s supplies, but I wonder if it’s much too later for that. Remy draws the line between that to the cult activity and the demons.

Then brings up the conversation Wiest had with the Black Knight, and his sword. Rictus insists the royal knights are all dead. Remy explains more about their familiarity and how the Red Knight nullified his spell and how the Black Knight moved without being seen. Rictus asks if they are connected to the cult, and Remy spins a few threads together. Nat urges Rictus to have a care for himself if the knights are hunting those who were there at the death of the King, and warns of resentment fermenting in the populace, and the new deacon’s power to nullify magic, too. Rictus, however, is not worried about the common folk, only about a possible mage being behind it. Dalish asks for his advice, and he suggests simple triangulation from different abduction sites. He then leaves as abruptly as he arrived.

Nat wants to have some Tea dreams, so I make sure we’re all rooming together and the door is locked. Dalish gets us up early to go to the Hall of Records, but Nat refuses to rouse. Until an hour later, when she wakes in a panic.

It’s happening! Tonight!

She says Gerald and Marybeth will be the final sacrifices, she still can’t see where, but there were loads of demons there. I send to Brack to ask if there have been more abductions and ask for his necklace. He says there were two more last night and we should meet him in the same place. Remy tells us that he was able to send to his father, who wasn’t killed when he was taken. Wait? you could get through? Maybe we could scry? It would only be a dark room. We have to go!

We head up to the empty lot in the Bronx, and Brack leads us back down to the east side of Manhattan above Xingtown. There’s a small homeless camp in a back ally, and the shelters are torn up. He says he wasn’t here, but witnesses said the same thing. People came out of a wall, grabbed two specific people and then went back through. Dalish and Remy focus on finding the direction, while I ask Brack if I can borrow his necklace. He agrees. Nat asks about any anti-mage sentiment in the streets, but Brack says it’s just kids painting up walls. She asks about the church, and he says they seem pretty decent folk. They have a good soup kitchen and are getting a lot of new members.

After Dalish finds the direction the shadow teleport went, we ask if Brack knows of any other recent sites. He takes us all the way over to Queens for the next one. This one is in a park, near a retaining wall they used to teleport through. I pull a direction off this one to the south west. Now we just need a map to figure out where we’re going. He offers to keep helping us even as we offer to help him after this is all over.

Then a thin, red line appears across his through and he falls to the ground! NO!!!

New Friends?

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

In the morning, we gather for breakfast and planning. A quiet moment being a rarity. I wonder if they know we’ll come for them now, instead of throwing themselves at us. Klyce wants to trap one, if they do come after us again. It seems like not all of them can just teleport away. They ran from Philip instead of just disappearing. So maybe, we could snag one, and make it talk. We still have those iron bands from Italy, and Gerhard has his domes. This seems like a solid plan for now, but what do we do in the meantime.

We need to go visit the bar we told the homeless painters to report to. We need to go to the Petals to check some things at the Wiest’s office. And we figured on going to Brooklyn to see where the writer was getting his stories about the abductions. It’s going to be a lot of walking today. Philomena agrees to stay behind to help Orrin and Philip guard everyone.

We start by heading down south to the Xingtown bar. A man is waiting outside for us. He says Old Brack wants to talk to us, and takes us all the way back north to the Bronx. To an empty lot. Remy pays the man, which seems odd to me, when there’s no one here. But then a man appears out of the shadows saying that we’re drawing the symbol wrong.

Remy confirms this is Brack, and introduces himself, explaining why we were drawing the Dawnmother symbols around town. He says it’s the wrong symbol, and shows us a necklace with the inverted symbol on it. He got it two days before when another homeless couple were taken from right in front of him. Old Brack, it seems, has been on the streets a long time, and helps the newly homeless get settled and find places to sleep or find food. Two nights ago, he was doing just that, and a group jumped out of the shadows, abducted this couple and then disappeared again, through a wall. In the scuffle, they ignored Brack, and one dropped his necklace. Dalish is also a bit suspicious of Brack, and to be honest so am I, but in the moment, he’s telling us what we need to know, so I don’t care. We can come back and kill him later if we have to.


Remy tells him we’re trying to stop those people, and he leads us around a corner to show us where it happened. Remy asks who the couple were, and Brack unknowingly tells him they were his parents, the Renaud’s. The boys take a look with their magical eyes. There is definitely magical residue in this alley. Dalish says it’s some form of powerful conjuration. Shadow teleporting or something, like Rictus did the other night. I head up to the wall, and leaning my hands against it, concentrating on my desire to find my brother, I get a small sense of direction. They used this to go somewhere to the Southeast, mostly South. Maybe Brooklyn? Remy and Dalish get the same thing when they put their heads together, too.
Nat looks around and says it looks like there were eight people who came here through that wall. Eight people to abduct Remy’s parents. We have to figure out where they went. We have to save our families. Maybe they didn’t go very far? We start searching for that same signature of magic in the nearby streets, heading south and east. We get out to twice my current teleport spell’s range before we give it up. They could be anywhere if they aren’t close by. It’s time to move on to other things.

We head down to the Petals, starting with the Records Office. Dalish hands over the note from General Burns and we are taken into the hall. Most of Porter’s file is redacted, and his most recent orders is an empty folder. She gives us the list of his squad, and their current orders are also missing. They’re all slightly older than Porter, and include at least one member of the Magia families. We ask if someone has accessed these files, and perhaps taken their orders, and she takes us back to look at the logs. Five months ago, someone did look at their files, but she cannot tell us who. We’re going to have to find one of these mages, maybe one of them didn’t go along with Porter’s plan.

Heading up to Wiest’s office, we find it locked up tight. Klyce decides making a new doorway is probably safer than trying to unlock it, and opens the wall. Marybeth decides to maintain an illusion while we’re inside so no one notices a big hole in the wall. The office is nicely furnished, but fairly empty. Dalish does find a crystal ball in the wall, however. He doesn’t seem to use this office much at all, except when other people ask to see him. Fortunately, this one goes back six months, instead of just one. Two and a half months ago, Pyrus met with him to discuss the war and the mana deposits out west. Three months ago, Porter and two of his squad came for a visit.

Porter charmed Wiest at the beginning of the meeting. And I do mean Charmed, as in the spell, as in Illegal magic. On A Prime! He then assigns them to Black Ops inside New Gnosis. We have to back up the recording and reposition to see what orders he writes for them. He transfers them to be under his authority only, and out of the normal military chain of command. He also wrote them open orders for all the mana and supplies they want. There is no scope or end date to any of these orders. After they leave, he seems confused by what has happened, but they already have all the paperwork they need.

We decide that we have to get those orders rescinded. Surely, with Wiest dead, Rictus or someone can countermand the order? Maybe even tell us if they show up looking for supplies? This seems like a good first step in stopping at least one of our problems.

Nat skims through the rest of the orb. Five months ago, Rictus met with Wiest. Wiest was asking pointed questions about us and our service. Rictus tells him flat out that we belong to him and are under his control. Wiest then says that situations can change and that some mages want us used differently. Rictus insists that as long as he is Prime, nothing will happen to us. Well, isn’t this charming. Thank the Dawnmother for that geas.

Next, we headed to Prime Atherion’s office. He died around the same time, though his body was not retrievable inside his collapsed Magnificent Mansion. His door is also locked up, so Klyce opens a wall again. Only, this time, there is literally nothing in the office. Someone realizes, he probably has an extra-dimensional office, and we’ll have to go through the door. So, Nat picks the lock and we all rush inside before someone notices. Then things got weird.

A voice asks for a Password, and when no one can give one, we appear in a steel cube of a room, about thirty feet to a side. Surrounded by flying snakes. It’s a bit terrifying, but one quick Storm Sphere and all but one of them collapse to the ground. Nat quickly zaps the last snake out of the air. Then the voice comes again.

You have reached the office of Prime Atherion. What business do you have?

Or something like that, I think there were more words, but the storm was still up for a few seconds, and I didn’t really hear.

We tell the voice that Atherion is dead and we’re trying to investigate.

Access is restricted to Prime Atherion and those he gave access to.

We explain again that he is dead. We ask if Prime Rictus had permission, but the voice says no. Then we have to have a conversation about what dead means. It went something like this…

He’s dead.

What does that mean?

He isn’t alive. Or at least he isn’t on this plane anymore.

He… isn’t?

He isn’t.

But where is he?

Collapsed inside his mansion.

Oh.

Do you know how to get him out?

No.

Can we go into his office to look for information?

Prime Atherion isn’t?

Yes.

Who are you?

Then we introduced ourselves… but it didn’t get better for a while…

And you Are. But he isn’t? But I am?

And this went back and forth for awhile, until the voice explained that he is a “Life Model Decoy” of Prime Atherion, with all his knowledge, up to the point of his creation. Then the voice decided that it Was Atherion now. Because it’s existance was based on Atherion. This is when Klyce got impatient, declared the voice to be Atherion, and asked its permission to enter the office.

You want to visit My Office?

Yes, there is likely information about… a dead body that we need.

I give myself and all of you permission to access My Office.

Then a door appeared in one of the walls, and we all head through, into a Magnificent Mansion about two or three times the size of the one we all had shared those years before. There’s an Infinity Pool, a Zen Garden, and all sorts of other random frivolity. The unseen servants in this mansion, however, are all shaped like the other Primes, in the most ridiculous way possible. Atherion voice now starts insisting that it wants a body, and Remy patiently tries to help.

I lead the way to find his office among all of the silliness, and we find it. Throne and all. Who was this guy? The documents are mostly boring. Shipping manifests, mana information. Incarceration and death rates for the mines. Information on new deposits out west. Discussion of teleportation or rail systems to get mana back east. We also find his spellbook, which peaks a lot of interest, especially as it has the spell to make these mansions. We decide to confiscate it as evidence for now, and turn it in when we are done. Klyce and Remy both wander off to look for more interesting things. Dalish checks for recording orbs here, but unsurprisingly, doesn’t find any. Eventually, Remy comes to tell us he found a spell component room, and we all head there to “borrow” supplies.

Atherion voice tells us that no one besides Atherion` ever came here, and no one else had gotten into the trap room like we did. We ask where Atherion` had his mansion, but Atherion voice says he carried them with him wherever he went. Them?  He had eight mansions on his person at all times. Well, that’s a lot. We have to get out of here and get moving, we have found some good resources, but no information on the matters at hand. It doesn’t want us to leave, but Remy convinces him that we have to go outside for a bit, if only to get what we need to come back and make him a body. He tells us the password to get back in is Alleria.

Once we’re outside, Remy lets us know that there was also a Machine inside, though he disabled it. We head to Rictus’ office, but he isn’t there. I send to him, instead, to say Porter mind-controlled Wiest for unlimited supplies and free reign in the city. Rictus says he’ll meet with us this evening. Nat leaves a not for Alleria, asking “Are they yours?” And we head to Brooklyn to do more investigation.

My Brother’s Keeper

On By ravonlockeIn Story, TristiaLeave a comment

The night is troubled with awful dreams. Not the vague terror of her childhood just a few years ago. She doesn’t dream of the beating heart or the green. She doesn’t run for her life or feel the earth breaking.

She dreams of her once despised brother. The ‘real mage’ of the family. The ‘proper son’ who always did the right thing. Who had apologized and asked forgiveness. Who had pleaded to help, even though she knew he couldn’t. Who she had left with Orrin to watch over him. Who was gone now. Taken.

He was with them now. Not dead. He couldn’t be dead. Not after everything. Not with everyone else already gone. Taken. Not dead.

But that made the nightmares worse. She Did remember the pain, even if she teased Remy about it. Remembered the searing pain inside when that thing held her in the fountain. But she was used to pain. Gerald was not.

She dreamed of him being tortured as she had been. She dreamed of him being ripped open. She dreamed of him being bled while they laughed at his screams. She dreamed of many more horrible things.

And every time she woke in a cold sweat, reaching out for him. She concentrated on finding him. On going to him. On finding the magics that would take her to her brother so she could save him. She prayed to the Dawnmother for guidance.

On her watch at the end of the night, she pulled one of the bones out of the bag of bits Marybeth had gathered. She cleaned it up, and held it, concentrating on where it came from. On the nest the creature had spoken of. On how to get there. She could already go short distances. They had traveled between the fae and here. Surely there was a way. They were no mere mortal men. They were Gods, as Remy loved to point out. And even he had a fae in his head.

When the group was ready to go, she would take them. They would find her brother and no more of her family would die.

Demons Run

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

The rest of the polic station is alright, and the Chief assures us that he’ll just get some mages up to fix his wall. What are we going to DO?

The conversation shifts off the demon attacks momentarily and onto the cultists. They’re the best link we think we have, so Nat suggests trying to get their attention. She wants to graffiti the Dawnmother symbol around town, and then catch someone trying to change it to their symbol. To either question or follow them. The group ponders paying homeless people to do the painting and the monitoring. I think this is ridiculously dangerous and will just get those particular people taken and killed. But I’m overruled, and Remy buys paint and brushes. Then he convinces eight random people to agree to paint and watch the symbols around Manhattan. He tells them a bar to come to if they see anything. But then we don’t tell the bar, nor do we go to said bar. I’m not so sure about this plan.

Next, we go looking for Porter. We all head out to the military base outside of town. Dalish uses his authority to get us inside and we have some dinner in the mess while waiting to be seen. The general has time for us after dinner, so we head off to his office. General Burns used to be in charge of Porter’s unit and says it’s all classified. Dalish says he thinks Porter’s gone AWOL and has become an enemy of the state. Marybeth pipes up that he’s her brother. The general relents. He says that Porter was under his command for three years, but then his unit was reassigned to New Gnosis three month ago by Prime Wiest, for unknown reasons. He has not further information, other than he’s somewhere in the city. With Wiest dead, no way of telling whose orders he is following now. There were 18 men and women in his unit, and all of them were called into the city to serve Wiest. The general gives us a paper so that we can go to Records and get the names of the people in that unit. We are then dismissed.

Remy suggests checking in on the house before we do any more running around, so I send to Gerald. He replies back, repeating the words “Everything’s Fine…” over and over in a dreamy voice. We RUN back home. There’s a black plume of smoke, once again rising from my home. Rushing in, we find it contained to an outer wall, and Philomena is working to put it out. There is a Lot of Blood. Philomena shouts at us, and Klyce sends us all inside while he helps her. The house seems alright, until we get up to the study where everyone was sheltering. The room is covered in blood and demon gore. Marybeth’s mom, Klyce’s mom and sisters, Philomena’s parents are all there and okay. Gerald and Philip are gone. I start shouting for Gerald, when they tell me Philip chased the demons away, but no one had seen my brother. Nonononono!!!

I send to him again. This time I get a female voice back, saying Gerald is otherwise occupied. What? Dalish! How could that happen? How could someone else answer my sending?? It sounds like those succubus ladies we met! Dalish says she could be controlling or possessing him. Remy and Nat check his room, but there is simply the smell of sulfur and perfume. Dalish cleans the study of the blood while Remy checks Marybeth’s mother for signs of Grandfather, and Nat looks around at the remants of the fight. It looks like there were eight demons. The three closest to the family were obliterated, and the other five busted out the wall to get away. I try to send to Philip, to tell him the family is okay and ask where he is. The reply is a strange, chilling tone, saying he’s not done, yet.

We have to go find him. Demons are running loose in the city and he’s chasing them with a butcher knife. Klyce stays with Orrin and Philomena to protect the families, and we race north. HeyHey and Dalish fly above the streets to see if they can spot the wake of demons. They find two more alleys covered in blood. Then we hear a disturbance ahead and rush forward. There is a crowd surrounding another splattered mess.

Police are draped over Philip, trying to arrest him or at least restrain him. I toss up sparks to get their attention, and Dalish tries to use his authority to declare it a mage matter. They say he’s disturbing the peace. Remy tries name-dropping the police, but then Philip throws one of the men into a lamppost, probably breaking his back. We all freeze in shock, long enough for him to throw another man through a wall. Dalish rushes over to save the first man. Nat puts a couple officers to sleep. I fail to levitate Philip out of the mess. Remy convinces the last guy to just let go, then sames some curses and the officer who was pointing a gun at Philip disappears. Nat sends HeyHey through the broken wall to stabalize that cop, and tries to get the crowd to disperse. I rush forward, and tell Philip I just want to get him out of here, and Dimension Door us out of the crowd and ahead. He immediately takes off through an alley, and I rush back to tend to the wounded, praying to the Dawnmother to heal at least a little of the damage he caused. Remy wakes the sleepers and tells them to get medics for their friends, and we’re on the chase again.

By the time most of us catch up with him, he’s standing over a dead succubus and is back to confused, scared Philip. Nat wonders about casting speak with dead on it, but we go back and forth on it. It doesn’t have to tell him the truth if it knows she’s an enemy. Can we trick it? What questions should we ask? What could it answer? Dalish mentions that there’s a nest somewhere, and that takes high priority. We need to know which side it’s on, and if it knows where Grandfather is. What about Rictus? If we say they’re interferring with our investigation, maybe he’ll take us seriously. Maybe he can make it talk? Let’s take it home, at least. We shouldn’t do this here.

We get home, avoiding the police, and explain to Klyce what happened. Okay, we have a lot of pots on the stove. We have to take stock. We could talk to the newpaper/penny dreadful publisher, but he’s in Brooklyn. We need to go to the Hall of Records for the names in Porter’s unit. We could visit Professor Wiest and see what she will tell us of her father’s plans. We could try to get into his office in the Tower of Justice. We could talk to Rictus and the Succubus corpse. We start with this last because we have a body, somehow, still.

Dalish sends to Rictus, and we head downstairs to meet him. In my father’s study, it turns out. We lay the body out on the table for him to examine, and he does, at length. Remy mentions the nest we think is in the city. Dalish says there are many variations of these creatures that are hindering our ability to investigate the Black Knight. Dalish tells him about the trade of souls. Rictus reforms its head and then sets it back to normal, messing with time around it’s skull. He puppets an arm. He stabs it a little and smells the blood. Dalish explains the between place. Remy mentions one kidnapped my brother, and Rictus isn’t all that concerned about Gerald. He asks what we need, and we explain about asking it questions about the next and the cult. He asks where we learned of such a spell, and when we say Satiel, he nods. She made the spell, it turns out. He doesn’t have any better ways to go about it. He can’t force the truth without a soul present.

We then set to creating a list of questions. Where’s your next. Who’s your boss? Where is Mr. Pumbleby? What’s your plan? Where’s Gerald? Nat wonders about using detect thoughts, and if there’s enough of a brain left to do that. Rictus says no, but won’t stop her from trying. Nat settles down to cast. The detect thoughts doesn’t work, but the corpse does start talking.

Where is your lair?

The nest is unreachable by mortal man.

What is your connection to the cult of the anti-Dawnmother?

The Blood of the Dawn will usher in the Dusk.

How is Peter Pumbleby connected to you and yours?

He is the bridge between this world and the next. He will usher in the great dark.

Where is the ritual happening?

Within the nest.

How do you access the nest?

I teleport.

And then she went silent. We ask Rictus if he knows what Wiest was doing with Porter’s unit of 18. He was not aware of what he was doing with them, but they were quite a capable assassin squad in the south west and Central America. Nat asks if we can have his authority to check his home and office. He agrees, but warns that his daughter may not care about his authority. Remy asks for mana so that we can “deal with this like mages, and not Police Officers.” Remy asks for 150 motes when prompted, and Rictus give us 100. Saying we can revisit if needed. Then asks Dalish to stand very still and tosses the corpse through his shadow. He says he expects Dalish to stay in touch and then steps through his shadow himself. We divy up the mana and gather up to take watches and rest for the night.