The Hallows Killer

In the last days of long summer of 2013, Perseus, a respected mage of The Consilium by the Bay was shot in an alleyway. It was believed that his death was simply a case of wrong place and wrong time.

Two days later, Rockefeller was also shot.

Another two days, and Lark was dead. The consilium realised then that it was being targeted, and the floundering began.

Soon, Tor and Alchemiss were also dead. Five magi had been killed within a month.

Summer finally died and gave way to autumn, the day being a Sunday in early October. leaving the investigations to their seniors and trying to carry on as normal, The Rose set about investigating The Fairy Steps. At this point, Rayth was on holiday, without a phone, Felix and Foster had yet to join the consilium and M'aiq was still a member of the cabal.

Part way through blitzing the area with mage sights, it was noticed that a small group of people were coming. The cabal decided to stop for breakfast. Soon enough, Constantine walked past with three sleepers. The two groups wished each other a good morning - it was about 7am by this point - and continued as they were.

Just as the Rose was finishing breakfast, a gunshot was heard. Dropping their things, the young cabal rushed to find out what was happening. And here I must pause my commentary; Pauli spent the next period lost in the forest, whilst I myself was otherwise occupied. But, the three sleepers were dealt with - one died,one was seriously injured and taken to hospital, and the third was arrested. Constantine was not seriously injured, although M'aiq took a bullet to the arm. He would not let anyone forget this for a long time. Constantine made himself scarce before the police arrived, leaving the remaining four members of the Rose to deal with the police.

Some questions later, and it emerged that Constantine was woken up early that morning at gunpoint, told to get dressed and marched to the fairy steps. And, no, he wasn't sure what was going on. He may be an Acanthus, AKA a lucky bastard, but that won't save you from gunshots for long.

A cabal meeting was called with immediate effect.

What happened was explained amongst the group and, finally, the youngest cabal (in all senses of the word) dragged its heels out the mud and started investigating. Favours were called in, and Knighthood went to invesigate the body, posing as a possible relative.

The next morning, Rayth stepped off the plane in Manchester airport, collected her phone from lost property and discovered many, many missed calls. Her return call to Rowntree was just in time to make it to a cabal meeting; Knighthood had returned his information, which included a strange tattoo but little else.

Rayth, Achaikos and Birch set about investigating the murder sites - if Constantine was dragged out of bed to be taken there, then they must have been something special about the places - whilst Rowntree and Pauli worked up a ritual to speak to the ghost of the deceased. M'aiq decided to forgo the cabal meeting in favour of playing poker with the rest of the Free Council.

The away team went to the first murder site, and blitzed it with every mage sight going. It was a Hallow, it was corrupted and connected to all of the other murder sites, plus a few. Birch hit it with time questioning; 'did the murderer come here?' 'yes' 'when?' 'about two years ago 'why?' 'looking for hallows'.

Suffice to say, every one of the locations - even those at which no murders had taken place yet - gave the same answers.

The Hallow by the fairy steps, however, was connected to the local Post Office.

Meanwhile, M'aiq finished his game, and set about trying to be helpful. Rowntree suggested he join the away team. The away team didn't want him. He followed them anyway.

Which leaves us with the home team. Once ritual circle, extortionate amounts of ectoplasm and a few spells later, and they were chatting to a ghost. The ghost was very confused, not even being certain of his name (Keith? Kevin? Somethinglikethat - we called him Kevin). This was to be expected; by this point, he had been dead for a while. What could be dragged up from its memories were that he met a guy at a bar, went home with him, some strange words were muttered over him (he repeated; they were High Speech. Pauli told the guy it was Greek) and ended up with a tattoo. As for the murdering thing, it just felt like it needed doing, almost like an instinct. He had seen the guy before, though; he as a 'bloody Preston supporter'. That set alarm bells off very, very quickly. Just unfortunate that the guy had only ever been seen hooded.

The cabal reconvened to share information, then split ways again; Pauli went to Asda to buy his groceries and, finally, a phone (the decision was made that, considering recent events, it would possibly be wise to finally become contactable outside of work hours); Rayth stayed the night to do some dream divinations; M'aiq went to work; Rowntree was already home; Birch went to work; Achaikos got chased by sleepers with mind spells on them.

Yeah. That was a thing. He rang Rowntree, then got into a taxi and taken to the closest pub - it just so happened to be the Plough, where M'aiq was working. Rowntree rang the Sentinels. Suffice to say, M'aiq got beaten up again, Achaikos survived the night and Hoodsman was revealed to be a detective inspector of the local constabulary.

Once that business was cleared up, another 'family' meeting was called. No more data, and now slightly unsure what to do, but Hagstone had called a consilium meeting to discuss recent events. Information was pooled, especially concerning Hallows; did anyone know about Abyssal corruption in Hallows? What about the one at the Fairy Steps?

Pooled information revealed that Hallows change over time, taking on aspects of things nearby - a Hallow in a graveyard would eventually reek of death, for example. Although, as Pauli pointed out, this was not always things in the fallen realms; at least one theory suggests that other realms can affect Hallow 'flavours'.

The Post Office in Betham had once been owned by one Roland Jefferson, a mage. What of him? He was arrested and executed for something, the details of which were locked away.

Rayth offered her dream divinations; a House soaked in blood, twins suckling from wolves and a tractor being turned on. The tractor could mean the person behind tngs saw himself as a driver of something, the twins thing could be literal, the house... Well, nobody recognised it.

Rowntree was elected cabal spokesman, and reported into the consilium on recent matters; they were shocked to see the youngest cabal collect any information, let alone that much in so little time. Two new magi, Katniss and Segway, along with Churchill who had just moved to the area, were introduced, new sentinels, a herald and a factotum elected.

Soon, Rayth petitioned Demdike for information as to why Roland was executed. It would take a while to come through but, when it did, proved very interesting; he was executed for a string of murderers which took place at Hallows - he had been murdering people to try and 'fix' the Abyssal taint.

Out of ends to chase, the Rose set about their daily lives, whilst attempting to think of something useful.

Then, out of the blue, Rayth received a call from an unknown number. She answered; it was Katniss. Katniss had gone murderer hunting, found a house, then been chased by guys with guns to an abandoned warehouse outside town. She was now hiding up a tree, had shot one guy who was chasing her, but didn't want to reveal her location to another. She'd used fate magic to get the number of someone who could help.

Rayth rang Sargasso, and then went to help herself.

The two of them managed to hold off any trouble until Sargasso arrived. Katniss gave out the location of the House, and a description. Low and behold! It matched the image Rayth had seen in her dreams, just with less blood. Sargasso disappeared, and Rayth took Katniss back to town.

The Rose decided that, with their new information they would organise a raid on the House. Calling around, Sargasso proved impossible to contact. Although, considering circumstances, it could be explained away.

The mage swat team, as I have decided to call it, was composed of the Rose, Katniss, Churchill, half of the Free Council and a few others that I forget. They met up in the car park at Asda, like every good swat team, and made their way from there.

Pauli stayed on watching for trouble and relaying messages, whilst everyone else investigated. Birch took the garden area, and chatted to a spirit living there. It was quite friendly, but didn't know much.

There was a room full of guns, a library with a coded message, a pretty rug and Sargasso in a tank full of tass. In releasing Sargasso from her prison, the tass was also released, knocking out and scrambling the memories of everyone in the room. Birch was called inside, and helped dragged everyone into the hallway. By this point, most people had finsished their own investigations in the House that was actually a Demense; M'aiq found a library for Achaikos, who found a coded message. Some of the NPCs found a basement.

Leaving the rest of the group to fix their memories and collate happenings Pauli and M'aiq went to explore the basement. Said basement had a Hallow in, but not much else. Whilst Pauli had his back turned, M'aiq pulled out the Soul Stone. At which point everything started returning to normal. It was possibly a good thing that Pauli had matter sight up, as the basement was quickly reverting to concrete. They ran outside, to find the House was now a bungalow.

Still, they had a soul stone. Birch did some time divinations, revealing it to have been created by someone who looked like Ford but wasn't, in about the eighties. Which Rowntree was busy yelling at M'aiq for his incompetance, Pauli slipped off to make phonecalls - specifically, to Gwyllion. 'Two things; M'aiq just collapsed the Demense that was probably our best evidence, and what information do we know about Ford's family?' Turned out Ford had a brother, also Awakened, in the Mysterium, and if really necessary, then the Demense could possibly be reconstructed. Not much else was known, so Pauli passed on this information to Achaikos to deal with, and waited for M'aiq to leave to tell Rowntree.

Scrying on the Soul Stone showed Ford at a local pub. The thing was, Ford had said he was out of town. This set off alarm bells, and the sentinels were called in.

Meanwhile, Achaikos decoded the cypher. It was a letter discussing details, but not over-alls, between two associated parties. More to the point, talking about the fact the two could swap between each other.

'Ford' was arrested, and a trial called. The Rose were dragged up to act as jury; it was, after all, just gone 11 at night at this point.

Sitting waiting for things to start, Pauli set about translating his notes on the case into something that could actually be useful in court. Whilst doing this, he flicked through his notes on Ford himself. He always remembered all conversations and such like, but his quirks would sometimes change slightly; usually put down to an 'off day'. However... He looked closer at the arrested, and noticed scarring reminisent of cosmetic surgery. This was pointed out.

The trial started with the accused admitting to not being Ford, but rather Ford's twin, Slingshot, a member of the Mysterium in Preston. It emerged that the murders were to attempt to fix the Hallows, as the corruption had been observed, as had the fact it could get worse. Slingshot said that Ford was, at current, also in Preston.

The discussions of the jury were long and arduous, continuing until about 3am. By this point, they convicted him, but asked for a footnote to be added to the records concerning a good, although misguided, intention. By this point, Hagstone had finally lost her taste for revenge and blood - Perseus may have been a close friend, the others may have been under her protection as any person under a leader is, but so much blood had been split. Instead, Slingshot was exiled and all consilia told of his crimes, with Ford to be tried should he ever step foot in the Consilium by the Bay.

This never did get the opportunity to happen; please see The Free Council Trials for more details.