Chapter Seven

Yes. Tanzania Quilp is a kind of humunculus created by her "father" the alchemist Julius Quilp, and regrown with modifications on five other occasions. However, once grown she is in all ways human. She is therefore quite eligible to donate blood to the vampiric Mr Edward Endleby if she so chooses.

Vampires usually require the blood of creatures with souls sooner or later, although other blood can sustain them for a while. The MHC know that their former sage, Endelby’s friend, Nathan Rumbustle somehow fixed it so that Endelby did not have to drink human blood. As far as they know Endelby never has - yet. It is the drinking of human blood which triggers the alignment change which comes over people who rise as vampires. However, at the moment Endelby may well die unless he partakes of human blood.

Most natural bodily functions cease when a person becomes undead. Non-corporeal undead such as ghosts and spectres often have the appearance of bodily functions, such as spurting blood, but this is part of their psychic imprint. Corporeal undead vary, from zombies which have no spittle to ghouls which most definitely salivate. Vampires drool and bleed. Liches don’t.

The ones that stand out most in the records are Balsamaeo Andracotti, the Eyeless Artist, who used his knife of cell restructuring on living subjects to create his grotesque and terrible sculptures, and Dr Pretorius, an enhanced Crypt Thing (a type of guardian undead created by necromantic ritual) whose abilities were enhanced by archscientist Adam Maladraviil to further medical research by using the Crypt Thing’s natural paralysis, teleport, and invisibility powers for human dissection. Both of these villains are considered destroyed.

By the way, it took me ages sorting through all the cards to get this, but at least I spotted a few villains worthy of a comeback on the way.

Yes. These powerful denizens of the Grey Wastes (the outer plane of Neutral Evil) have been thwarted by the Club on several occasions. As well as a nameless Arcanoloth who is plotting something major in a tower he’s building on the way to the Abyss, the MHC have had dealing with Zuthos, who was even the familiar spirit of one of their members for a while, and her sister Mother Zenathos of the Innocence Agency. Zenathos won’t be able to return to the prime material plane for another 65 years or so, and Zuthos was slain in the grey Wastes and won’t be back at all.

On the other hand, it means the Club is fairly familiar with the doings of the Arcanadaemons.

As always the Club’s solicitors are Hamble, Hamble, Hamble, Durham, Hamble, and King, of Grey’s Inn Road. Honorary member Augustin Hamble is caught in the Web of Time, but the firm is in good hands with senior partner Banbury Maddock, whom the Monster Hunters saved from the clutches of the Hellfire Club back when he was a law student in 1922. A former partner at the same firm, the Right Honourable Sir Wallingford King now sits on the King’s Bench and may yet aspire to the House of Lords.

The MHC both fought and later allied with the Railway Sentience, which travelled and dwelt in the rail track network. That creature was last seen with the Morrigan. The Railway Sentience was able to teleport things along railway lines but the effects and residual effects were different to the ones being detected (or not detected) at Waterloo. The MHC have considered the similarity of ley lines and railway lines before, since metal wires and electromagnetic fields are known by them to deform leys.

The purified volume is once cubic foot per level of caster, within a ten foot area.

There were four men present when the wall came down, Wode, Bellnichol, and two other members of the King’s Men Morris team.

The Monster Hunters don’t regularly have access to Speak with Dead. It is a third level clerical spell which appears fairly infrequently in the spell lists of player characters because of it’s plot-destroying potential in mystery scenarios. It does not appear in the list of miracles usually granted to the Christian Cleric, since speaking with the dead is one of the things specifically forbidden in the Old Testament (despite Saul and the Witch of Endor), and hence Flaxton doesn’t have it. Qayrawun, who gains his spells by sending his gens (elemental imps) off-plane to steal them from the minds of planar powers, can ask them to find him such a spell, but ANY clerical spell stolen may raise the ire of a god, and the more powerful the spell the more likely the chance.

When the Club really need to Speak with Dead these days they often ask the assistance of the London Necropolis Company, a long-time front for the operations of Qualius the Lych. The LNC naturally have a flair for such magics, and may even regularly question all the people they inter for useful information.

As an interesting footnote, the Club once found out the hard way that Qualius can overhear any Speak with Dead done within a mile of him, and can even answer through the corpse’s lips.

And so to the action…

Even a cursory glance shows that old Walter Wode has been clubbed to death, apparently by a rapidly-growing animate oak tree that he hangs on. In fact the tree has now even grown through his body, but he was clearly pounded almost flat before that. The tree is obviously not a usual feature of Wode’s cottage kitchen but it gives every evidence of being a century or more old. Bearing in mind the previous suspicions of druidical activity this sets Magda checking the frenzied ley lines and even using one of her spells which senses the motivation of living creatures. The tree is feeling justified. There is no evidence of a Transport via Plants spell or similar, but then there might not be after some time has passed. Given the state of Wode’s body and in the absence of a forensic specialist it could have been any time from twelve to thirty-six hours past since he died.

Crannog and Genevieve check the cottage for clues. They do indeed find some of alcohol, which Crannog uses to test the "evil alcohol burns" theory – it does. Crannog also finds Wode’s spade, which only Crannog could identify as having an old stain of toad blood upon it. Genevieve finds Wode’s old Morris Dancing trophies, but it must be thirty years since he last lifted a bell or handkerchief.

Eventually the hard-working PC Cundy will have to be called in here. He will confirm that Wode has lived in this cottage all his life, and his family have lived here as long as anyone can remember. Cundy himself in an incomer, having been born eighteen miles away. A later check with parish records at Chalfont Didbury traces the Wode family back to 1761, but before that any records would have been in the now-lost King’s Dulcarnain church.

As the Club wait for the police, the Monster Hunters have another check around the gristly murder house on Temple Hill Lane. They are able to secure photographs of Mrs Stankey and her missing daughter. Flaxton notices one picture of Mrs Stankey wearing the actual skirt she lies dead in, except that there it comes to her knees and now it is so short as to not even fully cover her underwear. If these clothes have shrunk they have shrunk only in one dimension. Deborah Stankey’s clothes do not appear to be affected, and the dimensions do not match those of the strange alterations to Mrs Stankey’s wardrobe.

Revell is more concerned about a strange prickling sensation he is getting, and a Detect Shadows warns him about the three undead lurking with orders to attack when the first policeman arrives. Given advance warning, Revell the Shadow Mage and Flaxton the cleric launch a pre-emptive strike. The MHC will probably win this combat with the temporary loss of one or two strength points. Flaxton can heal any injuries before the police arrive. Revell and Flaxton are both convinced that these undead were bound here.

Then the police arrive, and the next few hours get very busy. Qayrawun does manage to get a Speak with Animals from his gens on the third attempt and goes and talks with Mr Furry. It takes some time to calm the alarmed feline down but from what the cat says a bad man came to the door with a man who comes here a lot and has sex with Mrs Stankey. The new man smelled of evil and of being old. Deborah answered the door and he seized her and cut her – not seriously – with a black knife. As she screamed lots of ghosts and things came and the cat decided to be somewhere else. The cat has seen lots of ghosts around before, but he liked to sleep on the dress they came to guard. It isn’t there now.

As intriguing as all this is the cat can’t really tell much more, and this much is only possible thanks to the patience of a mage who has to constantly deal with three bickering gens. The cat can’t describe the dress except that it was nice to sleep on, doesn’t know why ghosts guarded it, and doesn’t have enough concept of time to remember how long the dress has been there. The dress used to lay crumpled at the bottom of the wardrobe.

The police reconstruct the events much as the MHC did before them. It seems evident that there have been some crimes of passion. Forensic evidence at the scene of crime investigation indicates that Maureen Stankey has had intercourse shortly before dying, possibly on the hall floor where she died. The police are puzzled as to why some of the victims appear not to have struggled against their assailants. They are more puzzled by the graffiti on the walls and baffled by the poltergeist allegations. It will take quite a lot of sorting out, and the MHC are cautioned to keep themselves available for further questioning.

An all-points bulletin is put out for the missing Deborah Stankey.

Early indications are that the Stankey’s assets, including the house they have lived in for eight years, will go to Deborah if she is still alive, or otherwise to various brothers and sisters of Mrs Stankey and Mr Stankey’s now-widowed sister-in-law since the Stankey’s will did not anticipate the children pre-deceasing their parents.

It is clear from MHC case-notes that the Finchley poltergeist case began about eight months ago, not as recently as summer solstice. No immediate family links between the Stankeys and the King’s Dulcarnain tribes are obvious, but this kind of genealogical research can take weeks and Adele Walker is doing her best on her own.

Zany takes the decision to risk giving Edward Endelby human blood. She either donates some of her own or takes contributions from the willing library staff (Charlotte hasn’t said) and Endelby’s condition stabilises. He is laid in his casket to regenerate.

Sepia Snake Sigil is not a feasible option to save Endelby since nobody present can cast it.

The laboratory is a mess, but of special note is that the engine block and other pieces of Radshaw’s car have been attacked by the now-defunct Saaiitaii Manifestation. The only remaining bit of alcohol in the room is in the unbroken bottle found in the Horne barn, which is still corked with the dirty cloth as it was found. However, it too is no longer evil, having been within the area of the Purify Food and Drink magic.

Once Zany has stopped swearing she also draws her conclusions on the energy-draining toad. Her view is that some kind of summoning spell has become corrupted, and that instead of sending the summoned creatures back from whence they came the spell has been feeding on their positive material energies to maintain their existence on this plane. Zany cannot speculate how such interference might happen, but Meridian has a chance. The energy-draining effect is very weak, and the seagull would have had plenty of time to devour the toad before it killed the seagull. The toad inside the protected environs of the Endelby Memorial Library has died slower than the others since it was in a magical environment which sustained it longer.

Before departing for Finchley, Aveyard had time to use hypnotic memory techniques on Courtney, the so-called post office phantom. Courtney recalls that the tweed-suited man put Radshaw’s handkerchief in his tweed jacket pocket and kept it. This man made no over gestures or special sounds when he teleported things. His teeth appeared normal.

Of most interest is Courtney’s hypnotic recollection of the addresses of the two letters which had the two missing stamps on them. These were:

Since the Royal Mail owes the Club a favour for recent services, a judicious telephone call verifies that both letters remain unclaimed at their destinations.

The Monster Hunters are not short of a few dead people to look at just now. The investigation into the Mummer murder continues, although the police are not as co-operative as they might be. Albrecht and Meridian did have time to search for a catalogue which might document the missing books only to find an empty index card drawer. If Mummer was as meticulous as he seems to have been the placement of the gaps might be significant, and most of the surrounding books are on local natural history and local archaeology. Brother Indexer, the scholarly catalogue-keeper of the Endelby Memorial Library, might be of value here if the Club want to send for him. There are stacks of letters from correspondents through England and beyond on topics of natural history, but there are far too many to be assimilated by a casual inspection.

The Monster Hunters can find other photographs of old Mrs Mummer. She doesn’t seem to be anyone known to them. Cundy recalls that the missing photograph showed her sitting at the piano aged around 50.

The police are placing great significance on two washed teacups sitting on the draining board in the kitchen.

More genealogical work at Chalfont Didbury turns up quite a lot of Mummer family history. It is an old local family, and given enough diligence and time it is almost certain that there will be Mummer/Wode/Bellnichol family connections way back. In fact it would be odder if there weren’t. The Horne connections if any would not appear in a wedding register. The Hornes were a different class of person. Generally the Club can work out most of the local family stuff back to the time of the loss of the King’s Dulcarnain church, but records before that are very sketchy and only the Horne history previously described is available since the Horne’s were landowners.

All of that just leaves the question of who’s ashes are on the floor of Mummer’s library. Given the missing Mummer and the human remains the police tend to the obvious conclusion, but the MHC are more suspicious. In the absence of Speak with Dead it is down to Selkirk’s patternweave spell to determine that this was, with 67% probability, the mortal remains of Mr Mummer.

Angherad manages to excavate the full body of the Pit Fiend which was buried under the track at Waterloo underground station, but it is now decaying very fast. The precautions prescribed by Flaxton are observed, but by tomorrow there will only be some foul-smelling goo left of the beastie.

Angherad therefore attempts a partial autopsy, and manages to find the missing Mr StClement in the creature’s stomach – well, parts of him. St Clement is also decaying, having now effectively become part of the creature (Selkirk and Meridian can offer a long and incomprehensible diatribe explaining why, for example, food just swallowed goes with a creature when it teleports or plane shifts). The police are a bit uncertain how to handle what appears to be a monster with a man inside it. Fortunately HM Government’s Grey Operations in the form of Miss Susan Slade appears to wave a pass and make the officers of the law go away and not talk about it. She waits around and explains that Radshaw now owed her theatre and dinner.

Angherad’s staff, a sentient evil necromantic item which contains the extradimensional voodoo starstone, is unhappy about entering the excavation pit. Angherad senses it is afraid of being caught down there. It sees the pit and what is beneath it as some kind of prison. It uses the word "Carcieri", which is a lower-planar term for the outer spiritual plane between Lawful Evil and Neutral Evil.

A worker repairing the third rail complains of getting an electrical shock while Angherad is digging, but is ridiculed by his workmates since the power is most definitely off. When Radshaw finally returns from Finchley he checks again and finds that there is a slight electrical charge on the rail only when Angherad’s staff is in the demon pit. Aveyard notices how the frequency of the charge resembles that of the human thought cycle.

By the time Emmanuelle and Redvers-Ainderbury get back from their dinner engagement they have nothing to fear for the scotch and brandy R-A has hidden in his boot. Albrecht has managed to locate the local focus for the Saaiitaii Manifestation and exorcise it. This dangerous exercise involved a blessed volunteer – Dawn D’Aosta – actually imbibing the spirits so that Albrecht had a focus to exorcise. Dawn had to maintain a battle of wills against the possessing entity, but as Albrecht has reason to know Dawn can be very strong-willed when she feels she is acting for the Greater Good. In this case it was the only way to get the focus to manifest, and she couldn’t ask any other of her team to do it. After a four and a half-hour ritual, Albrecht destroyed the focus and cast the Manifestation back to the Outer Abysm. Dawn is now resting quietly, but covert checks indicate that she is indeed non-evil. When she recovers she will need a few weeks meditation before using her new level’s abilities.

Albrecht is of the opinion that there is also another, original, focus, but by the time the MHC track it to the bottle from the Horne barn that too has been dealt with in Harrogate.

That leaves Emmanuelle and Genevieve to grill Bellnichol on the smuggling and what he really knows about Horne Barn. With R-A on hand to assure privacy, this is Bellnichol’s confession:

"I had an agreement with Mr Gent, and that’s why I’m in trouble. I owe him a lot of spirits, but I can’t deliver and he’s going to break my kneecaps if I don’t. But the barn’s ruined and it doesn’t work any more."

"The night of the storm? It was bloody weird, that. When we heard the barn was gone down the cliff we went there to see what we could do. It was too late. But the strange part was that the bottles we’d left there were still empty, but there was a whole crate of new stuff, some German stuff or something, that we’d never put there. The barn had never done bottles as well as booze before. We tried it and it was pretty good. Walter called it "special". Maybe it was the barn’s last farewell, eh?"

When he hears about Wode, Bellnichol will be shocked and horrified. Even without Aveyard to use ESP on the publican it seems clear to those present that he is now, at last, confessing what he believes to be the truth.

Meanwhile Magda Maledicta travels north, to the green forest of Lammermuir where the Monster Hunters once faced an elder druid gone mad and befriending one of the last true Nymphs in the world. Magda locates the shy Galeili Worldsedge by her pool in the moonlit forest and the two of them bathe and talk secret things for long and long. Galeili mourns that Magda hasn’t brought Albrecht or one of the other nice boys for them to enjoy.

Finally, Magda explains what is happening with the Club’s current case. Galeili’s child-like face is filled with surprise. "Isn’t it obvious what’s happened?" she asks.

Then she explains to Magda.

We’re at the mid-point of the scenario, and since the case moves on from here it seems like a good time to ask some of the questions I prepared at the start. Since these were set down before the Club chose the direction of its investigations some may be impossible to answer and others really easy. Each correct answer is worth 10xp. You can mark yourselves after Chapter Eight.

1. Why did it rain toads on King’s Dulcarnain?

2. What became of Radshaw’s car, and how?

3. What killed the Waterloo Pit Fiend, and why?

4. Why are Margaret Stankey’s dresses too short?

5. What was special about the imported German spirits, and who imported them?

6. Why was Walter Wode killed, and by what power?

7. What did the tweed-suited man make Alistair Courtney do and why could he not do it himself?

8. What became of Radshaw’s handkerchief?

9. What killed David Mummer, on whose behalf, and how was it destroyed?

10. Who does the tweed-suited man work for?

The next chapter will take place a couple of days or so later in MHC time, so there will be time for people to redeploy to other bits of the adventure. Generally there will have been time for any of the Club to have had a look at any of the bits so far, but not to check on the postal clues. Magda will get back with her information from Galeli on the morning the next chapter starts. People need to tell me where they and others are going and what they want to do next.

Replies by 7pm on 29^th February to the bulletin board. After that we shall revert to replies by e-mail for chapter eight. There will be a longer gap between chapters eight and nine because I’m going to Brussels for a week from 5^th March.

IW