RECAP 4/20 (BLAZE IT, BY ST. GABRIL'S MIGHT)

 The party make haste back to the site of the tourney. They are nearly too late; the vampiric corpse has vanished, along with the corpse of the serving girl. They race to catch up with Baron Tyron's wagon train, only to see a shadow approaching it faster than they can intercept. They are not able to save many of Tyron's guard, who are brutally slain. Sister Sevara calls Aeo's light to smite them, and Cei castigates them. A brutal battle ensues. Ren grievously wounds the vampire master with the dagger taken from Blackhall, but is himself incapacitated. Lyra puts her new bow to good use. Cei strikes the vampire with multiple arrows, and is wounded almost mortally, but goads the vampire, attempting to draw its attention. Bartholomew bravely rides into its reach to protect her. Meanwhile, Abelard engages the serving-girl turned vampire, and slays her. 

They manage to defeat the master vampire, Cei and Ren barely clinging to life. Baron Tyron emerges from the caravan, along with his terrified wife and heirs, and thanks them for saving his life yet again. Purifier Endicott and Purifier-General Kaine arrive not long after. Cei explains the events that led to their reunion, crediting Sister Sevara's divine vision and Ren's realization.  

Tyron states that he wishes to give them full honours in court, and asks them to accompany him back to Charligan. They agree, and begin the ride back to the city.

Cei berates Bartholomew for taking such a risk in her defense, insisting that her vow as a Purifier requires her to be the first line of defense against the Utterdark, including if it requires sacrificing her life. Sister Sevara, however, glimpses Cei's motivations-- she feels consumed by guilt about both Bartholomew's parents' Purification and the loss of Bartholomew's eye, and while she still believes in the importance of her office, for her, the love and loyalty of her companions is Aeo's love made manifest in the world, and she would have gladly died for them if required.

Cyrus, usually mysterious, is unusually forthcoming; he discusses the Circle's organization and vows with Cei, and Cei discovers his role among the Circle is somewhat analogous to her own among the Church. He also mentions his and Lyra's quest to locate his mentor, and Cei offers to help in this quest in exchange for all their help in her Purifier missions. 

Sir Abelard is unusually shaken after the battle. Cei and Sevara seek to comfort him. He admits to Cei that he has grown weary of the fight. She exhorts him to stay the course, reminding him of their synergy and efficacy as a pair in earlier battles, proven again against the vampires, but leaves somewhat disappointed. 

A red-armoured figure-- Lady Brightburn-- intercepts the party, despite Kaine's annoyance. She identifies Cyrus as blessed with the power of St. Gabril, and bestows upon him the power to summon a spear of pure flame. 

RECAP 4/16/26

 The party, minus Cei, transport the body of the assassin, who died at his own hand by a desiccating poison, into a tent where the other bodies from the assassination attempt are being kept. They note that the particularly inconspicuous "assassin" has been felled by the arrows that Lyra and Cei fletched together. 

Cei returns to Abelard and asks for his help in interceding with Baron Tyron to gain custody of the serving girl, knowing that he was friends with his father Tytamon. Cei hopes to do so under the pretext of interrogating her; she also wishes to spare another hapless innocent. Cei and Abelard make haste to Tyron's compound, where Tyron, the Chief Inspector Hagen Duvall, and an unfortunately familiar face-- the Purifier-General, Sosamon Kaine-- greet them. 

Cei and Abelard give the new Baron all due honours, and Cei is commended for her role in the investigation, though she demurs and credits Aeo's guidance. Cei senses a number of surprising developments-- Tyron, very subtly, seems surprised to hear of multiple assassins, and Abelard feels nothing but hatred for Kaine. Alas, it is too late for the serving girl to be remanded to Cei's custody-- it seems she too  has died at her own hand by poison. 

The Chief Inspector politely warns the Purifiers that the case is now in his department's purview, and they are no longer to pursue it. Cei offers to provide them a copy of her (always very thorough) report, as inter-departmental collaboration, and requests a copy of theirs, stating that she is motivated to ensure Tyron's safe and smooth coronation due to her wish to see the Aeo-fearing line of Tytamon assume the baronship unimpeded. Abelard seems most proud of Cei's comportment during the exchange.

They rejoin the companions. Emelius, seemingly acquainted, refers to Abelard as "Lord" Abelard; Cei introduces her companions with no small amount of pride, and refers to Ren and Bartholomew as the brothers of her heart. They decide to ride some distance away so as to be able to discuss without being overheard. They ride some ways into the woods, and make camp.

Cei takes Lyra aside and asks if she wishes to be healed of her scars from her imprisonment and torture at the hands of Calli and her associates. Lyra says she does, but only if the tattoos can be studied and their purpose divined; she says she fears the judgment of any who see them. Cei offers to scribe the tattoos and then ask Sister Aisha's help in healing them, and assures Lyra that none are qualified to pass judgment on her. She then shows her a little-known fact of Purifier practice-- Purifiers ritually perform penance upon themselves in the form of self-injury; Cei's arms are covered in self-inflicted scars, which unlike most Purifiers, she declined to have healed; she wanted the reminder of the pain she paid in exchange for the pain her station requires her to inflict. Lyra asks why Cei carries Abelard's scent. Cei, subtly, observes that her tracking abilities are most unusual-- essentially stating she will keep Lyra's witchbreed abilities secret and protect her from detection by her Purifier colleagues as best as she can. The two, both reserved and guarded by nature, share a moment of friendship.

Many heated discussions transpire very quickly. Cei tells Ren she never forgot his words about Tyron's assassination possibly being fated, but says in her heart Aeo bid her oppose the actions of the clearly evil men orchestrating it. Ren challenges her, saying she needs to dispense with the talk of some higher power and instead take ownership of her own destiny and actions. She, uncharacteristically emotionally, replies that she is nothing without Aeo and the power lent to her through His service. 

Sevara attempts to scry/read the assassination scrip in cipher taken from the assassin's body, and is hurled to the ground, badly wounded, by a powerful, malevolent force. Before it repelled her, she glimpsed several people, including the assassin, and a demonic being, unquestionably evil. She commands Bartholomew to surrender the remaining vials of poison (heart's blood, made of vampire blood) so that she may cleanse them. 

Abelard is terribly shaken by the burst of demonic power, as it reminds him of the power that turned his wife and children, forcing him to slay them. Cei comforts him and reminds him that he did what he had to do, what they would have wanted him to do, much as Cei and Abelard were forced to do at the monastery on the mission where they met. 

Cei convinces Sevara to let her scribe the contents of the scrip before it is destroyed. She does so. But then Reniel puts all the pieces together-- the assassin did not die by suicide when he drank the demonic poison-- he had feigned death then committed the last act required to turn himself into a vampire. They realize that a terrible danger still threatens Tyron. Emelius, likely hoping to protect Cei, takes her transcript of the assassination scrip and rides with all haste back to Kaine. Cei and Abelard, the veteran demon hunters, will brook no further delay, and leave. The others follow behind them. 

MEGA RECAP-- FEB-APRIL 2026

 Searching for leads on Sanction in Charligan reveals very little, save the fact that they appear to be causing great upheaval in the city's criminal underground. While attempting to investigate at the Slovenly Siren, an inn on the docks, Cei overhears two strange men– one bearing a tattoo of crossed blades, evidently the insignia of a mysterious group of assassins  called the Brotherhood of Sleep– discussing an assassination to occur at the tourney planned for Tyron’s coronation. The men elude the party’s attempts to follow them.

Cei's old friend, Purifier Emelius Endicott, returns to warn the group that they are being tailed by a criminal syndicate called the Bludgeon. 

Purifiers rarely work together. It's very scary when they do.

They manage to waylay the tail, and learn that he was to report back to the innkeep at the Slovenly Siren. They return, and Sevara and Bartholomew employ some unusual tactics to be granted entrance after being ejected the previous evening.

Onward, Aeo's soldiers!

A messenger pigeon is dispatched, presumably by the bartender. A comedy of errors ensues; they retrieve the message, but it's written in a cipher.

They decide to spend their last evening before the tourney investigating Sanction and the Brotherhood of Sleep as best they can. 

Cyrus returns to the Circle of Thorns emissary and learns of a Brotherhood assassination fifty years earlier, in which a noblewoman was bloodlessly murdered, and the swords insignia discovered under a table.

Cei, Sevara, and Emelius head to the Campus of Saint Michael. Cei first visits a famed healer among the Ordo Solatium– a strange nun whose odd speech has the ring of either madness or prophecy– in an attempt to restore Bartholomew’s eye. They then search the archives of the Cloister of Saint Vicius for references to vampiric cults, or the Brotherhood of Sleep. Cei finds one reference to the Brotherhood, purely by chance– an ancient document stating one attempted to assassinate Charl, who at the time was endorsed by the Church– but who suicided to avoid capture. 

Tensions and conflict flare within the group. Ren wonders aloud if perhaps there were some sense in Kalli’s attempts to bring about change in the world via sacrificing them; Lyra angrily shouts him down. Both Ren and Cei’s feelings for Kalli bubble to the surface. No clear resolution is had; the group return to their rooms at the Magpie and retires. 

The Argument

They awake to find a note in the womens’ quarters, evidently from Sanction, advising them to mind their own business. Enclosed is Cei's broken arrow. They investigate the room and find a strand of red hair on the roof, identical to both the red hair of Cei’s pickpocket earlier, and the red hair in the vial taken by Silas Grange from Kalli’s possession in Blackhall.

A message from Sanction

The group travel to the tourney outside town. They decide to split up and remain vigilant. Cei and Emelius mean to position themselves in the stands to gain a vantage point. Cei is utterly discombobulated when she encounters a person from her past– Sir Abelard deMarcus, a Knight of the Reclamation assigned as her escort on a brutally dangerous and disastrous Purifier mission several years prior. Abelard intends to joust in the tourney. The connection between them still smoulders, but Cei puts duty first; she tells Abelard of the potential assassination, and departs.

Well Met, Sir Abelard

Lyra competes in, and wins, the archery tourney, acquiring a powerful new bow. 

Lyra, triumphant

Cei glimpses the assassin from the inn in Charligan and alerts the group, who move to intercept him. She also (in a truly Aëo-given flash of insight) notices a servant girl poisoning a cup of wine intended for Lord Tyron and manages to intercept it… then sees, and cuts down, another would-be assassin, who upon investigation appears to have been a red herring. The group manage to seize the real assassin, but he dies by his own hand to avoid capture.