3. The Crimson Crossroad - New Blood Rising

The Crimson Crossroad - New Blood Rising


  • The Courts of the Waterdhavian Coven stir once more.

    It has been one year since the destruction of the renegade kindred, Jubal the Incandescent, at the hands of a newly formed Coterie. In that span of time, the three eldest, the self-styled Masters of Narfell, have been uniquely active as they attempt to settle the affairs of their respective Courts.

    In the North, the Court of Sorrows has taken advantage of the absence of Peltarch's most visible heroes, and begun to reassert its subtle grip on the Jewel of the Icelace. In days past, Prince Ancon Je'laan ruled the North's night with caution and a subtle hand, but was said to have lost control of his many subordinates. Now, his awakened mistress Danag Styx has imposed a more direct hand in correcting the mistakes of his timid reign. The kindred of her Court have had to contend with doppelgangers and other pretenders as they seek to regain their old territories, all while attempting to avoid the scrutiny of mortals which led to their retreat from the Jewel last time around.

    In the South, the Court of Valour consolidates a commanding, envied position. The leadership of their master, Lidérc, may be questioned by the other Courts, but not among his own kind. By keeping their territories well separated from the town of Norwick, they have avoided the scrutiny of the mortals they claim ownership over. All but the most senior members of the Court must abide by carefully coordinated feeding regimens, to ensure the good townsfolk of Norwick are never overpreyed upon by their visiting predators. Long a stable, peaceful food source, some say the town has become a source of complacency for the Court - from where, after all, would they feed if anything should happen to Norwick?

    In the East, the Court of Hunger expands, like a drowning man gasping for air. Recovering from the seeming stain of Jubal the Incandescent, the typically uncoordinated brethren of this unsettling Court are uncommonly united in a seemingly singular purpose this past year.
    Sire.
    Spawn.
    SPREAD.
    Commands unuttered are nonetheless carried out as if each kindred were taken hold by some new, base instinct. In the other Courts, the siring of new fledgelings is a matter of formality, ceremony and hard won permission. For the vampires of Narfell's ragged East, it is a sudden, debilitating impulse, born at the unholy hour of their master's awakening. Á̴̛̯̟̖͎͖̮͉ͣ̍̾͑̀͐ͫ̋̎̄̓̚̕s̸̵̳̱̯͇̯̹̬̹̘͙̘͍̹̺̺͍̦̊̑̄̄̋̐̈́ͫ̅͋̆̃͑͘͞ͅͅē̋͗̽͏͚̩̥̀͜m̶̿̇̇͢͜͏͏̹̤͎̳̳̝͙͙̤̣͙̩͇̠͕ͅâ̛ͯͮ̎ͤͤ̉̀ͥ̚͜͜͏̸̙͍͓̠̜̝̠͚̠̟͈͓̙̜͕̖̰̹̹'s will, ever ineffable and unspoken, has yet never been clearer. The East is far less populated than most other regions of the country however, and one has to wonder, as numbers begin to swell where will the Court of Hunger slake its newfound thirst?

    All the while, the newly formed Coterie takes instructions from their seniors in all Courts, their venerable kindred each seeking to make use of them to aid their Court's own goals (or perhaps their own). Each command takes the new group up and down the country fulfilling requests that are sometimes conflicting, sometimes dangerous, sometimes inscrutable and obscure. Following their successful retrieval of the childe of Jubal the Incandescent, Constance, the previous year, the confused neonate has been spirited away into the 'care' of Wolfe Casement of the Court of Hunger. Though Jubal's blood now runs through the veins of the Coterie, her eldritch secrets remain locked away just out of reach. If they could only get their hands on Constance they may find answers to some of the mysteries of the woman they feasted upon in the Red Communion...

    The promises of their elders as they bid them to each new task have yet to be fulfilled. In unlife, rewards are taken, not given - the ambitious in the Coterie might look to securing their own source of food, their own territory free from the predations of their brothers and sisters, a haven from which finally, they might begin to pull strings of their own. Yet for every advancement gained, the jealous eye of mercurial peers is turned, and as they step past long serving kindred the wise would do well to beware a stake in the back.

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    OOC - As you have no doubt gathered by now, I am resuming the Crimson Crossroads plotline we ran just prior to the establishment of TOTON. In the initial work of setting up the new server I set it aside, and now I have finally gotten around to the planning to set things in motion once again for our undead cadre. We have a few players now who do not have Vampire PCs, so to start off I would like to invite those who wish to join in to take a look at the Waterdhavian Coven details in this thread, select which of the three Courts you would like to play, and please also feel free to select a sire from any of the listed pre-existing NPCs (except the three Masters).

    If you have any questions during the character creation process, please don't hesitate to PM me here or hit me up on Discord. You can see in this thread which vampires your fellow Coterie members are currently playing.

    Existing Coterie members - given the timeskip detailed above and the general designs of your Court, feel free to post in this thread (or get in touch with me privately for secret schemes) about anything specific you think your characters might have been focused on during the past year and I can work it into the upcoming narrative.
    For clarity's sake, much like how Flom handled the Moonreach plot, we will be resuming prior to the Zhentarim invasion and no doubt the course of the war will affect the undead just as it did the living...


  • Undoubtedly Agatha Wondmere has crisscrossed the paths of many of the coterie, and scholars of the paranoid arts are free to debate whether it's better to have spotted her than not at all. From her stories, shared liberally, it seems the eternal ingenue has been indulging the temptation to recreate her days of color. Agatha speaks of chandeliers and dancing, masques and exotic entertainments, and she casually name-drops a few of the more snootish mortal revelers. The glamour and gossip reveal very little in the end---and one is left to wonder whether there's any dashed meaning to it all.

    Much more quietly, the Waterdhavian transplant has been rebuilding her web of thralls and collaborators. There are the fences, crooks, and crooked guards, naturally, but Agatha has particularly sought out collectors of oddments, relics, and magical rarities. It's in their service that she's lent her nimble fingers on the winged promise of a favor owed.


  • Valeria Beaumont, meanwhile, has spent what private time she has in pouring over maps and travelling the nocturnal northern lands in search of a place to call the coterie's own. As a warrior and former vampire hunter, she focuses on the strategic aspects - a well hidden location, defensive possibilities and of course proximity to a desirable food source - although her time in the Court of Sorrows have left her also craving a certain level of style.

    Despite her unflinching facade at the various errands their elders send them on, the rest of the coterie will know full well how it chafes at her pride. Independance is on Valeria Beaumont's agenda, though she takes care to be discreet in her endeavours.


  • The jovial and psychopathic Bellamy Vadeboncoeur has, in his own private time, commanded his ghouls, familiars, and servants to abduct and capture various mortal mages, seeking necromancers and transmutationists amongst other practitioners. He has then coerced such captive mages to research the precise nature, and implications of his own blood. He has ordered them to conduct comparative studies with the blood of other, non-coterie vampires which he has collected through unspoken means. That is all in an effort to fully understand the nature of the coterie's new blood, i.e. the result of the experimental devouring of Jubal that now runs through his and his compatriots' veins. Perhaps he is a scholar after all. Or perhaps he suspects the nature of the ritual may not be entirely as it has so far seemed and was presented to them. Either way, such was his private effort in the interim.