The Murder at Room B7 – March 5th, 2024
On a rain-slicked night in Bloomsbury, the characters respond to an urgent, cryptic message from Professor Evelyn Drake of University College London, “It’s waking. We need to stop it.” Each of them arrives at the Senate House Library to find her already dead, slumped at her desk in Room B7, her body withered as if drained by something far older than mortal or fae.
The scene is a wreck: burned books, fractured symbols on the chalkboard, and a presence in the air that leaves even seasoned supernaturals unsettled. Something was stolen, a book that shouldn’t exist, and something terrible was awoken.
Ophelia, the Oracle, experiences a vision of a name she cannot retain and pockets a hidden note left by Drake.
Shepherd, the Tainted, follows the lingering scent of powerful, ancient magic. His dark Lady urges him to claim what remains of the ritual, and he proposes a binding pact to force trust among the uneasy allies.
Nightsky, the Fae, attempts to leave the scene, rattled, but is stopped by Sofia and the group’s suspicion.
Valeris, the Sworn, cold and calculating, pushes for cooperation but agrees to Shepherd’s demonic contract to ensure truth is shared.
Emilia, the Hunter, sees evidence of a magical feeding, not vampire, but something worse, and offers her safehouse as a neutral ground.
Sofia, the Cat, intercepts a hidden fae observer named Eoredon, who warns her that Morrigan Vale is watching, and implicates Nightsky by association before vanishing.
Tensions rise. Accusations are made. Trust is frayed. Yet a fragile alliance forms.
Before leaving, the group shares what they know and theorizes that Professor Drake attempted to defend herself with erasure magic, a desperate act that failed. The book she protected is gone, the ritual incomplete, and whatever she feared has already begun to spread, perhaps starting with the Withering Grove in Russell Square.
They leave the blood-soaked basement behind to regroup, not yet realizing they are already entangled in a war older than the city itself.
Russell Square – March 6th, 2024
After leaving the scene of Professor Drake’s murder, the group, tired, tense, and divided, makes their way through rain-slicked Bloomsbury toward Russell Square. The air is unnaturally cold, the streets too quiet. A brief stop at a food cart offers comfort, but even the vendor mutters, “Feels like something’s waking up.”
Upon arriving at the Withering Grove, an old fae sanctuary hidden in the square, the group finds the trees blackened, their bark split and weeping ash. The ground is dry and lifeless. A place of power has been corrupted. Sofia discovers iron filings arranged into a name: Ebonbinder, with the haunting phrase “He takes. He takes. He takes.”
The group debates whether to investigate further or retreat to Emilia’s safehouse. Before a decision is made, they are approached by Toby Graves, a clean-shaven, beautiful young man in a University of London sweatshirt, revealed to be a member of the Night Watch under Old Hank. His calm demeanor and unexpected presence raise suspicions, especially as he admits to arriving half an hour earlier and observing the scene.
Tension builds.
Toby claims to have reported both the grove’s condition and the group’s presence to his superiors.
Valeris challenges his authority and motives.
Emilia hints at the need for wider cooperation.
Sofia distrusts his composure and presses him for details, especially about a “strange rain”, one he claims carried a faint magical tang and occurred just before the grove’s death.
Toby offers little in return but a warning: “This is bad. Whatever it is, the Night Watch won’t be enough.”
The scene ends with the group preparing to leave for Emilia’s hidden safehouse to share what they know, under protection and away from prying eyes. But the damage is clear: something old and terrible has returned, and it’s already begun to spread.
Emilia’s Safehouse – March 6th, Late Night
After fleeing the unsettling scenes at both Room B7 and the corrupted grove in Russell Square, the group regathers in Emilia’s hidden Watch safehouse beneath Little Russell Street. Protected by iron, wards, and secrecy, the underground bunker offers a rare moment of quiet, and safety, to finally talk.
Tensions remain thick. The shadow of Professor Drake’s death lingers, and the missing grimoire still haunts every corner of conversation. Trust is fragile. Alliances tenuous.
Inside the bunker:
Ophelia shares the name Ebonbinder, pulled from the paper she hid in Drake’s office. She adds her unsettling sketch of a tall, shadow-wrapped figure with a crown of thorns, likely from her visions.
Sofia connects the iron filings found in the Withering Grove to the scene of the murder and confirms her suspicions that something was taken. She also voices distrust of Nightsky, and later Toby Graves, whom she found suspiciously calm and well-informed.
Valeris admits Drake had ties to the Court of Leaves, perhaps even to Queen Mabryn herself. She engages cautiously, still wary of exposing too much but acknowledging the weight of the fae’s involvement.
Nightsky, evasive as ever, speaks in layered metaphors, of wolves and forests, stories blending into allegory. But when pressed, he implies a primal, ancient entity may be the true threat… one even older than London.
Emilia grounds the conversation, pushing for clarity amid the riddles. She warns the others about the Dust Court’s movements and her growing concerns about Toby’s extremism.
Shepherd, bound by a blood pact with Valeris, finally speaks. He confirms the book taken from Room B7 is crucial to understanding what happened. He believes the magic used was not fae, but something older, reinforcing the theory that Ebonbinder is not of any current faction. He also admits a power spoke to him at the murder scene, something potent and alien.
Through it all, the group slowly begins to piece together a bigger picture:
Ebonbinder is likely the entity behind both the murder and the corruption in Russell Square.
The missing grimoire may hold the key to stopping, or understanding, this force.
Factions across the city are stirring, and even the Watch isn’t prepared.
The city itself may be caught between forest and ice, and the wrong move could tip it into oblivion.
The session ends with guarded cooperation. Truth has begun to take root, but the soil is bitter, and shadows are already growing.
Streets of Bloomsbury and Beyond – March 7th, Early Morning
Nightsky slips away from Emilia’s safehouse under cover of early morning haze, only to be followed openly by Sofia and discreetly by Valeris. He attempts a transformation, likely into an owl, but the magic falters, failing him in a moment of need. The air feels thick with consequence.
Sofia confronts him, and despite his deflection, Nightsky eventually leads her to Morrigan Vale, deep within a soot-streaked greenhouse hidden in Bloomsbury. Morrigan, enigmatic and ancient, tends to her withering garden and speaks in riddles and truths. She refuses to bargain, but confirms that Ebonbinder is a force seeking to wake something ancient and destructive, a primal Wolf, and that the cycle itself is at risk.
Nightsky offers the burned oak-bark book (taken from Drake’s study) as payment for knowledge, which Morrigan accepts only to bury it, not use it.
After Nightsky departs, Sofia stays behind, confronting Morrigan about the debt she owes to Eoredon, the fae who once spied on Nightsky. Morrigan denies using that debt now, stating that Eoredon will call it when he chooses, and when it matters most.
Meanwhile, elsewhere in Bloomsbury, Emilia accidentally wanders into Dust Court territory while seeking out wolfpacks. She’s brought before Lady Ainsworth, who tells her of the Black Vein Codex, a book of dying magicks once possessed by Professor Drake. Ainsworth offers Emilia more information, if she will retrieve a blood-written tome from the Hollow Library in exchange.
Elsewhere again, Ophelia meets with Isaac “Ink” Varney, a tattooed vampire enforcer. She learns of another victim of the Codex, Corwin, a hedge wizard who tried to rewrite fate and failed, and that Drake might have succeeded too well. Ink warns her: the name Ebonbinder is a curse, and it may already be too late.
The tension escalates: the Codex is loose, Ebonbinder moves unseen, and each player edges closer to truths that may unravel them.
Outside the Hollow Library – March 7th, Early Evening
Emilia meets the rakish changeling Puckett outside the hidden entrance to the Hollow Library in Bloomsbury. With his cryptic charm and knowing smirk, he warns her of the Library’s price: four secrets from four souls, truths never spoken aloud. Soon, Nightsky, Ophelia, and Sofia arrive, offering their own confessions (some more willingly than others), and the ancient iron door opens.
Inside, the Library shifts and breathes like a living creature. Reality bends, books whisper, and shadows stalk. They face not just illusions, but echoes of what might have been, unrealized versions of themselves, manipulated by the monstrous Librarian, a faceless avatar of forgotten stories.
The group disrupts its narrative grip with clever chaos, fake-outs, and absurdity, forcing it into a confused rage. The Library lashes out, but a staircase reveals itself, and they flee, just barely, into deeper levels.
There, Emilia locates the book they came for: a tome bound in skin and pulsing with ancestral weight, the Ainsworth volume, linked to the Dust Court’s secrets.
Though the Hollow Library lets them pass for now, it remembers their names, their stories, and the truths they didn’t speak. And it waits.
The cost has only just begun.