Last of 2025 - A Witch's Ride

Well, it's been twelve months. 

Boy howdy.

Anyhow, I'm going to take the weekends up to the New Year off, so be aware: no post next weekend. Service resumes in 2026.

I'm giving serious consideration to going to the Chaosium event in May 2026, in the UK, so if anyone wants to be the tipping point and persuade me to attend now's the time to say.

A brief story snippet based on an item found in Funk & Wagnall's Folklore: the Gandreið, aka witch's ride, which in some versions of the tradition took place at the Epiphany. Briefly, this is a feast of the dead which, if the dead attend in great numbers, signifies good fortune in the year to come. 

It can be customary to remove Christmas decorations at the Ephiphany; at the Museum of the Home in London it was customary to have a public event for exactly this purpose, though I don't know if they still do it. I liked to attend, when I was living in London. The cards, wreaths and other decorations, which would be this point be looking a little ragged, are taken out and burnt. The ceremony is accompanied by singing and festive drinking. At the Museum, of course, they didn't burn the actual decorations - those are historic - but there was a mimicry that did the same thing round an open outdoor fire.

This Bookhounds short assumes that the shop had Christmas decorations on display and are now getting rid of them, at the Epiphany. Whether or not they have a full ceremonial fire or just sweep everything in the bin on Twelfth Night is up to the players.

The Gandreið

It's an especially cold and breezy Twelfth Night this year. All the news is full of it, and people joke about another Frost Fair. A little nervously, perhaps, but they still joke. The last time the Thames froze over was over a hundred years ago, but this year seems destined to be a record-breaker so who knows? Perhaps this will be the year the Thames freezes. 

Most of the shop's regulars are out of London. The well-heeled ones are enjoying comfortable Christmases in the country, or abroad. The less fortunate are huddled at home, not wanting to risk frostbite even for a first edition. Most, bar a few die-hards, and Eliza Gatewell, who either doesn't feel the cold or doesn't let it bother her. 

Eliza is convinced there's a copy of an 1835 first edition (German, naturally) of Jacob Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie out there, and she wants it. Wants it so badly she can taste it. This is the book that, among other things, first described the witches' ride - the Gandreið. Eliza has a bit of a reputation for witchery herself; perhaps deserved, perhaps not. Perhaps that's why she wants it.

The Hounds have heard rumors of a private collection about to go up for sale which may have the elusive volume. A Bright Young Thing in need of readies to fund her Christmas drinking is dying to liquidate her late uncle's stash. The collection is in Belgravia, Westminster, as is the Bright Young Thing - temporarily, anyway, until she can clear the place and relocate somewhere a little less stuffy. The Bright Young Thing might be approachable; her Cleaner is supposed to be bribable, if the Hounds prefer a different approach. 

The question is, does the collection include Grimm's work and, if it does, can it be had for a bargain?

Option One: Bright Lights The Bright Young Thing, Melody, has her own witchery ambitions. She doesn't mind selling Grimm's work but she wants to know who she's selling to, and Eliza is keen that her name not be associated with the purchase. Melody has her own means of finding out secrets and if the Hounds aren't careful she'll find out who the buyer is. That could go poorly for Eliza; Melody and her Nightgaunt allies could come calling on Epiphany. Melody doesn't mind a good deal, but she shan't tolerate a witch rival.

Option Two: Twelfth Night. The Bright Young Thing is clueless as to the book's true value. Eliza could pick the thing up for a mere nothing. However, the cleaner, Mrs. Karswell, worked all her life for that miserly uncle and all she got out of it was a small legacy. Mrs. Karswell was hoping to liquidate the uncle's collection herself, or at least the best bits of it. After all, the Bright Young Thing's clueless as to the true value of the collection, or even what's in it. This would be the easiest fraud ever, were it not for the Hounds and their client. Now Mrs. Karswell and her Rough Lad friends need to tread carefully and snatch the thing before the sale, or that pretty little Christmas bonus she was counting on will vanish like a witch's promise.

Option Three: The Gandreið. The dead uncle isn't as dead as he's supposed to be. In fact, the old fellow, a longtime amateur practitioner of witchcraft, became a Ghoul, aided and abetted in the deception by his devoted servant Mrs. Karswell. The uncle, Stephen Norwich, expected to be able to carry on as before, only with a little more subterfuge, after his ghoulish transformation. He wasn't expecting to be declared dead by a rapacious niece, nor was he expecting his collection to be sold off to pay for the niece's Christmas hullaballoo. Now he wants his books back, and he doesn't much care how he does it. He'll need new digs, too; his Belgravia apartments are off limits. Perhaps he can kill two birds with one stone and occupy the Hounds' shop? New management, that's the ticket. After all, reasons Norwich, even if my bank account's been pilfered by relatives and my apartment's being lived in by a regrettably high-profile Bright Young Thing who can't be murdered quietly, I still have Magick on my side, as well as a ghoul's appetite. What Hound could resist a little light extortion? Especially at Christmas?

That's it for this year! Enjoy!   

Christmas Clippings (Bookhounds of London)

 

Extra History

Big fan of that channel. Loved it ever since the Extra Credits early days at the Escapist.

This week's post is inspired be the bit at about 6.50 in, where the conversation turns to clippings from magazines preserved by eager children. 

The magazines would have been 1850-60ish. Fast forward about 70 years and those children are in their dotage, fondly remembering Christmas Past and looking forward, with some uncertainty, to Christmas Future. Probably very near future, in some cases.

Lest Old Acquaintance Be Forgot

There's a sudden uptick in demand for magazines published c. 1850-ish. Heavy on the ish. The magazines need to be in pristine condition to get the real money, but there's a demand even for the indifferent stuff. Given that the magazines in question weren't made to last, indifferent is the standard rather than the exception. 

The Hounds soon discover that this demand comes from the four grandchildren of Oliver Packer, a noted occultist and enquirer into the uncanny. The Hounds may even have relied on Oliver's expertise from time to time. While he doesn't go on adventures anymore, (not with his lumbago), in his day he was quite the active rogue. 

Technicolor: Oliver spent several seasons exploring Egypt's mysteries and his house is practically a museum, filled with peculiar antiquities.

 

Arabesque: Oliver is (and was) an explorer of the ghostly byways of old London and knows more about the hidden side of the city than any two other people.

Sordid: It's said Oliver bargained for his longevity with hideous creatures that dwell beneath the Thames, making who knows what kind of sacrifice.

The grandchildren, Thomas, Alice, Quentin and Prunella (aka the Prune), are jockeying for position. Each of them thinks they might be the one to inherit Oliver's fortune and are sucking up to the old boy. One of them hit on the idea of presenting him with a collection of his favorite magazines from his childhood, and are using an old bound collection of Christmas clippings as a means of identifying the magazines he read as a child. Once one of them had the idea the other three copied it, and now they're all chasing after Oliver's past in hope of presenting him with the perfect Christmas present. 

However, while they can identify most of the magazines (and have bought up reams of the stuff) the one thing they can't identify is something called the Barchester Sampler, apparently published between 1848 and 1853. The illustrations purloined from the Sampler are among the most evocative, and the grandchildren are keen to complete the set. Can the Hounds help?

Option One: Barchester Bull. There's no such town as Barchester. It's a creation of Anthony Trollope, who used it in his Chronicles. However, what the grandchildren don't realize is that Oliver's father, Roger, was an amateur artist and printer who created the fictional Sampler for his son. Oliver, who is no fool, knows full well what his grandchildren are up to, and encourages this snipe hunt as a means of teaching them a lesson. However, there are plenty of unscrupulous people out there - possibly including the Hounds - willing to forge a magazine or two if it will get them easy money.

Option Two: Barchester Dreams. While Trollope created Barchester, young Oliver extended it. In his youth he was a Dreamer and made regular forages into the imaginary landscape of England, including Barchester. Oliver brought back the magazine scraps in his wanderings. Oliver has been trapped on the mortal side of the Gate of Dreams for some time, thanks to a ward put up by his enemies in Dreamland. However, if someone else can make the trip across the veil they might be able to bring back a complete set of the Sampler. Or even get Oliver back into Dreamland again ...

Option Three: Barchester Nightmares. There is no such place as Barchester. Not unless you're prepared to make certain sacrifices while travelling in Somerset, where Trollope drew much of his inspiration. Oliver learned the trick years ago; it was one of the first magickal rituals he created, in his younger days when he was full of vinegar and willing to take all sorts of chances. Oliver learned it was possible to cross from mortal realm to fictional one, but the fictional world isn't the kind of place you want to spend a lot of time in. Shadows gather there. Things which ought not be hide between the pages. Oliver soon abandoned this particular ritual but it can be recreated, by someone reckless and willing to try any kind of blasphemy. It will be even easier if they have that bound volume of Christmas clippings ...  

That's it for this week. Enjoy!

Drunken Zoogs (Bookhounds/Trail of Cthulhu)

 

Sourced from NBC News

You can't tell me about a drunk trash panda and not expect me to use that material.

Besides, it's December, which is basically silly season.

Tricky Taxonomy

Written as Bookhounds but could easily be transposed to a different setting.

Your Hounds open the shop one day to find the place an absolute mess. Liquor's all over the floor; someone got into someone's booze supply. The devastation does at least make it easy to trace the culprit, passed out in one of the offices (or lavatory): a small, hairy creature unlike anything anyone's ever seen. Possibly some rare breed of fox? Or an animal escaped from someone's private collection of exotics? 

Physically the thing is about the size of a smallish housecat, with very prominent and evocative eyes. Its brown hairy body is somewhat ratlike, and its mouth is full of razor-sharp teeth. It could be mistaken for a raccoon by someone who has never seen a raccoon in real life which, if this is Bookhounds, is entirely possible; Londoners don't have much opportunity to see North American wildlife. Even zoos don't keep anything as common as a raccoon, not when there are penguins and tigers to entertain the public.

The liquor, if (for plot or character reasons) it doesn't belong to the Hounds, belongs to one of the staff. They've been hiding it and drinking on the sly during working hours. This staff member is very determined to ensure the Hounds don't figure out whose booze it is.

The creature, when it wakens, has a hideous hangover and will not want to move anywhere for a while. However, it is wild and will lash out if provoked. If forced off the premises, it hangs round, because it has nowhere else to go. This may mean it takes up residence on the roof, probably somewhere near the chimney or in the attic since it's cold outside. If encouraged to stay it is relatively tame, has tidy toilet habits and eats meat with the voracious enthusiasm of a starving weasel. It will bite if given the opportunity, or cause.

Identifying the creature is a problem. Consulting texts in the shop (Biology, History, Outdoorsman) identifies several possibilities, none of which are native to the UK. Maybe it escaped from someone's collection? 

Consulting Mythos texts will find descriptions of a similar creature: the Zoog, an inhabitant of the Dreamlands. A relatively intelligent inhabitant ... 

Option One: Dreams Made Real Someone connected with the shop - either a Hound or someone who's there regularly, like a customer or a staff member - is a Dreamer. They may not know it. Their dream life may be entirely separate from their waking existence. However, their dreams are beginning to break through into the waking world and this Zoog is merely the first sign of a weakening membrane. The focal point is that comfortable armchair tucked away in a corner of the shop, where they stop to slumber for a minute or two now and again.  That chair, and its immediate environs, is becoming a little too close to the Enchanted Wood where the Zoogs live. The Hounds can find this out if they notice the fresh shoots and plants springing up on and around the chair.

Option Two: Moving Right Along The Zoog is from a collection of exotics. This is the star attraction of Professor Phlogiston's Palace of Delights. The Professor, aka Morton Polk, is a Boston native who's brought his collection across the water and, as luck would have it, he's taken up residence not that far from the Hound's shop. His landlady is at her wit's end trying to keep her house in some semblance of order, with all these creatures roaming the place. Polk wants his star attraction back at almost any cost, but he's allergic to spending money. Breaking and entering is more his cup of tea.

Option Three: The Perils of Publication The Zoog escaped from the Dreamlands via a text that the Hounds recently acquired. This text is sitting in the back room while the Hounds work out how much it's worth, and the Zoog is actually one of the illustrations. The Hounds can work out which illustration because now there's just a blank space where it used to be. However, the Zoog isn't the only illustration in that book; there's all sorts of peculiar creatures described, and the Zoog is bright enough to know how to get the others off the page and into reality - if given half a chance ... 

That's it for this week. Enjoy!