If you like you can look at the (sketchy, incomplete) GM notes as well.

The News

ETERNITY

THE REIGN OF AMITY (Frances Hardinge)

Having put the unpleasentness aside, Amity set about making preparations to wed Christopher Columna in an act of reconciliation to Crace's line. Christopher, however, was kidnapped on the night of the wedding. Fortunately, Amity was able to track him down with the aid of her Court Wizard. She located him tied up in a room of mirrors and rescued him, no harm having been done, or so she believed. The wedding went ahead as planned, with Count Titiphus being the one to give the bride away. Between them they became full fae, the effect of the Kingdom itself having adopted them, and raised several children who went on to be educated by a number of the Riverview's most famous clientelle. During these years Darla joined her in the land of the fae and learned of the Tales from her. It was only a number of years later that it was reveled that Veilia Conraed has been using a spell on Amity which enabled who to experience all that she felt. The spell, after some effort was broken by her court Wizard.

Amity is also believed to have aided Armand Carrack in his investigations into what became known as "Titiphusgate". A number of scandalous secrets about the aristocracy were revealed, albeit over a number of months. The knock-on effect being that the Upper City was cleansed of its former corruption; to his credit, Cornelius Dalcrow seemed to have repented of his old ways and actively backed the campaign to clean up the nobility, declaring that unless the lords and ladies of Horizon turned back to the old virtues of the Second Age they would lose any right they had to their privileges.

Amity's re-education of Christine Columna continued and she was eventually able to settle down and marry a nice young man, providing Amity with several nieces and nephews.

Over the years the distinction between Treacherous and True Lands became less distinct. This was heightened by Amity's setting up of a number of Fae embassies in the True Nations. Considerate but cautious diplomatic relations developed and ordinary people developed a greater acceptance of all things Fae.

For the first few months of her reign, Amity managed to thwart Dracion's attempts to regain his power by convincing the Queen to distract in with geases, games and quests. She also sent the Queen an adorable little maze with which to play with her new pet in as a gift, much to Dracion's humiliation. However, after time Dracion regained some of his former power and was able to return to the world, forty years of time having past in the True Lands. As Midsummer Monarch he became an increasingly integral part of the fae kingdom, eventually resulting in a situation where the Queen and Amity ruled in winter and Dracion and Neltharion in summer. During the summer months Amity would travel out into the Kingdom - and even into the wider world - and rumours started up of a mysterious saint-like figure who would go about doing good works, although these became increasingly obtuse over the years.

The parties of Count Titiphus returned. Rumours abounded of individuals receiving invitations mysteriously, along with packets of Fairy Dust and instructions on how to use it. The parties were rumoured to be greatest, the world had ever known and even after the death of the Count they continued on in his name, the Count having eccentrically bequeathed his title to a fairy in his will. Count Titiphus himself passed away peacefully of old age, having lived a considerably long life. His last words were rumoured to be ones of pride at the woman he had come to regard as a daughter.

THE VICTORY OF ARMAND CARRACK (John Reynolds)

Carrack's relentless campaigning also saw an end for Prosperity as the "aristocracy's party". Exposing the corruption at the top, Carrack allowed Prosperity to fall into the hands of Virros, who proceeded to transform it into a more respectably conservative party.

Carrack's other great achievement was in working with Mayor Hess to clip the heels of the bloated, bureacratic and hopelessly corrupt Watchdogs. By the time d'Avenant became Mayor, the Watchdogs had become a police force, not a mob.

THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION OF BERNARD HAYES-MORTON (Mark Booth)

With the explosion of companies using Grey technology in Horizon the Horizon Steam Distribution Company became enormously profitable, and with this and his investments in Vegdarbarra Hayes-Morton rapidly became the richest man in the world. He never forgot, however, that as Gilbert Isambard he owed loyalty to Inmack and the Boys, and he helped the Boys weather the storm of the Hess regime.

THE RETIREMENT OF SERGEANT BILKO (Rich Griffin)

He remained loyal to his mother in law, Mayor Hess, and ensured her political safety until after a vote of no confidence from the four nations (brought about by the actions of Michael d'Avenant) forced her from office, after which she took up a position in the now fairly reputable and cleaned-up watchdogs. Bilko's political career in Prosperity thrived and although he never became party leader he always had a lot of support amongst the members and eventually moved into politics full time, resigning from the Horse Guards to concentrate on government. He always professed sensible reforms and most people listened when he spoke.

Five years after his marriage to Jennifer Hess, the two of them had their first child, Jonathan Bilko, who, at the age of 5, began replacing money in his fathers wallet with play money. (Despite the necessary scolding, secretly Bilko was proud!) In the next decade they had two more children, Janine and Benton. Jonathan joined the watchdogs, rose through the ranks remaining popular with all the men, and eventually became head of the Horse Guards. Janine married a wealthy steam factory owner, while Benton emigrated to the UFS and ran a prosperous supply firm following in his father's footsteps.

He and his wife settled down while the children were young although wild schemes were usually going on in the background, supplying "unusual" items for Titiphus's parties and the like. (It was his continued efforts to keep his supply business going that usually ended him up back in the Doghouse each year without fail.) His wife never seemed to mind too much however. She got herself into her own trouble every now and then. Always fond of the odd tipple, and with the Riverview no longer around, she was "escorted" home by Bilko on a number of occasions from numerous establishments until the arrival of her first child when she became a somewhat responsible character.

Bilko and wife eventually retired in Jurica where the weather suited them and where they had shared a very happy honeymoon all those years ago. Looking back on his life and schemes Bilko realised in the end that the Big Payout he had always been hunting for was his family – and he'd got it.

And the story would have ended there – if it hadn't been for Jonathan Bilko. Jonathan had a son called David who too went on to join the Loyal Order of Hounds and then the Mayorial Legions (much like his great-grandmother) rising to the rank of Captain – and a respected one at that. After Michael III was overthrown by the Sternos Invasion it looked like they were never going to leave… Until, that is, David organised a meeting, uneasy as it was, between the remainder of the government and the Sternos contingent. He put before them a proposition that seemed to the Sternoses to be to good to be true... but after signing they were pointed at a loophole (a certain fuzziness as to which *side* of the Mountains of Dusk a certain paragraph referred to) which meant they had effectively agreed to leave the city and never return. Hailed as a hero, David was made next leader of Horizon.

THREE CHEERS FOR KING BILKO!

THE FURY AND DOWNFALL OF CHRISTINE "CRACE" COLUMNA (Jen Spencer, H1)

Within a few years Frost, still pursuing Crace, arrived in the Kingdom of the Fae. In order to defeat her he had to reduce her influence over the Queen, and began rallying the Fae against the malaise that had overtaken their Kingdom. Soon there were two Courts of the Queen of the Fae, ruled by Crace and Frost as Prime Ministers, who fought a war for the Kingdom and the heart of the Queen. In 4018 HR Crace sent the more human of her children, Chrisopher Columna, out into Horizon to garner support for her cause among those of Fae blood, and to wreak her revenge on all Horizon. He took the name Christopher Anseer, and began infiltrating the Family...

The war in the Fae Kingdom only ended with the death of Frost in 4021 HR, as a result of complicated manoveurs involving Chrisopher, Amity, Emily Kellor, and a party. Within months, though, Amity had set up another court to rival Crace, with Crace's much - abused children betraying her to join Amity. This time the war took the form of a deadly game of Tales, a game with the fates of Malthus Kilburn and Armand Carack, with the Kingdom of the Fae at stake. Crace lost, and submitted to Amity's authority. She was imprisoned with her retainer Lendolayze. During the day he is forced to take the form of Crace's long-dead brother Alric, and dominates her; by night he takes his own form, and the roles are reversed. Thus the two torture each other down the long centuries...

THE SECRETS OF DARLA (Aileen Robertson)

THE FALL AND RISE OF DRACION (Henners)

It had felt, to him, like only a few months in the Fairy Kingdom - but it was forty years in Horizon before he returned. Learning that Lorenzo had died of old age in the intervening time, thus cheating him of vengeance, Dracion flew into a rage, killing Lorenzo's lover Quince at the launch of Lorenzo's memoirs - ensuring that folk would talk more of the terrible dragon which attacked the book launch than of the book itself.

He was, however, able to re-establish himself. There were those who feared the Undying Wyrm's wrath - old underlings of his, fairy dust addicts who had encountered him in the Fairy Kingdom, those who the Queen had sent him against in vegeance for crimes against fairy - who had ensured that a seat was kept for him in the Goodly Chamber, and the spectacle of a small dragon berating the New Chamber was spoken of worldwide. Brother Rufus, meanwhile, the Crocodile Who Became a Dragon, was in the process of infiltrating and taking over the Dockyard Rats, and Dracion soon took the opportunity to become a shadowy power behind Rufus's throne.

Through all this, he rose in the Queen's estimation. First he was a stupid pet... then a funny pet... then her favourite pet in all the world. A new tradition took root, that of the Midsummer Monarch, when Dracion would take his man-form and rule over Fairy for midsummer. It was needed, for Dracion provided an important splinter of the Divine in a court which constantly risked being overtaken by Grey influences.

Bit by bit, the Midsummer Monarch became a more and more central feature of the Court... until eventually, the Queen succumbed to him, and the nature of fairy changed forever. In the reign of Summer, King Dracion and Prince Neltharion would rule the kingdom, and the Queen and Amity would go forth and be one with the land, nourishing it, protecting it when the King committed follies, and being the very essence of Summer. In Winter, the Queen and Amity would return to rule, and Dracion and Neltharion would be pets once more - although in a place of honour, reminders of the vital, Divine Summer to come after the Greyness of Winter. At the equinoxes of Spring and Autumn, the Queen and King would consummate their union.

Whilst the ascension of Dracion to King of Fairyland was of concern to some, he seemed satisfied - certainly, it was less of a disaster than him becoming a God, and he seemed to have brought balance to the land of Fae. So, reluctantly, the successors of Partario, Sternos, Lt. Roberts and the other founders of the Global Defence Initiative let them be, rather than risk a war in fairyland.

THE EXILE OF ERISTOPHELES THE BLACK (ALSO KNOWN AS SOPHITIA) (Jen Spencer)

It was as late as 4068 HR when explorers found a previously unknown human colony in the Treacherous Lands. Small and feeble as it was, it styled itself the Kingdom of Darkness, and was ruled over by a clan who took the name "the Black". A regular target for the less competent adventurers, the Kingdom and its Doom-laden rulers persist to this day.

THE END OF FROST (Chris Venus, H1)

Eventually, Frost's eyes rotted in his head, and were replaced by his court wizard with twin stars. Twenty years later, the banishment of Grandma Kellor - the esoteric force that ensured Emily Kellor's hold over her family - would find its Fairy reflection in the disappearance of Frost's wizard. The starlight that was his eyes dimmed and vanished; thus crippled, he was no longer an acceptable Prime Minister of Fae, and the Fairy Queen soon put him out of his misery at one of Count Titiphus's parties.

THE FLIGHT OF JOAN MARKAN (Briony Lea)

THE ROYAL END OF KLAUS VON JAEGER (ALSO KNOWN AS JIM MORDEN) (Mark Jenkins)

By the time of Klaus' death in 4079 HR, the country was well on the way to becoming a stable, prosperous, constitutional monrachy, which was ruled for many generations by a popular von Jaeger family. Successful in political life, Klaus was also happy in his private life, devoting himself to his wife Jessica, and their children and grandchildren.

THE GOLDEN YEARS OF LORENZO AL-SHIRAZ (Helen Burt)

Meanwhile, Lorenzo also did voluntary work for Partario's Global Defence Initiative, and although he was never entirely trusted he did help contain Dracion for the forty years. He also proved an adept tutor of Amity's children, teaching them the ways of alchemy, clockworking, and demolitions.

Miles Basey's failure to grasp monogamy proved fatal to his and Lorenzo's relationship, and for a time Lorenzo despaired of finding his true love. He distracted himself by creating a Clocker child he could tutor and nurture, and eventually found a fulfilling relationship with William Quince, a Tyler of the Strict Clockworkers. Their attempts to teach Apost-HAL to be more human were, sadly, rebuffed by that entity's contempt for emotions and feelings.

His memoirs, published towards the end of his life, were derided as "turgid, pretentious, poncy rubbish" by critics, but gained much popular appeal - especially after the feared Dracion took his revenge...

THE TWILIGHT YEARS OF MALTHUS KILBURN (Ann Napier)

THE TRUE STORY OF MICHAEL D'AVENANT (Joe Crawford)

Now, it just so happened that Michael was marked out for favour by the goddess Illaria. It certainly wasn't for anything he'd done. Perhaps one of his ancestors had done her a favour. Perhaps it was just a divine whim. Whatever it was, it meant that strange and slightly spooky events had a habit of following him around. When he lost his watch, a black cat returned it. A servant spoke ill of him, and immediately afterwards lost his voice. It gave him a bit of a reputation for weirdness. Gods can be bastards like that.

Michael had no idea why this was. He wasn't interested in theology; he preferred hob-nobbing with naval officers and beating up his younger brother. But Christopher was a clever, bookish little chap, and he started taking notes on the exact nature of his brother's "little quirks", and finally he worked out their probable source. So he faked up some rather amateurish cult equipment; papier-mache idols and whatnot, the sort of thing that a teenager who thought it was cool to worship the forbidden gods might clump together. He waited for the next major bout of weirdness. Then he planted them in Michael's room. Little brothers can be bastards like that.

Baron D'Avenant and his household priest put two and two together. All Michael's strange, spooky bits of good fortune now made sense; he was plainly a cultist of Ilaria. The matter was hushed up, of course; it just wouldn't do to throw a noble of the blood to the ghouls. But, as the baron explained to Michael, he would have to be disinherited. The last thing they wanted was for House D'Avenant to attract the attention of the gods.

Michael was furious. He stormed away to his ship, resolving to leave Horizon and live as a gentleman privateer until he could clear his name. But privateering is never very gentlemanly, even at the best of times, and within a few years Michael's principles had been compromised more often than the security of the DCH. He ran illicit cargoes. He made unprovoked raids on foreign shipping. He fell in with the Rope-Bound Brotherhood, crossed a band of Jurican corsairs, and developed an expensive drug habit. Soon he was just another pirate captain, albeit a successful one who cultivated a rather absurd image of gentility. When Baron D'Avenant died, and Christopher took his place, it was widely assumed that Michael was dead - or, at the very least, that he would never return.

However, in the year 4020 HR Michael D'Avenant returned, moving his base of operations back into Horizon and setting up residence with his ill-gotten gains. He quickly established a reputation for himself within the Rats for piracy and weapons smuggling. He further established his reputation with his invaluable efforts in taking the trade district from the Inmacks boys. When Mahmoud died, Michaels support for Quickpistol as leader of the brotherhood and later of the rats, expanded his power base enormously and saw him rising to right hand man of the head of the Dockyard Rats. It was during this time that the city was subjected to a series of acts of terror by HPLF extremists, to assist against these acts, Michael switched his piratical activities to honest food trading to assist Horizon in its hour of need.

During the time of the election Michael attempted to become friends with and assist the Mogul in order to further expand his powerbase, unfortunately the Mogul was murdered by Velia Conraed at the command of the emperor, so Michael moved his support to the Merchant who was likewise unfortunately assassinated by the HPLF with the aid of Sophitia.

It was at this point that his arch rivals, the Jurican corsairs came back onto the scene, challenging d'Avenant to a piracy race, which d'Avenant won by raiding the Corsairs ship as it pulled into harbour, an act which lost him considerable respect with the honourable Rats and won him kudos with the pragmatic Rats.

It was at this point that Illaria decided to make an appearance again. For Dracion, a rising member of Jude's Concern, had of late been performing cruel acts upon kittens in rituals to steal spells from the goddess. One of these such acts involved the removal of a cat's paw, an act which infuriated Illaria immensely; and so, she sought revenge. She approached d'Avenant and told him that If he could deliver Dracion's hand to her she would kill his brother for him and replace his will with anything Michael wanted. And so the deal was struck, Michael had Dracion's hand removed by Joan Markan and in return his brother was clawed to death and a false will put in place, admitting that it was Christopher's fault that Michael had been disinherited and that Christopher was leaving all his property and title to Michael, so as to return what was rightfully his. This inheritance Michael gladly received, becoming Baron Michael D'Avenant and moving into his family mansion within the Noble district.

At the outbreak of war with Vegdarbarra, Michael became a privateer and greatly assisted Horizon's war while deepening his pockets at the same time. With the decline in the war Michael joined forces with Lieutenant Roberts and Partario in a fight against the evil of the Grey Order, causing the old regime's imprisonment and replacement by Patario.

At this point d'Avenant's star was rising, as was his power within the Rats, and simultaneously Quickpistol was proving more and more of a liability - and so d'Avenant got his friend drunk with spiked rum, then while he was in such a state challenged him to a duel and shot him, thus promoting himself to head of the Brotherhood and shortly afterwards, in agreement with the heads of the other factions, Virros and Dracion, declared himself head of the Dockyard Rats.

With the disappearance of Mayor Wright d'Avenant stood for election as the next Mayor, unfortunately losing by a single vote to Hess. However, with the Democratic Party decrying the skewed nature of the voting Michael was able to use his power and connections within the Goodly Chamber to impose his own policies on Horizon in competition with Hess, and within three years the crisis came to a head, Michael caused Hess to lose a confidence vote in the New Chamber, and d'Avenant was elected Mayor. He served in this capacity for many glorious years, during which he many a glorious act of heroism (thus strengthening his public support). He fathered three children with his lovely Irgarim wife, the eldest of which was named after him.

Unfortunately, Illaria did not forget Michael's betrayal of her cult to the Sternoses, and so she whispered in the ears of his eldest, eventually she striking a deal with Michael Jr., one similar to the deal with his father: she would Kill Michael Sr. and change his will to whatever Junior so desired in exchange for his undying faith to her. And so the sixty-five year old Michael D'Avenant was smothered to death in his bed by cats. His death was of great sadness to the entire city and a day of mourning was held in his honour.

It was shortly after this that his will was discovered in which he stated that he would hand all property and title over to his eldest son and the will went on to urge the Moot of Years to declare his son King Michael II. The common people of Horizon by now were so devoted to d'Avenant that they gladly made his son monarch, and began talking about Michael Senior as if he'd been a king all along. And so the d'Avenant dynasty began, a dynasty which lasted the next two generations until it was overthrown by the Sternos Invasion.

THE LONG DEATH OF MOEBIUS COLUMNA (Ivan Alaiz, H1)

THE FINAL ADVENTURE OF BARON MONTAGUE (Francis Travers, H1)

THE LAST MISSION OF PARTARIO (Chris Venus)

Partario was a Grey Salesman and the Order's technical wizard. He singlehandedly discovered the existence of a sixth kind of Essence, Grey Essence. He invented the Grey Armour. And he discovered, on his own, the Grey Order's darkest secret: the existence of a trapped God within the Citadels of Steam.

When the Order found that Partario had learned what he had, he was swiftly promoted through the ranks in order that this information be protected. Unfortunately for the Order, this then meant that the idealistic alchemist now came face to face with the Grey Order's greedy and corrupt Commanders. Outraged by the Order's decision to prolong the Vegdarbarran war in order to sell their weapons to both sides, Partario led a coup within the Order assisted by Micheal d'Avenant and Lt. Roberts.

Partario had, however, no time to lead the Order; his alchemy had led him to discover that the Grey was becoming an essence of its own right, and to fear that it would consume the world. His investigations into the world's ultimate fate caused him to conclude that the dominance of any of the six Powers over the others would result in catastrophe.

In response, in the years after the appointment of Maria Hess to Mayor, Partario would forge a breakaway group, the Global Defense Initiative, within the Grey Order. The Initiative consisted of a few core people: most prominently Malthus Kilburne, Lt. Roberts, Lorenzo, and a cadre of Sternosses. The group used a combination of alchemy, sorcery and firepower to seek out imbalances within the world and destroy them.

The GDI enjoyed several successes: most notably, they managed to remove the Autumn Princess from common knowledge. With her name and legend dead, the Princess's Divine Self starved, and she died unmourned and unremembered in the basement of Horizon's Asylum. In HR 4068, there was uproar in Lasinia as Daniel Priestley came close to ascending to godhood as the Iron God of Communism, but he was stopped in his tracks by a GDI strike team.

Under Partario's leadership, the Order shed its rituals and anonymity, and became a legal, public company. Despite a long-standing battle, the Order was never able to persaude the Strict Clockworkers to make their secrets public. Beginning in 4023 HR, the Order's holdings in Horizon were subject to a sustained campaign of vandalism, theft, mugging, kidnapping, threats and assassination, and upon d'Avenant's institution as Mayor, the Order were kicked unceremoniously out of Horizon; the true reason for this was never fully explained, but sources close to d'Avenant believed that he was still bitter over Partario's voting for Hess in the elections.

Partario's death is still a matter of confusion, largely because it was never really announced. In his later years, the alchemist became more and more paranoid about a "monster with his face", eventually withdrawing from the world entirely to live in a private suite in the Citadel of Steam; until in HR 4095, long after he should have died, he was seen making farewells in the Citadel and then leaving on a pair of heavily modified clockwork wings, claiming that "he would return with details of what he found on the outside". He has never been seen since.

THE SECRET HISTORY OF PENELOPE "BOB" WEISS (Joe Williams, H1)

The Crone presented Weiss with a rope, and she knew what she had to do. The next morning the guards found Weiss's cell vacant, with an empty noose hanging from the ceiling. Some time after, the first tales of the Whore, new avatar of Lacrymosa, began to circulate....

THE LEGACY OF STERNOS (Joe Williams)

Throughout all the works of Sternoses, the original Sternos Alpha's drive for justice shone through. In Horizon, this manifested in their purging of corruption from the Watchdogs, followed by a sustained attempt to drive the mobs from the city. While these efforts made leaps forward under Mariana Hess, they were consistently blocked by Mayor Michael D'Avenant and his successor King Micheal II. Thus the Sternoses were the main driving force in the decades-long battle between the Watchdogs and the D'Avenant rulers of Horizon. It was also the Sternoses that finally ended that battle; biding their time until they felt they could strike without plunging the city into chaos, and calling on numerous reinforcements from their Treacherous Lands colonies, in 4147 HR they rose up against the corrupt government of King Michael III and destroyed it, executing him after a full trial for numerous charges of corruption.

It was at this time that the original Sternos Alpha met his final destruction. Fuelled by two nations full of his clones and a worldwide network of followers, Sternos Alpha was found to on the verge of ascending to a position as God of Justice, spurred further on by his clones' elimination of the King of Horizon. The imminent ascension was detected by the sorcerers of the Sternos community, and the more Star aligned of Sternos-kind tore their progenitor apart before he could betray his own original ideals, thereby saving the world from the appearance of another malicious god.

Immediately following the Sternos revolution, the Nation of Sternos was persuaded to sign a contract for the safety of the city. The contract, drawn up by one David Bilko (who later became king) turned out to be a devious text which committed the Sternoses to departing beyond the Moutains of Dusk into what had once been the Treacherous Lands. Bilko was generous enough to sell the Sternoses a number of second-hand cart parts and slightly used horses to help them leave - all at a bargain price. Ever creatures of their word, the Nation of Sternos did indeed leave Horizon in 4147 HR and joined their bretheren in Adhania. Thereafter, a large region of what had once been the Treacherous Lands became the country of machines, and in particular the Nation of Sternos. The Sternoses tended not to stray from the borders of the Nation - the fate of Sternos Alpha, and the semi-regular appearance of powerful Star shamen amongst them, made them realise that in the interests of the balance they had come to serve they needed to sally forth only in times of great need.

The Bilko Contract only let one Sternos clone remain in Horizon: the one who lived with the clockwork replicas of the original Sternos family, in the Ghoul Quarter. They can still be found there to this day, living out the life they were denied by Sternos Alpha's passionate Star shamanism, happy and united, forever.

THE LATE CAMPAIGNS OF GREY COMMANDER ROBERTS (Stuart Jenkins)

THE EMBERS OF ROSE (Tracey Gent)

Finally, she and her husband were blessed with three children, all of whom sported striking red hair and matching eyes. The eldest, named Jonah after his father, developed a sucessful career in the Horizon theatre and later in the rest of the Four Nations. He was often compared to the legendary Joakhim al-Bahrad but maintained a style of acting that was very much his own; he was also notorious amongst his co-stars for his frequent tantrums backstage. The second, Catherine, was frequently unemployed and spent most of her time living off her brother's wages. She is said to have wandered off into the Treacherous Lands at the age of 21 and never returned. The youngest, Matthew, was best known for having caused a mass riot in the Slums. Having sparked off the violence by spreading dissent against the Watchdogs, he ended up leading a violent protest in which over fifty people were killed or injured. He was finally shot down by Watchdog forces in the midst of his rampage, who later remarked on the stange resemblance his body bore to that of the late Carlos Hernandez (aka Lucrecious Corinth).

Late in her life Rose was responsible for writing an inflammatory pamphlet remarking on the considerable injustice of the city of Horizon. She sparked off a short-lived uprising and was hunted down by the Arcanum Guard, who chased her to the edge of the - by now long-cooled - lake of fire on the Vegdarrbarran border. She dived into a crevice leading deep down into the lava which had once filled the lake, and presumably she could not possibly have survived.

THE OBSESSION OF VELIA CONRAED (Tamsin Mehew)

For many years, Velia lived in her Treacherous Lands home as a grieving recluse. Travellers in that part of the world periodically reported glimpsing a shape that resembled Christopher Columna in the house, although he was always verifiably elsewhere at the time, so these sightings remain unexplained. Happiness was only to enter Velia's life at its conclusion, predictably enough resulting in trauma for someone else. A teenage son of Christopher and Amity, travelling the Treacherous Lands, had the ill-luck to stumble upon Velia's home one bright summer's afternoon in 4056 HR. He vanished. When his frantic mother and father eventually tracked him down it was winter. They found the boy, naked but apparently unharmed, gibbering in a beautifully decorated bedchamber, handcuffed to a bed. The now aged Velia was also laid in the bed, recently deceased, with an expression of complete happiness on her face.

Velia was also responsible for stealing, and later giving the peace of death to, the remains of Moebius Columna.

VIRROS AND THE OCEAN'S REVENGE (Joe Robbins)

After the vote of no confidence in Mayor Hess just a few short years after her election, Michael d'Avenant was elected. Despite Prosperity and the DPH not always seeing eye to eye, Virros and d'Avenant had a good partnership from their time in the Rats together, and Virros continued to offer advice to Mayor d'Avenant, and then his son, for the next 40 years.

Meanwhile, Virros ran Shoreleave House perhaps better than anyone had ever run it before. The women were more empowered and had better conditions than in any other organisation; after the incident with the Whore in the Family establishments many girls moved over to the Rats where Virros welcomed them in. EasyGirl continued to thrive and had outlets across much of the city. Virros' Girls had a reputation and no body ever dared crossed them.

Virros was always known as the man with a lot of knowledge and that continued throughout his carreer. He gained more "friends" in more organisations and across more of the city than perhaps even the government. His network stretched like a web across the city; it was said by some that he knew more lies, truths and secrets than even the Ocean.

After Dracion's disappearance, Jude's Concerne was taken over by Judith Betts, sister of Richard Betts. From the start Judith and Virros got along and, as had been agreed under Dracion, d'Avenant and Virros, the Long Duel remained unfought and the three leaders kept a peace between themselves. The Rats continued to prosper in the Docks benefiting from the new order of things; not suffering too much under Mayor Hess and positively thriving under Mayor d'Avenant.

7 years after Betts took over the Concern, she suffered a mysterious accident as happens in such leadership roles. The crocodile-turned-dragon named Rufus took over leadership. Virros became spymaster for the Rats and worked with Rufus as well as he had with Betts.

40 years after Dracion's disappearance, Rufus moved to take more full control of the Rats - with the aid of a certain sorcerous ally thought long-dead. Virros, now fairly old, let him and continued as his Spymaster. Realising that Dracion and Rufus were working together, Virros conspired to keep certain secrets from Rufus -at least until he could flush out and deal with Dracion. However, this plan backfired when somehow Rufus discovered that Virros had been acting in bad faith. Maybe Virros had gone senile in his ghoulish old age and told someone something he hadn't meant to tell, or maybe the Ocean revealed something for Virros's apostacy all those years ago. In any case, Rufus was not happy and exacted his revenge upon Virros. Transforming into his dragon form, he dragged Virros out over the Ocean (despite the protests of his Girls) and let him fall. A great sea beast rose up to receive him and Virros was never seen again.

One of Virros' girls took over the running of Shoreleave house and continued in the fine tradition of the Dockyard Rats; she would eventually take over leadership of the Rats after Dracion withdrew entirely to his Kingdom and Rufus stood down. (Some say Rufus led his crocodile brethren on an exodus to an esoterically significant swamp; others say Rufus heard tell that the crocodiles were planning to rebel against him, and he ate them all and left Horizon in a huff.)