Chapter Two: Green Grows the Lily (Part One)

Table of Contents

The investigators have discovered the murderer of Professor Ragnarsson and brought to light the terrible cult he belongs to.  They now have their next lead: the village of Oxmoor, where Ragnarsson’s former assistant is now living. She was entrusted with one of the artifacts the professor removed from the island, and has more information about the ill-fated expedition.  In a stroke of phenomenally bad luck, the cult is also gathering there to seek out an artifact from the island and a mysterious text. The investigators must travel to Oxmoor, find Jasmine, and put a stop to what the cult has planned next, which seems to also be putting Eloise’s young cousin, Aurelia Westmont, in danger as well. 

In this section, the investigators will visit Jasmine and find out what she knows about the cult and its practices, and have their first encounter with the dark magic of the island.

(All page numbers refer to the Seventh Edition of the Call of Cthulhu Keeper Rulebook, published 2015 by Chaosium, Inc. I am in no way affiliated with Chaosium or the writers of the Call of Cthulhu roleplaying game system. Content notes for this chapter: mentions of sexism/racism and suicide, forced pregnancy, body horror.)

The tiny village of Oxmoor is located a few hundred kilometers north of the city of York.  It grew up around the Westmont estate, but it never did get very large. The population is only a couple hundred villagers, but it does have a telegraph office, at the request of the late Lord Gordon Westmont.  There is a single main thoroughfare, on which is a church, an elementary school, a general store, the town’s only pub, a small boarding house, the police precinct, the telegraph office, and a bookshop. Residential houses surround this town center, and further out are the farmsteads occupied by a majority of the population.  The townsfolk are mostly a suspicious lot, wary of outsiders—the investigators will often feel as though they are being watched.  

While it was once an important stop on the road between York and Edinburgh, the town has had few visitors in recent years, and jobs are becoming scarce.  Some of the fields are showing the effects of the mysterious plant blight, especially farther from the road. The town is looking run-down and in general disrepair, and there are many people out of work who spend their time loitering on street corners or at the pub.  The cult has always existed in Oxmoor, though it has been dormant since the event that destroyed its power many centuries ago; since the war, the cult has become more and more active, sacrificing people and spreading the blight. There are a handful of sympathetic residents, but most of the people here are cultists, and it will be difficult for the investigators to find people to trust. 

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Oxmoor Women’s Shelter

The address on Jasmine’s letter will lead the investigators to a large house at the edge of town.  A handwritten sign on the door reads “Oxmoor Women’s Shelter.”  

The shelter was founded by an Indian immigrant, Harshad Khurana, and his wife, Amrita, seeing that Oxmoor and the surrounding villages had need of a service such as this, as well as more doctors.  After a few years, they invited their cousin, Malati, to travel to England and lend them her skills as a midwife. Within a year of Malati’s arrival, Harshad and Amrita decided to return to India, leaving the shelter in Malati’s hands.  She ran the shelter alone until last summer, when Jasmine arrived on her way to Edinburgh from London. Jasmine stayed at the shelter, only planning to stay for a night or two, but she made herself useful and Malati decided to offer her a job.  The town generally has a favorable opinion of the shelter and the women who run it, even if the latter are foreigners, though there are some who don’t think it is really necessary as the townsfolk can take care of their own.

The house is three stories tall.  The first floor has a tiny office, a living room, a kitchen, a bathroom, and two small bedrooms.  The second floor has another bathroom and three more bedrooms, while the third floor has one bedroom, shared by Jasmine and Malati. Only women are allowed to stay at the shelter; Jasmine and Malati will direct the investigators to Adelaide’s boarding house for other lodging. 

There will almost always be at least one cultist outside the shelter, watching it. When the investigators first arrive, there will be two men outside, one of whom will see them and immediately move off.  Following him leads the investigators on a circuitous route to the church, but when the investigators enter, he will have disappeared (there will be more about the church in a later section).

When the investigators enter the shelter, a bell above the door will chime, and Jasmine will emerge from the office to greet them.

Jasmine Indrani, the professor’s former assistant

Jasmine is originally from Delhi and traveled to England alone several years ago in search of employment and education.  It is possible that her family is important in the colonial government and she had connections to help her, but she is reluctant to talk about her life in India, redirecting the conversation to more important subjects at hand.  She lived in Oxford while she worked for Professor Ragnarsson, but moved to London when she withdrew from the university. She decided to move to Edinburgh early last summer but ended up here in Oxmoor and decided to stay, believing she was far enough away from Oxford for what happened on the expedition to no longer follow her.  If asked about her decision to leave Oxford, she will explain that she could not in good conscience remain involved in a project that had already resulted in three deaths, especially as the professor seemed determined to push it forward. Though she disagreed with the professor on this and other important issues, she has great respect for him and is grateful for the opportunities he gave her.

Facts and Clues: 

• Jasmine describes Professor Ragnarsson as a good, fair-minded man, but driven to the point of obsession.  He had trouble understanding anyone who was not quite as passionate about the pursuit of knowledge.
• Ragnarsson sent her a letter (Handout 2-1) and a package a week or so before he died.  The package contained some of his translation notes (Handout 2-2) and one of the artifacts from the island, the mysterious stone.  (See below for handouts and a description of the object.)
• She can give an overview of the expedition.  
  • The island is a rock in the middle of the ocean, seemingly uninhabited and uninhabitable.  It was dreary and miserable, and would have been so even if the weather hadn’t been unpleasant the entire time.  She says it gave everyone bad dreams and an irritable disposition. 
    • There was no living vegetation, only the blackened remains of twisted trees.  It looked almost as though there was a fire at some point, but the weather would probably not allow a fire to burn continuously.  She is unaware of the blight, but if its effects are described to her she will make the connection.
      • In fact, there are some of the outlying fields around the village that are showing the same effects. This began in December.
    • Most of the structure was underground, with a single main door set into a hillside, sort of like a mausoleum.  The team entered and moved some distance inside, to a large chamber where the stone and several others like it were set into the wall.  They did not get very far into the structure before the murders happened and the expedition was called off. 
      • The key was found on some skeletal remains in this first chamber.
      • The structure seemed to be more extensive than what they saw, but they weren’t able to map the entire thing.
  • Between their research and the inscriptions on the walls of the tunnels, the structure was apparently used for some sort of strange fertility rite.  A number of kidnapped women were brought to the island from surrounding areas. There was also imagery dealing with dying vegetation and monstrous creatures laying waste to towns. 
  • Gareth Jones, a Welsh laborer, was crushed by the vehicle they brought to transport excavation equipment.  It appeared to have been a brake failure. 
  • Caleb Thomas, a student, and Peter Brown, a laborer, were found with their throats cut several days later.  Though they thought there was no one else on the island, but after some panic, it turned out all the members of the expedition were accounted for and the murderer was not one of them. 
    • The first laborer to be hired was Cullen O’Mara, who worked for the professor once before, and the last was Eske McIvor, who was picked up in Northern Ireland before they set out for the island. Being the one the others knew the least, Eske was initially a suspect, but Cullen provided him an alibi.  Jasmine does not say what it was, though she was the one who vouched for Eske to the professor.
  • When the remaining crew arrived back in Coleraine, the port in Northern Ireland, the professor had to inform the laborers that since the expedition was called off early, he would not be getting the full grant money, and he would be unable to pay them the agreed amount.
    • The crew disbanded, and it was discovered that the key had been stolen.  Jasmine suspects Cullen and Eske, as the object has not resurfaced, and her suspicions appear to be confirmed by Ragnarsson’s letter.
• “Green grows the lily:” the professor believed that a cult so powerful for so long must have made it into the popular consciousness.  He believed he had found proof of his theory upon hearing some folk song about a well while he was in Ireland, but did not get a chance to follow up, as he had to return quickly to Oxford.
• She can show the investigators the artifact, but is reluctant to hand it over at this time.  She is willing to give information, but won’t give them an object entrusted into her care until she is certain they are capable of stopping the cult. 
  • Along with everyone else who has set foot on the island (cultists included), Jasmine started having nightmares in December.  The rest of the inhabitants of the shelter, except for Claire, started having them when the artifact arrived.  
    • Jasmine has dismissed her own dreams as nonsense and the fact that everyone is having them as coincidence.
• Jasmine is vague on the reasons she decided to stay in Oxmoor instead of continuing on to Edinburgh (the reason, of course, is Malati), but with news of the professor’s murder and the cult’s activities, she realizes she has come out of the proverbial frying pan and into the fire. 
• She talked to the police about the men lurking outside, but was told that it was a public street and there is nothing wrong. 
  • If the investigators tried to forewarn her, she will have heard nothing about it from either the telegraph office or the police.
• The “unusual occurrences” she described in her letter have to do with the arrival of Claire.  She says it is better that the investigators see what she means.  

When the investigators are ready, Jasmine will lead them up to the second floor, to the bedroom at the end of the hall.  She will knock, and a soft female voice says, “come in.”

The bedroom is small and clean; rather sparse but comfortable, with extra pillows and blankets on the bed.  The window looks out on the fields behind the house. Malati is tending to Claire, checking her pulse and her temperature (“deep breaths for me, sweetheart”). 

Malati Khurana, shelter director

Malati scrambled to keep the shelter running alone until Jasmine arrived, and with Jasmine’s help, she can now focus on the residents’ needs and their medical care.  She was trained as a midwife and has also learned first aid and some basic wound care (she can set a bone or stitch up a cut, but cannot perform any non-obstetric surgery).  It is something of an open secret that she can, and is willing to, perform abortions. She keeps the shelter running with whatever the residents can pay, fees from a handful of non-resident patients, a small and somewhat dubious grant from the local church, and any other work that Jasmine can pick up.  

She dresses in a Western style, but keeps her hair very long.  She is more willing to accept supernatural explanations for the various strange occurrences than Jasmine is, and finds that fact that everyone has been having similar dreams to be a useful piece of information (though she doesn’t yet know what to do with it).  Generally softspoken and gentle, Malati will be willing to fight if she or her residents are threatened. While it is tempting to escape from the racism and interminable winters of rural England by going back to India like her cousins did, she is dedicated to the success of her shelter.  

Facts and Clues: 

• Malati and Jasmine have no secrets from each other, so Malati knows about the expedition and the artifact and can reiterate any information if the investigators need it.
• Claire arrived in late December, just before Christmas, having apparently been thrown out of her parents’ home in a nearby village for getting pregnant.  She must have wandered to Oxmoor on foot, as she showed up alone, but Claire insists that someone is watching over her. 
  • Claire’s pregnancy is progressing unusually fast. Judging by her condition on arrival, she can’t be more than three months along, but she looks to be nearly six months pregnant.  
  • Malati has no idea what to do about Claire’s other symptoms. She has taken her to the hospital in York twice, but since she seemed otherwise healthy, there wasn’t anything to do for her. 
    • Claire is starting to lose a lot of weight, the markings on her body are getting worse, and her pulse is starting to get weak.  Her temperature is slightly below normal. The baby is kicking and seems healthy, though far ahead of schedule. Malati wants to take her to York again, but Claire insists she is fine.  
• Claire is not the first pregnant girl with these symptoms: there was a Welsh girl who arrived in early December, a couple of weeks before Claire.  She was not as lucid, and could only mutter about dark water and things moving in the trees. Malati took her to the hospital and she died there.  The doctors in York did not provide many details, and Malati worries it was a suicide.  
• Malati can tell the investigators about the other women in the shelter, though she won’t talk about their medical histories.
• She also is one of the very few NPCs with the Psychoanalysis skill, if the investigators want to try to get her to help with their Sanity loss.  Her tactic is usually to assert that the darkness in the world has an equal and opposite light, and right action and devotion will help goodness prevail. This may be a comforting lie, but it can help a troubled investigator hold it together a bit longer.

Claire Cooper, harbinger of the new world

Claire a mousy brunette, around sixteen or seventeen years old, and looks to be around five or six months pregnant.  When asked how she came to be as she is, Claire will talk about how her boyfriend Julian told her she was special, and took her to a hidden place in the woods where some shadowy men gave her some “dark water” to drink.  She insists that this is how she conceived, though Jasmine believes she is inventing stories to deal with trauma. Julian appears to no longer be in the picture, and Claire is less concerned with him and more concerned with her status as a chosen person.  When the time is right, Julian told her, she will be taken to the holy place to join the Great Mother. The idea seems to be that the child is not really hers—certainly not hers and Julian’s—but rather belongs to this mother. The child is both some kind of being (Claire isn’t clear about whether it is human or something else) and a symbol of the new world to come.  Claire insists that she is blessed to have been chosen for this task. While she is grateful to Malati and Jasmine for taking care of her, she worries they don’t understand the situation and will try to prevent her from leaving when the time comes. 

Claire is very thin and is starting to take on a greyish pallor.  Her belly is covered in inky, grey-black fissures and moves with whatever thing she is carrying.  The black marks spread out from her abdomen and are just visible at her neck and sleeves, where her dress does not cover.  Her eyes are also starting to show black blood vessels. A full view of the damage (if she pulls up her dress, or if an investigator walks in on her in the bath or during a medical exam) will require a Sanity roll: 1/1d10 points lost.  Malati tries to keep her covered up as much as possible, as her condition is so unpleasant to look at.  

Facts and Clues: 

• Her boyfriend is the same Julian Walters that used to be a police officer in Oxford and dismissed the professor’s report that he was being followed.  He apparently has gone ahead to the holy place, and is no longer here.
• Claire only vaguely describes the new world she believes she is helping to bring about.  The earth will be cleared off, she says, and everything will be quiet and peaceful, with no more war or violence.  She says this is what people are supposed to do, but only a few ever find out the truth (she may suggest that female investigators or other women might be lucky enough to be chosen someday).
  • She has been having the same nightmares ever since she was given the dark water, and though she was afraid at first, she now finds them comforting and a confirmation of her chosen status. 
• She claims the men watching outside the shelter are there to look after her and no one has anything to worry about from them.
• As for the cult’s plans and methods, Claire has been kept deliberately uninformed.  
• Ominously, Claire says the time is coming soon and she will not need to wait much longer.  If asked to specify, she says, “You’ll see.”

The other women in the shelter are: 

• Winifred, a young widow with a four-year-old daughter, Bella.  Her husband came home from the war but eventually succumbed to shell shock and took his own life. 
• Violet, a spinster whose house (a farmstead just outside Oxmoor) burned down a couple weeks ago, due to an accident with the wood-burning stove.
• Beth, who ran away from an abusive husband in another village. She is frightened of men, including male investigators.

These women believe that Claire is ill and having a difficult pregnancy, and that is why she stays up in her room.  They take turns visiting and keeping her company, and otherwise spend their time in the common room, running errands, or sharing cooking and housekeeping duties.  They have all started having nightmares since the artifact arrived in the house, though they are unaware of its presence.

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The Package

Shortly before he died, Ragnarsson sent Jasmine a letter, some of his notes, and the stone removed from the temple on the island.

Jasmine:

I hope you will forgive the prying I had to do in order to find your new address.  I am sending you the artifact from the island, as well as some of my translations, for safekeeping. Hopefully, I will be able to recover them from you soon, but at the moment I need to protect my research.  I have been followed around the university since August, some time after you left Oxford, and now it appears my office has been broken into.

It sounds preposterous, I know, but the only explanation I have been able to come up with is that the cult that built the temple on the island somehow still exists.  I am hesitant to present this theory to the police, especially with what happened the first time I tried to make a report, but I am telling you so you can take whatever steps are necessary to keep yourself safe. I could still be wrong—I hope I am—but whoever it is, they are persistent.

 I hope it will not come to it, but I may have to get rid of all my research to keep whomever is following me off my trail.  I do not relish the thought of starting again. I fear, however, that this strange organization may decide to attack me and even end my life in order to prevent me from using the knowledge I have gained against them.  If that is the case, I will gladly try to replicate my findings later, from a safe location.  

I will try to contact you again soon with more information.  In the meantime, keep your eyes open. You were wise to get out of London. 

 Please let me know when you receive this package, and if you’ve spoken to anyone else from the team recently.  I will try to contact Mr. O’Mara in Dublin and see if the artifact he appropriated is still in his possession.

ER

On Michaelmas day Brother Dara returned from the northern islands, and he was much changed.  The chieftain also returned, without many of his men/warriors

…not Northmen but dwellers (?) on an island in the sea 

…the center of the valley, and it goes down into the depths of the earth. At the bottom lies a pool well from which the dwellers draw out water from the deep (abyss).  This was told by Brother Dara

…the rites performed there and the fate of the village folk [illegible] too terrible [i.e., invoking terror] to describe

…and passed away in midwinter

[what I wouldn’t give for a complete Latin text!]

The artifact

One of many stones like it throughout the underground structure, the artifact is a stone of a dark grey color that shimmers eerily like an oil slick in the right lighting.  It is roughly twelve inches in diameter, rounded on one side and flat on the other where it was affixed to the wall. It is etched in a spiral pattern with strange runes, nothing that the investigators or anyone on the expedition had ever seen before.  It is much heavier than it looks.  

The artifact does nothing on its own except cause those near it to have nightmares and , occasionally, hallucinations.  Jasmine and Malati have not connected nightmares to the object—Jasmine, along with anyone else who has been to the island or involved with the cult’s rituals, started having them back in December, and after a month and a half with Claire in the house, it is no wonder people are having bad dreams.  

Handling the artifact for the first time will prompt a Sanity check, and a failure will result in a nightmare.  In addition, anyone who sleeps near the artifact (such as in the same room) will have a nightmare, and if it remains in one place, that effect will spread out to adjoining rooms or the surrounding area. 

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Terrible Dreams

The investigators will begin to have nightmares as the come into contact with the cult and its artifacts. Investigators can choose not to sleep, but if they do so, they will need to make CON checks at increasing difficulty for each night of missed rest or take penalty dice on skill checks.  Failing checks, particularly pushed rolls, may result in the investigator falling asleep in the middle of doing something.  

• The stone/the key/any other object from the island: anyone who handles the artifact should roll SAN.  Failure will result in a nightmare (but no lost Sanity points). Sleeping close to it, e.g. in the same room, will automatically cause a nightmare each night.
• The cult text/the Westmont text: losing Sanity points from reading/studying the texts will cause a nightmare.
• Monsters: seeing a Dark Young or other creature and losing Sanity points will cause a nightmare. 
• Cult victims: losing Sanity points from witnessing the effects of the corruption will cause a nightmare.
• Dark water: Touching the dark water will cause one nightmare on the next rest.  Sustained contact with the substance will need a CON roll to avoid the corruption taking hold (being partially or completely submerged in it will take a Hard roll, and consuming it will require an Extreme one).  If an investigator should become corrupted, they will have recurring nightmares.
• The island: anyone who sleeps on the island itself will have nightmares each time they rest.

The Keeper can have an affected investigator will roll 1d6 and receive the corresponding dream handout, or assign dreams based on what will most frighten the individual investigator.

I.

You are walking through an ancient forest.  The enormous trees press in close around you, and their branches reach up higher than you can see.  Only the faintest streaks of sunlight pass through to the ground. As you press onward, picking your way over thick roots and through the underbrush, the sunlight fades from a pale gold to a thin grey, the green of the wood turns dark and sinister, and sickly yellow leaves begin to fall around you.  You quicken your pace, certain that the edge of the forest must be near, but the trees are endless. Now you see the falling leaves are grey, and they crumble to ash as they touch the ground. The trees are now black against a sunless sky, twisted into grotesque configurations, and drifts of fine ash cover the forest floor. A chill wind whistles through the remains of the trees.  Though you see no one, you have the distinct sensation of being watched.

You wake up normally in the morning, but the dream haunts your waking thoughts.

II. 

You are in your home, going about your day as usual.  As evening falls, you feel a sense of foreboding. When you reach out to open your bedroom door, you see that the veins in your hand have turned black as ink.  You examine your hands and see the blackness spreading, until the ends of your fingernails crumble and fall off. You run to the bathroom and look in the mirror: your face is being covered with spreading black veins, and your skin has taken on a deathly grey pallor.  As you watch, your hair falls out in clumps, and your face begins to twist and distort.

You awake with a start, and find you cannot get back to sleep.  Make a CON check to avoid taking a penalty die on your skill checks for the next day.

III.

You are in a dark tunnel.  The air smells damp and the rock walls are slick with moisture.  In front of you are figures in black, hooded robes, and you turn your head and see that these people surround you and are escorting you down the tunnel.  Suddenly, you panic—you do not want to be going where these people are taking you. You try to get away from them, but the people to either side of you hold you fast, and you are marched onward.  The tunnel opens into a wide chamber, where more robed figures are gathered around something you cannot see in the center of the room. The fear overtakes you and you fight harder, but you are trapped.  In the distance, a great bell tolls, reverberating through the chamber. You are dragged inexorably forward, struggling in vain.

You wake to the sound of your own screaming.  The dream stays in your memory and you are unable to return to sleep.  Make a CON check to avoid taking a penalty die on your skill rolls for the next day.

IV.

You are sitting down to dinner in your childhood home, surrounded by your family.  The table is spread with delicious-smelling food. You look down at your plate but find only a ceramic cup of black liquid.  Confused, you look at your family, but they only stare at you expectantly. You move to get up from the table, but the people on either side of you grasp your arms and hold you in your chair.  The person across from you picks up the cup and holds it up to your face; you try to turn away, but someone grabs you by the hair and holds your head in place. The liquid is so dark that the cup looks much deeper than it could possibly be, and as it sloshes over the side it still looks impossibly black.  You struggle and struggle against your family until you wake up in a cold sweat.

Make a Sanity check.  If failed, you lose 1d4 SAN points, and a feeling of mistrust stays with you throughout the day.

V.

You are in a dark valley, surrounded by hills.  The sky is black and starless. In the distance, you hear waves crashing on the shore, but you cannot see the water.  You know that you have been here for some time, but are not sure how long—weeks? Months? Years? You are waiting for the person who left you here and promised to return.

As you wander aimlessly around the valley, you notice dead trees among the hills, reaching upward with bare, twisted limbs, and hung with crumbling briars.  Here and there are smaller mounds and you know, in the logic of dreams, that these are burial mounds. Alone among the dead, you try to think of some way to contact your loved one, to ask them when they will come back for you, but it is impossible.  The dead trees and the hills loom over you as you walk in endless circles.

You wake just before dawn, loneliness lingering in the air even as the dream fades.

VI.

You are back in London, walking quickly down a busy street, weaving your way through a crowd of people.  You carefully avoid eye contact with anyone you pass. The winter air is cold, and you wrap your coat more tightly around yourself.  As you do this, something under your coat shifts in an unnatural, squirming motion. You look around, worried someone has noticed. The other people look at you, their faces blank but accusation in their eyes.  You walk faster, covering your restless, shifting burden with your coat.

After endless turns and crossings, you find yourself on a bridge crossing the river.  You reach the center and hesitantly approach the edge. The bridge is empty, and the river crawls sluggishly below you.  Suddenly, you hear a clamor of voices. You look toward the source of the sound and see a mob of people running down the bridge toward you.  The thing you are carrying starts moving frantically, almost breaking free from your coat. A second mob materializes at the other end of the bridge.  You are trapped. Panicked, you back up toward the railing. The mob reaches for you, and you try to escape their grasp. You lean back too far and fall over the railing.

Just before you hit the icy water, you wake up, still feeling the sensation of falling.  It is still very early in the morning, but you find yourself unable to get back to sleep.  Make a CON check to avoid taking a penalty die on your skill checks for the day.

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Next time, the investigators will travel to the Westmont manor and learn about the book that the cult is looking for—and how their dark designs were thwarted many centuries ago. They will also see more of the town of Oxmoor.

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Back to Chapter One (Part Two)

Forward to Part Two

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