Page 104 - Hunter - The Vigil

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A A ASHWOOD ABBEY (COMPACT)
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mals has got its kicks from killing things no one else ever managed to kill. And having fun
with them. Before and after the killing part.
The original Ashwood Abbey, near Edinburgh, was the home of Reverend Doctor Mar-
cus McDonald Ogilvy, who, notwithstanding his august title and status within the Anglican
Communion, was, by any standards of the day, a very bad man. He held debauched court over

one of the several so-called “Hellfire Clubs”: secret societies of like-minded, well-connected
men and women who sought to smash the taboos of the day. By modern standards, the recre-
ational drugs, casual sex and public bondage-play were pretty tame. Rev. Ogilvy, a thinker ahead
of his time, seemed to understand that. He urged his followers to break the rules any way they
could. It was during an outdoor orgy one Midsummer night that the wealthy attendees at
Ashwood Abbey fell foul of a pack of werewolves who objected to people taking turns
screwing against a standing stone they put great store in.
Many of Ashwood Abbey’s regulars died that night. The rest ran off. The survivors
were nonetheless able to avert a scandal: the dozen or so worthies who died had not left
behind any note of their location. When Ogilvy and a dozen armed men went back by
day to get rid of the bodies, they found a couple of gnawed, bloodied bones, and what
looked like dog feces, only in prodigious quantities, left at the corners of the site, as if
as a marker.
A more conventional Victorian clergyman would have thought it a sign that
perhaps it was time to give up on the pursuit of sin. Ogilvy was no conventional
clergyman. He saw it as an opportunity. He led his inner circle back to the stones
three nights later. And on the top of that hill, in full sight of all his compan-
ions, he masturbated over the central stone.
Then he waited, standing next to the valet, who cleaned him up and dressed
him again even as Ogilvy loaded his trusty elephant gun with solid silver shot. To
his disappointment, he never got to hang the werewolves’ heads on his wall; they
reverted to human form as they gave up the ghost. Still, he’d got the bug. Over
the next decade, Ogilvy’s followers bagged everything from a six-armed demon
goddess they’d caught in India and let loose in Berkshire, to a thousand-year-old
man made of pieces of dead people.
And so it went. After Ogilvy’s swift and untimely death at the wooden tal-
ons of a three-armed goblin, the society continued. The Abbey was preserved at his
bequest, and became a high-class clubhouse. Several members moved to the New
World at the end of the 19 century and set up chapters there. Thanks to the incestu-
th
ous nature of European royalty (and yes, several members of the British Royal family
were members), chapters likewise were set up across Europe. They often outlived the
social structures that had created them, as societies collapsed and changed over the
course of that tumultuous century.
These days, the chapters exist more or less independently. Most still pay a regular
fee to Ashwood Abbey for the use of the name and a list of worldwide members.
Joining is an odd business. Some people are simply asked, after having been
groomed by a member for some time. More commonly, members are coerced into
joining: a prospect is invited to a dinner party held by the membership; they re-
veal they hunt monsters, describe the location of a prospective victim and make an
elaborate show of drawing lots. There’s a bag of billiard balls. Lots of red balls, one
white ball; the one who gets the white ball gets the privilege of leading the hunt.
And — surprise — who’s the lucky member? The new boy. It’s fixed, of course, and

by the time the hunt’s over, the new member is either full fl edged or dead.

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