|| The Stokers

The Order’s ideological foundation originates with Berengar of Tours (d. 1088), a theologian who rejected transubstantiation. Historical records indicate Berengar argued that consecrated Eucharist was purely material. According to later Order lore, Berengar attempted to use sacramental bread to poison a vampire, expecting the substance to transmute into divine flesh and fatally harm the creature. The experiment failed. Berengar subsequently published treatises denying the Eucharist’s mystical properties and asserting its exclusively corporeal nature. These writings circulated among clerical and monastic circles for the next four centuries, influencing various folk beliefs about food as a weapon against supernatural beings.   In the early 1600s, a French chef documented to possess Dreadfulness—an ability with the added condition of enabling retained perception of the supernatural—applied Berengar’s rationale to culinary experimentation. Guild archives from Lyon and Paris note that this chef conducted controlled trials using common kitchen ingredients (garlic, hawthorn, wild rose, rowan, mustard) against Dreadful species. He recorded observations of minor physiological disruptions—reduced vampiric regeneration, temporary aversion—but no singularly reliable “kill method.”   Over time, these experiments gave rise to mnemonic-based vampire lore. Ingredients were codified into popular memory not because of consistent efficacy, but to create a memorable folklore lexicon. Subsequent oral transmission, constrained by what is termed the Global Egregore (a cognitive filter erasing direct recollection of supernatural events), ensured that successor generations of laypeople learned of these ingredients through distorted folk tales. “Steak” as “stake” emerged from mistranscription of the chef’s records, preserving the concept in a simplified mnemonic. It persisted through the idea of staking a vampire in the heart.

The chef’s apprentices formalized the earliest Order structure around 1620. Documentation from surviving guild ledgers in Lyon shows that these apprentices included apothecaries, pastry chefs, and minor Dreadfuls. They organized as a craft-based, guild-style order distinct from Church militia. Surviving minutes from 1650 reveal that members joked about themselves as “Knights of the Rotund Dining Table” and met under culinary guild auspices to exchange recipes for food-based restraining compounds. By mid-18th century, records from the Marseille Chemical Consortium indicate a shift toward systematic chemical experimentation. Order members discovered that nitre (saltpetre) from food preservation and sulfur from kitchen saltpeter used in cheese curing could be processed into gunpowder and primitive incendiaries. Aqua fortis (nitric acid) and vinegar distillates—common in food preservation—became dual-purpose reagents: early chemical weapons and metal-cleaning agents.   Between 1700 and 1750, the Order secured funding through expanded mercantile operations. Tax records from Lyon in 1723 list “oil varnish” and “bone glue” as major exports attributed to suspected Order-affiliated workshops. Bone glue derived from slaughterhouse waste served burgeoning furniture and carriage industries; varnish oils, produced from linseed and fish oils, served both woodworking and early firearms maintenance. While the Order maintained a nominal presence in apothecary guilds, they also held unregistered patents for glue and varnish formulations under proxy names.   Official recognition as the “Order of St. Berengar” appears in 1782 registries from Dijon. The founding statute described the organization as a consortium of chefs, apothecaries, and Dreadfuls “devoted to the material eradication of Dreadful predators.” Because of the degree of interaction within the Order, intermarriage was common. This eventually became formalized in strategy, and "the Breadwinner" was given as St. Berengar's epithet. This is symbolic of the fact that in food and fight, there's no gender distinction, only one big family, and that all operatives had the right to provide. The term “Breadwinner” designates the operative not only as a hunter and wage-earner, but as a sustainer of the household unit—regardless of gender, origin, or assigned function. Operational logic held that anyone who secured materials, terminated threats, or prepared meals was effectively fulfilling a provisioning role. Internal manuals from 1785 reference “Tours” as field expeditions and “stakeouts” for individual hunts. Because literacy rates varies among apprentices, the Order has a running gag reminding members that “the e goes before the a” when writing “stakeouts,” to ensure continuity of heritage (as in "steakout").

Demography & Population

By 1840, the Order’s total membership stands between 100 and 200 individuals at any given time. All members display documented Dreadfulness (a requirement for Tours and learning), often arising from childhood trauma or near-death experiences. These Dreadful operatives are prone to mental instability. While the business model is comprised of a majority trained non-Dreadfuls—apprentice chemists, technical scribes, logistic coordinators who maintain laboratories and support structures—they have no knowledge of the Order, or what the operatives do.   Technological advancements between 1820 and 1840 introduced white phosphorus, chloroform, and mercury fulminate into the Order’s arsenal. Laboratory notes from Paris headquarters report controlled trials of chloroform as an anesthesia to immobilize suspected vampires during capture, as early as 1835. Mercury fulminate, used in percussion caps by 1838, appears in Order records as a means to destroy undead remains during experimental cremations. Chemical supplied via Lyon and Manchester was funneled to Tours for field use under the cover of standard merchant shipments.   Membership recruitment principally occurs through parish orphanages, workhouses, and industrial schools. Children displaying early Dreadfulness are recognized by operatives on Tours and inducted for vocational training in alchemy, deception, and forensic pathology, a process formalized in a 1832 with specific aspects of Order bases set aside as academies. Travel houses in Paris, Manchester, Newcastle, Vienna, and Lyon serve as staging posts where incoming apprentices complete six- to twelve-month residencies before deployment to field or laboratory roles. Although children are inducted at ages ten through fourteen, they are not permitted on active “Tours” until reaching legal adulthood (eighteen). Prior to that, they accompany adult operatives or auxillary workforce as merchant assistants or laboratory aides in standard business conduct.

Territory & Foreign Network

As of mid-1840, the Stoker branch in Cabinet operates under the umbrella of a broader Order infrastructure. Paris remains the central headquarters, containing primary laboratories for chemical R&D. In Manchester and Glasgow, satellite labs test early contact-process sulfuric acid and experimental aniline dyes; Newcastle facilities focus on soda ash and quicklime refining. In Lyon, the Order invests in textile dye research, attempting to penetrate French dye markets by 1843 through subtle partnerships with local dyeworks. Vienna’s network sources chloroform and early mercury salts from Austrian chemical houses. Each locale maintains legitimate patents—one cited Lyon’s 1837 patent for aniline-based red dye and Munich’s 1839 patent for cork-based bleaching agents. Research findings are transmitted via sealed merchant crates to Cabinet, disguised as shipments of glassware and silverware components.   In Cabinet, the Stoker branch’s property in Wicker Wharf encompasses a consolidated warehouse and laboratory precinct built on reclaimed marshland. A docking lane off the canal basin directly feeds raw materials—soda ash, sulfur, coal tar—into the depot’s rear bay. Simultaneously, small rail sidings link the depot to the Eastbank Railway Yard, completed in 1838. These rails enable quick import of acid reagents from Manchester and Sheffield. The Cabinet branch’s formal remit includes supplying local cutlery finishing workshops, tanneries, and textile dyehouses, while covertly executing field operations. Revenue from legitimate chemical sales finances the covert vampire-hunting missions.

Agenda

The Order publicly operates as an upper-middle-class merchant consortium engaged in chemical refinement, civic charity, and silverware innovation. Charity records indicate annual donations exceeding £300 to various workhouses and orphanages. The Stokers sponsor local bursaries for grammar-school education, hold event tables at subscription galas, and underwrite church renovations. Their public branding emphasizes “scientific advancement,” “industrial hygiene,” and “modernity.” They publish occasional pamphlets—Jules’s anonymous 1839 essay on “Safe Acid Handling for Dye Workshops” circulates among the local apothecaries’ association. Their relationships with the Cutler’s Guild are maintained through Joseph’s involvement in the silver innovation committee, where he advises on alloy refinements and silver-dip processes.   Privately, the Order’s sole purpose is to detect, catalog, and exterminate vampire entities. They maintain casebooks recording feeding intervals, regenerative anomalies, and reproductive methods observed in confirmed Dreadfuls. Patented tools—silver wire collars, portable chloroform inhalers, bone-splinter retaining devices—are developed, tested, and iteratively improved. Revenue streams from silverware, antiseptics, and industrial compounds underwrite laboratory expansions, apprentice stipends, and field equipment procurement. Although their philanthropic activities generate public goodwill, most Stokers harbor antipathy toward Cabinet’s underclass, viewing them as expendable intelligence assets. Only Marguerite publicly expresses genuine concern for the poor, but she remains aloof from street-level charity work, engaging only with upper- and middle-class society.

Modus Operandi

The Order employs a decentralized intelligence network based on economic and demographic pattern analysis, rather than formal espionage. They access burial logs, hospital registries, parish death registers, and workhouse admission records through pro bono arrangements with church officials and dispensary trustees. Gannet retains privileged access to parish registers, logging variances between recorded death causes and physical condition at burial. Reports of “wasting disease” with missing blood are flagged. In tandem, Stoker-affiliated undertakers note corpses with anomalous blood volumes and preserve those remains for field examination.   Field operatives insert themselves into communities under merchant cover. They conduct multi-day stays in targeted districts, meeting brothel madams, sextons, and funeral staff to gather anecdotal accounts of unusual nocturnal activity. Because the Global Egregore causes non-Dreadfuls to reinterpret or forget supernatural experiences, Stokers cross-reference multiple independent anecdotes before deeming them credible. If a Local Egregore forms—indicating repeated reports of inexplicable phenomena—the area is escalated for concentrated surveillance, usually involving Dreadful operatives who can detect residual paranormal signatures. This is an extremely dangerous situation. Information and accounts become far more credible, but at the cost of supernatural activity escalating exponentially. The most important goal of the Order is to stop this happening.   Operational priorities focus on circumstantial evidence rather than widely publicized forensic reports. Investigators look for staged trauma—slit throats, decapitations—with drained blood levels inconsistent with the wounds. Economic anomalies—sudden declines in food purchases without population loss or visible illness—are monitored. Once a target zone is identified, operatives deploy portable chemical kits containing chloroform, silver wire coils, and paralyzing compounds to incapacitate undead entities. They avoid ritualistic methods, relying instead on a scientific approach: severing T8–T10 vertebrae fractures, applying corrosive salts, and ensuring remains are monitored until ash.   Communications occur through disguised merchant letters and crate shipments. Routine correspondence between Paris, Vienna, and Cabinet houses coded research data within commodity ledgers. For example, “pine resin shipments” concealed silver nitrate vials and chloroform inhalers. These codes are deciphered internally by Savarin, Curtis, Franzascher and User, who archive them in encrypted ledgers. When field agents require immediate updates, they dispatch “urgent chemical sample” parcels that double as intelligence carriers.

The Cabinet branch of the Stokers established its presence in 1836, capitalizing on existing merchant and religious networks. Members with preexisting ties to Cabinet’s silverware trade and the Cutler’s Guild received rumors of a series of murders among Burnside District’s underclass. These reports emerged through merchant gossip and clergy bulletins. Upon relocation, the Stokers registered as upper-middle-class merchants specializing in patents for chemical refinements—silver polishing formulas, antiseptic tinctures, and small-batch match compounds. Their Wicker Wharf District property included a small family lodging and a connected warehouse for importing alchemical agents: quicklime from Newcastle, mercury from Idrija, and vermilion pigments from Amsterdam.   Although publicly unaffiliated with foundries, the Order embedded itself in bone grinding, animal glue production, and tanning reagent supply. Channeling urine, feces, and carcasses into adhesive and gelatin feedstocks, they supplied cabinetmakers, cutlers, and matchstick sweatshops. This integration provided natural points of contact with undertakers, carpenters, and corpsedisposal contractors—key information sources for tracking vampiric activity. Their chemical literacy conferred legitimacy within guild councils and dispensary committees, allowing them to secure permissions and avoid intrusive inspections. Evidence confirmed vampiric activity in the Burnside-Wicker Wharf corridor by late 1836.   From 1837 to 1840, the Stokers deployed grid-pattern patrols and airborne reagent testing (garlic, mustard, wild rose, hawthorn) to identify vampiric entities. Their standard methodology hinged on behavioural profiling: historical Stoker data had shown that first-generation vampires typically preserved wealth and preyed downward on laborers, prostitutes, or tenant-class populations. The assumption: exploitative individuals with protected reputations, and untraceable victims. Suspects fitting this profile were centered around Broomvale District and Trivet Heights—areas populated by magistrates, guild board members, and merchant-industrial families with absentee control over factories and sweatshops.   The Order's first confirmed encounter occurred on 13 March 1837. Patrol agents Anthelme and Curtis Stoker staked James Raglan, a chimney sweep they observed in Kelvin Island with fresh blood staining his mouth and undershirt. He exhibited a bronchospasmic reaction to airborne garlic dust. Raglan fled after an initial feint from Anthelme, was mentally incapacitated by Curtis, and in his confusion leapt an eleven-foot drainage gap. He displayed signs red eyes, elongated ears and nails, and vampire fangs under moonlight—enough for field classification as vampire. Anthelme impaled him through the abdomen using a transmuted bone appendage formed by his Dreadfulness, followed by Curtis driving silver-soaked rib splinters into his thoracic cavity. Despite his enhanced speed and strength, he succumbed within minutes. The kill was procedural but not celebrated.   The Stokers classified Raglan as a minor or irregular vampire—a low-threat vampire rather than a node of significance. This is because he did not fit the usual profile. It was assumed he was a victim of an attack by an upper-class vampire, who survived and thus became vampiric himself. This line of thinking could not be confirmed by interrogation, as it is Order policy to immediately kill any vampire to reduce risk to the operatives. Past hesitation has led to Order casualties. Their kill-on-confirmation rule is tactical, not ethical. His disintegration into ash means they could not identify him, and thus could not investigate his proximity to Porter Shaftesbury and Griggs' Crew. Unbeknownst to them, Porter is a hybrid first-generation vampire with genetically mutated feeding and siring signatures. Shaftesbury’s lineage allows for stable second-generation spawn with progressive power scaling and minimized typical degeneration or myth-based weaknesses (sunlight, running water, holy objects, garlic, hawthorn, etc.)—making his crew (Griggs' Crew) almost invisible to standard detection methods. The kill was purely coincidental.   Griggs’ Crew functions under plausible deniability. As sweeps, they are frequently invited into homes and rooftops, satisfying vampire invitation laws naturally. Their feeding mimics criminal violence: staged break-ins, mugging scenes, corpse disfigurements consistent with blunt trauma. Since their targets are middle-upper class (opposite to the Stoker profile), and deaths occur in districts like Broomvale (outside vampire-typical zones that the Stokers monitor), the Order dismissed them as criminal social upheaval due to Cabinet's worsening economic condition. Their status as 2nd-generations sired by Shaftesbury—with little myth sensitivity and low metabolic strain—means they exhibit minimal telltale signs. They are active during the day albeit covered to prevent direct sunlight exposure, as due to Porter’s Dreadfulness they have muted photoreactivity, meaning sun causes discomfort, exhaustion, and rash burns—not combustion. In general, Cabinet vampires also have it easier because the sun is almost always smothered by a cloud of smog.   Meanwhile, Smokey Manor’s Cabinet branch proves even worse to pin. It houses vampires who no longer express strong myth-based allergies or indicators (sunlight, running water, holy objects, reflection, invitation restriction etc.) due to mental desensitization (no associated fear → no trait expression) and cognitive normalization of their condition. They retain weakness to stakes, garlic, mustard, wild rose, hawthorn, and decapitation but these cannot be easily administered as a diagnostic method. Higher-generation vampires are also more resistant to garlic, mustard, wild rose, and hawthorn to begin with. These are industrialists and slumlords who, having weaponized exploitation, cannot be guilt-burdened or fearful of what they’ve built their livelihood on. This means since they have no fear of being parasitic, their blood consumption drive is low, and feeding sessions are slow. Even the second-generation offspring, sired by William Wickerman, operate on twice a year feed cycles and often consume near-dead individuals, which does not drastically alter Cabinet’s already sky-high mortality rate.   They source human trafficking victims through opium import networks from Calcutta and Surat, stored in modified ballast holds. They are brought in through legal channels and bundled with cargo that has legal protection or diplomatic cover, with company logos and enforced by East India Company guards. Because of their monopoly over the Improvement Commission Cell, they can effectively dominate civil positions in the docks and sweep things under the rug. The Stokers have no viable way of breaking into this exclusive social and political circle. These individuals are undocumented and transient, enabling feedings that leave no pattern across local death registries. Stoker field teams attempted several infiltration efforts at Smokey Manor properties between 1838–1839. None showed any real clues.   Simultaneously, the actual primary vampire force—the singularity March Dacre—operated with maximum unpredictability. A working-class girl raised in rotational debt-labor systems, Dacre does not match any Stoker suspect profile. She feeds on fellow underclass workers and transient tenants, disposing of corpses through trash furnaces, quicklime pits, and river drop sites. Her kill rate, which exceeds 40 per year confirmed by postmortem analysis, led the Order to believe multiple vampires were involved. This is far beyond the volume that any normal vampire needs. They maintain active operations under the assumption that a low-profile coven of 6–10 vampires are present, not a single high-capacity predator.   As of June 1840, the Stokers have no identification on March Dacre but have captured a pattern: repeated fresh killings within twenty blocks of the ironworks, all with hematological drainage inconsistent with typical wounds. A field survery by Anthelme Stoker brought him into direct combat with March, but she quickly fled and appeared to vanish after contact with fire. In Anthelme's words it "wasn't combustion, she's still out there, but more like teleportation"—they suspect a newly sired vampire (like James) working uncontrolled, and that this vampire (given the amount of victims dead in their homes, where the invitation rule should’ve applied) has a secondary ability to teleport between open flames, thus bypassing the invitation rule. Their current plan involves setting up controlled bait targets in a false billet to draw out March, removing any open flame present in the area to prevent escape, and engaging in prolonged combat to draw out the colony they believe is active. They are waiting for Elmé Stoker, Jules Stoker, and Gannet Stoker to arrive from a finalized Tour in Bristol to begin. This operation will likely bring them into direct proximity with March.

Faux Bloodline

The Stoker branch in Cabinet masks its true operative hierarchy by presenting itself as a multigenerational merchant family. In public, the family surname “Stoker” is used to imply blood relations, hereditary legitimacy, and continuity of trade expertise. Gordon and Marguerite occupy the patriarchal and matriarchal roles, lending social gravitas. Their “children,” Joseph, Elmé, Lucullia, and User appear as adult siblings who manage distinct facets of the family’s commercial enterprise. Apprentices such as Curtis, Franzascher, Louis-Eustache, Gannet, Anthelme, and Savarin occupy junior positions akin to younger offspring learning the family trade. In reality, this bloodline is entirely fabricated: each “child” is a recruited operative whose status corresponds to training levels rather than actual genealogy.   Women in business, science, or logistics were often met with suspicion unless their involvement was framed through kinship—e.g., as the daughter, wife, or sister of a male tradesman. By presenting Lucullia, Gannet, Franzascher, and Jules as daughters or wives within a family-run operation, the Stokers can justify their technical, clerical, or public health roles without drawing scrutiny. As well, family adoption is the only way for external females to be inducted into these trades, as they would not normally be permitted to pursue them through apprenticeships or education. The ability to absorb new operatives from orphanages (as “youngest children”) hinges on legal guardianship. As nominal parents, operatives can sign for custody, avoiding critique. Women couldn’t easily sign contracts or own property independently, but as “wives” or “daughters,” they could operate under the male household head's legal umbrella. For instance, Lucullia’s formulations can be filed under a brother’s, husband’s, or son’s name (e.g., Savarin), bypassing formal exclusion from male-only guilds.   Family roles allow believable movement across class boundaries. A son might deliver goods to upper-class clients (e.g., Louis-Eustache), while a daughter might engage in charitable visits to workhouses (e.g., Gannet). “Family business” excuses both upward mobility (through elite connections) and downward visibility (into labor and orphanage systems). Mixed-age, mixed-gender groups living under one roof would normally violate boarding laws or spark gossip. As a “family household,” the Stoker compound can house male and female operatives, apprentices, and married couples without suspicion. A family unit can host mixed-gender events—salons, church teas, charity galas, or product demonstrations—without violating social norms. An unmarried woman hosting an event would draw scrutiny, but a merchant’s daughter co-hosting with her father or brother appears acceptable.   Guilds favored multi-generational membership, and longstanding family businesses held greater influence. Presenting the Stokers as a hereditary commercial entity grants them easier entry into the Cutlers’ Guild, the Adhesives Guild, and parish merchant boards—despite being an intelligence front. Family-run enterprises were common apprenticeship sponsors. Posing as a “father” (Gordon) or “uncle” (Joseph) justifies the training of younger operatives like Curtis and Anthelme. No external master is needed; the family provides its own system of trades instruction.   Should an operative disappear (due to reassignment, capture, or death), the family fiction allows for seamless cover: “gone to live with an uncle in Scotland,” “on a trade in Birmingham,” or “married and moved north.” No public probe required. The family’s prominence makes them a known quantity, which ironically limits deeper investigation. Officials and townspeople will discuss the Stokers as a social unit (i.e., gossip), not as a potential intelligence anomaly.   When the Order undertakes an operational “Tour,” generational status within the faux bloodline determines field assignment and authority. “Seasoned” operatives such as Gordon, Marguerite function as first-generation family members—fully fledged and entrusted with strategic decisions. In the second-generation, Joseph, Alexis, Elmé, Jules, Lucullia and Grimod form spouse pairs for operational units. User has recently become fully fledged, and is thus unpaired. They are paired up not by romance, but by who’s Dreadfulness can support both the other operative, and effectively train the journeyman-level operatives under them. These journeymen in the third “generation” receive incremental privileges: Curtis, Franzascher, Louis-Eustache, Gannet, Anthelme, and Savarin are presented as younger siblings or cousins.   Family mechanics enforce this faux lineage through careful assignment of birthdays, public photographs, and community mentions. Ages are adjusted by a year or two to fit the birth order. These details are circulated among guild registrars and parish records to prevent scrutiny, as well as backed by Order-affiliated law practitioners. When a new apprentice arrives from an orphanage, they are swiftly inducted into the family narrative as the youngest child, with a matching baptismal affidavit signed by Marguerite or a similarly ranked Order member. This continuity convinces Cabinet’s elite that the Stokers are an established commercial lineage rather than a front, minimizing suspicion. The Order’s deceptions rely on the fact that Cabinet’s Improvement Commission and the Cutler’s Guild rarely investigate private family records.

Family Operational Overview

The Stoker branch functions as a single industrial organism with individual family members assigned to specific operational domains that intersect and reinforce one another. The patriarch and matriarch oversee high-level trade relations, financing, and social capital; their adult “children” manage technical divisions—silver finishing, chemical synthesis, and hygiene instruction—while apprentices and journeymen supply hands-on labor and field reconnaissance. Apprentices advance through stages of competence: those nearing full initiation assist in public-relations tasks and emergency logistics, while newly recruited children learn basic chemical handling and coded intelligence recording in workhouses.   Each operative’s public title corresponds to a legitimate business function—consultant, lecturer, or coordinator—while internally they fulfill covert tasks such as compiling vampire sighting logs, crafting specialized reagents, or facilitating clandestine transport. Interactions among family members occur in structured assemblies—daily briefings at the depot, weekly strategic salons at Grimod’s dining hall, and monthly ledger reconciliations conducted by User—ensuring that all commercial, logistical, and intelligence aspects remain synchronized. However, they can also communicate privately in residences. Apprentices rotate through various divisions, under the direct mentorship of their assigned senior operatives, until they attain journeyman status and are deployed on “Tours.” Family mechanics thus integrate merchant operations with covert imperatives, producing a seamless network that remains impervious to external scrutiny.

The Order, through its Stoker branch in Cabinet, maintains a diversified portfolio of chemical and allied industrial presences that form its public-front mercantile activities and covert vampire-hunting operations. Its known involvements span production and distribution of:  

• alkali and soda ash (sodium carbonate), used both in glassmaking and textile processing
• soap, supplying local households and workshops
• glass formulations used in laboratory vessels
• textile dyes and mordants critical to garment workshops
• sulfuric acid and hydrochloric acid, which serve as foundational reagents for early explosives precursors and pickling processes
• chlorine and nitric acid for bleaching, fertilizer, and chemical synthesis
• aniline and synthetic dyes for textile and leather industries
• hydrogen chloride gas as a byproduct of the Leblanc process later reused in metal pickling
• coal tar and its distillates, supporting early antiseptic and paving industries
• ammonia and its derivatives used in fertilizer and cleaning
• quicklime (calcium oxide) and limestone for mortar, tanning, and pH regulation
• vitriol (sulfuric acid) for textiles and fertilizer
• nitrates for gunpowder and agricultural use
• pickling metal and lead-acid battery components for emerging battery applications
• tar distillates for waterproofing and antiseptics
• bleaching powder as an early disinfectant
• white phosphorus in matchstick manufacture

  In addition to these chemical commodities, the Stoker network trades in bone-derived gelatines used as adhesives and silver-bonding agents. Each of these assets forms part of a vertically integrated system: Lucullia’s chemical preserver and gelatine works at the Cabinet depot transform animal byproducts into industrial feedstocks; Grimod’s quality oversight and engraving of silverware communicate finished product quality; Elmé’s merchant-agent function secures bulk imports of raw reagents from industrial centers in Britain; Jules’s role as industrial hygiene instructor ensures safety and compliance; and User’s operations stewardship manages interdepartmental logistics and compliance.   Intelligence is gathered in traveling casebooks: field operatives record vampire traits, corpse decomposition patterns, feeding intervals, and anomalous chemical residues. Apprentice recruitment funnels children from church-run orphanages and workhouses into specialized training in chemistry, anatomical targeting, and field logistics. Despite lacking formal military status, the Order leverages religious networks, trade guild affiliations, and merchant logistics to maintain a sustained presence in Cabinet and other key cities.

The physical infrastructure supporting the Stoker branch’s operations centers on the Wicker Wharf District and Eastbank Works District of Cabinet, where the depot and laboratory complex occupies a consolidated warehouse precinct adjacent to the canal basin. The depot encompasses multiple interconnected buildings. In Wicker Wharf, there’s a ground-level chemical storage hall for acids, alkalis, solvents, and phosphorus; an elevated mezzanine for finished compounds; and a docking bay opening onto the canal basin for direct barge loading. In Eastbank Works, still connected to the depot, is a reinforced laboratory wing housing distillation apparatuses, acid storage vats lined with lead, and phosphate reaction chambers; a secure souterrain level for hazardous waste neutralization and quarantine of phosphorus residues.   The depot’s structural design incorporates thick masonry walls, interior ventilation slits, and lead-lined floors to contain corrosive liquids. A small adjoining outbuilding in Eastbank Works functions as a glassblowing and retort workshop where custom lab glassware is fabricated; this building also houses bone rendering pits where Lucullia’s gelatine is extracted under controlled heat. Adjacent and crossing to the depot is a lean-to assembler’s aisle for kit assembly: polishing compounds, silver-dip baths, and lab reagent kits, packaged in wooden crates branded with the “Stoker & Co., Manufacturing Chemists” insignia. Overseeing all depot functions, Anthelme Stoker serves as depot labour foreman, directing lime kilns, soda ash feed conveyors, and acid pickling tanks. His subordinate teams of unskilled labourers handle ore unloading, reagent storage, and basic mixture preparation. Above this, Grimod Stoker supervises final quality control.   In Broomvale District, the Stokers maintain residential properties for key operatives: separate townhouses for Elme (second family) and Lucullia’s (third family) families, and a larger family manse for Gordon and Marguerite, where Joseph’s family (first family) as per eldest child tradition stays. User will regularly stay in any of these locations, depending on the day. These residences are deliberately sited away from the depot to maintain social standing among Cabinet’s upper-middle class and to distance families from the foul odors and potential accidents of chemical processing. From Broomvale, User Stoker commutes to the depot to oversee logistics and ensure supplies from rail and canal connections arrive on schedule. Gannet’s itinerant visits to workhouses, orphanages, and charity events occur from this residential base, providing a socially acceptable cover for her reconnaissance and recruitment activities.   Additional infrastructure includes a minor satellite facility in the Scranfield Commons district: a workshop fronting as a woodcarving and varnish production site, which also processes animal bone remnants into glue and gelatine under Lucullia’s direction. It needs to be off-ledger, as the effects of her Dreadfulness are otherwise hard to account for. Scranfield Commons also has industries in cabinet-making and funeral joinery due to timber cutting, drying, and basic carpentry in light artisanal contexts. The small chapel employs a sexton for undertaking, so corpses can be transported by hand-cart or horse-cart to Scranfield from Cabinet. This two-story building has a ground-floor storefront labeled “Scranfield Varnish Works,” open to local carpenters and cabinetmakers; its second floor conceals a small distillation lab and reagent mixing station. Field operatives such as Anthelme and Savarin occasionally report to this satellite to inspect the corpses coming in from Cabinet.   At the municipal edge in Kelvin Island, the Stokers lease storage silos near the coal wharf to stockpile soda ash, limestone, and quicklime imported from Newcastle and Glasgow. These silos serve dual purposes: they serve as staging points for coal-powered lime kilns operating under night-shift cover and as discreet storage for surplus white phosphorus crates awaiting shipment to domestic match retailers. A low-profile fence surrounds this facility, and a handful of night-watchmen—posed as private security—patrol its perimeter under directives from Marguerite’s nominal patronage of local watch boards.

By 1840, Europe’s scientific and industrial revolution is in full swing. The Stoker branch capitalizes on mid-19th-century advances in chemical manufacturing: the Leblanc process for soda ash, the development of the contact process for sulfuric acid, nascent distillation techniques for hydrochloric and nitric acids, and early laboratory glassware production enabling small-scale synthesis. The Stokers’ labs contain steam-powered evaporation pans for concentrating acid solutions; multi-necked glass retorts for controlled sulphuric acid production; lead-lined pickling vats for silver treatment; and distillation columns configured to recover chlorine from hydrochloric acid byproducts. Jules Stoker, as Industrial Hygiene Lecturer, trains local artisans on safe handling of these reagents, reducing accidental explosions common in unregulated distilleries.   The Stokers also leverage early mechanical milling machines powered by belt-driven line shafts, used to grind bone into fine powder for gelatine extraction and to pulverize coal tar for antiseptic and dye feedstocks. Anthelme’s depot employs a small steam engine to power a lime kiln and soda ash reactor, automating sifting and chemical mixing processes. For glassware, the glassblowing workshop uses portable charcoal furnaces to shape retorts, flasks, and specially designed matchstick dipping rods. The presence of a skilled glassblower on staff is essential, as the Stokers cannot rely on local glassworks specializing in windows or basic bottles; instead, they collaborate with two in-house glassblowers and a Order-affiliated regional glassblower from Newcastle who occasionally visits to create difficult custom reaction vessels.   In the silver sector, the Stokers utilize mid-19th-century techniques for silver plating and dip processes. Joseph Stoker, although primarily a theorist (the Stokers do not own cutlery workshops or finishing sweatshops), assists in collaboration with the Cutler’s Guild to promote the best practices for plating: using acidified silver nitrate solutions, regulating bath temperatures, and applying electric current for improved adhesion using potassium cyanide as an effective electrolyte. For engraving, Grimod acquires a pantograph engraving machine imported from the Order’s Birmingham technical development team, allowing faster replication of decorative patterns on cutlery handles. This is rented to the Cutler’s Guild in order to avoid having to purchase and operate a full workshop, and they consult him for use of early pneumatic engraving tools to carve fine lines into silver surfaces. Grimod retains the right to use the machine at any time. The presence of such technology gives the Stokers a competitive edge when securing contracts with Cabinet’s elite: they can produce more intricate designs faster than traditional hand engraving alone.   Their research extends to early match chemistry: Lucullia’s lab experiments with white phosphorus in match production mimic processes pioneered by Walker and Phillips. They maintain a clandestine test chamber where phosphorus paste is mixed with wood slats; Anthelme oversees logbook entries on ignition speed, safety incidents, and yield, while Savarin analyzes residue composition to optimize formulation. Shepherding innovations from French labs in Lyon and Paris, the Stokers experiment with potassium chlorate as a safer oxidizer alternative. Their trial batches of “safety matches” remain unmarketable due to cost, but the knowledge acquired informs Jules’s public lectures on reducing worker poisonings. They do not operate matchstick factories or sweatshops, simply selling the white phosphorous.   Medicinal chemistry is also present: the Stokers produce early antiseptic compounds such as coal tar distillates for topical applications and chlorinated lime solutions marketed under the “Stoker Purifiers” brand. They bottle these solutions in small apothecary flasks, selling to local surgeons and midwives, but also to domestic laborers like housewives and estate servants. Jules instructs on their proper use, masking the Stokers’ true motive of studying vampire susceptibility to chemical agents.

Cabinet’s industrial landscape in 1840 is dominated by coal mining, iron and steel production, cutlery and silverware finishing, textile manufacturing, and chemical works. The Stokers occupy a unique niche: they do not own blast furnaces or weaving sheds, but supply indispensable intermediate goods—chemicals used in textile bleaching, leather tanning, metal pickling, and glassmaking. Their presence in alkali and soda ash markets is critical, as these commodities are required by both glass and dye producers. Cabinet’s textile mills purchase bleaching powder and sulfuric acid from the Stokers to maintain white cloth yields; in turn, smoke and chemical effluents flow through rudimentary drainage systems, producing local environmental hazard that few now question.   In the cutlery districts of Eastbank and Kelvin Island, local masters craft blades from steel rolled and forged at foundries. Once a blade is formed, it proceeds to a finishing workshop controlled by the Cutler’s Guild. Here, the Stokers supply silver-dip baths and polishing compounds. Joseph and Alexis manage relationships with these guild workshops: Alexis’s household polishes double as metal cleaning agents, while Joseph’s plating alloys provide a luxury silver finish on fine forks, spoons, and knives branded as “Stoker-commended.” Cabinet’s municipal mint also purchases cleaning acids from the Stokers to maintain silver coin dies.   Bone glue, produced by Lucullia from local slaughterhouse waste, feeds into Cabinet’s burgeoning furniture and carriage industries. Carpenters and cabinetmakers purchase this adhesive to bond wood joints; harness makers use it for leatherwork. It’s also used in cutlery. The tanning industry, centered in St. Lawrence’s Quarter, depends on Stokers’ tanning ammonia and quicklime solutions to break down hides. Savarin’s byproduct processing—extracting gel, tar, and ash—converts waste into salable feedstocks for soap makers. These synergies create a network effect: slaughterhouses unload hides and bones at the Stokers’ Scranfield satellite, which in turn supplies both tanners and carpenters with processed materials.   Matchstick production, though not directly owned by the Stokers, relies on their supply of white phosphorus from British sources. Local match-making sweatshops in the Burnside district purchase phosphorus paste from the depot to produce cheap strike-anywhere matches.   Their stake in textile dyes and mordants is less visible but equally important: Cabinet’s cotton and woolen mills, though not as large as Manchester’s, operate small-scale dyehouses. The Stokers supply mordants (alum, ferrous sulfate) and aniline dyes, enabling mills to produce colored yarn for local markets. These chemicals are imported in barrels via canal barges. Jules’s oversight as Industrial Hygiene Lecturer ensures dyehouse workers do not succumb to dermal toxicities, allowing the Stokers to maintain good standing with municipal health officials.   The coal tar distillates produced at Stoker depots are sold to local tar manufacturers who then supply roofing and paving contractors. Stoker-branded antiseptic tar is purchased by hospitals for sterilizing halls and by farmers for waterproofing fences. Their fertilizer line—ammonium sulfate and nitrate blends—is sold to local farmers for potato and grain cultivation in Scranfield and Burnside’s outskirts, cementing rural ties.   The Stokers do not overtly engage in arms manufacturing, but the presence of nitric acid and sulfuric acid in their inventory means they can produce gunpowder precursors. These are usually done within the Order manufacturing bases, rather than outsourced to major capital holders. These chemicals are nonetheless sold as fertilizer or pickling solutions to mask their potential military application. Cabinet’s modest militia occasionally procures black powder from an independent foundry; some of the sulfuric acid used in that black powder is sourced from the Stoker laboratories, albeit through an intermediary to maintain plausible deniability.   Consumer relations are handled by Gordon, Joseph, Alexis, and Louis-Eustache who ensure that Stoker-branded polishes, adhesives, and silverware agents are stocked in cabinet-makers’ shops, railway station provisioners, and elite grocers. Louis-Eustache’s presence at market stalls introduces these products to a broader urban clientele. He’s also responsible (along with, more subtly, Jules through lectures) for the direct marketing to elites, both because he’s charming and because he has his nose even higher in the air than them.

The Stokers rely on an integrated network of canal, rail, and road transport to move raw materials, intermediate products, and final goods. Cabinet’s canal basin, situated on the river that flows past Eastbank and into the industrial heartland, links directly to the Coalbrook Canal, which in turn connects to the Great Western Basin. Barges laden with Newcastle coal, limestone from the northern quarries, and soda ash from Manchester or Glasgow arrive at Wicker Wharf daily. These raw goods are transferred into Stoker depots via chain-lifts and winches, then distributed internally within the chemical works or forwarded to allied industries.   Rail transport has grown increasingly important since the completion of the Eastbank Railway Yard in 1838. A branch line connects Cabinet to Sheffield and Manchester, enabling expedited shipment of glassware, aniline dyes, and specialized steel plating. Elmé Stoker negotiates preferential freight rates with the Western & Northern Railway Company, leveraging the family’s bulk purchase contracts to secure discounted tariffs. These rail lines also transport Stoker-manufactured pickling solutions to textile centers in Bradford and Leeds. The depot’s siding, discreetly maintained by the Chamber of Commerce’s slave of Stoker interests, allows direct loading and unloading of specialized casks and crates containing chemicals or finished silverware.   Road transport, via horse-drawn wagons, supplements canal and rail networks. Anthelme supervises the scheduling of twenty heavy wagons that traverse the main thoroughfare from Wicker Wharf to Broomvale, carrying gelatine drums, pickling vats, and silverware consignments to local distributors. Seasonal road repairs orchestrated by the Improvement Commission occasionally delay these convoys, but User’s astute tracking of municipal works schedules enables circumvention through back roads. Gannet’s courier duties include delivering sensitive documents—lab notebooks, client orders—from the depot to Guild Hall or to Marguerite’s charitable networks.

Imports

Stoker imports originate primarily in northern England, Scotland, and, to a lesser extent, continental Europe. From Manchester and Glasgow, they import soda ash produced via the Leblanc process; cotton bleaching agents such as sulfuric acid and bleaching powder; aniline dyes from experimental dyehouses; and alkali used in glass and soap manufacture. Newcastle yields shipments of coal tar distillates and quicklime, delivered by coastal barge and up the canal. London remains a secondary source for legal documents, patent registrations, and white phosphorus, which travels via rail or mail-coach in lead-lined crates.   Continental imports include sulfur from the Rhineland mines, used in match and gunpowder manufacture; chlorine gas produced in French laboratories; synthetic dyes from Lyon; and medicinal spirits such as chloroform distilled in Vienna. Elmé arranges French shipments through Saint-Malo ports, routed by Llandogo shipping lines, while Jules oversees importing cottonseed oil from Bordeaux for later conversion into industrial alcohol. Raw bone and animal fat from Normandy sometimes arrives to supplement local yields for gelatine extraction.

Exports

Cabinet’s exports move in two primary streams: industrial chemicals and silverware components. Soap and gelatine produced under Lucullia’s direction are exported to Birmingham and Liverpool, where they service larger industrial workshops. The Stokers’ antiseptic tar and bleaching compounds go to local hospitals and rural markets, but small shipments also travel to cities such as Birmingham and Bristol via canal barges, marketed as “Stoker Purifiers.” Certified soda ash and lime are consigned to Manchester and Stockport mills, where they maintain linen bleaching and leather tanning operations. Smaller lots of white phosphorus paste are discreetly shipped to matchstick entrepreneurs in Birmingham who repackage under local brand names.   Their silverware exports consist of engraved cutlery handles, silver-polished flatware kits, and decorative silver statuettes commissioned by elite patrons. Grimod ensures these items comply with hallmarking standards by employing a London-based assayer to certify silver content. These luxury goods are shipped via Liverpool’s export docks, moving on clipper ships to Liverpool’s markets and, in rare cases, to Paris under special consignment. The Stokers also export small-batch chemical reagents—notably sulfuric acid and mordants—to Dublin and Edinburgh, where textile manufacturers pay premiums for their reliability.   A third export category is intelligence, covertly carried in casebooks and coded letters. Gannet transmits encrypted logs of vampire sightings and chemical formula revisions to Stoker affiliates in Paris, Vienna, and Glasgow. These communications, disguised as financial codes for commodity shipments, travel alongside crates of reagents, enabling real-time research collaboration without arousing suspicion.