Downfall of Henry Hodges

Reconnaissence of the ranch

The ranch is at the head of a valley overlooked by an ancient Native American cave village… Hodges is a master of Navajo Witch Magic - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_(Navajo) but his lair is protected by the ghosts he has harvested from the burial ground on which he’s built his house… 

Around the valley there are ghosts chained to their platforms… Lyris is outraged and Marco convinces her to sabotage the fetish skeleton crucified in the village and not release the ghosts until everyone is ready (she manipulates the fetish nightmare to make it slowly go dormant and empowers the sacrifice to start to resist)… Nell scouts the house and finds a hall of arcane mirrors… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qir5t9RbEHo... Heh heh heh… 

Wisely she decides not to proceed any further and investigate what the mirrors are protecting! She also notes there is a puma ghost protecting the house but she notes that it reacts to movement and as long as she can see it she can probably evade its gaze…

What happened

• Johann scouts the valley - finds the mesa which is the focus for the daily fey gate in the cliff face
• Lyris talks to spirits in the caves
• Nell checks out the ranch
• Prof talks to local Mexicans and gets a cook
• Marco talks to jouralist and priest and gets the back story on Henry Hodges. Find a link to 5 Rings in New York.
• Nell and Lyris talk to the Indians and understand the nature of the Puma and the Navajo burial grounds.
• Lyris and Johann visit the fey realm.

Pulling this together they work out that Henry Hodges was a local of Columbia that went to the Philappines in the army and returned a different man with a Filipino vampire bride (Amihan) and the start of his long association with the 5 Rings and the power that came with it. The ranch was created in the valley specifically for the access to the fey gate. Amihan has major powers and is using the fey realm to store Carmen's key artefacts.

Party work out that they need to neutralise the many ranch-hands and especially the 10 Ulstermen gunslingers. Amihan has to be neutralised and Henry Hodges and Porter taken out.

Night before they intended to strike, they spotted 10 riders leaving the ranch. They followed them to a small town across the Mexican border. There the riders seemed to be non-plussed by the presence of a US army soldier (big, blonde captain). Nell and Marco slipped into the town where they helped Patton (though from his skill little help was needed) to dispose of most of the riders form the ranch. Lyris watched the remaining 3 riders return to the ranch. Marco and Nell talked to Patton and suggested that he come to the Hodge ranch the next day to collect the gun-runners.

Next day, Amihan went to the fey realm and Johann secured the gate behind her. Hodge sent the remaining Ulstermen and Pitman (Patton's suspect) off to hide in the caves. The party closed off the caves traping the "Hole in the Wall Gang".  

Nell slipped into the ranch and dosed the breakfast with a poison concocted by the Prof. This had the ranch hands running for the khazi (or the river). Nell, Carlos, Prof and Marco rode into the ranch with Mexican bandits who they left outside. They went inside to talk to Hodges. Marco explained that the game was up and suggested that Hodges leave which he did (picking up soeme money and bearer bonds). Porter made a beeline for the mesa where spell casting was taking place. Johann trapped him. Lyris got worried by indiscriminate use of green weave. Lyris and Johann went into the fey realm. Marco, Nell and Prof went into thee hall of mirrors. Amihan spirited in from the fey realm, Marco hit her with a poker and she died. Her ghost appeared, party jumped on her and eventually Lyris returned and dismissed her with necromancer bell.

Marco sent 2 telegrams:

• To 5 Rings in New York - "The "bitch" found death inconvenient, beware..."
• To a school-taecher near Columbia - "Henry Hodges has lost wife and career, he's ready for a new start with the right guidance. Tell him that the thing about angels is that you only get one."

Back to Mexico to extract the souls from the soul prisons. Johann cracks most of them with a few casualties.