Orphean Society Building

Townhouse, Cult HeadquartersElegant exterior masking horrific secrets; public spaces refined, lower levels horrifying

Location Overview

The Orphean Society headquarters occupies 43 Grosvenor Street, Mayfair—a five-storey Georgian townhouse of impeccable external appearance. Publicly known as a respected private club for musical refinement and philosophical discussion, it serves as the physical center of the London Choir of the Aeternum Canticle.

The building is divided into public performance spaces (ground and first floors), private member areas (second and third floors), and a hidden sub-basement containing the Catacoustic Chamber and ritual vault.

Exterior Description

Classic Regency architecture: soot-darkened brick, disciplined stonework, brass doorknob and knocker, elegant wrought-iron railings. The entrance gives no hint of what lies within. Street-level windows are frosted and shuttered. Multiple chimneys rise from the roof. A narrow alley (Ballast Lane) provides rear access for servants and deliveries.

The Public Front – The Orphean Society

A respected private club for musical refinement, philosophical discussion, and spiritual improvement through harmony. It appeals to the gentry, reform-minded clergymen, and aristocrats with artistic leanings.

Club Activities:

• Afternoon lectures on music, mathematics, and ethics
• Private recitals of sacred and “lost” music
• A “Ladies Circle” led by Lady Aurelia for vocal instruction and spiritual healing
• Student scholarships (a means of recruitment)
• Patronage of promising young performers (some disappear)

Five floors, including ritual rehearsal spaces, library, private offices, and a hidden Catacoustic Chamber in the sub-basement for detaining and conditioning victims

The janitor that Rooke bribed to gain access to the Orphean Society’s sub-level is named Eli Tadcombe.

Atmosphere

• Ground Floor (Public): Refined, scholarly, welcoming. Soft lamplight, expensive furnishings, the scent of beeswax and expensive tea.
• Upper Floors (Private): Increasingly exclusive; signs of obsessive musical focus (sheet music everywhere, harmonic instruments).
• Sub-Basement: Profoundly wrong. Cold stone, harmonic vibrations in the air, the lingering scent of blood and incense. Sanity-taxing.

Floor-by-Floor Layout

Ground Floor – Public Reception & Performance Wing

Access: Public (with appointment or invitation) General Use: Hosting guests, small musical salons, Society’s public face

• Entrance Lobby: Dark wood, soft rugs, coat hooks, and a discrete logbook. A young clerk (novice cultist) tends the desk.
• Main Hall: A modest open space with busts of Orpheus, Pythagoras, and Newton. Stairs ascend at rear.
• The Lecture Room: With harpsichord, music stands, and pews. Sheet music stored here includes several pieces marked with subtle harmonic distortions (Listen or Occult to detect).
• The Tea Salon: Lightly furnished with classical décor. Visitors may be received here.
• Kitchen: A narrow but well-maintained space with a cast-iron range, hanging copper pans, and a stone sink beneath a small, grimy window; it smells faintly of boiled tea and grease.
• Scullery: Cramped and damp, with scrubbed wooden counters, stacked crockery, and a coal bin in the corner; buckets and rags suggest recent cleaning, though the air is always tinged with mildew.

Clue (Public): A torn invitation to a vocal “screening” at Kensington Stables is slipped into a returned music portfolio in the Lecture Room (Spot Hidden).

First Floor – Offices and Archives

Access: Semi-private (members only) General Use: Society bureaucracy, correspondence, library

• Dr. Hume’s Office: Neat, locked. Contains:
  • Handout: Letter from Prof. Albin Herzfeld (Vienna) – Expresses concern over ritual tempo adjustments and questions Danforth’s reliability. Refers obliquely to progress on the “Germanic harmonic cycles.”
  • Handout: Letter from “G.B.” (Venice) – Confirms receipt of resonant larynx fragments and comments cryptically on progress with “voice decay trials.” Mentions translation segment III nearing alignment.
  • Map with strange annotations including a circled pin near Kensington. (Spot Hidden)
• Lady Danforth’s Office: Perfumed, well-appointed. Locked armoire conceals:
  • Her personal notes on the Choir hierarchy and an assessment of her own standing: “Hume remains blind to the truth. The Canticle will require a soloist. One with vision.”
  • Annotations on multiple students from the Royal Academy subjected to sonic experiments: “Clara strongest. Five others collapsed. Two did not survive. Stables handled it.”
• Records Room: Contains Society rosters, donor logs, and harmless music theory texts.

Clue (Private): Danforth’s marginalia references “adjustments made at the Stables” and contains a receipt from a Grosvenor coach firm for transport to Kensington.

Second Floor – Student Quarters and Practice Chambers

Access: Members and students General Use: Music rooms, guest beds, observation

• Practice Rooms (x4): Each contains music stands, marked sheet music, and faint chalk sigils (Cthulhu Mythos roll).
• Observation Room: Fitted with peepholes behind mirrored glass—used to monitor vocalists in altered state.
• Dormitory: Shared sleeping quarters for indoctrinated students.

Clue: Clara Fen’s old bunk contains a scorched corner of her notebook copy, with a partial Canticle phrase (singing it triggers POW roll).

Third Floor – Inner Circle Quarters

Access: Inner circle only (Hume, Danforth, elite cultists)

• Danforth’s Personal Suite: Lavish, faint smell of incense. Concealed drawer holds:
  • Handout: Draft of “Canticle Segment VI”, with mathematical annotations and translated Senzar glyphs. Suggests Danforth is rewriting portions herself.
• Ritual Preparation Room: Marbled floor, traces of salt, candleholders, and locked chest.
  • Loot: Cultes des Goules – French translation, well-worn, with extensive annotations by Hume regarding “sonic modulation and neural attunement.” Contains spells including Enchant Knife, Implant Fear, and Shriveling.

Basement – Access to the Sub-Basement

Description: The basement is used for mundane storage and heating infrastructure. Crates of wine, broken musical instruments, and firewood are stacked in cluttered corners. The air smells of damp wood and coal dust. Flickering oil lamps provide meager light. Most staff and visitors believe this floor is simply for utilities.

Access Point to Sub-Basement:

• A shelving unit on the rear wall conceals a trapdoor beneath a false wooden panel. A successful Spot Hidden reveals scuff marks on the floor and worn hinges. Moving it requires STR 40+ or a crowbar.
• Clue to Access: A misplaced maintenance ledger mentions, in passing, “boiler ash stored behind the old trap,” suggesting someone knows about the hidden level.

Sub-Basement – Cells, Vault, and Ritual Space

Access: Hidden (trapdoor behind basement shelves) General Use: Detention, occult storage, chant preparation, long-term prisoner holding

• Detention Corridor: A narrow hall lined with five iron-barred cells, two currently occupied: Bellamy, and Father Jeremiah Creel, an elderly fire-and-brimstone nonconformist preacher who stumbled upon one of the Society’s rituals. He is gaunt, half-mad, and constantly murmuring scripture laced with discordant song. He’s been held here for over a month, and while physically frail, his eyes are lucid with horror. He may serve as a valuable source of information about recent rituals or sacrifices, if calmed and coaxed into speaking. One cell shows clear signs of prior use (Rooke’s former holding).
• Guard Station: A stool and desk with observation peepholes into each cell. Contains a ring of keys and a half-burned logbook of prisoner names and notes.
• Resonance Chamber: Carved stone walls; harmonic glyphs emit faint vibrations. One of the prisoners shows signs of long-term exposure (bleeding ears, cracked voice).
• Vault: Contains:
  • Loot: Petrified throat sac of a Deep One hybrid – emits faint tone.
  • Loot: Scroll tube with pages from an unbound mythos manuscript, indecipherable but musical in structure.
• Chalk Circle Room: Recently used for ritual practice. Chalk smeared, candles stubbed. Blood traces suggest partial sacrifice attempt.
• Warding Sigil:
  • Location: Etched into the stone threshold just before entering the Chalk Circle Room, occupying the narrow doorway between the corridor and the ritual space.
  • Purpose: Designed to prevent anyone from entering the Chalk Circle Room without proper occult disarming.
  • Trigger Conditions: The sigil activates if anyone physically crosses the threshold into the ritual space without disarming it first.
  • Discovery: Spot Hidden or Cthulhu Mythos 15%+ to notice the sigil under faint overlapping sheet music and dust; Occult 50%+ or Mythos 20%+ to recognize its defensive nature.
  • Disarm: Requires erasing a specific outer ring while humming a perfect fourth interval (INTx5 roll or successful Art: Singing).
  • Effect: If not disarmed and the threshold is crossed, the sigil triggers Shriveling on the intruder (1d10 damage, POW vs POW contest). It also emits a high-pitched discordant tone that echoes unnaturally through the stone halls, alerting the entire building.

Cult Guards (x2):

• Walter Baines (STR 60, DEX 50, CON 70, HP 12, Fighting Brawl 50%, Firearms 35%)
  • Gruff veteran of prior sacrifices; loyal to Hume. Carries a truncheon and pistol.
• Nathan Pryce (STR 50, DEX 60, CON 60, HP 11, Stealth 60%, Psychology 40%)
  • Furtive and watchful, believes in Danforth’s leadership. Often stationed near the vault.

Handouts

Handout 1: Letter from Prof. Albin Herzfeld (Vienna)

Purpose: Points to international cult network and tensions among its members. References Vienna chapter. Location: In the middle right drawer of Dr. Hume’s ornate oak desk (First Floor Office). Requires a successful Spot Hidden roll to locate amid administrative clutter. Physical Description: Folded cream stationery with gold-embossed header from the University of Vienna. Ink is deep brown and slightly smudged at the edges.

My Esteemed Dr. Hume,

I must once again voice my concern regarding the tempo fluctuations in your rendition of Segment IV. The Germanic cycles require precision—too much variation risks harmonic destabilization, as we’ve seen with the unfortunate case in Kraków. Additionally, Lady D.'s increasing… liberties with the source notation are worrying. Perhaps you might counsel her restraint?

In Brotherhood of the Open Measure, — Prof. Albin Herzfeld, Vienna

Handout 2: Letter from “G.B.” (Venice)

Purpose: Confirms exchange of occult materials. Suggests Venice as another major cult node. References sonic experiments. Location: Tucked inside a folder labelled “Correspondence – Foreign” on the shelf behind Hume’s desk (First Floor Office). Requires Library Use to search efficiently. Physical Description: Thin parchment sealed with red wax, slightly curled at the corners. The handwriting is ornate and slightly theatrical.

Dear Hume, The canals swell with song this season here in Venice, and the echoes have found new resonance in the stones. The fragments you sent arrived intact—delightfully resonant. My acolytes responded almost immediately to the laryngeal sample; the overtones were exquisite. Translation Segment III approaches final alignment. Tell our mutual friend in Paris I’ll need more singers by midsummer. Yours in vibration,— G.B.

Handout 3: Letter from Mathilde Savarin (Lyon)

Purpose: Points to Lyon chapter and Bastille Day deadline; references broader Canticle plan. Location: Hidden in a locked correspondence box in Hume’s private cabinet (First Floor Office). Requires Locksmith or successful Hard Spot Hidden to notice behind a false panel. Physical Description: Heavy parchment folded into thirds, sealed with pale green wax stamped with a lyre sigil. The writing is stylish and precise, in a violet-ink fountain pen hand.

My Dear Hume,

The Société Harmonique de l’Aube grows impatient, as do I. Our arrangements at Fourvière proceed apace, but only if the voices remain undisturbed. I remind you that we are committed to crescendo on the 14th of July—a date of symbolic resonance we dare not squander.

Segment V lacks its central motif still. I’ve reviewed Danforth’s variations, but they stray far too freely from the source. Be mindful she does not confuse invention with insight.

May all converge in resonance, — Mathilde Savarin, Présidente, Société Harmonique de l’Aube (Lyon)

Handout 4: Map with Kensington Mark

Purpose: First clue pointing to Kensington Stables as a site of hidden cult activity. Location: Folded into a leather portfolio sitting atop Hume’s desk blotter (First Floor Office). Can be found automatically if the desk is searched. Physical Description: A worn and folded map of London dated 1812, edges frayed, with new ink marks. Several musical venues are circled in blue; Kensington Stables is circled in red.

[A folded city map of west London. Hand-marked in ink are several known performance venues. A red pin and a circle are drawn around a nondescript yard labeled “Kensington Stables.”]

Handout 5: Danforth’s Private Notes on Choir Hierarchy

Purpose: Reveals her resentment of Hume and her personal ambitions to control the Canticle. Location: Hidden beneath loose sheet music in the bottom drawer of Danforth’s escritoire (First Floor Office). Requires Spot Hidden or Luck roll to uncover. Physical Description: Small leather-bound journal, clasped shut with a silk ribbon. Pages are scented faintly with lavender and marked in an elegant, looping script.

[A leather-bound journal, carefully concealed. The most recent page reads:]

“He still sees me as ornament, as chorus—never soloist. But I hear the chord structure now. The Canticle is incomplete without a center. When the time comes, it will be my voice that binds the resonance. Not his.”

Handout 6: Danforth’s Student Experiment Log

Purpose: Shows multiple students have been harmed. Links to deaths (obituaries) and coverup. Location: Locked inside an armoire behind Danforth’s desk (First Floor Office). Requires Locksmith or successful Mechanical Repair or forced entry to access. Physical Description: A slim folio bound in pale calfskin, its pages filled with small, exacting copperplate handwriting. Smells faintly of chalk and citrus oil.

Clara: full pitch range retained, minor hemorrhage. Ruth: spasms, failed tonic shift. Expired. Margaret: unstable tremor, loss of language. Handed to the Stables. Lionel: recovered. Lying low.

[Final note: “Stables disposed. Coach receipt on file.”]

Handout 7: Grosvenor Coach Receipt

Purpose: Second clue to Kensington Stables, matching oblique references in Danforth’s notes. Location: Inside a folder labelled “Receipts – Travel” in the filing cabinet to the left of Danforth’s fireplace (First Floor Office). Requires Library Use or successful rummaging. Physical Description: Thin parchment slip with ink-stamped seal from the Grosvenor Carriage Company. Folded twice, slight water damage.

Grosvenor Carriage Co.

Paid in full for private hire of covered coach to Kensington Yard, June 3, 1814. Client: “Miss D.”

Handout 8: Partial Canticle Segment (Student Bunk)

Purpose: Mythos exposure, auditory trigger, and link to Clara Fen. Location: Jammed into the crack behind the wallboard near Clara Fen’s bunk (Second Floor – Student Dormitory). Requires Spot Hidden to find. Physical Description: Burnt scrap of parchment, torn from a larger page, with inky musical scrawls warped by smoke damage. Charcoal smudges cling to the edges.

[Burnt scrap of parchment, handwritten in ink and smudged charcoal.]

“…li-keh-nah-TUH yah-SHOH-thoth ah-lah-tehn…”

[Singing this triggers a subtle harmonic hum felt in the bones. Requires POW roll or 1 SAN loss.]

Handout 9: Draft of Canticle Segment VI (Danforth’s Suite)

Purpose: Reveals that Danforth is composing her own version. Deep Mythos connection. Location: Hidden beneath the lining of a harp case standing in the corner of Danforth’s suite (Third Floor). Requires Spot Hidden and some time to uncover. Physical Description: Sheet music on vellum, stained red along one edge. The musical notation drifts unnaturally down the page. The annotations include glyphs scribed in what appears to be powdered bone ink.

[Sheet music scrawled in red ink, with annotations in French and Latin. The key signature is corrupted; time signatures bleed into glyphs.]

Final chord must be sung into silence.

Beneath the music, a footnote: “Paris holds Segment V. I will finish VI in time.”

Handout 10: Cultes des Goules (Tome)

Purpose: Mythos Tome. Allows Mythos skill increase. Contains Enchant Knife, Implant Fear, Shriveling. Location: Locked inside an iron-banded chest beneath the altar in the Ritual Preparation Room (Third Floor). Requires Locksmith or breaking open the chest (STR check). Physical Description: Tattered 18th-century French volume bound in cracked, oily leather with worm-eaten corners. Heavy with the scent of mildew and tallow. Marginalia in Hume’s hand throughout.

[Tattered 18th-century French volume bound in cracked, oily leather. Marginalia in Hume’s hand throughout.]

Reading time: 2 weeks Mythos Gain: +5% SAN Loss: 1d6 Spells: Enchant Knife, Implant Fear, Shriveling

Additional Security

Night Watchman – Mr. Ephraim Colley

• Age: 56

• Profession: Retired constable turned night guard

• Summary: Hired recently by Danforth, Ephraim is loyal but not especially observant. He patrols the ground and first floors once an hour, checking doors and looking for trouble. He carries a lantern, a truncheon, and a whistle.

• Stats (CoC 7e):

  • STR 60, DEX 40, CON 55, INT 50, POW 45, EDU 40, APP 35
  • HP: 11, MP: 9, SAN: 45
  • Skills: Listen 50%, Spot Hidden 40%, Intimidate 35%, Fighting (Brawl) 45%, Psychology 20%

• Roleplaying Notes:

  • He is chatty and might grumble about “ungrateful songbirds” or “bloody students shrieking at all hours.”
  • A successful Charm (vs 40%) or Fast Talk (vs 35%) roll can distract or detain him briefly.
  • Listen (vs 50%) is rolled if the players make any noise on creaky floors or disturb furniture.

• Potential Outcomes:

  • Catches someone: will challenge and threaten to summon Dr. Hume.
  • If seriously alarmed (e.g. blood, weapons), he flees upstairs to alert others or raise alarm on the street.

Locked Doors

A. Dr. Hume’s Office (First Floor)

• Lock Type: Quality brass mortise lock (DC moderate)

• Challenge:

  • Locksmith roll required: Regular Success (Hard to pick in darkness)
  • Strength to force: STR 60+ for door; STR 75+ to avoid damaging the handle/lock beyond recognition

• Clue:

  • If they force it, Tadcombe will notice the next morning, increasing future security
  • A successful Listen (vs 30%) roll in the hallway may catch faint ticking or movement from within — an automatic music box sometimes left running

B. Danforth’s Suite (Third Floor)

• Not locked, but Danforth’s door creaks loudly. Dexterity (vs 50%) check to open it silently. A failure causes Colley to roll Listen (vs 50%) if nearby.

Additional Notes:

• Any footsteps above the first floor at night will echo. A group moving together should roll Stealth collectively with penalty dice unless moving single file.
• If Ephraim is distracted, he can be tailed or locked in the Records Room or cloakroom.
• If combat breaks out, he flees—he’s not a zealot.

Access & Security

• Front door: Locked after hours; visitors announced
• Rear (Ballast Lane): Service entrance; accessible with staff knowledge or during deliveries
• Upper floors: Locked doors, keyed entry required
• Sub-basement: Trapdoor hidden; requires knowledge or discovery
• Patrols: Ephraim Colley makes hourly rounds ground and first floors, 6pm–10pm

Investigation Opportunities

Research & Interviews:

• Students and staff can be interviewed with proper social standing (Charm, Persuade, Credit Rating)
• Hume will grant audience to interested patrons; requires Hard rolls to extract information
• Danforth will attempt recruitment of talented visitors; use conversation to test loyalties

Infiltration & Theft:

• Handouts discoverable in offices with successful stealth/Locksmith
• Sub-basement requires either trapdoor discovery (Spot Hidden) or access from someone with keys
• Guards can be distracted, avoided, or overcome depending on player approach

Combat & Confrontation:

• Building is defensible; cultists will barricade and call for reinforcements
• Fire spreads rapidly; oil lamps are hazard
• Structural instability in sub-basement; collapse possible during extended combat

Campaign History

• Chapter 1 (June 1814): The investigators raided the sub-basement of the Orphean Society building. They took out two guards — Walter Baines and Nathan Pryce — and freed Imogen Bellamy from the detention cells. Father Jeremiah Creel, the mad priest in the adjacent cell, was found but deliberately left behind. Augustus Bolt entered the Catacoustic Chamber and mercy-killed the Choir Below — the chained, eyeless prisoners who had been singing endlessly. A tome was recovered from the chamber. After the Stonehenge assault, in which Dr Erasmus Hume and Lady Octavia Danforth were both killed, the London cell of the Aeternum Choir was effectively destroyed.

Appearances