Warbands: Usher's Unofficials

This warband belongs to Koltama, one of the partaking players in our Streets of Oldentown campaign. You're treading in his hobby stronghold right now.

Ever since he was dismissed from his duties as a Witch Hunter in the Order of the Knights of Azyr, Roderick Usher has been at a loss on what to do with his life. After weeks of sitting in his cousin's attic, locked away in a dark room in self-imposed exile, Roderick finally made a decision to strike out as a private investigator. This was easier said than done, since his dismissal from the Order had somehow involved wooden stakes, funeral pyres and a bunch of dead un-tried nobles.

Usher was eventually able to purchase an old office for himself in the capital's disreputable Oldentown District, right at the corner of Grumblebeard District and Tumult Street, to act as a base of operations for his newly founded Usher's Investigation Office. The license for his private office's legal registration is still pending at the Puffington Ministry of Warranted Guilds & Businesses.

Even though Roderick's office started off as a one-man job, his business soon attracted more operatives despite its current legal issues. The Brotherhood of the Absent Flame, a fanatical group of locals who've hit the bottom of the barrel in their lives, has joined the Investigation Office and regularly helps Usher by providing strong faith and lots of manpower. The Brotherhood seeks to root out all evil and corruption from the city, starting with the Oldentown District, which for the time being aligns with Usher's goals of regaining his reputation by working investigations in the private sector.

Father Eli is the beating heart of the Brotherhood of the Absent Flame, and it is he who rounded up all the Brothers from the ruins of their previous lives.

Eli himself has always been a priest, and until just some years ago his occupation was that of a local preacher in Nordminster. The villagers knew him for the charmer he was, and more than one local human youngling was known to visit Father Eli's chambers for "private masses". The priest's adventures regarding the local bailiff's son and daughter earned him a spot in the hangman's row, yet he managed to slip away into the capital before the guards found him.

Having a searing desire to preach Sigmars' word, Father Eli held roadside-masses for any who would listen; which was not many considering he had now been excommunicated from the Holy Church of Sigmar. Founding the Brotherhood saw Father Eli regain some of his former prestige, and his holy work in scouring the city's scum has earned him a not-inconsiderable amount of street-cred.
His prayers of healing and smitation are still frequently answered, but whether or not it is the God-King granting these boons is unclear.

Brother Ashton was a promising athlete in his youth, claiming gold in several guild competitions over the years. His specialty was the javelin, which he could fling further and more accurately than even the local aelves. This was to be his downfall, as the aelves conspired against him and plunged him into a spiral of rumours and lies that eventually drove Ashton to sleep in the street gutters, forsaken and dirt-poor. This is where Father Eli found him, and ever since the Brotherhood has been a home to Ashton. He even gets to fling javelins at heretics on a weekly basis!

Brother Owen used to be a mason before joining the Brotherhood. Born and raised in Oldentown, Owen often acts as a district guide for his mates despite hating the area almost as much as he hates heretics. His entrepreneurship as a mason did not go too well, as everything he built by day was torn down at night. Such is the nature of the most restless of districts in Puffington.

One morning, after walking past a fresh chimney he had finished just last night and finding it smashed to dust, Owen just couldn't take it anymore. He picked up his sledgehammer and went to town, venting his rage on the gangs that infest Oldentown. To this day there are stories circling in the Grumblebeard Street how a single man tore down two fifths of a city block before a guard patrol could detain him. The rhytmic banging of Owen's hammer heralds doom to those who would seek to harm or hinder Puffington's honest workers.

Brother Nash enrolled to the freeguild regiment known as the "Crimson Caps" as soon as he came of age. Born and raised in the nobility districts of Puffington, the young man craved for danger and adventures of military life, completely oblivious to the horrors of war.
His detachment served years patrolling the streets and battlements of the city, until one day a group of volunteers was rounded up to join a realmgraphical expedition into the empty vastness of the Oblast to the northeast of the capital. Needless to say young Nash was among the first to join in.

What happened in the Oblast is a mystery to all but Brother Nash himself, and even he is reluctant to speak of the matter. The expedition went missing, only for lone Guardsman Nash to be found by a patrol from the Blacksoul Citadel weeks later, his body wasted and his eyes plucked out. After being seen to by the healers of the citadel, Nash was sent back to Puffington for interrogation about the fate of the expedition. No matter who asked him or how, they couldn't get any answers from the poor wretch of a guardsman. He was dismissed from duty due to the loss of eyesight, but Nash didn't agree and escaped with his service handgun as he was being escorted back to the barracks.

Nash joined the Brotherhood of the Absent Flame after Father Eli found him selling his services as a gun-for-hire, and now he gets to chase the heretic and the corrupt on a weekly basis. When asked how he can hit anything at all without his eyes, Brother Nash often replies that he can still hear perfectly well.

Brother Reece is one of the many foresters that tend to the vast Ghurian woodlands that spread out around the capital city of Puffington. He spends his days fending away foul predators and seeing to the welfare of the region's flora under the pressure a rapidly growing Order city tends to cause to nature. By night, however, he sneaks out to join the Brotherhood of the Absent Flame in their attacks against the city's heretic elements, making use of his trusty Warden's Voulge in cleansing the city one corrupted limb at a time.

Yet Reece has not always been a night-time vigilante alongside his daily occupation. Although he still retains his position in the Foresters' Guild and his respected status as the Warden of the Northeastern Woods, Reece has been slipping deeper into insanity ever since his firstborn was carried away by sewer-dwelling mutants.

He vowed to his wife to retrieve their offspring and fought his way into the Puffington sewage system, cutting down mutants and giant rats as he went, only to find their dear child already sacrificed to some unnamed sinister entities.

Brother Reece found solace in the company of the Brotherhood, absorbing the teachings of Father Eli and appreciating the occasional chance to hunt heretics. The man strikes the onlooker as a painful and grim figure, not least due to the forester's key and the skull of his firstborn hanging on his person: constant reminders of a man's duty and a father's loss.

Adrian the Prophet holds a special role in the Brotherhood for his ability to commune with celestial entities in his dreams. He often wakes up screaming in the night, blurting out holy litanies of things he's been told by the greater powers. Father Eli has to interrogate Adrian after each such incident to make sure the visions and requests acquired in the dreams are valid and safe, for there are known to be several soothsayers in Oldentown that do not get their visions from benevolent beings...

Adrian is a tortured soul because of his unusual gift. He sees and knows things that are not entirely meant for mortals, and as such his human mind becomes increasingly unstable with each dream. Other members of the Brotherhood report Adrian growing more distant each year, his formerly warm demeanor slowly replaced by a glassy stare and short, mumbled replies to conversation. He often flagellates himself in order to keep his mind anchored to the present moment, but his flail is equally nasty when used against the Brotherhood's enemies on the streets.