Immediately upon finding Anna's journal, Adele asks her roommate who left the book for her. She is handed the note that was with it. A quick look reveals that both the note and the journal have the same handwriting. Scrutinizing Anna's journal reveals a resonance of madness but nothing supernatural. Adele begins to scan the book, using Matter magic to find the most recent entry. This details Anna's capture outside Adele's house shortly after the fire at the cult headquarters. Someone or something took control of her mentally, thwarting her efforts to attack Adele at her home. Adele settles into reading, starting from the beginning, some 8 years before. She reads of Anna's troubles and her time with the Disciples of Nehjarra, where she began to encounter something dark in the world. Adele recalls the name from Convocation, realizing this was a group of Apostates near Gary. She hides the book beneath her pillow as she goes to sleep.
In the meantime Colt gets a call from Athaliah. She informs him that the Sentinel Hippolyta has gone missing and they suspect vampires are to blame. After getting the warning, Colt calls and informs Mammon and Valkyrie. Mammon takes precautions to hide himself, while Valkyrie calls Adele while Colt has to deal with some burning bacon. Shortly afterwards, Valkyrie receives a similar message from Red Knight who also warns her that the Arrow might need her help once they find the culprits. During the next couple days Adele reads the rest of Anna's journal, building a timeline of events and referencing them with her own life. She also compiles a list of people Anna recruited into the cult.
The Ebon Cross meets to discuss the vampire situation and the revelations of Anna's journal. As they discuss the latter, Mammon splits his mind between reading and the discussion. They talk about Anna's research into Adele's past, including revelations about how she was treated by someone with medical knowledge but outside the normal hospital system. One of the entries also indicated more information at a nearby abandoned factory. Mammon however raises the point that perhaps Adele shouldn't take that easy route and that the factory might be a trap. They also discuss having someone look into the past to see if Anna herself left the journal. Kensai is brought up as a possibility but Colt quickly vetoes this idea. Goes is also brought up as a possibility, one that is more reasonable to the cabal. Discussion turns to who could have mind controlled Anna in her final entry. Mages? Vampires? Ghosts? Spirits? But why?
The group divides up to investigate. Adele calls Goes asking for her help in finding more on the journal's owner. Goes answers but says she is currently busy investigating the recent murder. Mammon meanwhile investigates the Silver Ladder libraries for prophecies that might mention Adele or the destruction of Chicago, as revealed by Anna's notes. He finds nothing though he suspects something might be missing from the records. Colt and Valkyrie leave to find Athaliah to discuss murder of Hippolyta. They encounter her on the south side of the city along with Lug, Goes, and Kensai. The Time experts are busy tracing her path and that of her attackers (a group of biker vampires), while the others watch. The Ebon Cross members quiz Athaliah on the case. Other than a description of the attackers and their failure to scry or contact Hippolyta, they have learned little. As the discussion continues a street gang approaches and attacks them. Though some of the mages are wounded, they are able to beat them off, despite the three to one odds. Afterwards the group breaks up for the evening, Athaliah sending word through Samson to the Concilium. Colt leaves a message with Eric Tenscars about the developing situation. Goes stops by Adele's dorm and confirms that Anna left the journal herself. The older mage is too tired to do more searching but does inform Adele of some of the details of the investigation, including the exact time of the murder, 2:36 AM.
With other options exhausted, the Ebon Cross scouts the factory from Twilight. While the factory was cold and dead inside, in Shadow a rusted and charred structure is teeming with fire elementals. In Twilight they also find a single fire spirit dwelling in a still active forge. After talking with the Steel Forge Fire (and feeding a bribe of papers to burn), they learned about the fire worshiping vampires who visit here. It seems they use the forge to burn bodies and sometimes the living but that they failed to return with the customary sacrifice a few days ago. Unfortunately there were also no signs of the papers Anna mentioned either. The spirit also claimed that the Great Fire Spirit was returning to burn the city but that there was a child who was the enemy of the fire spirit that had to be destroyed first.
Suspecting that these were the same vampires who killed Hippolyta (based on the dates of the expected sacrifice), the cabal plans to meet the vampires that night with the help of Athaliah and Kensai. As they wait and watch, they find the vampires emerging from an undiscovered room beneath the factory. Waiting until they leave the building, the mages ambush them. Colt snipes two from a nearby rooftop while Kensai and Valkyrie close with the monsters. As they fight they slowly find themselves overcome by visions of demons and monsters. The vampires laugh and move with blinding speed as the mages employ fire. Despite the group's advantages, slowly the bikers wear them down. Adele shoots arrows from the catwalk, while Mammon fights for consciousness after the vampires he gutted nearly knocks him out. Athaliah and Colt are able to keep most of the mages up and fighting but Valkyrie is seriously hurt and Kensai drops from beatings and paradox. In the end they win but barely. Kensai is unconscious, Adele almost falls to her death, Mammon is bruised, Colt is very hurt, and Valkyrie suffers a final assault that shatters some ribs. They disperse the psychodelic spores that were affecting them, destroy all but a few of the vampires (with the leader Baal already collapsed into a smear of fungal debris), and leave.