Father Alasdair MacLeod was born in the Scottish Highlands, the son of a crofter whose family possessed little beyond stubbornness, faith and a collection of stories about things that sensible people insisted had never existed. As a young man Alasdair dismissed most of these tales as remnants of an older Scotland, useful for frightening children but hardly appropriate subjects for an educated clergyman. His studies for the ministry strengthened that conviction, although several years serving isolated Highland communities gradually made him less certain. There were lonely glens where people still barred their doors before sunset, ruined places avoided even by shepherds, and occasionally a burial conducted according to precautions that appeared to owe rather more to fear than Christian doctrine.
His introduction to the supernatural came when he was called to a remote household after several members of the same family died within a few weeks. What Alasdair encountered there destroyed any comfortable distinction between folklore and reality. More importantly, it brought him into contact with the Twilight Order, whose agents had been following the same events. They recognised both the strength of his faith and his unusual sensitivity to supernatural forces, and in time Alasdair was initiated into the Order and trained as an Arcanist.
He proved an unconventional one. Alasdair had little interest in mystical performance for its own sake and regarded supernatural power as something dangerous that should be handled with the same care another man might give a loaded pistol. His abilities were tools in the Order’s war, nothing more, and he remained a priest before he was an Arcanist. When circumstances demanded it, however, his prayers could become something considerably more tangible, strengthening his companions, resisting hostile sorcery and calling upon powers that even hardened Crusaders treated with considerable respect.
When the Order expanded its struggle against Dracula into America, Alasdair was assigned to Brother Matthias Kane’s posse. Kane commands the company in battle, but Alasdair serves as its spiritual counsellor and supernatural specialist. The two men have developed a strong relationship based upon mutual respect rather than unquestioning agreement. Kane decides where the posse will fight; Alasdair occasionally reminds him that surviving the fight would also be desirable.
He carries a shotgun, a weapon he initially considered rather crude until his first few months in America persuaded him of its virtues. Alasdair now regards it with much the same practicality he applies to everything else. Faith may protect a man’s soul, but when something with claws comes through the door, twelve gauge provides useful additional reassurance.
Perhaps his most extraordinary ability is his capacity to summon the Seraphim when the Order faces an enemy beyond the strength of ordinary men. Alasdair does not regard such an act casually. Calling a supernatural servant into the mortal world is not a parlour trick, nor something to be attempted merely because a battle is going badly. For him it is an appeal for intervention made only when mortal courage, silver and gunpowder may no longer be enough.
Despite everything he has witnessed, Alasdair retains a dry Highland humour that occasionally surfaces at the least appropriate moment. He has faced vampires, restless dead and creatures for which he still has no satisfactory name, yet remains convinced that the most frightening thing he has encountered in America is the coffee.
The monsters, at least, can sometimes be improved with a shotgun.
Thanks to ChatGPT for help with the pics.
