Another posse has found its way onto the painting table, although at the moment there is rather more bare metal than menace involved. This time it is my take on the Crossroads Cult, and before I start painting I wanted to give the figures names, personalities and a reason for being together. As usual, once I know who the figures are supposed to represent, painting them becomes considerably more interesting.

For this posse I have called my particular branch of the Crossroads Cult the Meridian Syndicate. Rather than portraying them as obvious cultists, I have imagined the wider Cult operating behind a network of wealthy railway barons, financiers and businessmen back East. Their legitimate commercial interests provide money, influence and an excellent means of moving people and rather more questionable cargo across the country. The expanding railway also provides the Cult with access to isolated places and creates new junctions and crossroads as the rails push steadily westward.

Thaddeus Wycliffe is both a senior official of the Continental & Western Railway and Magister of the Meridian Syndicate. When conducting railway business he dresses impeccably, presenting himself as a wealthy and influential company executive. When attending to the affairs of the Crossroads Cult he exchanges his respectable business clothes for the robes of a Magister. For Wycliffe the railway is much more than a commercial enterprise. Every mile of track extends the reach of the Cult.

Obadiah Stroud is the Syndicate’s principal front line representative and the individual Wycliffe sends when diplomacy has ceased to be useful. Unfortunately, Stroud generally considers diplomacy useless from the beginning. A supernatural being capable of flight and summoning unnatural beasts, he regards violence as the first and usually most satisfactory solution to any problem placed before him.

Brimstone is Wycliffe’s Hellhound and is treated by the Magister almost like a favourite hunting dog. The creature can be summoned when required and unleashed upon anyone unfortunate enough to attract Wycliffe’s particular attention. There is something wonderfully inappropriate about an impeccably mannered railway executive treating a creature from Hell as though it simply requires the occasional scratch behind the ears.

Wycliffe’s other “pet” is Moloch, an Abysmal Behemoth. Unlike Brimstone, Moloch is not something one casually brings along to a business meeting. The enormous creature is summoned when Wycliffe requires overwhelming force and subtlety has become entirely irrelevant. Brimstone hunts. Moloch destroys.

Harlan Mercer began as a railway labourer before discovering that he was considerably better with a pistol than a shovel. Calm and dependable, he eventually found employment protecting railway property and became one of Wycliffe’s regular gunmen. Mercer suspects there is more to the Meridian Syndicate than ordinary railway business, but has sensibly decided that the excellent wages compensate for not asking questions.

Gideon Slade is a gambler, former saloon guard and enthusiastic gunfighter who enjoys confrontation rather more than is strictly necessary. Unlike some of the Syndicate’s hired guns, Slade already knows that his employers are involved with supernatural forces. His principal concern upon discovering this was whether work involving monsters attracted additional pay.

Virgil Boone spent years riding ahead of railway construction crews and persuading reluctant landowners that opposing progress could be unhealthy. He prefers negotiation to shooting, although his habit of conducting negotiations with one hand resting upon his pistol tends to encourage agreement. Boone dislikes the supernatural side of the Syndicate intensely but likes regular employment considerably more.

Former railway detective Ambrose Keeler understands thieves, confidence men and criminals because he has spent much of his career operating remarkably close to their side of the law. Resourceful and observant, he is particularly useful when someone needs to be found. Wycliffe does not trust him completely, although Wycliffe would probably regard completely trusting anybody as a serious character flaw.

Jasper Reddick is a veteran who found that civilian life offered surprisingly few legitimate occupations for someone whose principal talent involved shooting people. After drifting through work as a stagecoach guard, deputy and hired gun, he entered the service of the Syndicate. Quiet and controlled, Reddick becomes frighteningly efficient once the shooting starts.

The man known simply as Chato is an Apache gunfighter who encountered the Meridian Syndicate while working as a scout and occasional guide. He knows the country in ways that Wycliffe’s railway surveyors never will, reading tracks, water, weather and the movement of strangers with an ease that makes their expensive maps seem rather inadequate. He carries a pistol and has become equally comfortable using it from horseback or on foot.

Chato does not trust Wycliffe and trusts Stroud even less. He has recognised from the beginning that the Meridian Syndicate is interested in more than railway construction, particularly when its surveyors begin searching places that sensible men would avoid. He remains with them partly because they pay well, but also because staying close allows him to see what they are doing. Wycliffe undoubtedly realises this. Curiously, he appears to approve. A man who knows he is being watched, the Magister reasons, is often more predictable than one who pretends to be loyal.

So that is the Meridian Syndicate before a brush has touched them. I now have the personalities, the organisation and the basic story behind the posse, which means it is finally time to start turning the collection of unpainted figures in front of me into Wycliffe and his rather unpleasant collection of associates.

I am particularly looking forward to establishing a visual distinction between the respectable railway interests behind the Syndicate and the supernatural reality beneath them. Wycliffe’s Magister robes, Stroud’s otherworldly appearance, the two summoned creatures and the more conventionally dressed gunfighters should hopefully make for an interesting looking group once they are all painted.

For now, however, they remain an intimidating collection of unpainted figures waiting on the desk.

Time to get the brushes out.