For too long, the Ventrue and Toreador Princes of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden ignored the Anarch threat, attributing the rising violence to refugee Kin­ dred fleeing from the Baba Yaga in Russia and the incomprehensible Finns. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the eminent Kindred of the region hoped the troublesome Anarchs would just go away so that they could resume their nights of bloody luxury. Sweden, in particular had, in the words of a Sabbat provoca­ teur, “an Anarch problem.”

The Anarch presence in Stockholm doubled during the late 1990s and then doubled again within another 10 years. Stockholm — with a population only large enough to sustain perhaps 20 vampires in compara­ tively safe Masquerade — swelled its Kindred ranks to over a hundred.

Eventually, the Scandinavian Anarchs realized what power they had in numbers and threw down the Prince’s Praxis. For over a year, the Anarch Move­ ment held sway in Stockholm, deposing the Prince claiming the old town of Gamla Stan as its center of resistance against elder oppression.

The Camarilla quietly nursed its wounds after the embarrassing loss. Ivory Tower Kindred stole into the secret tombs of the elder Ventrue beneath Riddar­

holm Church, waiting for the right moment to topple the nascent Anarch caucus. Promising forgiveness for past transgressions, the Camarilla also offered a “fresh start” in Stockholm for Kindred exiled from other domains, provided they upheld the Traditions and rooted out the Anarchs. A contingent of Brunhilde’s valkyries even approached the city, though they broke off negotiations with the besieged Anarchs, rather than plunge the city into Masquerade-threatening bloodshed. It worked, to an extent.

Tonight, Praxis lies in a dangerous detente between Camarilla stalwarts and the relentless Anarchs. Com­ pounding issues is the worry that the Anarchs have granted an amnesty to the Methuselah Louhi, an an­ cient terror from Finland whose knowledge of Thau­ maturgy challenges Tremere supremacy in that Disci­ pline. If the Scandinavian Anarchs truly have such a potent ally hidden among them, something dire is surely in the domain’s future.