Moonstruck

The next day, Anshu and Salamander went to the bathhouse, with Dhiren tagging along. There they met nearly a dozen other Exalts of gold and silver, and one rather forgettable man with violet eyes. After a brief scuffle involving a rowdy pair of Dragon-blooded, they moved to a caravanserai to continue their introductions and ponder the circumstances that had brought them all together. Despite attempts to make trouble by a mysterious green-eyed man, they continued to talk long into the night.

However, at midnight, the city of Nexus was rocked by explosions. Agents of the Mask of Winters had hidden at least a dozen soulbreaker orbs at strategic locations around the city. The sudden, catastrophic loss of life caused an immense shadowland to form, plunging the city into the Underworld, where the Mask's armies were waiting. Caught off-guard by the attack, the grand circle nevertheless managed to delay the Abyssal-led armies and buy time for Dhiren and his Solar mate to gather survivors. During the battle, one of the Masks's subcommanders Exalted as a Zenith after the death of a member of the grand circle; after spiriting her away and boarding the mortal survivors aboard a barge, the grand circle used sorcery and necromancy to flee the Underworld and reach Great Forks, where they hoped to catch their breath and regroup.

Unfortunately, Great Forks was already evacuating in the face of the Mask of Winter's threats. Still, with time to prepare and full access to certain members' private resources, the grand circle repelled the assault on the city despite losing their Dawn to a Night-caste assassin, and then launched a daring raid on Juggernaught itself, doing substantial damage to it and rescuing a Twilight prisoner. With the Mask of Winters' advance temporarily halted, the grand circle set out for Denandsor, leading a throng of refugees and a private army on a march to the fabled Lost City.

Shortly after the march began, tragedy struck. Anshu, exposed several times to brushes with the minds of the Neverborn during the grand circle's confrontations with deathknights, was meditating on the experience, attempting to better understand it. He succeeded too well; by contacting their minds, he opened himself to their wrath... which exposed Salamander as well. Cruelly, the Neverborn stripped away the magic keeping the Wyld energy at the heart of her Exaltation at bay*, transforming her into a monstrous chimera in an instant. At Salamander's request, Anshu was the one to kill her, but not before they shared a farewell kiss.

A few months later, just outside Denandsor, the grand circle encountered another group of Exalts, among them Anshu's new bondmate, Cerise of the Rose's Thorn. After driving out the Infernal forces attempting to claim the city, the grand circle disabled the artifact creating the zone of fear. With the city cleared of enemies and its own defensive mechanisms mostly under control, mortal and Exalt alike searched Denandsor for new places to call home.

*I realize now that this is an impossibility under the rules of the setting. However, it makes a damn good story this way, so I'm not changing it.