04-22-2013, 08:00 PM
[Hey guys! I checked with niko to make sure these posts were meant for my attention before chiming in, but for the record: I'm not planning on NPCing the Guardians or Warder for every new character introduction. It's a bit more than I'm willing to do for a volunteer gig and will get repetitive and boring fast. However, the introduction 'protocol', if you will, is a lot clearer in the system pages for Cold Crescent than it is for Forgotten Questions, so I'm going to write a bit here so everyone gets a general idea of the gist and can fill in the details themselves in play. From here on out I'll only step in and NPC the Warder/Guardians for things like this when I think it's necessary.]
--
At dusk, the near-4,000 acres of Roxborough State Park belong to the Garou. The kinsman who lives in the tiny fire department between the park and the town sleeps lightly; he listens for the voice of the crow-spirit that has come to him from the Warder before, twice since the last one died but not for a long time now. Bad nights, those. He remembers them well.
The station by the gate where during daylight hours a ranger takes cash and hands over passes and maps is empty now, the gate closed. No great barrier, that; cars can't get through, anyone can walk around. Or hope over. There is very little to stop restless teenagers or anyone else from wandering in, except the fact that there is nothing in Roxborough Park to lure them in ward. Nothing to do there but hike. No shelter worth looking for, if they were to need it.
There is also this: it's hard to remember why you came there, even before you get to the gate. Walking or driving out those roads at night it's difficult to answer for yourself why you're bothering this bumpy road at this hour. There is nothing there. It starts to feel like the park is a myth, something you dreamt up and now you're only sleepwalking. Maybe you're still at home in your bed or in front of the television. The sensation is an unsettling one, and as a result Roxborough is silent, and dark,
but not empty.
--
Some things love the smell of blood. Animal-blood, hunted-blood, died-well-and-fast-blood.
Jack and Nina are being watched long before they realize it, and even longer before they see sign of their watchers. There: the way the moonlight gleams on the dark eyes of a mule deer that pauses in its grazing and looks over at them. There, too: one of many birds that flies past them overhead, night-hunting, hooting or calling back to Theurges.
A snake rattles somewhere off the path, rustling through the scrub and the patches of snow that won't seem to stop falling even this late into spring. A bullfrog talks to itself, but its voice sounds like a warning. But that's just how bullfrogs sound.
They are well far from the initial border of the bawn, but farther from the endless heart of the caern, when the Guardians make themselves known.
Under a heavily waxing moon, they can make out grey and brown and red and black among the colors of fur of the wolves that lope out of shadows, out of scrub-trees. They can see the way that brambles cling to those coats, still winter-thick thanks to the clinging cold in the air. Tongues lap past teeth, jaws snap; they behave like a pack, emerging from many points at one time, wafting around the newcomers like water around stone. Jack and Nina are given a wide berth, though. They are sniffed from several yards away, and they can hear the low, almost doglike calls the Guardians give to each other:
clean. clean Garou. clean meat.
One, not much larger than the others and with eyes that burn gold with both violence and intellect, stands out from the pack, which still moves, sniffing and staring at the meat, staring at the newcomers. She says nothing to them, tail still and ears attentive. Her stance is not aggressive. Nor is it welcoming.
She waits.
--
At dusk, the near-4,000 acres of Roxborough State Park belong to the Garou. The kinsman who lives in the tiny fire department between the park and the town sleeps lightly; he listens for the voice of the crow-spirit that has come to him from the Warder before, twice since the last one died but not for a long time now. Bad nights, those. He remembers them well.
The station by the gate where during daylight hours a ranger takes cash and hands over passes and maps is empty now, the gate closed. No great barrier, that; cars can't get through, anyone can walk around. Or hope over. There is very little to stop restless teenagers or anyone else from wandering in, except the fact that there is nothing in Roxborough Park to lure them in ward. Nothing to do there but hike. No shelter worth looking for, if they were to need it.
There is also this: it's hard to remember why you came there, even before you get to the gate. Walking or driving out those roads at night it's difficult to answer for yourself why you're bothering this bumpy road at this hour. There is nothing there. It starts to feel like the park is a myth, something you dreamt up and now you're only sleepwalking. Maybe you're still at home in your bed or in front of the television. The sensation is an unsettling one, and as a result Roxborough is silent, and dark,
but not empty.
--
Some things love the smell of blood. Animal-blood, hunted-blood, died-well-and-fast-blood.
Jack and Nina are being watched long before they realize it, and even longer before they see sign of their watchers. There: the way the moonlight gleams on the dark eyes of a mule deer that pauses in its grazing and looks over at them. There, too: one of many birds that flies past them overhead, night-hunting, hooting or calling back to Theurges.
A snake rattles somewhere off the path, rustling through the scrub and the patches of snow that won't seem to stop falling even this late into spring. A bullfrog talks to itself, but its voice sounds like a warning. But that's just how bullfrogs sound.
They are well far from the initial border of the bawn, but farther from the endless heart of the caern, when the Guardians make themselves known.
Under a heavily waxing moon, they can make out grey and brown and red and black among the colors of fur of the wolves that lope out of shadows, out of scrub-trees. They can see the way that brambles cling to those coats, still winter-thick thanks to the clinging cold in the air. Tongues lap past teeth, jaws snap; they behave like a pack, emerging from many points at one time, wafting around the newcomers like water around stone. Jack and Nina are given a wide berth, though. They are sniffed from several yards away, and they can hear the low, almost doglike calls the Guardians give to each other:
clean. clean Garou. clean meat.
One, not much larger than the others and with eyes that burn gold with both violence and intellect, stands out from the pack, which still moves, sniffing and staring at the meat, staring at the newcomers. She says nothing to them, tail still and ears attentive. Her stance is not aggressive. Nor is it welcoming.
She waits.