1 November 2013
Waning Crescent Moon
It is All Saint's Day.
It is Día de los Angelitos.
It is -- or was, prior to the early sunset -- Samhain.
It is a holy day among many mortals, but mortals do not own the night. They fear it, and they burn any fuel they can get their hands on to ward it off. It is a darkening, chilling time of year in this hemisphere; the feasts of plenty and the celebrations of light seem very far off, and hard to see when the sun is so scarce and the shadows stretch ever longer.
The night is not holy. And it is not for mortal folk.
--
All who are known hear the call. The blissfully unconscious jolt to awareness as though from a nightmare, and those that hunt after dark arrest their steps and lift their muzzles to the south. Spirits of crows and hawks and small rodents and spirits of strange emotions and half-imagined things carry messages. Garbled messages appear on phones and in e-mail in-boxes that delete themselves upon reading. Garou and Kin alike are called, though the instinct is stronger and the demand is greater upon the former. Even the cub that is out there these nights, new to this life, feels on instinct even before her mentor tells her: we must go.
Those closer to the caern get there soonest, naturally. The rangers and volunteers who help guard the state park have the gates open, and unattended kin are given flashlights if they need them. There are few who do not know what they are being called to witness. Two adren and three athro garou still await judgement.
The summons lead the called to Persse Place. The homestead is obviously too small to be suitable for a gathering, but the path and the meadowland around it will suit. The house is for those who may need shelter, those who may need warmth. Such as the children.
Pulled from their beds, lifted into the arms of parents and aunts and uncles and guardians, bundled against the cold, eyes bleary and some with tears falling, the children of the nation's common blood are called as well. They do not understand. Some of them will drift from the nation, even run from it. Some of them may even grow to be garou themselves; the rites of true divination that once foretold who would change and who would not have been lost for a very, very long time (though that does not stop some from making attempts anyway). For tonight, though, they are just children, being raised by their people.
They are all, in the end, one people.
--
Luna is angled in the sky, thin and sharp at her ends, the sickle-curve of harvest, the gleaming silver knife that can cut so deep with so little rage. It was not, originally, the moon they were to be judged beneath. This is not a moon of judgement. It is a moon of difficult choices, of bindings and bargains, remembering and forgetting, sometimes soul-selling and sometimes soul-stealing and yet also: healing. Creating. It is a strange moon, and its particular lunacy --
you are all moon-mad, in your way,
don't forget
-- is one of the hardest to understand by those outside it. Even those inside of it. Luna casts only a thin light, but she sees many things.
Beneath that light and the long shadows it casts, the garou and their kin gather together. Some of the kin huddle inside the homestead, a fire lit and an infant fussing until nursed. That would be Amanda Brown and her newborn; Clamor of Night's son. Miles brought a couple thermoses of coffee and a flask of whiskey, but then: he always has the latter. Most stand at the door or windows or just outside, watching as the wolves gather. More than a few of the kin carry firearms of one kind or another, because this is Colorado and this is not the city and even if they were not ardent supporters of the 2nd Amendment, they would have that 9mm, that .45, that shotgun. Most of them say, whenever they are asked: you never know.
You really don't. Until you do. And often by then, it's too late to do anything about it.
--
The leaders of Cold Crescent stand with their counterparts from Forgotten Questions. They stand with the garou who were mentors, who were icons, who were ideals to strive for as often as they were traditionalists to rebel against. There is anger between them now, and betrayal, and shame. But they are not enemies. They have never been enemies. Even the Master of Rites of Forgotten Questions, hard-eyed and brutal and threatening under a few full moons past to tear the throat out of Warning Threshold, is restrained. For it is often one thing to talk of punishment, and it is another to mete it out.
It is an awful, sacred thing.
Time ticks by as the wolves gather, and then somehow it is simply known that all who will come have come. Then Summer's Early Dawn, the Keeper of the Land who tends the spiritual side of Forgotten Questions where so many kin and rangers and the state itself tend to the physical aspect, comes forward with Hunter of Peace, Goddess's Silence. He is much taller than his caern counterpart is, and not quite as dotty, nor as good at managing groups of people.
Summer's Early Dawn turns to him, and it becomes clear to all in attendance that there will be no soliloquy here, no setup, no speechifying. There has been enough talk. They are getting right to it.
"Hunter of Peace-yuf," she says, "we show you mercy. Signs of your care for your sept can be found from the hidden levels to the very rooftop of Cold Crescent. Til violated, the spirits were pleased there and the shrines well-kept. I have spoken with the soul of your Challenge Floor, which was tended neatly. After the violation, you fought those above you to allow lower-ranked Theurges to join you in recovering, cleansing, and healing the place given into your care, and under your watch, even the Gauntlet was made thinner in the midst of the city."
She puts her hand out to her tribemate, her brow stitching. "You spoke up, but you did not speak loud enough. You fought, but you did not counsel with the needed strength. You did not seek outside help from your allies in the caern when you should have." There is a pause. "I know from our talks these past weeks that you were trying to balance respect for your elders with loyalty to your people as a whole. I know that in trying to do your best, you disregarded your own instinct. I believe the city has dulled the wolf in you, and made you forget how to honor Luna's touch on your mind: you have tried to turn moonlight into ice to make it solid, and this is the work of the Weaver.
"You cannot remain as a leader in the city," she tells him, shaking her head. "You cannot remain in the city at all. For thirteen moons, you will remain in Forgotten Questions. You will forsake the comforts of mankind and live in the three forms furthest from man whenever possible. You will eat what you hunt. You will seek a pack, as you have not since you went to the city. You will keep the land with me, and find your redemption in wildness."
Hunter of Peace bows his head in a deep nod to Summer's Early Dawn. And then, without preamble or hesitation, he removes his glasses. He removes his clothes, down to the last thread, putting them in a pile to the side. Slowly, he shifts down to lupus and crawls forward on his belly, licking at the Keeper of the Land's toes. He knows how merciful this is. He knows he is not forgiven, but he is spared.
He follows her, when she leaves the center, loping behind her heels, leaving the trappings of his human disguise behind him.
--
Retribution's Fist is next. His back is unbowed, his head held high, his shoulders squared. He will not crawl on his belly to lick the feet of anyone, whatever his judgement. His eyes are steel-colored, his jaw shadowed by the beard that has grown in over the last few weeks. When he comes to stand face to face with the Master of Challenges of Forgotten Questions, All Is Shadow When Turned From the Sun. He has been the Master of Challenges at Cold Crescent longer than she has held her post at the caern. They are born from the same tribe and equal in rank, though he is a bit older. They have tangled for a long time, each accusing the other of presumption more often than not. He refuses to call her rhya, though she is now his judge.
All is Shadow does not seem to have much love lost for him, either. There is a bristling, crackling energy between the two of them that trends towards outright loathing but is held in careful, respectful, aching restraint that longs to be unleashed.
She takes a breath. "Mercy," she says, flatly and clearly, though it's obvious she wants to spit the word at his face. "In your role, you did not take action that allowed your sept to be desecrated.
"You didn't do much to stop it, either," she goes on, a little more harshly. Retribution's Fist nearly bares his teeth at her, but controls himself.
"It is the Challenge Master's duty to watch the leaders of the garou for weakness, for mistakes, for taking steps on a path that could lead to the downfall of us all. In this, you failed not only your sept, but your tribe, your moon, and all of your people. You must answer for that failure. Because you did not serve your nation and protect them from the weaknesses of their leaders, you may not be a part of this nation."
All is Shadow hesitates a moment. Strange, that, as she watches him, hating him, she hesitates.
"Retribution's Fist-yuf, you are ostracized." She closes her eyes. "Gaia, I shun Retribution's Fist. Of all your children, I have no such brother." She turns on her heel to her left, sharp, sudden, like tearing off a bandage.
Another garou, an elder of the Lords, steps forward and calls out as well: Gaia, I shun Retribution's Fist. Of all your children, I have no such brother. He, too, turns away from the former Master of Challenges of Cold Crescent.
Again and again, first the grandchildren of Thunder and then more and more of the garou present -- then almost all of them, their voices a cascade, several speaking at once until the words resound in the gathering, echoing: no such brother. no such brother.
None see now but the kinfolk. All have turned their backs on him, even those who did not speak for the rite. From the doorway of Persse Place, Retribution's Fist sees his mate watching him. She is uncomfortable here; she's never fit in out in the sticks, she was glad when they moved to the city. She was glad when they left behind his neverending feud and tension with All is Shadow. She looks uncomfortable now, having watched all of this. She looks sad, and she looks
strong,
as she turns widdershins from her mate. Those kin inside who see her face can see the tears she does not shed, the anger and the resolve in her jaw. Those kin inside know: she is being punished, too. Not intentionally. Not spitefully. Just by association. Just because this means closing her door on her mate for five, six months. Miles gives her a steadying nod, his regard for her honor, for her loyalty to the nation, for her cunning; and it is cunning, for when spring comes, her decision tonight will make a difference in the way Retribution's Fist is welcomed back by the garou.
And no one sees, but when the initial shock and kneejerk anger and pain leave the eyes of the Ahroun who was just punished, he looks strong, too. Resolved. And he is looking at no one but her, making her oaths in his mind and heart that he does not speak aloud,
before he leaves them all, walking past the discarded clothes left by Hunter of Peace and slipping through the ranks of werewolves, heading down the long path into the darkness.
--
Forge of Nótt is not restricted to the caern or her lupus form. She is not shunned from her people for half a year. The Ritemaster of Forgotten Questions, even more gravely filled with rage at the Cold Crescent's leaders than perhaps any other, looks as though he wants to tear her to pieces where she stands, but she does not receive this most final of judgements. She, like her counterpart, is tasked with knowledge, with instruction, with understanding.
It was up to her to learn enough to understand what they faced in the pit, to teach those beneath and above her of its dangers. He shouts at her, shames her for the fact that those beneath her rank were the ones to question, the ones to discover, the ones to share what they knew. He dresses her down, and then, shifting into crinos, the Ritemaster towers above her.
Forge of Nótt, Adren Godi, faces him, preparing for her death with honor, with iron will, without fear or cowering. But his claws never reach for her. He whuffs a steaming puff of air, turns from her, and leaves the circle for a moment, only to return with a rock the size of a small child. He throws it to the ground, sending dust outward, and points at it.
"You will be Scorned by your people," he snarls at her, growling from the depths of his throat, the words shifting along with him as he returns to his human form. "And you will speak to them in the voice of the Jackal. Your voice will return with your honor... should you reclaim it."
What follows then takes far, far longer than the rite to ostracize Retribution's Fist. There are many, many garou in the crowd who have things to say about the Theurge who failed them, her pride, her oversights, her mockery of those more ignorant. The claims and accusations grow audacious at times, vengeful, but the rite cannot be stopped. At times there is laughter, and the Godi looks sometimes as though she is on the verge of losing her mind with anger, but she does not retaliate.
Especially not, when almost three hours have passed and people are finally starting to run out of things to say about her, and the Ritemaster lifts a handful of dust from the earth and throws it over her head, into her face, telling her that her pride and failure have shown her to be of jackal blood. Forge of Nótt looks brokenhearted by then, even if she does not bow her head, even if she does not slump her shoulders. There is fury and pain in her eyes.
"Now," the Ritemaster says, staring at her in her shame, standing beside that stone covered with carvings and paintings of the stories told about her, "you will still teach. In the voice of your cowardly breed, and to anyone who comes. And you will teach until your throat is raw and your fingers bleed, without chiminage, without renown, and you will not escape these punishments until all you know, you have taught another. Now get out of my sight."
--
The night is long, and yet it is still hours from dawn. Some of the kin have fallen asleep. Some of the cubs and cliaths have been nipped awake by their betters.
There is a stirring when the Forgotten Warder stalks forward in crinos, on all fours, her thick fur braided in places with stones and feathers and bits of bone. It is hard to see any light in her eyes, for there is almost none. With her walks Warning Threshold, in homid, but when they come to the center of the gathering, he immediately shifts to lupus. He is large, compared to many wolves. He seems impossibly small when he stands in that form before the Forgotten Warder.
She reaches into her own chest, it seems, drawing something out with a faint glimmer of gnosis, barely perceptible as a rippling glow before it fades. She holds in her hand a... box. The box itself is small, but carved with glyphs that seem to shift and move even after the glow has dissipated. Even those several yards away can feel the power of that creation, which the Forgotten Warder simply drops in front of Warning Threshold.
Who does not whine. Who does not keen or howl or back away as the lid to that box falls open as though of its own accord. A great feeling of void enters the hearts of the wolves who watch this. There is something very cold in that box, very empty, a loss that to most seems unimaginable, even if all know that it is survivable.
The Forgotten Warder rises to her hind legs, baring her teeth at the Glass Walker who, though her counterpart, is utterly different from her,
particularly in how deeply he failed his sept.
She does not speak. She reaches down, wrapping her enormous crinos paw around his throat, lifting him from the ground. He twists in midair, letting out an instinctive but truncated yelp as his jaw is pushed back to an unnatural angle. With her other handpaw, the Forgotten Warder
carves
off
several inches of his skin, fur and all, tearing it with tidy brutality from his side. Warning Threshold cannot stop himself from flinching, though his throat will not let out anything but the barest noise of panting, of pain.
The Forgotten Warder drops him unceremoniously back to the ground, and he remains in lupus, trying to push to his feet, trying not to shrink away from her, trying not to beg,
as she drops the bloodied strip of his fur into the box. There is a sudden blast of that darkness, that chilling sense of vulnerability and loss and even imprisonment, and even some of the higher-ranked garou in the gathering flinch. In that blast, that flash that blinds but not with brightness, Warning Threshold turns suddenly into a man. A man with torn clothes and a very, very bloody torso. Which hurts him, as it must, because even he does not try to touch the gifts Gaia has bestowed upon him to push the pain away.
The Forgotten Warder stares down at him as she reaches down, lifting the box and simply closing the lid. Some of the howling feeling of depression and fear dissipates through the gathered septs, but not the cold, sick feeling of what they are seeing: the Wolf being stolen from Warning Threshold. She begins to walk away, to go bury his fur, and his rage, in a secret place.
"When!" he calls after her, his voice harrowed
and yet unbroken.
Even pressing his shirt and his coat against his wounded side to try and staunch the flow of blood, he pushes to his knees, then his feet, watching her go. "How long?"
The Forgotten Warder turns to look at him. Her voice is dark, as her eyes, as her fur. She does not growl or snap at him; she does not need to. Her voice flows into the high tongue, a sound that is both primordial and sacred.
"When. You. Atone."
Warning Threshold lowers his shoulders, hearing that.
Because he may never be able to.
--
There is no pack for Warning Threshold to go back to. There is no theurge willing to step forward and heal him. He wouldn't let them. He looks to the kinfolk, but not for succor; he just looks to them, as though looking for someone, then looks away.
He does not know why he is not killed.
He follows that thought by wondering if that is what he wanted.
--
Last of all, the Great Alpha. He did not have to send anyone to escort Curved Sky from her post in Cold Crescent; she was summoned, and she left. Nor does he have to call her, or drag her forward now. She follows him to stand in front of all the assembled garou, and though she does not know what is coming, she seems to know it will not be mercy. She is dressed simply, in a grey suit. Her hair is tied back. She does not look up.
The Great Alpha is, as ever, in his hunting for, standing as a great wolf among them. He does not change. He is unmoved even by this, at least as far as the eyes of his people can see.
"Tell them,," is all he says, and Curved Sky, Sept Leader of Cold Crescent, takes a breath.
She does not lift her head.
"When I led the movement to establish a sept in the city almost a decade ago, I knew of the pit beneath 1999 Broadway. I told no one but my packmates and my closest allies. Even without knowing that there were nightmares below, many others supported our vision to create a headquarters and gathering place -- a home -- in Denver.
"As we argued with the elders of Forgotten Questions and began establishing the sept of the Cold Crescent, fights erupted amongst our number as well, within the inner circle. Some wanted to make sure it was known to everyone what was beneath us, and what we were trying to guard." Curved Sky takes another shallow breath. "I and my party were dominant, and we kept it a secret."
There is a pause there. A place for her to defend. But she does not defend. Still: she knows she has to tell them why.
"The opposition to a city sept was so strong at the time, and is strong even now. I thought that if it was known what was beneath 1999 Broadway, the sept would never be established. But that decision should not have been mine and mine alone. I was so wary of its creation being stalled or killed that I did not even give most garou a chance to voice their thoughts.
"When they did, through the years, I quashed it. Until this simply became the way I led: to resist questioning. To stand above the garou who flocked to Cold Crescent, to only permit those closest to my rank to even approach me." Her throat moves as she swallows. "I believed we could handle anything ourselves, a sept wholly independent of Forgotten Questions.
"Even when the Beloved Horror first discovered what was beneath us and turned their eyes away from the caern and to Cold Crescent. Even when we lost so, so many lives to kill only half of their number, I refused to tell my elders or my peers or those beneath me what we were atop. Those who stood with me, knowing the secret -- I threatened them with their lives if they should speak of it, warning them that they would destroy our sept. Even when the Beloved Horror returned, impossibly strong, I only tightened my grip harder."
Even in profile, her head down, her eyes on the earth, it is not hard to see that Curved Sky is ashen.
"All who have fallen in battle to the Beloved Horror trying to defend not only the pit and the sept but my secrets... their deaths are on my head.
"All who followed me, who lied for me, who failed for me... their punishments are on my head.
"River of Clouds, Slaughter, Wind on Concrete, Champion of Honor, Raspberry Sky, every guardian who died violated and desecrated by the Wyrm... their deaths are on my head.
"Every garou who made mistakes or missteps because they simply did not know... their shame and guilt is on my head. Everyone who has faced the Beloved Horror and been terrified for their life, wounded, their packs and kin injured or lost... your suffering is on my head."
There should be more. Some sort of grand summation of her mea culpa. Some extremity she could go to in order to truly show remorse, some poetry she should spew, but
there is nothing.
--
The Great Alpha lifts his head after a long, long moment of silence and looks behind him. The Forgotten Warder, the Ritemaster, Summer's Early Dawn, and All is Shadow walk back towards him from wherever they have gone to stand now. They each change shape until they are crinos, standing enormous and hulking in an arc to either side of the Great Alpha and Curved Sky.
It is the Ritemaster who lifts a sharpened stone from the ground and drives it into his palm. It is the Ritemaster who walks forward and smears the blood rushing out of his hand across Curved Sky's face, touching her brow and eyelids, smearing it onto her ears, covering her mouth. His handpaw moves to her head, as though to crush her skull, but her punishment is worse than that.
Curved Sky's tears leave tracks in the blood on her face, but no one hears the way she begins to sob, the way she begins to beg for forgiveness but not mercy, the way she just says
i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm so sorry
because these words are hidden beneath the howl that the Ritemaster lets out, lifting his head and releasing a cry of grief and rage that echoes throughout the park, filling the whole sky with their collective pain. And
many cannot help but join him. For many have lost
so much
to her sin.
It all lands on her head. It all falls with her tears, with her blood, to the hard packed earth, the rocky ground. And then, with the howl beginning to fade, the septs -- elder to cub, kin to infant -- starts to hear the screams that even the town nearby will hear in their nightmares, only lost slowly to the erosive forgetfulness of the caern's power.
Curved Sky is shrieking, horrified, as the ground beneath her spikes upward in knives of silver, through the soles of her feet, into her legs. She falls, and she shifts, but no form can take this. Her hand-paws hit the ground when she finds crinos, only to find that razoring argent rage slicing through her palms, breaking through her bones.
That is when the five elders of Forgotten Questions lower themselves to all fours. That is when, a pack of war-formed, snarling hounds of justice begins to nip at the already bloodied flesh of the galliard. That is when they start to make her run. And she does run. It doesn't matter, and it won't matter: all of Gaia now is lancing, searing agony to her. The Earth itself no longer welcomes her.
No longer forgives her.
Garou scramble to get out of the way as the sinner is harried from their midst. She is chased towards the hills and the vast sandstone formations that have existed here since before the time of man, before the time of garou. She will not survive this rite. No one survives this rite. She will not be given to the Gravestone. She will not be mourned with any rite, any gathering. Her screams echo behind her, even as her name
starts
to fade
from the minds and memories of her own people, turning to a curse, an obscenity on their tongues.
--
There are no elders left behind to shepherd the people. Only alphas and their packs, garou and their kin. Amanda's baby is wailing now, hiccuping sobs that seem so immediate, so strangely real and mortal and alive, after what was just witnessed. And Amanda herself, shh-sh-sh-shhing her son, trying to calm him despite the fact that she is shaking, shaking.
Even though it is over.
Waning Crescent Moon
It is All Saint's Day.
It is Día de los Angelitos.
It is -- or was, prior to the early sunset -- Samhain.
It is a holy day among many mortals, but mortals do not own the night. They fear it, and they burn any fuel they can get their hands on to ward it off. It is a darkening, chilling time of year in this hemisphere; the feasts of plenty and the celebrations of light seem very far off, and hard to see when the sun is so scarce and the shadows stretch ever longer.
The night is not holy. And it is not for mortal folk.
--
All who are known hear the call. The blissfully unconscious jolt to awareness as though from a nightmare, and those that hunt after dark arrest their steps and lift their muzzles to the south. Spirits of crows and hawks and small rodents and spirits of strange emotions and half-imagined things carry messages. Garbled messages appear on phones and in e-mail in-boxes that delete themselves upon reading. Garou and Kin alike are called, though the instinct is stronger and the demand is greater upon the former. Even the cub that is out there these nights, new to this life, feels on instinct even before her mentor tells her: we must go.
Those closer to the caern get there soonest, naturally. The rangers and volunteers who help guard the state park have the gates open, and unattended kin are given flashlights if they need them. There are few who do not know what they are being called to witness. Two adren and three athro garou still await judgement.
The summons lead the called to Persse Place. The homestead is obviously too small to be suitable for a gathering, but the path and the meadowland around it will suit. The house is for those who may need shelter, those who may need warmth. Such as the children.
Pulled from their beds, lifted into the arms of parents and aunts and uncles and guardians, bundled against the cold, eyes bleary and some with tears falling, the children of the nation's common blood are called as well. They do not understand. Some of them will drift from the nation, even run from it. Some of them may even grow to be garou themselves; the rites of true divination that once foretold who would change and who would not have been lost for a very, very long time (though that does not stop some from making attempts anyway). For tonight, though, they are just children, being raised by their people.
They are all, in the end, one people.
--
Luna is angled in the sky, thin and sharp at her ends, the sickle-curve of harvest, the gleaming silver knife that can cut so deep with so little rage. It was not, originally, the moon they were to be judged beneath. This is not a moon of judgement. It is a moon of difficult choices, of bindings and bargains, remembering and forgetting, sometimes soul-selling and sometimes soul-stealing and yet also: healing. Creating. It is a strange moon, and its particular lunacy --
you are all moon-mad, in your way,
don't forget
-- is one of the hardest to understand by those outside it. Even those inside of it. Luna casts only a thin light, but she sees many things.
Beneath that light and the long shadows it casts, the garou and their kin gather together. Some of the kin huddle inside the homestead, a fire lit and an infant fussing until nursed. That would be Amanda Brown and her newborn; Clamor of Night's son. Miles brought a couple thermoses of coffee and a flask of whiskey, but then: he always has the latter. Most stand at the door or windows or just outside, watching as the wolves gather. More than a few of the kin carry firearms of one kind or another, because this is Colorado and this is not the city and even if they were not ardent supporters of the 2nd Amendment, they would have that 9mm, that .45, that shotgun. Most of them say, whenever they are asked: you never know.
You really don't. Until you do. And often by then, it's too late to do anything about it.
--
The leaders of Cold Crescent stand with their counterparts from Forgotten Questions. They stand with the garou who were mentors, who were icons, who were ideals to strive for as often as they were traditionalists to rebel against. There is anger between them now, and betrayal, and shame. But they are not enemies. They have never been enemies. Even the Master of Rites of Forgotten Questions, hard-eyed and brutal and threatening under a few full moons past to tear the throat out of Warning Threshold, is restrained. For it is often one thing to talk of punishment, and it is another to mete it out.
It is an awful, sacred thing.
Time ticks by as the wolves gather, and then somehow it is simply known that all who will come have come. Then Summer's Early Dawn, the Keeper of the Land who tends the spiritual side of Forgotten Questions where so many kin and rangers and the state itself tend to the physical aspect, comes forward with Hunter of Peace, Goddess's Silence. He is much taller than his caern counterpart is, and not quite as dotty, nor as good at managing groups of people.
Summer's Early Dawn turns to him, and it becomes clear to all in attendance that there will be no soliloquy here, no setup, no speechifying. There has been enough talk. They are getting right to it.
"Hunter of Peace-yuf," she says, "we show you mercy. Signs of your care for your sept can be found from the hidden levels to the very rooftop of Cold Crescent. Til violated, the spirits were pleased there and the shrines well-kept. I have spoken with the soul of your Challenge Floor, which was tended neatly. After the violation, you fought those above you to allow lower-ranked Theurges to join you in recovering, cleansing, and healing the place given into your care, and under your watch, even the Gauntlet was made thinner in the midst of the city."
She puts her hand out to her tribemate, her brow stitching. "You spoke up, but you did not speak loud enough. You fought, but you did not counsel with the needed strength. You did not seek outside help from your allies in the caern when you should have." There is a pause. "I know from our talks these past weeks that you were trying to balance respect for your elders with loyalty to your people as a whole. I know that in trying to do your best, you disregarded your own instinct. I believe the city has dulled the wolf in you, and made you forget how to honor Luna's touch on your mind: you have tried to turn moonlight into ice to make it solid, and this is the work of the Weaver.
"You cannot remain as a leader in the city," she tells him, shaking her head. "You cannot remain in the city at all. For thirteen moons, you will remain in Forgotten Questions. You will forsake the comforts of mankind and live in the three forms furthest from man whenever possible. You will eat what you hunt. You will seek a pack, as you have not since you went to the city. You will keep the land with me, and find your redemption in wildness."
Hunter of Peace bows his head in a deep nod to Summer's Early Dawn. And then, without preamble or hesitation, he removes his glasses. He removes his clothes, down to the last thread, putting them in a pile to the side. Slowly, he shifts down to lupus and crawls forward on his belly, licking at the Keeper of the Land's toes. He knows how merciful this is. He knows he is not forgiven, but he is spared.
He follows her, when she leaves the center, loping behind her heels, leaving the trappings of his human disguise behind him.
--
Retribution's Fist is next. His back is unbowed, his head held high, his shoulders squared. He will not crawl on his belly to lick the feet of anyone, whatever his judgement. His eyes are steel-colored, his jaw shadowed by the beard that has grown in over the last few weeks. When he comes to stand face to face with the Master of Challenges of Forgotten Questions, All Is Shadow When Turned From the Sun. He has been the Master of Challenges at Cold Crescent longer than she has held her post at the caern. They are born from the same tribe and equal in rank, though he is a bit older. They have tangled for a long time, each accusing the other of presumption more often than not. He refuses to call her rhya, though she is now his judge.
All is Shadow does not seem to have much love lost for him, either. There is a bristling, crackling energy between the two of them that trends towards outright loathing but is held in careful, respectful, aching restraint that longs to be unleashed.
She takes a breath. "Mercy," she says, flatly and clearly, though it's obvious she wants to spit the word at his face. "In your role, you did not take action that allowed your sept to be desecrated.
"You didn't do much to stop it, either," she goes on, a little more harshly. Retribution's Fist nearly bares his teeth at her, but controls himself.
"It is the Challenge Master's duty to watch the leaders of the garou for weakness, for mistakes, for taking steps on a path that could lead to the downfall of us all. In this, you failed not only your sept, but your tribe, your moon, and all of your people. You must answer for that failure. Because you did not serve your nation and protect them from the weaknesses of their leaders, you may not be a part of this nation."
All is Shadow hesitates a moment. Strange, that, as she watches him, hating him, she hesitates.
"Retribution's Fist-yuf, you are ostracized." She closes her eyes. "Gaia, I shun Retribution's Fist. Of all your children, I have no such brother." She turns on her heel to her left, sharp, sudden, like tearing off a bandage.
Another garou, an elder of the Lords, steps forward and calls out as well: Gaia, I shun Retribution's Fist. Of all your children, I have no such brother. He, too, turns away from the former Master of Challenges of Cold Crescent.
Again and again, first the grandchildren of Thunder and then more and more of the garou present -- then almost all of them, their voices a cascade, several speaking at once until the words resound in the gathering, echoing: no such brother. no such brother.
None see now but the kinfolk. All have turned their backs on him, even those who did not speak for the rite. From the doorway of Persse Place, Retribution's Fist sees his mate watching him. She is uncomfortable here; she's never fit in out in the sticks, she was glad when they moved to the city. She was glad when they left behind his neverending feud and tension with All is Shadow. She looks uncomfortable now, having watched all of this. She looks sad, and she looks
strong,
as she turns widdershins from her mate. Those kin inside who see her face can see the tears she does not shed, the anger and the resolve in her jaw. Those kin inside know: she is being punished, too. Not intentionally. Not spitefully. Just by association. Just because this means closing her door on her mate for five, six months. Miles gives her a steadying nod, his regard for her honor, for her loyalty to the nation, for her cunning; and it is cunning, for when spring comes, her decision tonight will make a difference in the way Retribution's Fist is welcomed back by the garou.
And no one sees, but when the initial shock and kneejerk anger and pain leave the eyes of the Ahroun who was just punished, he looks strong, too. Resolved. And he is looking at no one but her, making her oaths in his mind and heart that he does not speak aloud,
before he leaves them all, walking past the discarded clothes left by Hunter of Peace and slipping through the ranks of werewolves, heading down the long path into the darkness.
--
Forge of Nótt is not restricted to the caern or her lupus form. She is not shunned from her people for half a year. The Ritemaster of Forgotten Questions, even more gravely filled with rage at the Cold Crescent's leaders than perhaps any other, looks as though he wants to tear her to pieces where she stands, but she does not receive this most final of judgements. She, like her counterpart, is tasked with knowledge, with instruction, with understanding.
It was up to her to learn enough to understand what they faced in the pit, to teach those beneath and above her of its dangers. He shouts at her, shames her for the fact that those beneath her rank were the ones to question, the ones to discover, the ones to share what they knew. He dresses her down, and then, shifting into crinos, the Ritemaster towers above her.
Forge of Nótt, Adren Godi, faces him, preparing for her death with honor, with iron will, without fear or cowering. But his claws never reach for her. He whuffs a steaming puff of air, turns from her, and leaves the circle for a moment, only to return with a rock the size of a small child. He throws it to the ground, sending dust outward, and points at it.
"You will be Scorned by your people," he snarls at her, growling from the depths of his throat, the words shifting along with him as he returns to his human form. "And you will speak to them in the voice of the Jackal. Your voice will return with your honor... should you reclaim it."
What follows then takes far, far longer than the rite to ostracize Retribution's Fist. There are many, many garou in the crowd who have things to say about the Theurge who failed them, her pride, her oversights, her mockery of those more ignorant. The claims and accusations grow audacious at times, vengeful, but the rite cannot be stopped. At times there is laughter, and the Godi looks sometimes as though she is on the verge of losing her mind with anger, but she does not retaliate.
Especially not, when almost three hours have passed and people are finally starting to run out of things to say about her, and the Ritemaster lifts a handful of dust from the earth and throws it over her head, into her face, telling her that her pride and failure have shown her to be of jackal blood. Forge of Nótt looks brokenhearted by then, even if she does not bow her head, even if she does not slump her shoulders. There is fury and pain in her eyes.
"Now," the Ritemaster says, staring at her in her shame, standing beside that stone covered with carvings and paintings of the stories told about her, "you will still teach. In the voice of your cowardly breed, and to anyone who comes. And you will teach until your throat is raw and your fingers bleed, without chiminage, without renown, and you will not escape these punishments until all you know, you have taught another. Now get out of my sight."
--
The night is long, and yet it is still hours from dawn. Some of the kin have fallen asleep. Some of the cubs and cliaths have been nipped awake by their betters.
There is a stirring when the Forgotten Warder stalks forward in crinos, on all fours, her thick fur braided in places with stones and feathers and bits of bone. It is hard to see any light in her eyes, for there is almost none. With her walks Warning Threshold, in homid, but when they come to the center of the gathering, he immediately shifts to lupus. He is large, compared to many wolves. He seems impossibly small when he stands in that form before the Forgotten Warder.
She reaches into her own chest, it seems, drawing something out with a faint glimmer of gnosis, barely perceptible as a rippling glow before it fades. She holds in her hand a... box. The box itself is small, but carved with glyphs that seem to shift and move even after the glow has dissipated. Even those several yards away can feel the power of that creation, which the Forgotten Warder simply drops in front of Warning Threshold.
Who does not whine. Who does not keen or howl or back away as the lid to that box falls open as though of its own accord. A great feeling of void enters the hearts of the wolves who watch this. There is something very cold in that box, very empty, a loss that to most seems unimaginable, even if all know that it is survivable.
The Forgotten Warder rises to her hind legs, baring her teeth at the Glass Walker who, though her counterpart, is utterly different from her,
particularly in how deeply he failed his sept.
She does not speak. She reaches down, wrapping her enormous crinos paw around his throat, lifting him from the ground. He twists in midair, letting out an instinctive but truncated yelp as his jaw is pushed back to an unnatural angle. With her other handpaw, the Forgotten Warder
carves
off
several inches of his skin, fur and all, tearing it with tidy brutality from his side. Warning Threshold cannot stop himself from flinching, though his throat will not let out anything but the barest noise of panting, of pain.
The Forgotten Warder drops him unceremoniously back to the ground, and he remains in lupus, trying to push to his feet, trying not to shrink away from her, trying not to beg,
as she drops the bloodied strip of his fur into the box. There is a sudden blast of that darkness, that chilling sense of vulnerability and loss and even imprisonment, and even some of the higher-ranked garou in the gathering flinch. In that blast, that flash that blinds but not with brightness, Warning Threshold turns suddenly into a man. A man with torn clothes and a very, very bloody torso. Which hurts him, as it must, because even he does not try to touch the gifts Gaia has bestowed upon him to push the pain away.
The Forgotten Warder stares down at him as she reaches down, lifting the box and simply closing the lid. Some of the howling feeling of depression and fear dissipates through the gathered septs, but not the cold, sick feeling of what they are seeing: the Wolf being stolen from Warning Threshold. She begins to walk away, to go bury his fur, and his rage, in a secret place.
"When!" he calls after her, his voice harrowed
and yet unbroken.
Even pressing his shirt and his coat against his wounded side to try and staunch the flow of blood, he pushes to his knees, then his feet, watching her go. "How long?"
The Forgotten Warder turns to look at him. Her voice is dark, as her eyes, as her fur. She does not growl or snap at him; she does not need to. Her voice flows into the high tongue, a sound that is both primordial and sacred.
"When. You. Atone."
Warning Threshold lowers his shoulders, hearing that.
Because he may never be able to.
--
There is no pack for Warning Threshold to go back to. There is no theurge willing to step forward and heal him. He wouldn't let them. He looks to the kinfolk, but not for succor; he just looks to them, as though looking for someone, then looks away.
He does not know why he is not killed.
He follows that thought by wondering if that is what he wanted.
--
Last of all, the Great Alpha. He did not have to send anyone to escort Curved Sky from her post in Cold Crescent; she was summoned, and she left. Nor does he have to call her, or drag her forward now. She follows him to stand in front of all the assembled garou, and though she does not know what is coming, she seems to know it will not be mercy. She is dressed simply, in a grey suit. Her hair is tied back. She does not look up.
The Great Alpha is, as ever, in his hunting for, standing as a great wolf among them. He does not change. He is unmoved even by this, at least as far as the eyes of his people can see.
"Tell them,," is all he says, and Curved Sky, Sept Leader of Cold Crescent, takes a breath.
She does not lift her head.
"When I led the movement to establish a sept in the city almost a decade ago, I knew of the pit beneath 1999 Broadway. I told no one but my packmates and my closest allies. Even without knowing that there were nightmares below, many others supported our vision to create a headquarters and gathering place -- a home -- in Denver.
"As we argued with the elders of Forgotten Questions and began establishing the sept of the Cold Crescent, fights erupted amongst our number as well, within the inner circle. Some wanted to make sure it was known to everyone what was beneath us, and what we were trying to guard." Curved Sky takes another shallow breath. "I and my party were dominant, and we kept it a secret."
There is a pause there. A place for her to defend. But she does not defend. Still: she knows she has to tell them why.
"The opposition to a city sept was so strong at the time, and is strong even now. I thought that if it was known what was beneath 1999 Broadway, the sept would never be established. But that decision should not have been mine and mine alone. I was so wary of its creation being stalled or killed that I did not even give most garou a chance to voice their thoughts.
"When they did, through the years, I quashed it. Until this simply became the way I led: to resist questioning. To stand above the garou who flocked to Cold Crescent, to only permit those closest to my rank to even approach me." Her throat moves as she swallows. "I believed we could handle anything ourselves, a sept wholly independent of Forgotten Questions.
"Even when the Beloved Horror first discovered what was beneath us and turned their eyes away from the caern and to Cold Crescent. Even when we lost so, so many lives to kill only half of their number, I refused to tell my elders or my peers or those beneath me what we were atop. Those who stood with me, knowing the secret -- I threatened them with their lives if they should speak of it, warning them that they would destroy our sept. Even when the Beloved Horror returned, impossibly strong, I only tightened my grip harder."
Even in profile, her head down, her eyes on the earth, it is not hard to see that Curved Sky is ashen.
"All who have fallen in battle to the Beloved Horror trying to defend not only the pit and the sept but my secrets... their deaths are on my head.
"All who followed me, who lied for me, who failed for me... their punishments are on my head.
"River of Clouds, Slaughter, Wind on Concrete, Champion of Honor, Raspberry Sky, every guardian who died violated and desecrated by the Wyrm... their deaths are on my head.
"Every garou who made mistakes or missteps because they simply did not know... their shame and guilt is on my head. Everyone who has faced the Beloved Horror and been terrified for their life, wounded, their packs and kin injured or lost... your suffering is on my head."
There should be more. Some sort of grand summation of her mea culpa. Some extremity she could go to in order to truly show remorse, some poetry she should spew, but
there is nothing.
--
The Great Alpha lifts his head after a long, long moment of silence and looks behind him. The Forgotten Warder, the Ritemaster, Summer's Early Dawn, and All is Shadow walk back towards him from wherever they have gone to stand now. They each change shape until they are crinos, standing enormous and hulking in an arc to either side of the Great Alpha and Curved Sky.
It is the Ritemaster who lifts a sharpened stone from the ground and drives it into his palm. It is the Ritemaster who walks forward and smears the blood rushing out of his hand across Curved Sky's face, touching her brow and eyelids, smearing it onto her ears, covering her mouth. His handpaw moves to her head, as though to crush her skull, but her punishment is worse than that.
Curved Sky's tears leave tracks in the blood on her face, but no one hears the way she begins to sob, the way she begins to beg for forgiveness but not mercy, the way she just says
i'm sorry i'm sorry i'm so sorry
because these words are hidden beneath the howl that the Ritemaster lets out, lifting his head and releasing a cry of grief and rage that echoes throughout the park, filling the whole sky with their collective pain. And
many cannot help but join him. For many have lost
so much
to her sin.
It all lands on her head. It all falls with her tears, with her blood, to the hard packed earth, the rocky ground. And then, with the howl beginning to fade, the septs -- elder to cub, kin to infant -- starts to hear the screams that even the town nearby will hear in their nightmares, only lost slowly to the erosive forgetfulness of the caern's power.
Curved Sky is shrieking, horrified, as the ground beneath her spikes upward in knives of silver, through the soles of her feet, into her legs. She falls, and she shifts, but no form can take this. Her hand-paws hit the ground when she finds crinos, only to find that razoring argent rage slicing through her palms, breaking through her bones.
That is when the five elders of Forgotten Questions lower themselves to all fours. That is when, a pack of war-formed, snarling hounds of justice begins to nip at the already bloodied flesh of the galliard. That is when they start to make her run. And she does run. It doesn't matter, and it won't matter: all of Gaia now is lancing, searing agony to her. The Earth itself no longer welcomes her.
No longer forgives her.
Garou scramble to get out of the way as the sinner is harried from their midst. She is chased towards the hills and the vast sandstone formations that have existed here since before the time of man, before the time of garou. She will not survive this rite. No one survives this rite. She will not be given to the Gravestone. She will not be mourned with any rite, any gathering. Her screams echo behind her, even as her name
starts
to fade
from the minds and memories of her own people, turning to a curse, an obscenity on their tongues.
--
There are no elders left behind to shepherd the people. Only alphas and their packs, garou and their kin. Amanda's baby is wailing now, hiccuping sobs that seem so immediate, so strangely real and mortal and alive, after what was just witnessed. And Amanda herself, shh-sh-sh-shhing her son, trying to calm him despite the fact that she is shaking, shaking.
Even though it is over.
my whole life is thunder.
