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~lb .. , ..... ,~ .......... a~·~ .. -.aa.~'tiW ...... ~ .. IW .... ~ ......... jJ,~;;~~~._ ...... ~ HMrrP(#P t1tn/4v.t "But, Mandy, who is it that connects the Head and the Arm of the Goddess?" Rich spoke the Garou tongue, human speech lost in his dire-wolf shape. Woodstock drummed on. "The shoulder of the Goddess, of course." Jone looked up from the glowing computer screen. "Does the sept have a "Spleen of the Goddess" too?" "No office or sept's big enough to cover the whole of Her." Mandy was unruffled, used as she was to No-Moons. "The Hole of the Goddess? Which hole is that?" "Key-clicker, hush and you might learn something. If you live that long." Rich nodded to Mandy to go on. "The Heart of the Goddess was the center of the sept, long ago. That was the one who neither did for Her nor spoke for Her, but simply was for Her. She, he, would be a metis, an elder, a child. Someone outside the mating rites, someone free from childbearing. Sometimes a man or woman would take the post and dress as the opposite sex, to honor Lore-Speaker Gron who held us to the way of peace." "So what does, did, the Heart of the Mother do? Just meditate all day?" "The Heart makes connection between the mind and the hand. Not always by speaking, not always by acting. He or she keeps the sept going, by believing, by being himself. Herself. Gives them energy, gives them life. I knew a Heart once who spent her last ten years of life just collecting the life stories of every sept member, Kin and Garou, on video. Let anyone see the tapes, anyone inside the Veil I mean. I saw a few tapes she did. It's amazing how centered it made her sept, how aware of each other as people. I hope they kept those secret from the more conservative Philodox; it'd be a shame if they had to destroy them in the name of preserving the Veil. Another one built a mound, deep inside the caem, spirits guiding him, never speaking. He's gone now. They have danced on that mound fifty years." "So is there any sept that still has a Heart?" )one was fascinated. "There's ours," Rich said, deep voice shaking Mandy's guts. "I am honored to beat there in Her chest." "Whathow did you get to be the Heart? I mean, are you elected or something?" "You just know. Sunset Sea had no Heart since Roaring-at-the-Stars fell. It comes from below. From where being comes from. I can't describe it. You feel how the pack is part of you ... you're one with them. It came to me one night, watching, right after we came and got you, jone. That the pack was whole now. That I am the Mother's Heart." "What will you do for the pack?" "Gaia willing, keep you all alive." He settled head on paws, statue-like in the sticky New York night. dnw.~- .f5nr,:~~.lfq "The Two Branches are the other important sept posts. Gathers-Flinders is the Green Branch at Sunset Sea; you've heard her speak on the web, guys. Basically what the Green Branch does is act as a voice for the biosphere, the parts of it that can't speak for themselves, anyway. Her teacher, Raises a Voice, would let the spirits fill him ... it was wonderful, amazing. She simply hears them and tells us what they say." "So do you talk back?" asked )one. Amanda went on, "We can. One moot, the Silver Gulch salamander spoke to us, to tell us her breeding pools were poisoned. We asked whether there were any other places she could spawn. I went on that trip, to move the salamanders." Amanda was proud. "The species still lives. There are two elementary schools that work to maintain her habitat now." C~.f5M,~;fq "Some septs still keep Cut Branches. Creepy. I only saw them once, at the sept in Brighton. They ... are the voices of the dead. For the ancestors; they usually keep tabs on their own and everyone else's. For the lost tribes, the lost Changers. For the extinct species. That night a Branch got up and sang a tale of the White Howlers, about their mad courage, their 'overmood' she called it, to jump down the Enemy's throat and gut it from within, even if it ate them doing it! About how being proud as the Devil is devilish." She drew a breath. "But still proud. We lamented that their honor was gone." "I do not defend my ... them. Their honor is gone. But know that their valor and strength are not." Rich seemed about to weep, even in Hispo. "So what do they do? Besides talk?" )one was reaching for her Visor. "They move us to remember. And to remember is to act. The Bun yip may be gone, the Croatan, but the fact that they lived and died should move us to do something!" "I think, after all this talk," Ringer said, "that we are going to see if the Hand of Gaia sept is talking about something else." He smiled. "And if the beer tent is still open. You coming?" The wolf got up and they went. The mud-wrestling pit was busy this time of night. Ringer watched with appreciation as two men and two women grappled, mostly bare, in the slimy mess. "Good takedown there!" "This," Hack said, "is the tackiest thing I've ever seen." One woman went flat on her face, covered head to toe in mud. Her opponent leaped on her and splashed mud over the first row of spectators. CAe:..pferTwo: TA.e Grove "I think it's cooL That people feel free enough to do this, you know?" The guys were shifting, each trying for a hold. He became aware of H istory-of-Clay standing beside him. "You a fan of this stuff? Or just like the show?" "I'm not sure what the difference is," Ringer said. "It's pretty neat to watch, yeah." "I agree. Y'know, the rave's starting up soon at the second stage .... I'm going to see about a rite there. Maybe y'd like to come with?" "Uh, sure. Hey, Hack, that okay with you?" The wolf nodded. The rave was a strange place to be: dancing under the lights, endless techno, Hack in human form because 'it's more fun that way', and the strange Theurge quietly pacing beyond the edge of the crowd, singing a chant that was drowned out. The music was great and Ringer danced a long time, Hack moving in and out of his vicinity, ethereal vocals and samples in a matrix of endless pounding beat. The dancing led him to a strange state of mind, time passing without him, and he looked up when music stopped to find his two companions. "It didn't work, really. I don't know if you noticed," History-of-Clay said. "What didn't work? What rite were you trying to perform?" They walked toward the beer tent. "The spirits ... to see if they'd come, maybe. The beat summoning them. But no joy, sorry. I guess trying to keep the rite subtle so the humans wouldn't notice is no way to convince the spirits that they're wanted." "I, uh, hope it works out better next time. C'mon, Hack, let's go drink some beer." Ringer, half-awake, stretched on the air mattress. The tent was big enough for him to stretch, at least. First time's never that good, they'd told him. The guy had been great, had been wild, had been. _ .. He turned. A wolf slept beside him, legs moving in dog-dreams. "Hack, wake up. We gotta talk." "Morning." Wolves were morning people. Ringer was not. "Hack, uh, about last night-" "You feel okay? Happy? Didn't hurt you, did l?" "Yeah, uh, I feel really good." He smiled, hung his head. "But ... I mean, don't you think it's wrong or something?" "You didn't think so 'bout two a.m." Hack was wearing his human form, possibly in case Ringer wanted more. "Going to blame it on the cheap beer? Come on, you know you're a kweerboy." "Yeah, I know I'm gay." Ringer wondered briefly where Hack learned everything about human society when he'd been pupped a wolf. Not important. "But, I mean, you're a wolf!" Dawn reddened the tent's fabric "Not now. And when I'm a wolf I don't want you, or anybody, except when the time and the company are right." "Huh?" Ringer's Garou senses could still smell last night. "It'sno, don't ask. It's too complicated, take my word for it." "But, look. I'm human, or at least mostly human. You're a wolf. And we're both Garou. Aren't we supposed to ... not do this?" "Well, the Bible stuff is for humans, one or two religions' worth. And I'm not a wolf when we're hittin' the mat. Now, the Litany's another story. I'm not mating with you, because I mate once a year-." "-In good years." They both laughed. Ringer thought I'll never leave him. Never. "And if you're hoping for cubs I have some explaining to do." His face grew serious. "But the Litany is for real. Remember Mandy's lesson ?" ••• "Othertribes don't like our take on the Litany .... " Mandy blew across a cup of coffee in Sally Ann's as cars whizzed by. Woodstock was already steamy this early on a summer morning. "Like the Talons?" ]one dug into a tofu scramble on toast. The owners had let Hack in (good reason to come here) and Ringer had given him last night's Chinese leftovers while the other patrons smiled. "Like most of them. Bur," Mandy went on, steam misting her glasses as the patchouli-scented waitress poured more coffee, "the Litany is there for a reason, and it's phrased the way it is for a reason. And things change. Oh, things change." t14'rtJit f.h4'1f' X IT/ ,Mif/p /1}/ffi t14'~1t Mandy pushed her eggs aside. The diner crowd was thinning as the morning passed. "Yeah, this is a tough one, because humans don't understand us, and wolves are only up for it during estrus. Basically it means don't, really don't, make metis. I know, Rich, you don't like that. Sorry. But that's what it means." ]one asked, "So two Garou, if they like each other, they can- " "Careful. Really careful. Our bodies don't work like a human's, so pi lis and condoms don't always work either. If you're gay, just have a pup by Kinfolk and no one will care; if you're straight, watch it with other Garou." "But isn't that rule kind of, well, outdated?" )one was curious. "No. For one, if you flaunt a Garou lover, other people get jealous, and you don't want to go through what a proven charach goes through. For another ... well, I know a Fury who had a metis pup aborted - Rich growled softly- "because it would have killed her before birth. So watch it." CPIHM #d IC/y/711 IU.htrNwr /T PktJ;ff 4',nfiU.hdhiJvtJr // 8~WJJ:A'l They were back in the truck, highway rushing past. Hack said, "The Litany orders us to battle, bur Garou have fought for eons against the Evil One and the Wyrm just grows stronger no matter what we do. If we're working for peace, we've failed." He was in Lupus as usual, sprawled across Ringer's lap. How lucky we are, Ringer thought. If! was dating a human, I couldn't have his head in my lap, not most places. "There are a lot of ways to 'combat' the Enemy." Mandy turned in the shotgun seat as Rich drove. "Violence really just makes the Beast-Of-War stronger, and it's how the other tribes have kept on losing. If you kill a dozen Black Spirals, the Hive can just go out raping and make more-- sorry, Rich. But it's true. But if you create a lasting peace, like the peace between Japan and the US, then the Wynn loses strength. It's harder work than fighting, but it yields a better crop." "And if you have to abandon your work for peace because a call to battle goes up?" "Then you do it. But only if it's a real call to battle. Going slumming downtown, looking for vampires to pick a fight with, that's a manufactured need. You have to learn to tell the difference." J<qfrt# ffiP 7irr/k/Jf tJ/ _A,;tJ'/hdr "This is one of the lesser commandments these days," Mandy said as they parked the truck amidst myriad vehicles. Hack jumped from the tailgate as Ringerand]one Iefton human feet. His nose twitched. maybe, Ringer thought, at the crushed and poisoned grass that lay round them. "Most septs will at least leave you alone unless you cross them. I don't even know why the elders- " "What the coil is wrong with you?" Hack exploded in the High T ongue. He trotted among them through the festival gate. "Look, you're born human, but you can smell someone else's ptss as well as I can. Maybe hom ids can squash it, but the feeling is real. Any warmblood, maybe the deaders too, gets jumpy around strangers! It's not something you can wish away. You twolegs scent yourselves, wash yourselves, and keep your distance even then. Your blood knows if you don't. There's a reason for that rule." "Yeah, our sept was always really careful, even if we did follow One-Horn," Rich added. "l think it's good to be polite." Mandy was careful. "We can make alliances more easily if we respect others' beliefs, not just their territory. We are the diplomats of the Garou. That's a good thing to remember." The pack trotted along through a crowd so motley that they looked almost normal, Ringer thought. ..411'Nj¢ '""· HP,~hfl# fitrh!,;$r The pack had gotten back to where tents leaned on cedar-bark mulch. Ringer took up his staff and swung into practice, listening as the talk rattled on. Sometimes he thought that the Children were less a tribe than they were a perpetual argument. ")one, l think you're bent on disputing every point of the Litany! Do you think that your preaching non violence means we don't have to fight?" "No. It means we have another way, another eye to see the All. Look at the commandment to accept a surrender. Show mercy. Doesn't that mean that it's even better to resolve problems without fighting?" Hack sat up. "It's Gaia's way. All Her creatures have ways to avoid fighting-." "'Cepe humans," )one muttered, plying cords into some kind of complex braid. "That's not really true. Even humans created diplomacy and statecraft. Look at the CongressofVienna! Easy to fight. Harder to talk things out. Humans aren't monsters, no matter what some of my lupus buddies say." Ringer listened, interested in spite of himself. Mandy added, "It means more than that too. When we must have a leader, when we need to order, there are better ways than fighting. We didn't invent democracy, but it does work better than one-man rule .... " Hack spoke. "Wolves decide things together. We always have. Look at us crossing the ice. One goes, sees how the ice bears her. Others watch. If the alpha goes and the others know the ice won't carry them, he isn't alpha long!" fitbfuk,~ ;1o 'lhat" P/ H&h'"r J'Mfp,~ "Speaking of which, who's our alpha?" Rich asked. "It sure as Wyrm stink isn't me!" "Do we need one? I don't think we do." Mandy pursed her lips. Kevin finished a series of squats and began practicing the Sepu !stu An. Run, jump, staff, tum and begin again .... "You're the alpha!" ]one was laughing. "You have to be. You started it!" "I am not some kind of patriarchal authority figure. l think it's an outmoded idea." She folded her arms defiantly. "Outmoded?" Hack growled. "No wonder you hom ids don't breed with wolves. You don't even try to understand them." CAe;.pfe-r-Two: TAeGrove- "Hack, please. Look, no offense, Mandy, but you're crazy. How can we do anything with no one at the center, no one to see all? You got us together, got us here. You're not dominating us. You can't make us do things. But we need you. Someone. Someone to intersee, not oversee. Someone to subvise, not supervise. That's what I mean." )one was serious, Visor pushed into a pocket . Hack nodded. Mandy sighed in the heat and sprayed herself with water before continuing. "I. .. thanks. Thanks, everyone. Look, l don't want to tell people what to do. It would take too long. But, yeah, I see what you mean. The Children have usually had leaders, alphas, whatever. But they don't get there by feeding people, like among the Bone Gnawers, or by fighting-" Kevin saw a man approaching at a distance. "Like the Get." Hack showed interest. "And not birth, like the Fangs. So how?" Mandy warmed to the topic. "Well, sometimes it's ad-hocracy. That's how Garret got the Knights of Gaia's Hand together. He was willing to stroke enough Full Moon egos to get a fighting force, Children and not. Sometimes the spirits choose, like Inanna got chosen." "The Voice, the lady from Australia? l met her a little while ago." A marvel of spaced-out mysticism, lnanna had gathered a large following of Garou. Ringer was amazed that someone like her, spirits filling all her sight, could function in the daylight world at all. "Yeah, she's ... well, she sees too much, too clearly, to be sitting and watching. Others are the most popular. That's practical, because it means you can get others to listen to you. This tribe just has a lot of ways to run things, maybe because running things is such a pain in the ass. We recognize that leadership is a complex status." Kevin stopped the Sepu I stu An and moved to stand with his pack, staff in hand. A woman went by with a sign saying NEED SHROOMS! She passed another man, who looked at her with faintly disguised contempt, then approached the pack directly. "Excuse me," the stranger said in slightly accented Garou, "Moon shine always on you. I am Ten Bulls, and come with news. Who is your great blessed alpha?" "I ... I am. A star shines on the hour of our meeting, Ten Bulls. I am Amanda." The human names sounded odd in the Garou sentence. "Your fame goes far, Amanda." Clearly it hadn't if he didn't know her deed name, but he was being polite. "Four Winds Howl sends his greetings and bids you to the council fire at moonrise. The Pipe will pass among us then. Is it your pleasure to attend?" "It is ... we'd be honored, yes." She nodded. "May Mother keep you till then." He loped off toward another campsite. 7hd flr.dfh4'/'d P/#d J(JJY fo,. ffid C:I'Mkd HJ ffir/kn "That was weird," said ]one. "Who was that?" "Another Gibbous Moon. We aren't always so florid," replied Amanda. "Now who wants to go?" They all did, even Rich. "Yeah, there are a lot of old forms of courtesy you'll see sometimes. The whole 'share the kill' thing, y'know." "Well, I've hunted." Hack growled. "And there's a reason for that one coo. Food isn't always plentiful. The strong need to be strong. Someone in the pack has to be in fighting form." "Social Darwinism, dammit. Well," Amanda insisted, "I'm not a wolf. And I don't hunt for my food. So what good is that to me?" "It's about sharing, period." Rich was sitting by the fire's ashes. "About portioning out. You said the leaders aren't always the old, the strong, the lucky. Well, if the greatest gets the first share, then he should use it for the good of the tribe. Maybe he needs to feed his warriors. Maybe mothers, maybe the poor among the Kin. Maybe he is wise enough to know what to do with it. And it's not just about deer's meat. It's everything. It's your damn passion for social justice, okay?" "You two-legs tum the Litany upside down!" Hack growled. "It is the truth, not grass to be twisted and woven." "It's words. If they mean something different to me, you've no right to call me wrong." YtJ J"h'tr!Y NP/-6':if #d .PM!£ P/ H111f14'41 PI'I1JP~I!.I "You won't argue that the Litany's precept against eating The Forbidden is mistaken, surely!" Hack was trotting round the campsite with agitation. Kevin had gone back to the Mahasu Qatu. "No. Save for the starving. If we eat our own kind, we're bad as Black Spirals, or worse." "Well, Mandy," ]one said thoughtfully, "just about every human society I ever heard of has rules against eating human flesh, most human flesh, most of the time. So is that one also a command not co 'eat' people by taking away their food? What they need to live?" "Yeah ... we should speak on that, at the moot. It's a good thought." Ringer twirled his staff, then Hack caught it in his teeth, the two playing tug-ofwar for a while. -A'tVfr# 7htVP &hM/h !/PII - A//ArP P/c14'i« "You especially have to watch it about Kin and ordinary humans." Amanda spoke as Ringer sprawled exhausted. "You can do things they can't, but there's a reason we have the Gifts, our strength and our shapeshifting powers. Mother let us have them to protect Her, and to protect the weak. Never hurt one wantonly, and especially do all you can to protect our Kin. Remember Sam Haight! He taught us a lesson about what happens when we ill-treat the humans and wolves we came from." ''The Get are beneath us, beneath our contempt, at least. Do we respect them?" Rich was smiling. "We show them respect - sometimes just by keeping our distance." 7hd f/di/J"#JJVP/-&.tlfo/ "This is the worst one for us. We're all of us closer co the humans than safety would wish ... the Veil is weak for us." Hack walked with them coward the council ring, Umbra! webs around the distant building reflecting Luna's light strangely. "But that's the beautiful thing about the Children!" Mandy objected. "We can share Gaia's blessing with everyone. That's why she gave us this gift." "That would be why thieves for medlabs took my mother's pack? Why humans killed eleven Children that I've known? When other Garou would send them screaming, the protection of Gaia is missing ... maybe your blood's too thin or something, but it sure is no blessing." Kevin knew that the Crinos form of the Children of Gaia still sent humans intO screaming fits. Even among Kin, some could not look at the man-wolf, or didn't want to. If the other tribes caused something worse, then the Garou must truly be alone. How could anyone truly know, much lf'ss love, a being that killed at the drop of a hat, that none could look upon? I'm lucky to have Hack, I guess. Lucky to have anyone at all. Lucky in his pack. It was the Garou way. 2/p NP/-J"If#,. ~ ~uj4 W 7H.~/7hjJllfhNW The pack sat in Council on the grass ofW oodstock's Umbra. Raised-By-A-Power, Galliard of the Mother's Eye Sept, wheezed and tottered into the circle on the shoulders of two cubs. Even with the Glabro form's additional strength, she could barely walk. Mandy cried, "That's Raised-by-a-Power. Have you ever heard her howl? She saw Jacob Morningkill on his throne! She must be a hundred and ten now ... my grandmother studied High Tongue with her and she was old even then." The ancient Garou wore a great woolen shawl even in summer heat. She reached the center of the ring and broke into a thin, wavering howl, head thrown back. Ringer sat, rapt in the ululating beaury of the tone, the way that she poured herself into each flowing passage. The circle was long silent after she was done, then others took up the call, voices folding and twisting, some singing overtones in almost Tibetan style, harmony piling on harmony as the Children howled to the eternal mother. The prayers of the Inner Sky were brief; there was business at hand. "The Litany says not to tend the sick. But did they mean ... old people?" Hack pondered for a while as Garou made speeches and argued. "I think that it meant not to waste resources. "The old way was to leave the sick and weak to die. But it was always a pack's decision, a sept's. Never something that everyone had to do. After all, the wording speaks to the ailingGarou and tells him not to be a burden; it doesn't condemn others for volunteering to help." "Our elderly do not suffer us to tend them. We choose to do so. Raised-By-A-Power had stomach cancer five years ago." Mandy was serious-faced. "She was ill for a long time and the Crescent Moon spent much to heal her. She has taught four apprentices since then. The sept needed her; she'll go someday soon anyhow." Ringer nodded. There was no merit to losing a hero because he stubbed his toe or got sick. Gaia needed every Child who could do anything at all for her. CA.Apfe-r-Two: TAeGr-oveIt wouldn't be a problem for him, he didn't think. Ahroun didn't usually get old. 7'M~rft'!j'& C%~~4 q A'& 7Jh!t! 1/~trl~ "PMtfd "Mandy, you say you're not a leader, but what would you do if we ever ran into bad trouble? Fomori, Black Spirals, those crazy humans with burning baseball bats? In battle, you need one person in charge." Ringer sat in the council ring with Hack's head in his lap. This way, Ringer thought, this shape, he's just an animal. My animal companion. Nothing sexual. Strange .. . shapeshifting is more than most Garou think. "Step back and let you tell us what to do. You're the hero. You should know." "Huh. Maybe I will. I think we might want some practice ... join me if you want to." "The Children of Gaia," announced a Philodox that Ringer didn't know, "have always held to the Litany. I therefore challenge True Silverheels for dominance before Gaia and Garou. He seeks to tum the Children toward such passivity that theE vil One will crush us. Hear me. I am Winter-Stars, Half Moon of the Knights of Gaia's Hand." An Amazon War veteran, then. "How will they do this?" Ringer asked. "] ust fight?"