Fell. Ringer stepped aside to avoid the dead weight. Rich'sinjuriesfromfallingwouldhealanyway.Heweighed too much to catch. A clawed hand slashed the air as he crumpled, air driven from his giant lungs as he hit the ground with a whoof. His head jerked back, over and over. "Get something between his teeth to prop his mouth open," Mandy barked quickly. "Ringer, your practice bo - " Ringer handed it to Mandy. Rich had clawed up meters of earth by then, Crinos hide sliding on grass and dirt. Jone and Mandy were in Glabro, holding their packmate's jaws open to let Ringer gee the staff in. Hack held Rich's right arm with his jaws, himself shifted to Hispo to hold the Crinos down. '"With a human, you want a rag, something soft, to keep from breaking their teeth. But Garou just bite through. I think he's over the first of it now .... " They sat with Rich, dodging the spasming claws, eventually moving closer as he fell still. Ringer sat by his friend's shoulder, one hand lightly over the furofRich's back. Gaia! Here I am packmates with an epileptic werewolf, and he's the nonnalone! The thought was amusing ... the hours wound on. The tales ended finally with a story from some Canadian Glass Walker about the great Dragons. )one listened and made some notes in her "Seeker" files, but Ringer just stayed with Rich, seated on the tom earth, a hand on the Crinos paw of his stricken friend. Sometimes the paw jerked, then was still. But his breathing was even, heart rate steady. This was a bad seizure but not one of the killing ones that Mandy had told Ringer about. Human medicine did not work on Rich's Crinos form. A few metis had tried antispasmodics, but even Tegretol didn't help. Ringer held on. Justice Like Great Waters conferred with Garret and History-of-Clay and then arose. She spoke. "These have all been worthy tales, true or false, of present or past. It is not simply being that makes what is and unmakes it. It is telling: so it has been since the Before when the Story walked in emptiness. To tell of a thing for the first time is to make it, to make it real. To hear of it and retell it is to remake it, not only in the ear, but in the Shadow, for each tale has a spirit. "Let Amanda Barret, Steam Rising on Teacups, come forth to take her boon." Amid backslaps from her pack, Mandy got up and walked with pride to the circle's center. "Amanda, you did not only tell tales to the gathering, that renown or spoils might be yours. You told them to your own pack, that they might know and understand. You are a true Galliard and you may take this boon." The older woman handed Mandy a length of hempen cord knotted and braided into strange patterns. "The Unbroken Cord. As many times as it is cut, it remains one. To each of the pack, the pack leader's greatest power: Gift, rite, or simply some skill. It has aided many of Gaia's heroes; may it aid you as well." The crowd clapped, cheered and howled. Mandy hugged Justice and walked back to where the others sat, huddled round Rich. "We can make, you know, necklaces or something out of this?" )one examined the length of braided, knotted line. "The book I read didn't have these knots." Eventually the seizure passed and Rich sank into sleep, )one bringing a blanket to cover the Crinos shape as Umbra dawn broke. "You know," )one said, "I heard another story about where the Children came from." "Oh?" Ringer was half asleep. "Pretty simple really. When the Western Concordiat took shape, kind of a Garou civilization, each totem had the Garou who did something different. Fangs ran stuff and fought, Talons took the wild, the Fianna were the singers, the Gnawers the beggars and thieves .. . we were the healers, the priests. Not Children of Falcon or Stag, not Irish, German, African ... earth's sons and daughters, native everywhere, welcome everywhere. Children of Gaia, the ones who spoke and did the Mother's will, not the tribe's or their own. Not a tribe ourselves, really, just the Garou who did what was right. No matter how hard it seemed. Still do." "That ... seems right to me. I guess we have to choose what we want to believe. You know, I heard that before. My teacher in school said something funny one day, said religion is choosing the forms of worship from poetic tales. The Baptist girl who sat in front of me got really mad." "Huh. Okay. Hey, Rich, you okay now?" He shook the great mecis shape. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay, I guess." Rich sat up, Crinos shape covered in dirt and tom grass. "Hey, let's go back co the real world." They did so. • • • rht; r ,w,g P/ffid Cl!rrPF# ~" Another campfire; another night Welcome. Welcome to my fire. I am honored that you have come all this way. I am Long Scars Suffered, a watcher-of-things. My voice is not popular at some of our moots. I am not a hopespeaker, one who sees humans embrace one another in a street or at a festival and says that the world must be turning for the better. I am notthe smiling elder thattells the pups of much good and little ill, so that the hope will bum all the brighter in their chests. My tongue is harsh and my teeth are still sharp. I speak of the ill things I see, not because I wish to kill hope - as some have claimed but because I would make certain that hope is strong enough to withstand the current of Apocalypse. There are things that must be heard, even by our youngest and most innocent. There are things that must be done.
Children of Gaia · Werewolf