Britain

Britain

**of Note**

Our British conquest was one of the most important territorial expansions in our history. Though the Anglo-Saxon Germanics failed to survive to this day, the British Fenrir certainly did, and to this day they remain one of the strongest portions of the tribe.

Our Kinfolk and a few of our tribe first hit Britain in 407, but we clashed with the Silver Fangs and Warders of Men that occupied it, and no good came out of this first expedition. In response to the hostility of the Romans, we went along with a series of raids from 410 on, and we pretty much showed them a thing or two about strength. The Britons, or Romans as they were, received no help from the Empire, but they were too many for us to overthrow alone. Now, we had dealings with the Fianna in the past; they had faced the Romans the same ways that we had on the continent, and those of that tribe that called themselves the Hounds of the Horned One had fought alongside us against Rome before. But the Fianna of Britain seemed unwilling to cooperate with us for any reasons at all.

We were interested in exploring and settling in Britain, it was a beautiful, lush land with many powerful caerns, and it cried out for worthy protectors.

As I told you earlier, the Romans invited Germanics to serve in their army. The same was true for the British, and when King Vortigern, who had declared independence from the Roman Empire, invited Saxon mercenaries to come and settle as mercenaries in his army, we decided to take the offer. A great Fenrir hero, Hengest, led a portion of men and settled in Thanet.

Hengest served Vortigern well, protected him against the marauding Picts, and helped against the threats of British rivals and Imperial invasion.

But Hengest did not trust Vortigern, for he was a weak leader and likely to betray them, and the British were weak and cowardly soldiers. He would rather the Saxons rule Britain, because they were able warriors and could protect the lands. He sent to Angeln and invited more mercenaries, because the lands were fine and the British weak. From Jutland, Angeln, Sweden, Norway, the Baltics and Saxony came more men. The Germanics had come to stay.

Vortigern, Vortimer and Ambrosius So the Saxons held a great feast, and Hengest offered Vortigern plenty to drink. And Vortigern took a great fancy to Hengest’s beautiful daughter, Rowena, and he asked for permission to marry her. Hengest did not like the sound of such a match, but he knew that if a grandson of his came out of the union, and Vortigern’s rivals were disposed of, the Saxon control of Britain would be likely. So it was that Vortigern asked Hengest to name a price for his daughter, and Hengest claimed Kent, where there lay a powerful caern. Vortigern agreed, married Rowena, and gave Hengest the lands of Kent.

However, Vortigern’s son Vortimer, who was not as weak and dim-witted as his father, immediately saw that his position as heir was threatened. He therefore overthrew his pitiful father, and seized power. He disbanded all agreements with the Saxons, and tried to drive the Saxons out of Britain. After a few years of his misrule, his stepmother Rowena managed to slay him, and Vortigern could again claim the throne. Vortigern, that soft, weak man, could not give his Saxon and Fenrir allies any food or clothing, for Vortimer had spent the treasury on wars against the Visigoths in Gaul, and the Elders agreed that this misrule had continued long enough. We ravaged the country for a while, until Hengest eventually declared peace, and called for a meeting between Saxons and Britons on the Salisbury Plain.

To show them exactly what we thought of their petty games for power and foolish politicking, Hengest’s party slew all three hundred of Vortigern’s soldiers.

Vortigern was captured, and held for ransom for the lands of Essex and Sussex, where caerns also lay and Hengest knew to claim and protect them.

Vortigern abdicated and tried to establish a stronghold in Gwynnedd in Wales. However, his men could not manage to build the castle, for every morning what they had built fell down again. Vortigern consulted Chapter One: Voices of Thunder many sorcerers, and was told to seek a boy with no father raised by Fair Folk. Eventually Vortigern’s men found a boy called Myrddin Emrys, who showed Vortigern that the reason the castle could not be built was because there were two fighting dragons, one red and one white, representing the Britons and the Saxons, underneath it. The white one was winning, and this scared Vortigern so badly that he fled.

This display of his utter lack of courage resulted in the Britons rebelling against their king, and a nasty piece of work called Ambrosius Aurelius seized power.

Now the Romans were back in charge, and a clear enemy was before us. We raided the Roman Britons, and managed to inspire the Angles to revolt with us against the Britons. For this, the Fianna showed an interest in us, and together we managed to drive most of the Britons over the Channel, where they settled in Brittany. Still, Myrddin showed Ambrosius the site of the castle Vortigern had been building, and he took this as his citadel. He rallied his Britons, and gradually pushed the Saxons back. The thread of our tribe’s involvement in this affair drops out of the tale shortly thereafter, but that should be no real surprise. About this time, something had started to smell awfully funny up in the northern portion of the Isles.

The Sixteenth Tribe Falls Some of the wolves of other tribes scorn us — they fight alongside us, but they disdain the Law of Fenris, that only the strong can be trusted to fight Gaia. They preach their own virtues rather than strength — secret knowledge, passion, even compassion — and they say we’re fools for being so “simple.” But there isn’t a one of them who doesn’t wish that the White Howlers had been a little more like us.

The White Howlers were, in their own way, like their Fianna cousins, only more so. Their passions blazed higher, their love of war and revelry was greater, their songs were louder and more terrifying — and their wills were even weaker. When the Wyrm came to their doorstep and tunneled under the stones of their homeland, they leapt into battle quicker than any other tribe, even our own, would have done. They challenged the Enemy in its dens — and they weren’t prepared for how strong it was there. They didn’t have the wisdom to foresee that they weren’t up to the task, and they didn’t have the strength to so much as die cleanly when they were overrun.

Sometimes you hear the other tribes singing about the tragedy of losing the White Howlers, of the fall of “Lion’s noble tribe.” You won’t hear us sing those same songs. The only tragedy was that Gaia let those weaklings prosper for as long as She did. If the others want Get of Fenris to mourn the loss of a noble tribe, they should spend more time lamenting the loss of the Croatan, who had the strength to die well and honorably, and for all the right reasons. Crying for the White Howlers while they’re still murdering and raping their way across Gaia’s face is not just pointless, it’s a damned insult to every single fallen ancestor who was twice the Garou the Howlers ever were.

The Viking Era As recounted by Martin-Cry-Of-The-Last, Get of