Greeks -

Greeks -

**of Note**

was the primordial serpent of Egyptian myth, who wished to return the universe to the primordial chaos that existed at the dawn of time. This is our vision of the Wyrm. The serpent who tears down the old, returning it to the primal energy from which it came. When Ma’at was lost, the Wyrm went mad. What was once a force of balance, clearing away the old to make way for the new, became of force of corruption. Rather than clear away things to make room for future growth, the Wyrm poisons and warps all it touches. Acts of creativity are twisted into nightmarish mockeries. Ordered structures are perverted, changing their purpose for the worse. Ma’at must be restored, so that the Wyrm can once again take its place in the natural order, acting as a force for change instead of mindless destruction.

If we can return the Triat to harmony, the universe will once again be the way Gaia intended it. It will once again have Ma’at. om/@d~h(8rOod Great Owl is our father, just as Gaia is our mother. He is our patron and our guide. In return, we honor and serve him, seeking hidden wisdom in the dark and hidden comers of both the material world and the Umbra. Owl is not a braggart or a protector. He watches, quietly observing what others miss and gathering wisdom. He is an example to all of us, teaching us how to learn more by listening instead of talking. Teaching us how to pay attention to what goes on around us. Owl also teaches us the secrets of the Dark Umbra, of the Underworld where only Owl dares to fly. And Owl is the silent hunter in the darkness. It’s from him we learn how to stalk and kill our enemies without them ever learning we’re there.

As our legend goes, Owl became our tribe’s patron when the first Garou dared to journey into the Dark Umbra. Owl agreed to serve as the Garou’s guide, showing him the secret pathways deep into the Underworld and then leading him back out again. Even after the harrowing journey, this Garou - the first Strider would seek out Owl for his wisdom and for his company. Later, that Garou’s children and cubs would also learn from Owl’s wisdom and follow him into the Underworld. Their children, and their children’s children, would do the same. Eventually, Owl adopted them all as his children, and they became a tribe. Us.

Owl continues to gift us with his wisdom. As I’ve said a dozen times by now, we can’t contact our ancestor-spirits. Other Garou can and not only can they channel their wisdom and power, they can also learn Gifts from them. We can learn those Gifts from the ancestor-spirits of other tribes, but they always I c e demand greater chiminage from us than they do from members of their own tribes. Luckily, Owl also teaches these same Gifts to members of his own brood, and they will teach them to us. We may not be able to learn from our own ancestors, but thanks to Great Owl, we can learn some of their wisdom from owl-spirits. mJpP&f&&& Although we’ve been driven from Egypt, we made a lot of allies in the ancient days, and many of them still aid us. Sphinx, of course, has long been a friend to our tribe.

He honors us with his wisdom and his riddles, teaching us new ways to solve our problems. Falcon has also long been known to us. In Egypt, he became the symbol of Horus, son of Osiris and was a bitter enemy of Sutekh. Falcon continues to aid us in our war against the undead. Scarab embodies nobility and immortality, and her greatest gift is patience and tenacity. Crocodile was the great and terrible guardian of the Nile. He gifts us with his strength and with his patience, and has helped bring renewed peace between us and his most favored children. Ibis was the sacred bird of Djehuty and symbolizes the Weaver as it was and can be once again when Ma’at is restored. He grants us his knowledge and his great memory. Cobra is a powerful and deadly spirit in service of Gaia and a symbol the ancient lands of Khem. Cobra is angry at how her image and her children have been corrupted by the Cult of Sutekh and aids us so that she may have vengeance. +k&2 fddk In the centuries since the curse was laid, we’ve found new allies as well. Spirits who understand the idea of a people forced to wander endlessly. Meros is the Planetary Incama of Pluto. He’s known as The Wanderer, and as The Homeless One. Meros understands the ways of the nomad and he watches over us, helping us reach whichever destination we seek. The spirits of the Four Winds are well known to us as well, since we’ve been scattered to them for so long. Those of us who have taken to the ways of the sailor have found friends in spirits such as Shark and The Flying Dutchman. During the days of the Wild West, we made friends with the spirits of the Great Plains, and even today, Bison, Twister and Thunderbird are great and powerful allies.

And then there’s the American Dream. America is the land of the immigrant. Where those forced to flee other lands are given a new home and allowed to make a fresh start. At least that’s the mythic ideal. But in the world of spirits, that mythic ideal has real power. Most American Dispossessed follow The American Dream. It gives them hope that America can be our homeland as well. The Bone Gnawers follow the spirit too, but their idea of the American Dream is different than ours. You see, to them, it’s a dream of freedom and equality and of the immigrant who came here with nothing but the clothes on his back making a success for both him and his children. To us, the American Dream is a dream of freedom and wide-open space and endless roads to travel. It’s the America of the cowboy and the wandering bluesman. It’s the land of Tom Joad and Jack Kerouac. Where anyone can come and walk, ride or fly from one end of the continent to the other and no one can tell him he can’t. That’s our American Dream.

R&8&d One other spirit that’s important to us, but in a different way, is Rat. You see, Rat doesn’t like us that much. Or, more to the point, Rat doesn’t like Owl that much. Part of it’s that rats and owls are natural enemies.

Rat also doesn’t like the fact that the spirits of mice and rodents that owls eat become part of Owl’s brood instead of hers. Garou who follow Rat aren’t allowed to hurt Rat’s children either, so a lot of them take offense as us leaving mice and other snacks out for Owl’s children. So we throw down on each other once in a while. Nothing serious. More like bar brawls than wars. Folks end up with some cuts and bites or the occasional stab wound.

Maybe some broken ribs. Like I said, nothing serious. It’s the way things should be, really. Owl’s role is to hunt rodents. Rat’s role is to fight like a total bastard against Chapter Two: The R o d Is Life anything that lays its hands on him. That’s Ma’at. But no matter how much they don’t like each other, both are loyal to Gaia and will close ranks against outside threats.

The same with those ofus who follow the two spirits. Me against my brother, me and my brother against our cousin, and our whole family against everyone else.

A&U& The Umbra is as much our home as any place in the material world. We follow Luna’s paths through the spirit world just as we would a dirt road or a deer trail through the wilderness. There are few Realms Striders haven’t been to. But some are more important to us that others.

We deal with death a lot. Ghosts bother us constantly and Owl encourages us to seek wisdom in the darkness that others may fear. The Atrocity Realm is a place of death at its worst. We get to see how the helpless are butchered and slowly ground down into nothing.

These are the kinds of ugly deaths that produce more than their fair share of restless dead. We do well to understand the Atrocity Realm, as it gives us greater understanding of the spirits that are part of our twisted birthright.

More important than that slaughterhouse, though, are the Tribal Homelands. Where the spirits of Garou heroesgo when they die. Unfortunately-andas I’ve said over and over - we’re cut off from our ancestors. That includes our Tribal Homeland. Oh, it’s out there somewhere, lost in the Umbra. But we can’t get to it. Not withoutahellofalotofeffort.AfewStridershavehadthe honor offinding the place. Ifrumor is to be believed, those who actually find our Homeland also find a way around part of the curse and are once again able to call upon the power of our ancestors. I don’t know if it’s true. If it is, I haven’t met anyone who can do it.

Oh, one other place that’s important to us. The Aetherial Realms. Now, you might ask, what interest would the Silent Striders have in the realm of the sky and stars. Well, how do travelers, nomads and wanderers find their way around? They follow the stars. We aren’t as obsessive about it as the Stargazers, but we have our fair share of sky watchers and astronomers too. On top of that, we’ve never really shied away from things like astrology and trying to find omens in the night sky.

So a lot of us travel to the Aetherial Realms in search of the same lore and wisdom we seek everywhere else. b O H ! h & b&d And then there’s the Dark Umbra. As Garou, we’re creatures of life. We’re alive in ways that humans or even wolves can never begin to understand. Every fiber of our being is bursting with Gaia’s power. With Her love and Her rage. This is why so few Garou dare the Dark Umbra. It’s a placeofdeath, notlife.Thatmaysoundtriteandsimple, but it means a lot. The Underworld is a place utterly devoid of life. It’s an alien environment, far more unsettling than you might think. Sure, there are countless realms in the Living Umbra or even the Deep Umbra where your senses can be twisted six ways to Sunday and back again. But those realms are still alive, even if only in a way we can’t wrap our minds around. The strangeness of those realms is on an intellectual level. They seem strange because the laws the Weaver has created that we’re so used to begin to break down, confusing the Weaver oriented parts of our brains.

But the Dark Umbra is different. It’s wrong to us, but not because it confuses our Weaver part. No, the Dark Umbra has its rules and laws and they remain largely the same throughout. As I said, the Dark Umbra is dead. We’re creatures of life and as such we’re tuned into the hum and pulse of the life that’s around us. The animals and birds.

The plants and insects. Even the winds and the earth beneath our feet. Hell, even the Glass Walkers and Bone Gnawers are tuned into the twisted heartbeat of the cities.

But when you enter the Dark Umbra, that pulse dims. It becomes muted. Distant. The deeper into the Darkumbra you go, the less and less you feel it. Until finally you realize it’s gone. No scents or sounds carried on the wind. No vibrations under your feet. No life. This is why the other Garou fear the Dark Umbra, and why they feel uneasy about our seeking wisdom in those dark, dead lands.

The Dark Umbra is a dangerous place. The restless dead that haunt the living - and us - are just the tip of the iceberg. Ghosts are like cockroaches. For every one yousee, there’sat least adozenmore youdon’t.Thatmany ghosts don’t get together without someone trying to be in charge. So you get entire kingdoms of dead people.

Kingdoms with armies. Don’t think just because you’re some big bad Garou you can walk in and start throwing your weight around. They’lIdog pile your ass and beat you down. Luckily that’s not our way. Like Owl, we walk quietly, watching and learning. The best strategy in the Dark Umbra is to never let them know you’re there.

That’s especially true these days. Every so often, when something really bad happens, the Dark Umbra erupts. Maybe its just so attuned to death that when the bloodshed here in the material world gets to be too much, the Dark Umbra goes nuts. Storms worse than anything possible in the living world scourge the Underworld. Rains of burnt rusted metal and the ghosts of shapeless creatures that died out before fish were little more than a gleam in Gaia’s eye. Twisted spirits, as bad as any fomor or Black Spiral Dancer boil up out of the tunnels that link the Dark Umbra to Malfeas, attacking anything that isn’t one of them. Much of the Penumbra of Death is a wasteland now, populated only by small, well-armed kingdoms that dwell in the ghosts of cities.

These storms always follow some bad event in the living world. And I don’t mean like “a fire bums down a