(6/98) Forest and Stone
Umbra: Hill of the Stone
Contents:
Chloe
Obvious exits:
North South
The song of the black wolf carries far, in the shadow: high, mournful howls halfway between coyote-cry and the deeper tones of lupine maturity. Loneliness and shadows fill the sound.
Sepdet is running. It's patrol, of course, but patrol is safer slow and silent, especially with one slow leg and the unknown in every dark shadow. Her passage isn't silent, but the brings the sound of a noisy wind thrashing through the bushes and tendrils of dark to the north of the hill. She's pulled up short by the cry, however. First instincts, beyond caution or even her tribe's discretion, urge her to tip her head and howl a high, wordless answer, as clear and thin and tenuous on the moon on nights like these.
There is no answer, no confirmation followed by dialogue--only a sudden silence and a chill wind.
Sepdet's second thoughts muffle her as well, and she follows the thread of remembered sound more warily. Strangely, caution equals something other than war-form. Dwarfed by trees and stone, the Strider scoots forward at a crazy run, darting from root to bush to the moving films of wyld energy that permeate the forest like one more shadow herself.
+shift lupus
Sepdet contorts and blurs as she is transformed.
You shift into Lupus form.
Eventually the voice reaches her: a human voice, hoarse, almost sobbing. *Mother, tell me, what must I do? What can I do? I've tried for so long..."
Hope-Star skids to another careening halt in a nearby whispering tangle of rosebush and thorn, long ears flickering like a rabbit, nose twitching for the scent she knows is there. But her eyes are still. She doesn't venture out immediately, however. Falling back on her haunches, she listens for a space, then, in some pained lag between human breaths, the Strider opens her mouth to sing again. She gives another, softer howl, questioning, open, the unhostile greeting of one lone wolf to another.
You paged Chloe with 'Sep's not particularly intending for Chloe to recognize her voice, although the lady might well do so. Some stray Garou or wolf perfectly willing to say hello, is the thought behind the deed.'.
A gasping breath in the silence. Then, apprehensive, a voice. *Who...?*
The Dreamspeaker kneels atop the hill, curled nearly to the ground, the dark hair spread across her shoulders to make a toy for the north wind. Both hands grasp the earth, digging fingers into it.
She searches the woods, a hint of wildness in the black eyes.
Hope-Star is stubborn in her half-thought-out intentions, although she'll have to reveal herself soon enough. Staying hidden, she lets out another howl, high and light, taking the first notes she heard in Chloe's wolf-voice and sending them spinning at the sky. Someone between the moon and the earth, like you.
Chloe swallows, and a moment later the black wolf takes her place, tipping her head back and returning an answer. Like and not like.
Hope-Star's tail rustles against the thorns behind her, although her ears tilt back unseen at sound of pain. Again the Strider calls, howl tinted by the subtle music-language of tone that she of all her pack has never quite mastered--enthusiasm notwithstanding. Maybe there's a little coyote teasing in there too. Yes. I sing from the wood. You sing from the stone.
The answer comes, holding less of that forlorn quality. Stone.
Hope-Star wriggles but keeps to her game, letting wolf-instincts fuse with seer's insight. Speaks-Water knows her. Heartsfire warms her. Windsingers watch her. Who is she, by the stone?
The coyote-lonely voice holds a hint of pain, a hint of uneasiness. Walking in Dreams must walk alone.
Hope-Star's tune echoes sadness for a moment. Alone too often. Remembered, but from afar. Walk-in-Dreams? Not Speak-Dreams? Will you not speak your dreams too? Mother knows your grief. She grieves too.
The wolf suddenly paces the hilltop. My dreams are her nightmares. The screaming of her pain. I know she grieves.
Hope-Star is silent for a moment. She has to muster another flourish that's beyond any weights of the heart, with the high belling howl that's almost a hawk's keening. Not nightmares. You must seek _Dreams_. Not let dreams rule you. You are a Shaper. Shape dreams.
The answer is angry, a temper-snap of sharpness. I seek only to change Her dreams. To do what I must.
Hope-Star changes key abruptly, lower, insistent, voice rising and falling in one howl and then another. The Moon is a Stone. The Moon is alone. She walks the whole sky on her own. Many fear her. Many sleep when she wakes. Many say she causes madness. Many shun her. She waxes. She wanes. Sometimes the shadows take her altogether. She walks on. But eyes lift to see her, eyes she may not see. The light she gives is dimmer than the sun. Subtle is its magic. But it touches things far from her feet. And stars love the Moon.
The wolf paces again, snarling softly and then snapping out an answer. I am not Luna. I am not spirit. I am Dreamspeaker and woman and wolf and raven and light and darkness, and I am truly alone. My brothers and sisters of the Awakened shun me. Gaia's skinchangers shun me. Sleeping humans shun me. Everything but the darkness itself.
You paged Chloe with 'How close is Chloe to the boulder, at this point?'.
Chloe pages: Very. Pacing in front of it.
Hope-Star begins to howl again, but the tone goes broader, deeper, spreading out over the treetops. There is more intensity to it, more purpose, and unfamiliar changes that are some sort of summons-cry. Here. We are here. We are here. Here! Suddenly, with all the speed she can possibly muster, she bolts off, due north, receeding into the forest like a bird at ground level.
The black wolf leaps into motion, trying to follow, an arrow hrough the forest that soon loses its course.
Hope-Star didn't expect the pursuit, and changes plans in mid-careen. Deliberately (for in fact, it takes will to stay aflight) she stumbles and goes sprawling into the shadows of the low-swooping branche of an ancient pine, fetching up against the roots with a whuff that knocks the breath out of her. She changes to her favorite shape and waits sprawled on her side, not bothering to sit up just yet.
Long distance to Chloe: Hope-Star does an impulsive thing. That 'Here!' was the beginning--just the beginning--of Rite of Summoning. Sepdet's trying for a raven-spirit of a darker moon than Chloe's old friend, or some other spirit with a closer match to Chloe's temperament now. One that might be willing to stay. (Which is a lot to ask.) Some of the words and things she'll be doing from now on, matched to what Chloe does or says, will be reinforcing the rite. Shaping the request. She may not finish it tonight. This may end up being an ongoing thing for a while.
Hope-Star contorts and blurs as she is transformed.
You shift into Glabro form.
You paged Chloe with 'and the running was her trying to get back to the stream, reach through, and come back right next to Chloe from the stone.'.
You paged Chloe with 'But this is just as good. :)'.
The black wolf passes her at full speed, sprinting northward onto dangerous ground--and a moment later comes back. As soon as it sees the Strider, the shape blurs again from wolf to woman. "I should have known it was you," she says darkly. The black eyes hold a little severity.
Sepdet holds up an arm, panting, ignoring the sharpness in her tone. "I still said the truth, dammit. I say it best on nights like this." She grimaces and wriggles a bit stiffly out of the awkward place where she landed.
Chloe leans down to offer the Strider a hand.
Sepdet rolls free, using the hand to steady herself, and comes up on one knee beside her. The Strider has the haggard, hollow-eyed look of someone who hasn't slept or eaten properly in many days, but there's an air of fatalistic cheer as she gives the human's hand a shake and a squeeze. "Sorry I was eavesdropping. But sometimes I hear you when you're lonely."
"You look like hell," the mage says critically, like a mother scolding a child. "If you're not careful I'll start leaving you dead rabbits everywhere."
Sepdet's expression brightens, although she says quickly, "Stormcloud would eat them all, then scold you for making a mess. 'Sides. I only needed one. Joe was missing." She reassures quickly, "Found him last night. On top of everything else--" she waves her free hand northwards vaguely--"I was getting a little stir crazy. Beat up some Fianna that deserved it. You should try it; it really helps."
Sepdet's words come out scattered and fast like squirrels chasing each other, the ebullience that she often lacks nowadays but used to have more store of before the last few year's scars.
Chloe's lips curve into a rueful smile. "I don't believe that's Brian's sort of game," she says lightly, almost teasing. Then her expression shifts a fraction. "And you need to try to stay on his good side, maybe."
Sepdet shrugs. "He called me a waste of air mule after I saved the whole damn caern which he called dead. After all those years I've loved and respected him and defended him against those who called him cocky or fool or arbitrary--that's my name, to him. I can't help what I am. I do my job. I help where I can. Maybe he or someone else will get tired of me and cull me someday, but that's okay. I'll have done more than just meekly bowing and baring my throat to insults from Garou half my rank."
Sepdet barely sounds bitter: it's more the cheer of someone who's faced up to being damned and doesn't care anymore.
Chloe's brow furrows, and she looks away. "You *know* it's just temperamental bullshit from him, and his stupid prejudice." She bows her head, then, and her everpresent wind-familiar plays through the dark hair, tangling it a little. "But I can't blame you. If I could do it without getting killed, I might try standing up to them all sometime."
Sepdet watches the invisible signs of wind distractedly for a while, flashes a toothy grin, then sobers. "I still pick my fights. This one called me worse than a charach, Chloe. I usually let these things go--it's not worth injuring one of Gaia's warriors over a few foolish words. But the words mean something. I'm tribe Elder now, and I can't let them go as I would. So." She looks away for a moment. "I heard Brian called me a dishonorable jackal. Which of course I am. But he'd be out a packmate for a week if I'd fought with claws instead of tricks. When I fight a friend, I pull the tail and do less damage than most do in a fight. Barely wounded him, which is more than can be said of what he did to me. If Brian calls that dishonor--well. I'm not changing it. I save my full claws for the Wyrm, not septmates."
Her sigh is audible. Running one hand through the tangled hair--or rather, into it--she takes a few contemplative steps. "I don't think about it anymore. I get involved when I have to, like with the river. But the rest of the time... I know it isn't my concern, and I don't understand enough of your ways."
Sepdet dismisses her brash beginner's forays into Garou politics with a loose shrug. "Nor do we, I think, sometimes. Try to keep out of it, it's safer, and why sit on stinging nettles when you've got moss?" She shifts her seat a little closer, still clinging to the woman's hand, but only lightly. "As for you: you gotta get tired of hearing me say it, but you don't _believe_ me. There's a third a sept that would soon bite you as lay eyes on you. There's a third that doesn't know you. Then there's the group that knows you, trusts you...guardedly, I grant you, 'cept fools like my pack, Arlen, about a half-dozen others. No, it's not many. And it's not fair. But you aren't quite alone. Brian's not the only heart you've warmed, and you know it."
She swallows, head bowed. Then he dark eyes flash up, almost angry. "I know that," she answers, quiet but fierce. "Don't you think I know that? But it doesn't matter to my own kind. I'm a pariah to some of them. People I care about."
Sepdet's brows lift, then furrow. She stops a question sharply, then hisses through her teeth. "Not David." She ducks her eyes. "That's shaper-business: don't answer if I tresspass."
Chloe shrugs, studying the ground. "I don't know. I haven't seen David in... a long time. I try not to think about why that might be. Nick... apparently hasn't forgiven me for my last fall. It doesn't matter anymore, I think. I fear the Chantry is broken."
Sepdet catches one side of her lower lip in her teeth. "I'm sorry." The concern in her eyes holds the confusion of someone who may never have even heard the word before, but from her tone, she is quick enough to guess its meaning, and the weight of such news. "I guess things like that break too. And I'm betting you can't just magick 'em back up after they fall down. Still--Thomas? Dana? Those are all I know; the madman with the colors went away. I can't believe they'd all hate you now. Little Thomas can barely stand himself, but he's more charitable to others."
Chloe swallows. "I haven't talked to ... Thomas. And Dana... I don't know. I think Dana and Nick are good enough friends. She probably hates me too." For once she sounds almost human, and insecure, and uncertain and afraid. All those things that people feel when faced with the ugly world. Then she turns away, a violent movement that rejects self-pity. "It doesn't matter, anyway. I have too much to do to worry about what they think."
From afar, Cari must go sleep, dear. We finish up later, maybe tomorrow?
Sepdet nods patiently. "But it helps not to be alone. Look for the stones you can trust to put your feet, when you walk in dreams. They're the friends and allies. The rest cut your feet, but at least that'll make it a bit simpler to go where you need to." She gets up reluctantly. "I think...I think I should let you go back under the sky, to think. But just know that if you need to cry, the earth's not the only one willing to listen." She brushes the woman's cheek lightly, and gets to her feet.
Chloe meets the Strider's gaze for a long moment. Then she turns to walk away, soft boots leaving little trace behind. The cold wind follows in her wake.

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