(12/13/95) Reading this log still almost makes me cry, but smile too. Sepdet's brother was dead. Sepdet had healed from that loss, and finally begged her leave of Anpwhotep and Renaissance. Thorn had just fallen, in spite of her desperate warning to him. But this night was my favorite kind of RP--joy between sorrows. Here's Paul, new-rited, with whom Sepdet was making up for lost time and getting to know. Here's Shattered-Moon, the cub whose life Sepdet saved the night Thorn died, by giving her a new name and something to hope for. In this log, this conversation, Whispers on the Wind was born...and Shattered-Moon, as much as any of them, was responsible for its birth. A few moons later, she was dead, allowed by Sepdet to join a battle she was not ready for. (And so Sepdet shall never be alpha.) This night explains why Whispers is the way it is today: Family, bonded by a dream, and the memory of one troubled cub that was never trouble to them.
Paul says very quietly, "I was thinking on Names, the other night. What means seshemw?"
Sepdet's eyes glitter. ~He who guides or leads the way. Waykeeper, almost.~
Paul says softly, "I'm not sure if I'm a guide just yet, but I suppose I did lead the way, to some extent. Think it fits me? Shows the Way for wolf?"
Sepdet nods emphatically. ~It suits,~ she says simply.
On the southern curve, Shattered-Moon comes in from the woodland to the south.
On the southern curve, Shattered-Moon follows the Wheel to the Pool.
Near the Pool, Shattered-Moon follows the Wheel north past the Pool.
On the eastern curve, Shattered-Moon follows the Wheel to the Fire Pit.
Shattered-Moon circles the Wheel, arriving from the eastern curve.
Shattered-Moon has arrived.
Sepdet looks up from the fire, curled up thoughtfully near to the other Strider. At the cub's arrival, she relaxes into a faint smile. ~Friend.~
Shattered-Moon dips her head. ~Most of us, yeah.~
Paul waves to Shattered-Moon. "Hello again."
Sepdet sighs, accepting this with a graceful dip of the head.
From afar, Paul signs carefully, keeping his hands concealed, "Some of her don't like you?"
Sepdet rolls onto her back, looking up at the sky. Her hands toy with the wind absently, carving patterns in it.
Paul senses "Sepdet's sign is expressive. /I hurt one of them. Wouldn't let her fight. Wouldn't let her go to battle, and probably die. That one is angry at me./"
Paul watches Sepdet with a faint smile, and murmurs to himself, "Ah... It feels good to have a name again." He turns to face Shattered Moon. "Would you like to be the third person to hear my name?"
Shattered-Moon moves closer to her friends, settling down near them. ~I was thinking...~
Shattered-Moon looks over at Paul! One would like that!
Paul smiles broadly, and says, "I'm going to be Seshemw. The meaning I'm thinking for it matches with Shower of the way, or Shows-the-Way for lupus. I hope I wear it well. My Teacher likes it, so it must be right."
Sepdet ducks her cheek under a hand. ~Of course,~ she says dubiously. ~Anubis is going to bloody well think I've brainwashed the lot of you.~
Shattered-Moon looks delighted. Way Shower and WayFinder! I'll definitely find my way out, now!
Paul chuckles. "WayFinder can find it, then tell me and I can lead others. Nice thought. Missed me clean for some reason."
Shattered-Moon licks at Paul happily, and then settles down again, thoughtfully.
Sepdet looks Shattered-Moon over appraisingly. ~And I can hope. What were you thinking about tonight, cub?~
Shattered-Moon rolls on her side. ~I was thinking about wolves.~
Paul squats next to Shattered-Moon, and pats her flank.
Shattered-Moon was thinking, more specifically, of wolfpacks.
Paul chuckles. "Me too. Must be in the air."
Sepdet lifts her chin, eyes gleaming in the firelight. ~What about them?~
Paul waits to hear what Shattered has to say.
Shattered-Moon wonders if Garou run in packs, too. Always Hungry made it sound like such, but she was born a wolf and raised in a pack.
Paul nods with a smile, and murmurs, "I asked that too, when I was a cub. Got told 'yup', and that when I was better prepared, I'd eventually find one. I'm still looking."
Sepdet nods, a little sadly. ~Stargazers and Striders don't always. But I ran in a pack. A very, very good one. Even my brother, who was a Dancer, had a pack he loved.~
Sepdet drops her eyes, focussing suddenly and deliberately on the shadows of the woods.
Shattered-Moon looks down. ~Stargazers do not? Oh.~
Paul says softly, "Sepdet? Is.. Are all of your packmates gone now?"
Paul pages to Shattered-Moon and Sepdet: Asks Paul, who obviously never kept track of who was in what pack.
Sepdet repeats quietly to Arcadia, ~Stargazers and Striders don't always, I said. But I did have a pack. Its name was Renaissance, and I decided last week--after all that's happened--I don't fit in it, anymore. I asked Father for my blessing. He is the alpha.~
Shattered-Moon looks back up again, her eyes brightening. What makes a pack?
Paul looks a little confused for a moment, but happier. "Ah. I'd -thought- you were in Renaissance. But I knew Tep was too, and.. For a second there, I was worried. Damn, Sepdet. I'm sorry to hear that. Maybe we should find you something you feel you fit into? I'm almost used to being alone, but it must be harder for you to be packless."
Sepdet looks at her hands and closes them into fists. ~I feel like I turned my back on my own family,~ she says softly. ~Not that many of them are left now. Michael and Eris are the only two; I haven't seen Di in months.~
Sepdet stares back at the fire. ~So what makes a pack? Some say, it is Garou bound to a single purpose, maybe just a quest. They must be able to work together as well as wolves, so it is often just one tribe, or a few tribes. The best packs sometimes have one of each Moon, for balance. And all are committed to a spirit, a totem of some sort, which is their guide in the special way they do things. Thunder, for a Shadow Lord pack. Bear, for strong, tough, enduring ones. Weasel for the fierce ones. Raccoon for wise and whimsical.~
Sepdet smiles, just a little. ~Coyote, for tricks, and cunning, and scheming, and being a wee bit crazy and reckless. That's what I've been, since Renaissance took me in. I was so serious, before. They made me see that sometimes you win by cheating and by jokes.~
Paul chuckles. "Poisoning the marriage cup."
Shattered-Moon looks at Paul, confused.
Sepdet looks quizzical, and then beams. ~Why, yes, of course.~
Paul says to Shattered-Moon, "On my Rite of Passage, we had to be tricky. We ended up sneaking a nasty over on a wyrmtainted wizard."
Sepdet adds, ~Some call Coyote dishonorable not-fit-to-be-Garou. But Toxic told me when she took me into the pack, that I was little like she was, so I'd better learn to survive by cleverness, and not act like some fool ahroun who thought the Wyrm would fall dead at his feet. She taught me how to use a gun, even.~ Sepdet's nose wrinkles.
Shattered-Moon tilts her head to the side. Oh. She looks back at Sepdet. They can't just be friends?
Sepdet looks back at Shattered-Moon. ~Oh,~ she says softly .~I was saving the most important thing, for last. To some Garou, it's not so important. But to me--that was the best thing, and the hardest thing to leave. Renaissance wasn't a normal pack. We had no purpose, after a while, though once, when we were stronger, we guarded the human city. But we were family. Closer than friends. Family.~
Paul says quietly, "I'm quite good with guns. Expert marksman in the Guard. And having family is SO important."
Shattered-Moon looks shyly down at the ground. ~How does one make a pack, rhya?~
Sepdet nods, eyes tearing up. ~Quiet wants me in Crossing. And they're so very much like the pack I left behind.~
Sepdet swallows, calms, and answers the question softly. ~You gather a group together, perhaps for a quest, that you have come to know and trust. And you quest for a totem spirit. If the bond is true, you'll be able to face whatever dangers come to you. And a spirit that fits the group will choose to stay with you.~
Paul rises and moves over to behind Sepdet. "Be of good cheer, Teacher. We'll find you a new family." He stars to massage Sepdet's shoulders, obviously trying to relax here.
Sepdet lowers her head. ~I could go with Crossing. It is family. I want to. So badly.~
Sepdet says, ~But I know that it would only be for myself. And I don't know how much time I have left. There's something the wind is telling me I must do...a pack that needs to exist, and doesn't now. I'm trying to find it.~
Shattered-Moon sighs and lays her head on the ground, her ears flattened. ~Always Hungry was my friend. And Rockslide. Always hungry called us her pack. But now Always Hungry is... gone, and I can't find Rockslide anywhere.~
Paul raises his hands to rub at Sepdet's neck now that her head's down.
Paul says quietly, "I want to talk to Rockslide. He cost me.. Sepdet, you'll find what you are looking for, I'm sure. You seem to do pretty well, as far as I've seen, at accomplishing goals."
Sepdet frowns. ~Rockslide? So much I lost, while I was in hiding, with my brother. A season.~ She sighs. ~I don't even know the name.~
Shattered-Moon tilts her head. ~He is large, and black. He is born of a mountain, he says, and he sees the Enemy. I think he has vision.~
Paul says quietly, "A cub. The one who went Umbral in daytime. Against his will, or so he said. 'Sucked'. And for a bit, unable to return. He's the one I lost Selene trying to be polite and feed a griffon spirit."
Sepdet turns and looks at Paul, then ducks her eyes. ~Yes.~ She sighs.
Sepdet says, ~I ought to meet him. Vision is, after all, one of those things a Harbinger is supposed to understand.~
Shattered-Moon snorts a little, splaying her ears. His vision might be no clearer than Wild-sky's. What's a Harbinger?
Paul mumbles something quietly to himself about feeding spirits, daytime, and hard lessons.
Shattered-Moon licks Paul gently.
Sepdet reaches a hand back to pat Paul's forearm. ~She'll come back,~ she promises quietly. Then she looks at Shattered-Moon. ~Harbingers are the prophets of my people. They see danger coming from afar, and sometimes have a knack for choosing future leaders.~
Sepdet drops her eyes. ~I think this is part of what I am supposed to become. Perhaps I am arrogant to think it. But sometimes the words come, and I speak as a Harbinger. You will see it, someday. It is...a little frightening.~
Shattered-Moon scratches herself carefully, and idly licks Paul again. ~I think Rockslide will be a great leader one day. ~
Sepdet smiles at Shattered-Moon. ~Perhaps I'd better go test my sight and take a look at him, emmm?~
Paul snorts. "I hope I'm not one of those leaders. Leadership is.. a very large responsibility." He looks down at Shattered. "I hope so. I admit I'm a little bitter, but he wanted to go umbral squirrel hunting in the afternoon. I hope he learns better."
Sepdet sighs at Paul
Shattered-Moon shivers. ~I'm-- I'm such a pack on my own. But I feel more like-- a babysitter, or a doctor sometimes. It is not the same.~
Sepdet rubs Shattered Moon. ~You are a pack of five, in your own head. But do not fear. I think the reason why I hit you, that night...it was my Harbinger speaking. I didn't really know who you were, yet. Only...that you may be needed.~
Sepdet adds, softly, ~You will be too, Paul. As Caster, perhaps.~
Sepdet says, ~Someday.~
Paul says, "Your Harbinger is a.. I'll what?"
Sepdet blinks, and looks back, blushing furiously.
Sepdet stammers, ~I'm sorry. I keep... I keep //doing// this. I don't know why I just said that.~
Shattered-Moon looks confused once again, but holds her peace in the face of Paul's obvious surprise.
Paul shrugs a little. "Don't apologize.. Just startled me."
Sepdet drops her eyes. ~But...but I have set my heart upon the next Gatekeeper for the Wheel, too. It's so...arrogant, you know? Or I am just biased. I see Joseph will have the power to be an Umbral Watcher, if he is trained for it. Maybe I'm just wishing my friends to fulfill what I see in them. I don't know. I really don't.~
Sepdet says tightly, ~But I dreamed Thorn's death, and it came true. So. We will see if my dreams of Hope are as true as my dreams of sorrow.~
Paul chuckles a little. "By all means, hope for the best for us. Dream large for us, and don't think you are being arrogant. Time will show if you are right or wrong. And it isn't like you can just point and say, "Make it so." Just because you know something will happen, that doesn't make you the architect of the event itself. Merely a herald of things to come."
Shattered-Moon can't imagine anybody seeing any kind of future for herself. She's so... lost, now.
From afar, to Paul and Sepdet, Shattered-Moon has, in fact, great problems seeing anything outside herself-- not in a selfish way; it's just the wyrm and the future are such vague concepts, and so large, compared to what's within.
Sepdet looks at Shattered-Moon. ~You have the power of many voices in you. That is both dangerous, and unique. If we can help you weave them together, you will have a very special path indeed.~
Paul says to Shattered, "Maybe I'll help show you -your- way to. Earn my name again and again."
Sepdet smiles.
Shattered-Moon rubs the side of her head against Paul and smiles at Sepdet. ~_Good_ people.~
Sepdet looks between the two of them. ~I hope you will be with my pack. I am hoping,~ she murmurs quietly. ~We will see.~
Shattered-Moon raises her sharply, pushing againts Paul a little in the process. ~Oh, -really-?~
Paul smiles warmly and says, "Thanks. To both of you. We will indeed see." He staggers a little but catches his balance after Shattered's abrupt movement.
Sepdet touches her fingers gently, as if testing them. ~I will tell you what I hope,~ she murmurs softly. ~Joseph, my spirit-brother. Dylan Burns-bright. Snow, who watches over me, though I do not know her well or why. My spirit-daughter, and through you, Wayfinder your mentor. Paul, for you...you are "comfortable", and you have sense and make me rest easier in my sight.~ She draws a deep breath. ~I see a pack that is brave enough to patrol the bawn even in the day, in the umbra, who tends and guards the spirits there and keeps the wards strong and well. We help the Warder, so that he does not have to do all the work--such a burden, alone, especially for one who has other duties.~ She smiles. ~I see this pack, and the wind at its back, kicking up the leaves at our feet. This is the wind I have been listening to.~
Paul murmurs, "Which wind? Do you know?"
Shattered-Moon barks with laughter suddenly, and whirls around, seeming to chase her own tail, until she stumbles over her feet and collapses in a heap on the ground. She looks up at Sepdet, eyes shining.
Sepdet looks eastward. ~The one that blows from the land of sunrise,~ she says wistfully. ~And hope's star.~
Paul smiles happily. "Quite a hope, Hope. I'd be proud to do my part to help you achieve that, if I'm let."
Sepdet looks back at Shattered-Moon, eyes suddenly bright with the cub's laughter. ~Oh, it is well! Anything that makes you dance so, it must be so!~ She sits up, and holds her hands up in the air, stretching her fingers to the sky and wiggling them.
Paul contorts and blurs as he is transformed.
Paul shifts into Lupus form.
ShowsTheWay bounds over to Shattered-Moon, his tail swinging wildly.
Shattered-Moon rolls on her back and waves her apws in the air at ShowsTheWay, her tail moving furiously on the ground.
+shift lupus
Sepdet contorts and blurs as she is transformed.
You shift into Lupus form.
Set.
Sepdet dives for the rolling pair, poking her nose at a muzzle here and a flank there, whirling around them like a tiny dust-devil.
ShowsTheWay rubs his head against Shattered's paws, tongue hanging out in a smile, then tumbles over her in a friendly way as Sepdet joins in.
Shattered-Moon barks again, and twists about to try and snag Sepdet with a paul.
Sepdet's whipcord tail wags, making the young Fostern look for all the world like the cub she was two, three years ago. She licks them both, letting herself get pulled down onto her side by Shattered-Moon with a small spray of snow going up as her side hits the ground. Look, she says, in wonder. Look. She gives her whole body a violent twist, eyes and ears swivalling around as if her command was more to the Wheel itself than the two. *Do you like it? Do you like?*
+weather
Currently on this breezy and cold fall night in the general St. Claire area, it is 31 degrees Fahrenheit (-0.6 degrees Celsius). The wind is coming from the east at 5.2 mph. The ground is snowy. Skies are hazy with a small chance of precipitation.
Sepdet's ears flutter. The wind has picked up slightly, and the direction has changed. It is coming from the east!
Shattered-Moon pauses in her romping, her ears pricking to Sepdet, her nose flaring.
ShowsTheWay yips a laugh, wrestling with the other two, then pauses to lift his nose to the wind.
Sepdet looks back at them, body wriggling, then tips her muzzle up to the sky, and begins to howl in a clear shimmering cry...for loved ones gone, for her brother, for Thorn, for her old pack...and changes in the weather.
ShowsTheWay lifts his voice with Sepdet's, his howl speaking of the glory of spring, the greatness of his friends, and the coming of something new.
Shattered-Moon looks around, and then lifts her nose to the sky to join the song. Her voice is unsteady, her song wordless, but it is obvious that she is suddenly enjoying life a great deal, and taking pleasure in the company she keeps.
Sepdet holds it for a long time. There is a lot of pain that needs to be sung free of the little Strider, things that badly need to be let go. And of course, she loses breath before she is quite finished. But she falls quiet, and she is warm and glowing as she tumbles, exhaustedly, back down between them.
ShowsTheWay holds his song with Sepdet's, trying to balance her outlet with his harmony. He was caught short, and falls silent before she does, though.
Shattered-Moon ends her song with a little yip and collapses gently on top of Sepdet, placing her front paws on the little Strider friendly-like.
ShowsTheWay paces widdershins around the two of you. It is started. Something new. Something different. ~Something very good, I think.~
Sepdet's breath frosts and whirls around her dark muzzle, dancing frivolously between her ears. She turns and nuzzles the cub, tail tapping a soft counterpoint against the ground. It is good.
Shattered-Moon pages to ShowsTheWay and Sepdet: Sure. Bed is a good idea. Or at least not as much multi-worlding. Thank YOU, Sepdet.
ShowsTheWay pages to Shattered-Moon and Sepdet: Thank you both! Was Very fun. And I have a NAME!
Long distance to ShowsTheWay and Shattered-Moon: Sepdet applauds, hugs very tightly... :) and slips away.
QUIT
Thank you for visiting.
Please return soon.
*********** D I S C O N N E C T E D ***********
