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Gather ‘round, Cub, Fostern, and Elder, and hear one and all the tale of the founding of Beitgherim, our Sept which has protected the Mica Mountain Caern not yet long, but well. It is a tale of two Veris—or, as some might ignorantly call them, Metis, though we will not speak that word here again—born on the same solar day one-and-ten years apart. Being Veris, each begins as a tale of woe, but weep not, for the story ends happily. We shall begin with the elder.
Our Voice of the Goddess was born under a Crescent Moon to a pair of Urrah deep in the heart of the city of Phoenix. If asked, they would claim the Tribe of Glasswalker, but in truth they were Ronins who had forsaken the Litany and abandoned the Garou Nation to live a quiet, comfortable life among the Sheep. The Moon-Calf Charachi deluded themselves into believing their offspring would be as human as they pretended to be, but the spirits gave them a rude awakening when their Veris child was born in the fur and snout of his Crinos form, with a pair of bone buds protruding from his head which would grow with age into faun antlers; permanent and obvious proof of his parents’ shame.
They named their son John William Cole, and his childhood was miserable. He was kept locked away and hidden, having contact with no one but his parents, fed only enough to keep him alive and taught only enough to keep him ashamed. From the moment he was old enough to understand the concept, his parents demanded every day that he shapeshift into Homid form. Every day he tried, and every day for many moons he failed. Finally, on his eleventh birthday, as the Crescent Moon rose past the horizon into the night sky, he experienced his First Change.
In Homid form, John's antlers were small enough to be hidden under a hat, and so at last he was allowed outside. He was sent to human schools, where he was of course a social pariah, having had no practice interacting with others. He was despised by his teachers as well, as he was constantly interrupting class to ask about the most basic things that a child his age ought to have learned already. Chastised, he turned his thirst for knowledge away from his teachers and toward books that did not scold him for his ignorance. All his waking moments that were not spent in class or at home were spent in the library, devouring every scrap of information he could get his hands on. He learned history, math, geography, language, and found he had a particular fascination with the natural sciences. He quickly went from being one of the worst students at his school to being one of the best, and while this did nothing for his status among his peers it did wonders for his status with his teachers.
One day, his curiosity finally overcoming his fear, John asked his parents about their family and heritage, as they had told him nothing about his grandparents or any other relations. They told him to stop asking questions unless he wanted a beating, so on his own time he looked up the name Cole and discovered it to be of English lineage. He accepted this, assuming his family to be descended from English immigrants, but deep down he knew there had to be more to the story.
Through middle school, high school, and eventually college, John distracted himself from the hole in his life by throwing himself into his studies, eventually getting a degree in Education and becoming a Middle School Science Teacher. This comfortable life among the Sheep was all he knew, all his parents had prepared him for, but it was never enough to satisfy him. He knew deep down inside that he was destined for something more, though he could not for the life of him say what it was… until one fateful night, he had a dream.
John found himself in an unfamiliar desert. Lost, thirsty, and starving, yet unable to die, he wandered for measureless time. At last he met a being of golden light that he could only assume was an Angel, who led him through the desert to a fertile land, where awaited a figure who was at once man and wolf, tending a flock of sheep. The Angel joined this man-wolf Shepherd and bade John come out to the wilderness to meet his destiny. When he awoke, without hesitation he left his home and walked out into the desert beyond the city, taking no supplies and leaving not even a note behind.
For forty days and forty nights John wandered the Sonoran desert south of Phoenix. By the end of the seventh of these days and nights his thirst and hunger were driving him nearly mad. He knew nothing of the wilderness, of survival, of visions or spirits, for his parents had taught him only the ways of man and city. In desperation, he cried out to the heavens, “I am here! What do you want of me!?” The being of golden light from his dream appeared in front of him, answering his call. It looked like a shining white horse with a golden mane and a pearlescent spiral horn springing from the front of its head. This was Unicorn, the patron spirit of the Children of Gaia. Unicorn stared hard into John’s eyes and commanded him, “Change!” And he did. For the first time since his eleventh birthday, John shapeshifted, taking his Lupus form at long last.
For the remaining thirty-three days and nights, John lived in the desert as a wolf: hunting for food, foraging for water, avoiding the roads and human settlements, listening to the sounds and spirits of nature, letting his animal instincts guide him. On the final day, a Ram spirit appeared before him and led him on a sacred hunt. He tracked and chased the ram across miles and miles of desert, and in the end he caught it and slew it. Over the body of the slain sacrificial ram, Unicorn once again appeared before him. It placed its horn on his lupine forehead and granted him a vision.
In this vision, John saw the man-wolf Shepherd figure from his dream, and by instinct knew him to be one of John’s own ancestors. He could see the wolf’s Rage burning inside the Shepherd, which was a danger to his flock, yet he turned that Rage outward at the bears and leopards and other dangers, using it instead to protect his flock. The shepherd turned and locked eyes with John, beckoning him to come closer. John walked forward, refusing to let fear be his master. The shepherd put his hands on John’s shoulders and told him, “You are not John Cole. Your true family name is Cohen. Your forefathers abandoned this name when they abandoned their heritage and their nation. You are descended from Levi, of the Tribe of Israel. The lineage of Levi mingled with Unicorn’s chosen, the Children of Gaia, when Israel conquered the land of Canaan. You are a Pure Bred son of that line. Your ancestors were priests and soldiers, shepherds and kings, and you are destined for no less than they. I give you your new name: Josiah, which means ‘Adonai Heals’, after the bonds of broken heritage that will begin to be healed in you. You are to be a Priest of Adonai and a Soldier of Gaia, as your ancient ancestors were, restoring the legacy of their bloodline.” Josiah awoke from the vision with new purpose. Unicorn anointed him, and after gorging on the flesh of the slain sacrificial ram, he slept.
Josiah woke the next morning in Homid form. He staggered clumsily to his feet; having spent the last thirty-three days and nights as a wolf, it would take him some time to reacclimate to his human form. He knew now that he was at once both and neither man and wolf, and could not—must not—fully give in to either side.
We will leave Josiah for a moment here and shift back several years, to the younger of the two Veris. Our Arm of the Goddess was born in the wilderness under Luna’s Full gaze to a Red Talon mother, the result of a reckless mating with a Galestalker male from a different Sept. The child’s Veris deformity was twofold: she was born without eyes, and her teeth were those of a shark instead of man or wolf. She was given the name “Fishfang”, and her childhood was not much happier than Josiah’s had been. Life is never easy for Veris, but it is especially difficult among the Wolves, even moreso with such a disability as blindness. Fishfang was given no mercy, no leeway, no accommodation for weakness—after all, the Litany says Do Not Suffer Thy People to Tend Thy Sickness , and her Sept followed that law to its fullest extreme. They gave Fishfang every opportunity to fail to survive, and yet survive she did. She learned to trust her nose and her instincts and her Rage. She clawed victory after victory from the jaws of defeat; even her Rite of Passage was designed to be impossible, yet the elders had underestimated her, and she succeeded through sheer tenacity and force of will.
As Fishfang grew, spiteful rumors began to circulate among the Sept that her father had been of the Homid Breed. While not as bad to the Red Talons as mating with a human and siring a Homid herself, the shame of bearing a Veris with a Homid sire was too much for Fishfang’s mother to bear. Perhaps the rumors would not have hurt so much had they not been true, but they were, and one day, with the help of magic, the father’s identity was revealed. Fishfang and her mother were driven out of the Sept, and not a week later the mother took her own life out of shame. Fishfang was not yet twelve years old at the time.
The young Fishfang sought asylum with her father and his Sept. While her father was not remotely pleased to be saddled with a Veris child, the Sept elders demanded that he take responsibility for his shame. She asked the Elders to give her the Rite of Renunciation, so she could join the Galestalker Tribe alongside her father and the rest of the Sept, but they denied her request, saying that if Griffin had accepted her in her Rite of Passage, then it was to Griffin that she must belong. She asked if she could at least be given a better name than “Fishfang”, and this request they granted, commanding her father to give her a new name. He named her “Kasa Kaltaïna", with the backhanded meaning "Dressed in Wolf Fur".
Kasa worked hard over several years to increase her Renown as an Ahroun, but the Rite of Advancement was never awarded her willingly; every scrap of Renown she gained she had to earn by direct challenge. When she had at last earned enough to advance from Cliath to Fostern, she challenged her father for the Rite. He set the contest as a fight to the death, hoping to kill Kasa and wipe his shame from the face of Gaia rather than allow her to advance and gain repute in Garou society. The battle was long and bloody, but against all odds, Kasa won, tearing the beating heart from her father’s chest with her shark fangs. The Sept were furious at her for taking the life of their packmate. She protested that the fight to the death had been his idea, not hers, but they placed all the blame on her. By this time she was more than fed up with them as well, so she took her new Rank, gave a very rude gesture, and left the Sept to live on her own.
Life among the Wolves and Galestalkers had been difficult, but life on her own was worse. There is a reason we Garou travel in packs; we are not meant to be solitary creatures. With no pack to support her, Kasa sought the help of the spirits. She sought first Griffin, her patron, but Griffin shunned her for the insult of having sought the Rite of Renunciation. That it had been denied her was immaterial; she had insulted Griffin with the mere request, and was deemed unworthy of aid. She sought next the guidance of North Wind, her father’s patron, but North Wind shunned her for how disrespectfully she had parted ways with the elders of the Galestalker Sept. She had broken a tenet of the Litany— Submission to Those of Higher Station —and North Wind regarded her with contempt because of this. Lesser spirits aided her in finding food, water, and shelter, but none could offer her guidance… until she met Unicorn.
Unicorn accepted Kasa as no one had before; not her mother, not her father, not either of their Septs or Tribes. Unicorn told Kasa that she was worthwhile and valuable, that she had a purpose and a destiny, that she was worthy of encouragement and acceptance and love, and most importantly that she was a cherished Soldier of Gaia and had an important part yet to play in the War against the Wyrm. Tears poured from Kasa’s eyeless lids as she collapsed into the loving embrace of Unicorn.
And here our two stories converge. Unicorn brought Kasa and Josiah to one another, meeting in the desert east of Tucson. Unicorn Herself performed for Kasa the Rite of Renunciation, and set them to a task together as the test for their Rite of Passage to be baptized anew as Children of Gaia: they were to make their way to a Caern atop Mica Mountain that had been corrupted by Wyrm spirits, clear it, and reclaim it for Gaia. Though separated in physical age by eleven years, in this they were Cubs together, equal partners under the watchful gaze of Unicorn.
And so they began the trek from the desert up into the mountains. As they climbed, they talked, exchanging histories and learning of each other that which has been told to you here. They could feel each other’s shame, and the shame of their parents which carried on in them, weighing heavily upon their souls. They felt a kinship with each other, a bond that would eventually blossom into love.
Halfway up the mountain, they encountered another hiker heading the same way. At first glance the young man appeared human, but Josiah and Kasa could smell the wolf on him. He was Garou, like them, apparently headed to the same Caern they were.
“Ho there!” Josiah called out in greeting. “What brings you to this place?”
“I have a duty to fulfill,” was his simple answer.
“As do we, shall we travel together? We’ve been told there is Wyrm corruption in these parts, and there is safety in a larger pack.”
The hiker gave a curt nod, and they continued the climb together. He gave his name as Xavier, and his Tribe as Bone-Gnawer, but otherwise said very little during their climb, responding only shortly or not at all to any query presented to him. Josiah was well used to being denied answers to personal questions and so thought little of it, but Kasa found Xavier’s behavior evasive and suspicious.
They could all three feel the energy in the air as they approached the Place of Power. The small canyon carved into the mountainside by a small spring thrummed with a power that was both beautiful and terrible to feel and to behold. Alongside its great and terrible power, they could also feel a wrongness to it, a corruption, a dying. It was not yet overpowering, not yet insurmountable, yet the faint stench of green oily death was unmistakable. This must be where they had been sent.
Xavier removed his backpack and began rummaging inside it. Kasa tensed, but Josiah was merely curious.
“What are you up to, friend?” Josiah asked.
“I told you, I have a duty to fulfill,” Xavier answered, steel in his voice. “Don’t try to stop me.” Kasa began to growl as she prepared for a fight, but Josiah, still trusting, was merely confused.
“I don’t understand, why would we stop you? Stop you from doing what?”
From his backpack, Xavier pulled a large metal canister, stamped with the Pentex logo. He unscrewed the lid, a sickly green glow emitting from the opening. And as he emptied a stream of bubbling Balefire onto Gaia’s green earth, he began to dance.
Kasa roared and lept for Xavier’s throat, her Crinos form bursting forth with her erupting Rage, but she was unexpectedly knocked from the air. Banes, Wyrm spirits summoned by the toxic waste, had begun to materialize around them, and one of them had intercepted her charge. Furious, she turned her Rage on them.
Josiah took longer to react, staring agape in horror at what was transpiring. He knew nothing of Banes or Balefire, nothing of Pentex or Black Spiral Dancers. He had gleaned from the mission Unicorn had given them a vague understanding that Gaia was under threat of corruption by Wyrm spirits, but this was more horrifying than he was prepared for. Yet despite his deficient upbringing, he was still Garou, and when one of the Banes came for him his instincts knew what to do. Though his reservoirs of Rage were much smaller than Kasa’s, he dug deep and plumbed his well of righteous anger for the will to protect his Mother. He took his Crinos form for the first time since his First Change, and entered the fray.
It was not an easy fight. Banes with the power to manifest physically without possessing a host are rare, and strong. But Kasa had not let anything kill her yet, and she was not about to break that habit now. She and Josiah fought valiantly together; with fang and claw they ripped and tore at the Banes’ manifested forms. It took all they had, but they destroyed the summoned spirits, and turned their attention on Xavier, who had taken his own twisted, corrupted, hyena-like Crinos form.
Xavier snarled at them, then said “You seemed like decent folk when we talked on the mountain. Run, before I kill you.”
Kasa did not hesitate. She once again lept for his throat, and this time no Banes were left to stop her. Xavier fought back, but he was no match for her ferocity, and in mere moments she had her fangs at his throat.
“Kasa, stop! ”
Josiah’s voice froze Kasa in her tracks, her shark fangs already piercing Xavier’s neck but not yet biting down. She dared not loosen her jaw enough to speak, but waited expectantly for a good reason why.
Josiah ran over to Xavier, shifting back to his Homid form. “He is Garou, like us. I do not know what has driven him to such madness as to commit this kind of atrocity against our Mother, but he should have the chance to give account of his actions, and atone for his crimes.”
Kasa didn’t like this. Every beat of her pounding, Rage-filled heart demanded blood. She wanted nothing more than to bite down, to sever Xavier’s head from his body and savor the crunch of his bones.
But then she remembered the last time she had tasted Garou blood, when she had killed her father and been rewarded for it by being banished from her Sept and shunned by the spirits. And so she forced herself to master her Rage, and willed her jaw to loosen.
As she stepped back and reverted to Lupus form, Xavier gazed at them in bewilderment. “You… Why did you spare me? You saw what I was here to do, you know who and what I am. Why wouldn’t you kill me?”
Josiah stepped forward and helped Xavier to his feet. “Because you are Garou. No matter how far you have fallen from Gaia’s grace, you are still one of us. All three of us here have cause for shame, pain in our past that has driven us to actions we regret. But there is hope, and a purpose for us yet. You have helped to corrupt this Caern, and if you were dead that would be the end of it. That would be your legacy. Now, alive, you can help us purify it. You can help to right that which you helped wrong.”
And in that moment, Unicorn appeared, her shining mane whipping in a sudden wind. She gazed approvingly at Josiah and Kasa, and even gave a stern but not unloving look to Xavier. She taught the three of them the Rite of Cleansing, and there under the watchful gaze of Unicorn did three outcast Veris—a Ronin, an Urrah, and a Black Spiral Dancer—purify the Mica Mountain Caern together.
Unicorn performed for Xavier the Rite of Renunciation—expunging his connection to Bat and the Wyrm taint that came with it—and then baptized all three of them as Cliath Children of Gaia, declaring them a new Sept and this Caern to be their home, and their charge. She named Josiah the Voice of the Goddess, for his wisdom and for his mercy, and Kasa the Arm of the Goddess, for the strength of her Rage and for her mastery over it.
In the time that followed, Xavier told Kasa and Josiah his story, a story not dissimilar to their own; he was a Veris as they were, and had been mistreated by his parents and Sept as they had been. He had been offered shelter and acceptance by the Black Spiral Dancers; they had taken him in as none before ever had. But this acceptance had been conditional, offered only after his promise or delivery of something in return. Josiah, and Unicorn through him, had shown Xavier mercy before he had done anything to deserve it. He had, as Josiah and Kasa had, been shown unconditional love for the first time in his life. And through this grace, the three of them found redemption. And in this redemption, they saw fit to offer it to others as well.
Josiah named their new Sept Beitgherim, a Hebrew word that translates roughly as “a home for strangers” or “a safe place for outsiders”. They made it a safe haven for outcasts of all sorts; any Garou who had no other home was offered the unconditional acceptance of Unicorn. Some underwent the Rite of Renunciation to become new Children of Gaia, but this was not required, and some chose to join the Sept but keep their old Tribe. Josiah took a part time job as a substitute science teacher in Tucson, teaching the next generation of human children about the body of Gaia and the dangers of pollution and global warming, while Kasa stayed at the Caern full time, taking care of the Sept and protecting it from intrusion. Eventually Kasa and Josiah were married, and he gave her the less backhanded name Eva, from the Hebrew word for “Life”. And over the years the Sept grew, both in number and in Renown, under the watchful gaze of Unicorn.
If you think this all sounds too good to be true, you would be right. Happily ever after never truly lasts forever. Wherever there are those who attempt to gather together in peace and love, there will be those who object to this practice—those who are suspicious and mistrustful, or full of jealousy or hatred, or who simply disagree with the very notion of redemption and trust and harmony—and will, for whichever reason, attempt to destroy that which they do not respect or understand.
For our story, this took the form of Eva’s old Galestalker Sept. When the new leader of her father’s pack—who had taken his place after Eva took his life—got wind of a mixed-Tribe Sept founded by three upstart Veris outcasts—among them a Black Spiral Dancer and their very own patricidal exile—he had no intention of letting it stand. After getting the Elder’s permission, he gathered his pack and took off for the mountains.
They came at dusk, when the shadows stretched long and the wind carried the scent of storm and steel. Their pack leader, an Ahroun named Stormhowl, led them up the mountain path with grim purpose. The scent of aggression rolled off them in waves, thick enough to choke on. Their fur bristled with righteous fury, their claws flexed with the promise of violence. They did not come to parley—they came to purge.
Eva smelled them first. Her nostrils flared, her hackles rose, her eyeless face turned toward their approach. The scent of her old Sept—cold wind, iron, and the musk of wolves who had never known a kind touch—flooded her memory. She bared her shark-like teeth in a snarl, but did not shift. Not yet.
Josiah, sensing her tension, placed a steadying hand on her shoulder. "We meet them as Garou," he murmured. "We offer peace first. Always."
Eva exhaled sharply but nodded. Together, they stepped forward to meet the intruders at the edge of the Caern’s clearing. Xavier and the rest of Beitgherim’s fledgling Sept gathered behind them, some in Homid form, some in Lupus, some already bristling in Crinos, ready to defend their home.
Stormhowl halted, his pack fanning out behind him, preparing for a fight. His golden eyes locked onto Eva, and his lip curled. "Kasa Kaltaïna," he spat, as if the name itself were a curse. "Or has your treachery earned you yet another name?"
Eva’s growl was low, dangerous. "My name is Eva, wife of Josiah Cohen, Arm of the Goddess annointed by Unicorn. And you stand on sacred ground, Stormhowl. State your business or leave."
Stormhowl’s laugh was a harsh bark. "Sacred ground? Tainted by a Spiral and a Ronin’s get? This is an abomination, not a Sept." His gaze flicked to Josiah, then to Xavier, lingering on the faint scars that marked where the Wyrm’s taint had once clung. "Gaia weeps at what you’ve made here."
Josiah stepped forward, his voice calm but firm. "Gaia rejoices in redemption, Stormhowl. Unicorn Herself blessed this place. If you have come to challenge that, then challenge it honorably, not with insults."
"Honor?" Stormhowl sneered. "What honor is there in harboring a Spiral? What honor in a patricide leading a Sept?" He flexed his claws. "We are the Galestalkers. We do not negotiate with corruption."
Eva’s patience snapped. Her Crinos form erupted in a surge of fur and fury, her shark teeth gleaming. "Then you are fools," she snarled. "Xavier was cleansed. Josiah was chosen. I was cast out only for surviving what your cruelty demanded of me, and Unicorn Herself saw fit to make me her Arm of the Goddess. If you see no honor here, it’s because your eyes are as blind as mine!"
Stormhowl’s answering roar shook the trees. His pack surged forward, a tide of fangs and fury. The battle was begun.
Eva met Stormhowl head-on, their clash sending tremors through the earth. She was smaller, but faster—her strikes precise, her movements honed by a lifetime of fighting against impossible odds. Stormhowl was brute strength and battle-lust, his blows like falling boulders. But Eva had spent her life turning disadvantage into victory. Every scar, every defeat, every moment she had been forced to claw her way back up—it had all forged her into something unstoppable. Stormhowl fought with the arrogance of one who had never truly been tested; Eva fought like one who had only ever been tested.
Josiah, conversely, did not charge headlong into battle. Instead, he directed their defense, calling out orders with the precision of a general. He knew their strengths—Eva’s unmatched ferocity, Xavier’s cunning, the resilience of the others—and he used them like pieces on a chessboard, countering the Galestalkers’ brute force with strategy. The Galestalkers were strong, but they fought as individuals. Beitgherim fought as a pack.
The turning point came when Eva, bleeding but unbowed, locked jaws with Stormhowl in a brutal grapple. They rolled, snarling, each straining for dominance—until Eva wrenched free and slammed him onto his back, her teeth at his throat. Just like with Xavier. Just like with her father. The world seemed to hold its breath. Stormhowl glared up at her, panting, waiting for the killing blow. His packmates, battered and bloodied, watched in stunned silence.
Eva’s chest heaved, her Rage a wildfire in her veins. She wanted to kill him. Every instinct screamed for it. Instead, she shifted back to Homid form, standing over him, her voice ringing clear across the battlefield.
"Enough." The word was a command like a thunderclap, and none could help but obey.
"You call us abominations. You say we have no honor. But look around you, Stormhowl. We fought you—not with the Wyrm’s corruption, not with tricks, but as Garou. As warriors of Gaia." She spread her arms, gesturing to the mixed-Tribe defenders of Beitgherim. "We are not the enemy. The Wyrm is. The Weaver’s chains are. The wars we waste on each other while our Mother dies— that is the abomination." Stormhowl’s snarl faltered, and Eva continued. “I will not kill you, Stormhowl. Not because you don’t deserve it. Not because I can’t . But because we are Garou .” She raised her head, addressing the gathered warriors—hers and his. “We are all blessed by Luna. Chosen by Gaia. We are Her claws, Her fangs, Her voice. And in this war—this holiest of wars—we cannot afford to turn on each other. The Wyrm does not care what Tribe we belong to. It does not care our Breed or Auspice. It only wants us divided, across whatever lines will divide us, for every claw we point at each other is a claw not pointed at it .”
For a long moment, there was only the sound of ragged breathing and the wind through the trees. Then, Stormhowl laughed. Not a mocking laugh, but a tired, broken thing. He sat up, wiping blood from his muzzle. "Damn you," he muttered. "Damn you both." But there was no heat in it.
Eva offered him a hand. He stared at it like it was a snake. Then, grudgingly, he took it.
The Galestalkers left that night, not as conquerors, but as warriors who had been reminded of the true war they were chosen to fight. Beitgherim stood firm, its defenders weary but triumphant. Under the light of the full moon, Eva and Josiah howled their victory—not just over an enemy, but over the cycle of hatred that had once defined them. For in the end, they were all Garou.
And Gaia’s war was waiting.
~ The End ~