The Garou's Birth-Gifts

A Garou can control the shape he wears. He chooses to be in a specific form, a form that is part of a spectrum ranging from human to wolf. The most powerful (and frightening) form of the Garou is the Crinos form, the half-wolf, half-man shape. In this shape, they are towering monsters, but they are also deadly warriors.
Garou are creatures of Rage and Gnosis. Their Rage enables them to be deadly warriors and can literally cause them to move and act faster than the eye can see. Their Gnosis allows them to tap into the spiritual wealth of Gaia and use spiritual magic in her service. The Garou are beings of two worlds: the Earth and the spirit world, called the Umbra. They can step sideways into this spirit world, where the spiritual is real and our reality is only a shadowed reflection.
The Record also speaks of the Gifts that their mother’s sister, Luna, gave to the Garou. Luna is revered for her mystical knowledge, but is also reviled for the consuming madness that she brings. Luna waxes and wanes, growing full and slipping away to nothingness. The Moon symbolizes the Garou’s own mystical side, and their changing nature as well. It is said that great Luna took the first Garou to her lodge in the sky and taught them secret knowledge. She looked into each Garou’s heart and saw what phase the Moon was in at the Garou’s birth; she provided the Garou with Gifts to fit the personalities and strengths of the different phases.
This fact defines a Garou’s role among her people, called the auspice. A Garou’s auspice determines not only the Garou’s role in society, but also some of the secret lore with which they are familiar. The auspice is determined by the phase that the Moon was in on the day of the Garou’s birth.

The Sacred Ways of the Garou

Over the centuries, spirits have given wisdom and knowledge of special powers to the Garou. These powers and secrets are shared among the other members of a Garou’s breed and auspice, and also serve to further define a Garou’s purpose and role within a tribe.

The Tribes

The Record speaks of the tribes, fifteen groupings of Garou that originally formed out of pack differences and changes in pack hierarchy. Among the first of these were the Silver Fangs (rulers and warrior-heroes), the Shadow Lords (beta-wolves, the schemers and politicians) and the Black Furies (the alpha females, who followed their own path). Several of the more mystical, philosophical Garou, those who watched the skies for portents and omens, formed their own tribe, one they called the Stargazers.
In the Garou’s far travels, the Record tells of the Garou splitting into more tribes: the Fianna of Ireland, the White Howlers of Scotland, the Get of Fenris of the Saxon, Norse and Germanic areas, the Silent Striders, who vanished for a time into the dark continent of Africa, only to re-emerge later, and the Bunyip, who travelled to and dwelled on the continent of Australia. The Record also speaks of the far-travellers: the Uktena, the Wendigo and the Croatan, who journeyed far across what would become Russia and traversed the same Bering Land Bridge that the original Native Americans (some of them related to the Garou by blood) crossed. During pre-history, the Silver Fangs ordained that the Garou would watch over the humans in much the same way a shepherd watches over his flock, except that they encouraged the Garou to cull the weakest and oldest from the human herds by ravaging their villages and encampments. As a result of this practice, which the Garou called The Impergium, two tribes formed: the Red Talons, who were all bred by wolves and favored the policy (they had grown to hate the hunter humans), and the Children of Gaia, who sought peace among the Garou and an end to the Impergium, knowing that somehow the Impergium would haunt them until the end of their days. 
When cities rose up, two more tribes of Garou emerged: the Glass Walkers, who learned to use the tools of humanity, and the Bone Gnawers, who had grown tired of eating the leavings from their Silver Fang betters and sought refuge and a new life in the cities. For a time, all Garou prospered, and the Wyrm was held at bay. 
But the Wyrm was merely gathering its coils, like a cobra waiting to strike. When it did, it took several tribes down with it. The Garou’s own inner rage caused the death of the Bunyip tribe in Australia as the rest of the Garou waged an unholy war against them and killedthem all, believing them to be tainted. The Croatan were also completely and totally lost in a supreme self-sacrifice to defeat a powerful minion of the Wyrm.
The most heinous betrayal, however, was that of the White Howlers. They joined with the Wyrm, although to this day, no one knows why. They went to the lair of the Wyrm, and there they were introduced to an insane labyrinth known as the Black Spiral. They danced the Black Spiral and went over completely to the Wyrm, whom they now serve. These creatures are called the Black Spiral Dancers, and they are the incarnation of all that is evil in Garou. Their name has been removed from the Silver Record, and they will be reviled forever.
Now only thirteen tribes remain, and the number of Garou is shrinking yearly. A tribe can mean a great deal to a Garou, especially if his heart and mind can accede to tribal policies. The tribe is part heritage and part community. 
When a Garou is among the members of his tribe, he is not only participating in Garou society, he is connecting himself to the wisdom of the Garou in the same tribe. The tribe shapes a Garou’s political outlook, his viewpoints on human society and the way other Garou relate to him.
Those without a tribe are called the Ronin, for they have no tutor or master. These people are usually renunciates, and they do not seek to help or hinder the Garou. Many of them are lost wolves, having lost some vital element that makes them Garou. Many are also of the Wyrm. The Ronin are mysterious, shadowy and distrusted, but some of them are among the greatest of Gaia’s heroes. 

The War for Gaia

The Garou are at war with the Wyrm in the defense of Gaia. Many also believe that these are the last days of that war, that the prophecies of the Apocalypse are coming true and that the end of all things, even the end of Gaia, is near. This threat of Armageddon influences all of the Garou’s actions. Patience is in short supply, and understanding even more so. The Children of Gaia, peacemakers among the Garou, have quite a job on their hands. Garou at this time tend to fluctuate between two extremes: frenzy, in which they are totally consumed with the hatred of the Wyrm and of all corruption, and Harano, in which they are totally overwhelmed by the imbalance of the fight they wage and become utterly depressed. Somewhere between frenzy and Harano is the balance that the Garou strive to attain, caught as they are between them. Many Garou seek to strike this balance by learning from their elders and from ancient lore.

The Legacy of Lore

The signs of the Apocalypse are foretold in prophecies, and many of them have already come true. It is hard to doubt that these are the last times. Because of the immediacy of the War against the Wyrm, the Garou have had to adapt their ways and traditions. Before this time, the Garou had grown quite separatist, uniting along tribal lines. Now all the tribes have been thrown together, and they must find ways to interact without provoking either frenzy or Harano. In addition to the Silver Record, the Litany is an ancient collection of laws given from the very first Garou onward. The Garou have created the Litany to help them combat the Wyrm within, as well as the Wyrm without.
Among the proscriptions in the Litany is the restriction that Garou shall not mate with Garou. When two Garou mate, they produce a sterile, disfigured breed of Garou called a metis, although sometimes such a fetus will not even come to term. Mating with another Garou is a taboo similar to incest. Since the presence of a metis is a direct result of a violation of the Litany, metis Garou aren’t well received and usually have to put up with the stigma of being a metis for their entire lives, especially if their disfigurement is obvious. 
Another important idea in the Litany is the Veil, a custom which dictates that the Garou must forever hide their presence from the mass of humanity and keep their existence and sacred knowledge secret. 
This is aided by the power of the Delirium, an effect caused by the Garou’s prehistoric participation in the Impergium. This effect is useful in keeping the Veil, because humanity has a hard time remembering the presence of a rampaging Garou. When a Garou reveals himself in its half-wolf, half-man shape, it triggers an ancient memory in humanity and results in an all-consuming fear and loathing. The human mind usually responds by rationalizing and blocking out the memory of the Garou.
Finally, many Garou legends and stories are preserved as a means to keep history, illuminate Garou wisdom and serve as object lessons for Garou wanting to become just as famous. Yet the Wyrm continually captures and devours bits and pieces of the vast legacy of lore that hasbeen left for the Garou. This is part of the Wyrm’s ultimate plan to destroy them.

The Shadow of the Wyrm

Like Gaia, the Wyrm is a difficult entity to describe. It is a part of the Triat, a powerful spirit that embodies a fundamental force in the universe. Some see it as the power of corruption and oblivion. The Wyrm is both a physically real thing and a spiritually corrupt ideal. It seeks to devour all of Gaia.
The Wyrm’s hunger for Gaia is explained by its history. The Wyrm used to be the balancing factor in the Triat, maintaining balance between the Weaver, which governs patterned reality and order, and the Wyld, which governs chaos, magic and pure creative energy. However, at some point in the past, the Weaver went mad, and the Wyrm responded by trying to balance its madness. The Weaver responded by trying to weave the Wyrm into its web. Caught in this web of madness, the Wyrm changed. This corrupted the Wyrm and caused it to embody corruption. The Wyld became disconnected, even as the Weaver grew powerful enough to try weaving it into her web. Now the Wyrm is unbalanced and seeks to consume everything; it is no longer satisfied by merely keeping the Weaver and the Wyld in check.
The Garou believe that humans are children of the mad Weaver, flaunting their technology, cities and societies. They also believe that wolves are of the Wyld, as are all natural and untainted places in the wilderness. Those Garou born to wolves are thought to be more mystical, even if they aren’t of a mystical nature. Consequently, many feel that the metis, the breed that results from a breaking of the Litany’s rules on mating, are of the Wyrm.
This is not necessarily the case, although it is true that all metis bear some disfigurement. Disfigurement is a mark of corruption among many Garou. The Wyrm manifests itself in many forms; some forms are physical, although the actual Wyrm resides in a metaphorical Pattern Web. The spirit army of the Wyrm consists of corrupted Incarna, Bane soldiers and Wyrm Elementals, evil spirits that represent the Wyrm’s corrupting influence and power.
The Wyrm is also a corrupt ideal, a source of hate, defilement and taint in the world. Many humans unknowingly serve it when they do corrupt or destructive things. Through Wyrm-taint, its power can be sensed by the Garou in many mundane things. Soft drinks, book publishing, the movie industry the list goes on and on. Indeed, the Wyrm lies waiting for anyone seeking escape from the troubles of this world. 
The Wyrm is quite powerful in these Last Days. Not only does it have its own evil spirit armies in the spirit world and in Malfeas, but it also commands a number of Wyrm-infested humans called fomori. These humans have powers and mutations because of their alliance with the Wyrm. The Wyrm also has a number of followers in the major corporations of the world, especially a powerful corporation called Pentex. The company is almost completely possessed by the Wyrm and is ruled by a board of directors that is thoroughly corrupt.
Among the Garou, the Wyrm is an ever-present threat, and its Black Spiral Dancers are everywhere. The Wyrm has also revealed ancient evil lore to twisted humans, humans who are Kinfolk to the Garou. The Wyrm has taught them a ritual to change themselves into Garou using the prepared skins of werewolves. These Skin Dancers, as they are called, are in many ways worse than Black Spiral Dancers, as they cannot be easily detected for what they are. The Skin Dancers appear as normal Garou to all but the keenest mystical senses, while it is obvious by just looking at most Black Spirals that they are of the Wyrm.
And yet, in The Apocalypse, the chief threat of the Wyrm is not monstrous beings it is the Garou themselves, for the Wyrm also resides within them. It is said that the power of Rage, that which causes frenzy, comes from the Wyrm. It is the Wyrm that calls out to each Garou and corrupts sacred ways and holy quests with its own agenda. The Garou are always in danger of falling into its jaws. Whenever any Garou seeks selfish power over selfless honor, dark lore over Gaia’s wisdom, or terrorized infamy over respected glory, the Wyrm wins a small but important battle in its war, and the Garou in question is one step closer to utter corruption. Intertribal prejudice and fighting between Garou also serve the Wyrm’s purposes, although the Garou are loathe to abandon such flaws. Ultimately, each time the Wyrm causes a Garou to step from the Silver Path, Gaia’s Way, the Wyrm scores another decisive victory against the Garou, and hence, all of Gaia. Among of the greatest victories the Garou can achieve over the Wyrm are conquering distrust, hatred and corruption among themselves.

Others Who Dwell in Darkness

The Garou claim the whole Earth as their territory and can turn up almost anywhere. They aren’t restricted to the cities or banned from them. However, the Garou are not alone in the World of Darkness. They must contend with many other supernatural peoples and entities. 
One of the traditional enemies of the Garou are the Kindred of Caine, the vampires, also known as the Leeches. Because vampires feed on blood, employ dark powers, and dwell in the rotten Wyrm-infested cities, the Garou believe them to be of the Wyrm.
In many ways, however, the Leeches and the Garou are alike: they are both predators, expertly adapted to their home environment. They are both concerned with their human protectorate. They both hide from the presence of humanity and work to maintain the illusion that they are not real. Both are prone to frenzied rages. Both employ magical powers. And yet, perhaps because of their similarities, the Garou and the Kindred are constantly at war.
Clearly the mostly-civilized Kindred are not the wild primitive warriors that the Garou are, but the vampires have powers of the mind and powers of blood magic that the Garou do not have. In the end, the Garou and the Kindred could easily assure each other’s destruction. Thus, the Garou tend to watch the vampires of an area and often seek to limit their influence without openly assaulting them, although occasional flare-ups are expected. Usually, members of the Gangrel clan of vampires interact most successfully with the Garou, as they are closest to them in temperament.
The Garou also share the World of Darkness with mages, who sometimes seek to drain the power of their sacred lands. Cloaked in mystery, and often working as servants of the Weaver, the mages are widely distrusted and disliked by the Garou, although there are a few mages who speak for Gaia. These mystics have found some acceptance among the Garou. 
The dark spirits of the dead, called wraiths, are often glimpsed hovering just outside the range of Garou perception, although what they wish of the Garou is still clouded in mystery. They seem to be particularly attracted to huge Garou battles, so much so that they have been called war crows, as they often hover in the Dark Umbra around battlefields.
Many Garou have relations with the faerie folk, particularly the Changelings of Earth who, born as humans, have discovered their faerie origins and now lead dual lives. The Fianna particularly have good relations with these enigmatic but powerful and slightly mad creatures. Truly, the Changelings are the daughters and sons of Luna herself, and, as such, are cousins to the Garou. Still, their bizarre and hard-to-understand codes of conduct and ethics make it difficult to interact with them, and many Garou believe that they serve the Wyrm through their seemingly neutral stance in the War for Gaia. The Changelings have, however, lost a lot to the advance of the cities and will often aid the Garou, particularly if it results in less civilization and more wilderness.

Other shapechangers also inhabit the earth. 

In ancient times, the werebears (Gurahl), wererats (Ratkin), wereravens (Corax), werecoyotes (Nuwisha), werecats (Bastet), werelizards (Mokolé), werespiders (Ananasi) and other lycanthropes grew and prospered alongside the Garou. The Garou grew jealous of their power, and, claiming the right of genocide from Gaia, started a great War of Rage against the other werecreatures. Now these other shapechangers are mostly in hiding, and their numbers are few. Only the Nuwisha and the Corax have peaceful regular dealings with the Garou. 

There are some humans who take it upon themselves to hunt the Garou. They see them as monsters who wantonly destroy human life. Perhaps they are attuned to the racial memories of the times when the Garou used to cull their ancestors from their “herds”. Perhaps they are simply reacting to the Delirium in a more violent fashion. Perhaps they serve the Wyrm, or perhaps they see Garou as some kind of diabolic evil that must be cleansed. Some are no doubt thrillseekers and glory hunters, for the Garou are certainly the most dangerous game one can hunt. Whatever their motive, werewolf hunters can be deadly, despite their mortal nature. Some have toughened themselves against the Delirium, and some of them are Kinfolk to the Garou and are thus immune to the Delirium. Many of them use magical weapons or stolen Garou artifacts. Nearly all of them use silver in some fashion. A Garou must step lightly when dealing with these hunters: one misstep may result in ripping the Veil into tatters.
Despite the presence of many enemies in the World of Darkness, it is the Garou themselves who are their own worse enemies. This is in part because of the nature of Garou Society.

Garou Society

Garou Society is complex, partially because the Garou see themselves as the center of many connections. Aside from the normal bonds of family, romance and friendship, the Garou also have the bonds of pack, tribe and sept. The Garou are both human and wolf, a synthesis of the two. The wolf-nature is strong, especially in society. Issues of dominance, station, territory and the pack are strongly influenced by this lupine heritage.

The Pack

First among all their relations, the pack is more than a family to a Garou. Anyone who is a member of a pack will gladly risk her life to protect a packmate. A Garou must stand by her pack in all things, even when she does not completely agree with them. In fact, many Garou do not totally get along with their packmates, although they usually fall into accord when they are threatened from outside the pack.
The pack is bound together by a mystical bond. Many Garou instinctively know when a member of their pack is in danger. Over time, the bond strengthens. Packs move as one, and they often perfectly integrate themselves in any action they do. A pack of Garou soon learns to fight as if they were one, not many. In addition, a pack totem is attracted to the pack and simultaneously adopts and is adopted by that pack. This totem watches over the pack and helps it discover its purpose. In these last days, every pack has a quest that it must eventually solve. This quest dominates the thoughts and actions of the pack. Many packs are formed out of a group of Garou who undergo the Rite of Passage together. The Rite of Passage is what marks a Garou’s passage from childhood to full adult status. Sometimes, however, a pack will lose all itsmembers except for one or two, and Garou can adopt new members into their pack with the Rite of the Pack, a modified version of the Rite of Passage.
Packs adopt a name that is appropriate to their ethics and beliefs and to the quest they believe Gaia has assigned them. For example, a pack called the “Messengers of Unity” might be interested in increasing cooperation between all Garou, or a pack called the “Ghost Runners” may be a group of spirit-warriors.
Tradition once held that packs were to be made up only of other Garou in your Tribe, but that is no longer the case. There are so few Garou represented. If a pack contains a metis, the pack will usually defend the metis from discrimination and attacks when no other Garou will. As Garou grow more powerful and higher in rank and station, they tend to live apart from the rest of their pack, even though they will be in touch constantly with one another: they are family. For many Garou, a pack is the only family left.
Not all Garou are in packs. Some are never accepted. Sometimes all the packless Garou in a sept will get together and form their own pack, but this is rare. Usually, a Garou without a pack has some problem associated with him. It is up to the sept to see that these “lone wolves” either get accepted into a pack or at least have something to bide their time. The Wyrm loves an idle Garou, and many of these “lone wolves” get turned into tools of corruption. 
There are many packs in a sept. Sometimes, a pack will come to hold all the key positions in a sept, and such septs can be particularly strong.

The Sept

All around the world, hidden in secret places in the wilderness or hiding in the parks of cities, high atop massive skyscrapers or deep within crumbling buildings, there are places of power that the Garou recognize as sacred to Mother Gaia. These sacred places are called caerns, for they originally were piles of stones dedicated to the honored dead of the Garou. Now they are more than that. A caern serves as a gathering point for all the Garou in an area. If a moot is to be held, it will be held at a caern. If a caern is held by the Garou, most likely it will be held by a sept. A sept is a group of Garou who take and hold a caern against the Wyrm. Each sept has traditional offices that are usually filled by the most capable Garou around— although in these days, it is difficult to find a competent Garou for every position.
In addition to being a sacred place of Gaia, a caern is also a means of transportation. Garou can step into a Moon Bridge, a magical tunnel through the spirit world, and can travel long distances between caerns in the twinkling of an eye. It is possible for a Garou to travel all the way around the world without ever relying on terrestrial transportation.
Most of the powerful, ancient caerns were discovered long ago. However, there is a way to utilize spirit magic and open a brand new caern: through the Rite of Caern Building. This rite is exceedingly difficult to successfully accomplish, but the end result is another sacred stronghold for Mother Gaia, and so it is often attempted these days— with an almost frantic frequency. Some old Ritualists worry that the Rite of Caern Building is being abused, and they seek to limit the number of new caerns that are opened.
The sept is the main focus of all Garou society, for it is at the sept that we see the Garou at their most social. Many septs are ruled by a council of elders, which includes sept that most packs are multitribal. The most successful packs have most, if not all, of their auspices members who hold positions of authority, as well as councilors from all the represented tribes in the area. Some septs are ruled by a single tribe; some are governed by Garou from a diverse collection of tribes. Justice tends to be a local affair at a sept: there is usually not enough time to send messengers to the nearest Silver Fang sept to ask questions as to whether something is legal or not. The Master of the Challenge and the Sept Leader must make a decision about what is to be done about infractions against the Litany or about intersept conflicts.
The Garou are ruled as a Nation by many powerful tribal septs. Generally, the Silver Fangs hold the most power, although the Shadow Lords are continually at their heels. In effect, it is the Children of Gaia who are the most instrumental in maintaining Garou peace and keeping the Garou on an even course, going so far as to balance some of the crazy ideas that the Silver Fangs have. Many Ragabash and most of the Silent Striders serve as messengers between caerns and heralds for the great septs, and Philodox judges of respected rank follow complicated Moon Bridge “circuits” to bring Garou justice to even the farthest reaches of the world.
Septs define protectorates, areas that are under the direct protection and care of the Garou. They also define hunting territory and settle disputes between packs and individual Garou. They enforce punishment for judgments against violators of the Litany, especially those who threaten the Veil. They are the ultimate clearing-house for Renown, marking the rise and fall of Glory, Honor and Wisdom among the Garou of their sept. In short, without a sept connection of some kind, a Garou has no way to gain Renown, is in danger of treading on another’s territory and has no legal presence in the protectorate that the sept claims. Furthermore, important rites like the Rite of Accord, the Rite of the Pack, the Engling Rite and the Moot Rite are not generally available, as these virtually require the presence of many Garou and the presence of a caern at the site. In addition, many elder Garou are generally available at a sept; it’s a good place to seek a tutor for a Gift or rite that you’re interested in learning.
It is traditional to announce one’s presence in an area through howls or direct presence. If the sept is threatened or otherwise in danger, the Warder may ask you to join the guardians of the sept, if only temporarily. A sept will often refine its particular rules of etiquette. When a Garou decides to join a sept, she asks the Warder of the Sept to mention her name at the next Moot Rite. Usually the Galliards will use this opportunity to tell what stories they know about the Garou.