City of Shadows Mux City of Shadows Mux

The Tale of the Weapon-Hoarder

In the moments before his death, Urfarah gave their Firstborn Red Wolf a single command: "Mark well how things change." So Red Wolf stalked through Shadow and Flesh learning secrets of adaptation and survival in the strange new world he and his siblings helped to create. Yet no other beast changed so quickly or drastically as the human, nor did any other creature change the world around it so profoundly in turn.

Soft and slow as they were, humans inherited a talent for toolmaking from their hunched, hirsute forbears. Since long before the death of Father Wolf they knew the secrets of shaping stones and knapping flint to trade blows with the beasts that hunted them, as well as one another. Long he knew of human weapons, spear, adze, knife, harpoon, but these were no match for the claws and teeth of the mighty hunting beasts that preyed upon them still. Made from bone, wood, or flint, they crumbled away so quickly that none had the staying power of his Uratha childrens' natural weapons.

Until, that is, Red Wolf laid his eyes upon the very first bronze weapons, and he began to grow uncertain. The hardened metal crushed and sliced the bodies of his children like never before, and humanity threatened to cut past all of his expectations. Human kingdoms rose from obscurity, wielding bronze to carve their names into the memory of earth and heaven. Yet one rose above all in might, a human king called Weapon-Hoarder. He traversed the earth in might, seeking the deadliest weapons to add to his armory and distributing them to his most trusted champions. For himself Weapon-Hoarder kept the sword called Mankiller, forged of iron from a fallen star and infused with a portion of Weapon-Hoarder's very soul. With Mankiller in his hand, nothing of Flesh or Shadow could stand against him.

Weapon-Hoarder and his host did not build, for it was far too easy for them to simply take what they desired from all they came across. Where they passed the palaces of the mighty burned, and the tide of camp followers marching in their wake picked apart the homes of the common people until not a single grain or drop of clean water was left. Red Wolf rightly feared that such humans would grow too powerful for even the People to contain, destroying their own works and ruining their own lives until there would be precious little left of humanity to which the wolf might cleave. Even Red Wolf knew he could not stand against Weapon-Hoarder and his Mankiller; too many of his Iron Masters had already fallen to its spirit-slaying edge.

So Red Wolf took on human guise as a lord from a distant land, bearing tribute for the Weapon-Hoarder and his bloodthirsty courtiers. He gave fine raiments and incense to their wives and daughters, toys for their children, gold and jewels to his commanders and chieftains. But for Weapon-Hoarder he had only one gift, carried in a golden coffret and wrapped in fine red silk: an ugly, grey lump of rock. Enraged, Weapon-Hoarder laid his hand upon the rock in order to dash in Red Wolf's brains. But as soon as his hand touched the stone, Red Wolf laughed and showed his true form, knowing he had already won. "O King," he said, "It is said that the sword is the soul of the warrior, and your Mankiller showed a soul like no other. But what is a warrior without a soul? Behold! Your human spirit is fled, and the blood of the wolf now sings in your veins. For I am Red Wolf, and you wield in your hand the flesh of my mother-father, the moon."

The once-king howled his dismay to his courtiers, and in the throes of ~kuruth~ slaughtered every one. The Moon spread their madness across the lands he had seized. Weapon-Hoarder's subjects rose as one to burn his palaces and drag the idols of his gods into the street for public desecration. Weapon-Hoarder longed for the might he once had for the rest of his short and miserable life. His desire to recapture his former puissance burned so hot that by his death a spirit had already formed of it, known to the People as the Coveter.

Red Wolf promised the Coveter the power of Mankiller would be theirs on the day Flesh and Shadow return to balance. Until then, he would show Red Wolf's children the way of binding blade and spirit together. In return they would hunt the mightiest warriors of humankind as their sacred charge, matching blade for blade, gun for gun, that no human that disturbs the balance through might alone would go unchallenged by the People. The Lodge of Arms today carries on this mission, harnessing the secrets of the Coveter in pursuit of the mightiest foes among all of humankind.