Sky-without-Clouds was a Philodox, and rebellious. Not quite the contradiction in terms that it sounds: she had strong convictions of what was right, shaped by her identity as a Child of Gaia as well as her immersion in the counterculture of California for the past six or seven years. There were radical schisms between this inner moral compass and the ages-old traditions of the Garou, and though there were also great swaths of similarity, they did not draw her attention nearly so sharply. Sky was seventeen.
"Andie?" Andie was her human nickname, short for Andrea. Sky heard the name, and recognized the voice - Rain-Grows-the-Grass, her Philodox mentor. Rain was in her late fifties, a grey-haired woman whose father had been the caern's Warder until his death in 1950. Rain's mother had been a half-Castillian, half-Chinese street kid with the blessing of Gaia on her, a Kinfolk who'd found her way to the sept by following a spirit sent to guide her there as she was on the verge of starvation.
Rain liked to talk about her parents. Sky didn't mind, since it was all part of the history of the Western Eye and very important. Sky sometimes wished her own parentage had been anything like as illustrious - neither of her parents was Garou, they hadn't even realized they were Kinfolk, and had been so stifling she'd run away from their Idaho home as soon as she could to San Fransisco. Which is where she'd had her first change and understood the nature of what she was, as the Garou of the Western Eye adopted her into their sept. They had no way of proving she was of their tribe, but she looked like it, and the totem accepted her.
Rain had named her Sky-without-Clouds because her eyes were that same deep blue. But she still mostly called her Andie, although almost no one else did.
Ahmose's boots splattered muddy water as he stepped in the puddle. He grinned at the sound, stomping the next footstep harder and enjoying the splashing. He even liked the pattern the droplets made on his jeans as the muddy water dried to dusty brown against the indigo cloth.
Fifteen years earlier he had realized he wasn't just a wolf, not like his littermates, and taken on human form for the first time. Little rage burned within him compared to many, and he took another year or two to discover his intermediate forms, but in that time he developed what would become a lasting preference for the physicality of the human shape. He loved wearing boots, and splashing with the flat, wide-soled foot. He enjoyed having his front limbs free to swing or carry a walking stick or bag. Most of all, though, he enjoyed the social interaction, though his idea of it was somewhat removed from that of a person raised to human society.
Human females were so... he daydreamed as he walked on, of the next one he'd meet, and of the smells of her, this woman in his imagination. Different smells at her hair, under her arms, behind her knees, between her legs... always new. A ghost muttered behind him, and he sped his steps a bit faster.
A Strider had just arrived at Western Eye. Curiously, as she hadn't before met one of his enigmatic tribe, Sky approached Ahmose with her wide, bright smile. He drew a deep breath, and his heart seemed to stop beating for a moment as he caught her intoxicating scent. More than human, he knew immediately though unconsciously; the flux of his desire so intense that he did not allow himself conscious comprehension. He put his hand on Sky's upper arm and drew her in close to him, feeling her breath against his skin, feeling the tiny hairs rise under that breath.
Sky looked at the stranger, her mouth slightly open. Then she regathered her wits and addressed him. "I'm Sky, well met. You must be the Silent Strider I heard just got here?" She put her hand over his on her upper arm, meaning to draw his away, but forgetting to do so, so that her hand just rested against his on her arm.
Ahmose had been fluent in English for over a dozen years, but it still took him a few seconds to mentally translate the words into ideas he could readily understand. She was called after the sky above, and she had been informed of his arrival. Yes. "I am called Ahmose, from the ancient tongue. In English it would be said Born of the Moon. You are Sky." He leaned in closer to draw in the spicy scent of her hair. He wanted to sample all her scents, but he knew of course that he could not, at least not yet.
Sky nodded. She liked his faint accent and odd style of speech. "Let me show you around the place," she suggested. He assented readily. Sky led him around the caern environs, explaining and introducing. Ahmose stored the place away in his memory, but most of his focus was on her.
Rain looked at Sky, her expression rather grim. "Andie -- what in Gaia's name do you think you are doing?" she asked. Sky was not sure if she was meant to answer or not, so just shrugged. Rain seemed not to appreciate this response.
Sky tried again. "What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean. The Strider -- Ahmose. You act like a bitch in heat around him." She paused to glare at her pupil. "I know you know better, I taught you myself."
Sky folded her arms mutinously as she answered. "Know better than what, getting horny? Since when did you tell me that was some kind of crime?"
"Since I taught you the Litany?" Rain answered, a faint unaccustomed tone of sarcasm to her voice.
Sky met Rain's eyes. "You said, our tribe didn't believe in keeping Metis down just because of their birth, or condemning lovers just because both were Garou, that's what I remember."
Rain felt her rage growing within her. The girl was willfully misinterpreting what she'd said. "There is a difference between our judgment of others, Sky, and our regulation of our own behavior. Telling you to be accepting of others is not the same thing as telling you to ignore Gaia's laws because you happen to be," she paused for a moment, "horny. Do you understand?"
"No." Sky frowned as her folded arms tightened so that she was nearly hugging herself. "You sound judgmental and not very accepting to me."
"I'm your teacher!" Rain was losing patience fast. "I'm supposed to guide you, not ..." words ran out, as she gritted her teeth and resisted her rage. She closed her eyes.
Before Rain regained her cool and opened her eyes again, Sky made her escape -- straight to Ahmose, of course.
Sky was always in her human form, and Ahmose found it easy to let himself believe she was Kinfolk. She certainly didn't have the manner he'd grown to expect from female Garou, half defensive-challenging-yes-I'm-as-good-as-a-male-don't-make-me-prove-it attitude and half untouchable-on-a-pedestal-look-but-don't-touch-me femininity. She was a lot more like the few Kinfolk women he'd met, a little less forward than some, a little less wanting of a commitment than the others.
Her smell was intoxicating. He took a purely spine-tingling pleasure just to breathe in her presence. It drew him closer, until he had buried his face in her hair or -- if they were alone together, as seemed to be happening more and more often -- her chest or lap.
They were exactly the same age, as near as they could tell, born in the same month. Not quite the same day, because his moon was the crescent, while hers was the half. And he'd been an adult for years while she slowly grew out of babyhood. Still, seventeen turns of the seasons had passed in the lives of each, and it seemed a sign to them both, in the besotted state they'd arrived at without quite noticing.
By the time Rain decided she had to confront Ahmose, it was too late. He was out walking the boundaries of the sept's land, feeling restless, and she had tracked him to where he stood looking up at one of the giant redwood trees, mind quiet and peaceful. Rain's voice, sounding harsher than she had intended, broke the peace abruptly. "I need to talk to you."
Rain was in her wolf form, making some obscure point with this choice, or perhaps having chosen it just for speed and better tracking, Ahmose was not sure. He shrugged expressively and answered, "Talk, then."
Rain had rehearsed so many times what she would say at this moment, that she found herself unable to say it. Finally, words came, though not what she'd planned. "I want you to stop seeing Andie."
Ahmose knew she meant Sky. "Why?"
Rain growled softly. "Garou shall not mate with Garou, Strider."
"Sky is Garou?" He felt a fragile sense of false security collapse around him, and stood away from the tree, bracing himself with his two feet spread apart on the ground, as though the earth were about to shake and try to knock him down.
"Don't tell me you didn't know." The growl in Rain's wolf throat as she said the words was unmistakable, as was the scent of her anger.
Ahmose paused a long moment before answering. "Then I will not tell you that." He lifted a hand, showing her the palm, that it was empty. "I will leave. Perhaps you will give her my farewells." Strider that he was, he left without another word, and was miles away by sundown.
Sky wanted to scream. She didn't. She wanted to howl. She didn't. With the greatest of efforts, she remained in her meditative calm, unspeaking. She thought of many things, the justice in the turn of the seasons, the playfulness of the daily shifts in weather, the joy and sorrow of summer and winter, the hope of spring and contentment of autumn. Sky meditated on the cycle of life and the inevitability of death. She had not said a word since Rain told her Ahmose had left and told her to say goodbye to Sky for him, three days before.
Changes had already begun inside her, and fate had sealed its bargain with the new life begun. She spoke again to others the next day, but only after a month had passed and she was sure, did she tell Rain. And Sky said another true thing: that Ahmose would be back. And then she told a lie: that she did not want to be Rain's student any longer. By the time Ahmose returned, the rift between Sky and Rain had healed, though it would never quite be the same again.
