the hollow court. [ lore // do not post ]

There have been stories about this land long before the Court.

Mostly, the stories claim it’s haunted land.  Cursed land.  There are ghouls that whisper things among the trees and vanish with the dawn, and there are winding paths through the underbrush that no deer will use, and there are tangled knots of caves burying themselves into the ground like hungry mouths.  At the center of it all, there is the Crown, and the pack that guards the Crown that calls itself the Hollow Court. 

 — for within the hollow crown

that rounds the mortal temples of a King

keeps Death his Court.

↠ the owner of your own fate. 

Though the Imperium guides the actions of the Court as a whole, they generally have little patience for micromanagement.  Individuals may structure their day to their preference, although it is best kept in mind that the Imperium equally has little patience for freeloaders.  Provided that wolves contribute to the well-being of the Court somehow, though, the Imperium turns a blind eye to outside affairs or petty squabbles.

↠ respect the wilds. 

Speak softly of ghosts, and travel together.  Leave offerings at the Crown after hunts, and at the Spire in the wake of or in anticipation of great change.  Do not follow paths you do not recognize at night. Understand that the Wilds will sometimes take, and that the Wilds will, on occasion, unveil old bones and sacred things.  There are unspoken rules to navigate the Court’s territory — some are provided to newcomers upon arrival, or taught in stories to pups.  Others are best learned alone; there is no teacher better than fear. 

↠ an eye for an eye.

While not entirely literal, the Court exacts retribution where it is due. Negligence is not tolerated; crime that harms the well-being of the pack is taken in blood or exile.  The murder of a wolf requires a death in kind.  Disrespect to the Wilds, the Crown, or the Spire demands an offering — and the offering is most often paid in blood. Those that are part of the Court know what qualifies as disrespect, but outsiders are frequently not so fortunate. This is preferred by the Imperium; it is better for the longevity of the Court that the Crown subsides on outside sacrifice.

↠ the crown

The Crown is a circle of five stone obelisks at the heart of the Court’s territory, spanning a diameter of approximately a mile across and each twenty to thirty feet tall.  Perhaps they were once man-made, although time and weather have made it difficult to tell — they’re irregular, jagged monuments now, and their glossy, silent faces tell no tales.  It’s said that strange things happen within the Crown’s perimeter, and wolves emerge with improbable stories of ghostly things that move in the dark, or of sudden disorientation at the Crown’s epicenter — or of paths that wind for impossible miles, going nowhere. 

↠ the court

The Court sits just beyond the northernmost obelisk of the Crown, tucked snug into the crook of a riverbend.  It is an entrance to the deepest tangle of caves of the Underground, although not the only entrance and it is — for the most part — steady.  Immovable.  As one would expect caves to be.  The wolves of the Hollow Court live in the dry, warm mouths, or spill out onto the riverbanks during warmer seasons.  There is fresh water and prey and shelter, and by all appearances, it is everything a wolves’ den should be. 

↠ the wilds

The Wilds sprawl in a dense wood around and throughout the Crown and the Court.  While wolves and other animals carve paths through the undergrowth, the Wilds have a mercurial habit of shifting — or so it’s told by those who have passed through the Court’s territories.  There always seems to be something glimpsed at the corner of your eye, slipping beyond a copse of trees; something flickering shiny in the distance to coax you from the trail; something alive and clever and cruel about the murmuring branches and their snagging thorns — and it’s improbably easy to lose yourself among the trees, as if the path itself coils underfoot to turn you away — 

But that’s only a trick of the nighttime, surely.  A consequence of shadows and sleeplessness.  There’s no such thing as ghosts, after all, and there’s certainly no such thing as a Wilds alive and cognizant of unwelcome strangers walking unwitting into its belly. 

↠ the underground

A vast network of caves that stretch for miles deep beneath the Wilds.  The Underground has mouths throughout the Hollow Court — stone teeth that pry up beneath the roots of trees, and rocky tongues nestled waiting along the riverbanks.  And there’s something about the Underground, once you’re in there, that seems more alive than the Wilds; there is something that glitters just beyond the dark esophagus of the caves that follows you into your dreams at night, and an invisible hand that sweeps across the tangled caves to change routes and rivers that you thought you’d known. 

↠ the spire

The Spire stands at the northern edge of Court territory.  It’s speculated that it might once have been a part of the Crown — and that the Crown must once have been much, much larger — but it stands alone and apart now in the center of a small clearing.  Members of the Imperium come to the Spire for meetings that are not meant to be made public knowledge — sometimes innocently, to discuss training of rising members of the Vivarium; other times, to quietly handle things best not shared with the members of the Vivarium.  Some things, after all, are delicate.  Not all wolves handle the cold necessities of leadership well. 

↠ Hemelstorm Cult // peach.candy (#419)

Theirs is an alliance built of cautious respect and distance.  The Court recognizes something of a kindred spirit in Hemelstorm — an echo of the same predatory coldness, perhaps, made more volatile by flame — and does well to maintain the framework of camaraderie.  It is easier to know when restlessness or momentum breeds and threatens to spark — and to ensure that Hemelstorm’s fires do not turn upon the Court in kind.

↠ Cyclone Pack // Ghostie (#1499) 

A fragile truce more than a true alliance.  The Imperium rarely speak of the debt they owe to the Cyclone Pack, and consequently little is known within the Vivarium of their unprecedented mercy, other than that it predates the Hollow Court itself.  But nevertheless, it remains:  Where other stragglers that venture into the Court’s territory often pay the price with their lives, those that answer to the Cyclone Pack are, instead, escorted back to the fringe of their home territory — sent on their way with a fragrant bundle of herbs that have been grown in the bloodstained shadows of the Crown as both gift and reminder. 

↠ Chayka // pack leader, breeding male.

There are whispers that he sees what others cannot:  The movement of the hungry earth, the dark things that move beyond the trees.  He has always been a lonely creature, and often a moody one.  Though there is rarely a question of his loyalty to the Court, he is more often roaming than home among the watchful stones. 

↠ Spider // herbalist, founder. 

The mysterious third founder of the Court, and with motivations more secret than her dedication to her craft reveal.  Spider has always been here (and perhaps always will be).  She is clever and sweetly charming, more elegant and more sociable than Sparrow and more pacifistic than Shrike.  There are games that cannot be won by tooth and claw, after all, and when she is needed to manipulate the odds, she will be there. 

↠ Pyre // pupsitter. 

Dedicated and practical, she is among the strongest of bridges between the Imperium and the Vivarium.  Pyre sees more than she acts upon, and knows more than she says; pups are not the only ones, after all, who have things to hide, or who have tells when they lie.  Though she is strict, she is also forgiving, and she knows her place and her limits.  The Imperium may hold their secret meetings in distant caves, but Pyre keeps the Vivarium from crumbling in their wake. 

↠ Prophecy // seer, scout second

A strange, solemn creature with eyes that shift as mercurial as the Court itself.  He claims to know of what has yet to come — that the Crown whispers of things to come in his dreams; that the entrails of the dead and that the blood of the dying spell messages across stone.  But his sight is a vague and dreamy thing, and sometimes what is foretold cannot be avoided — and his motivation and his loyalties, still, remain shrouded.

↠ Minnow // legatus stalker. 

↠ Flax // legatus chaser. 

↠ Fennel // legatus chaser. 

↠ Oriole // legatus chaser. 

Something of the Crown’s shine sparkles brighter for Oriole than for most.  She is polite in her manner and intense in her focus, sees glittering gold shining beneath cages of roots and stone.  By now she knows better than to chase the pretty little fantasies that the Court lays out for her, but there’s a hunger to her not sated by blood or by flesh, and there’s something in the wide yearning of her eyes that suggests it’s only a matter of time before the Court’s sticky hold grows. 

↠ Larkspur // legatus finisher. 

Delicate and pale, Larkspur seems as ephemeral as any of the Court’s ghosts, and almost as shy.  Even among her peers in the Vivarium, she is reserved — but there is a steely strength in her teeth, and a ferocity as eerily unsettling as any dark cave.  She is rarely seen away from Oriole’s side; though she will never discourage her from any number of misadventures, she is determined to ensure that her friend comes to no harm in the process.

↠ Sparrow // pack leader, founder. 

Her quietness is not kindness, and her wistfulness is not shyness.  Though she is more demonstrative of her affection and her loyalty to Shrike and Spider, she remains somewhat aloof from the rest of her pack.  Oh, they’re certainly hers, and she’ll defend them and keep them in line with the cut of her teeth when it’s required of her, but she’s a wanderer at heart, and there is something about the shifting lands and the restless caves that drags her away like a fever dream. 

↠ Shrike // scout, breeding male, founder. 

A figurehead, but a fine one.  Shrike is the heart and the soul of the Court, makes the Imperium feel friendlier and the nights perhaps warmer.  His loyalties are not so expansive as his affections would suggest, and he is greedier and more decisive than his kindness would have you believe — his teeth are for the well-being of his mates first and of his pack second, and certainly not to strays or wanderers, and he will do what must be done. 

↠ Permanent wolves should have at least a name, role, & blurb in this thread. 

↠ Only two pups maximum may be kept from any given litter, and preferably only one in smaller litters (3 or less).  Other pups may be given away, sold, chased, or allowed to die.

↠ Female wolves should only have up to 10 active / alive offspring.  Pups that are sold count as active / alive; pups that are chased do not. 

↠ Wolves shouldn't be bred until their appearances are semi-finalized -- if they're waiting on a marking opacity change or marking applicator, skip that heat. 

She’s nose-deep in yarrow and winterfat when something shifts in the clearing behind her — not the scrape of claws against the frostbitten earth, not the familiar rumble of a greeting or the scent of the stony Court, but a sense of proximity, and of being watched. 

“Sparrow,” the herbalist hums.  Her teeth click delicately against the tangled roots.  She paws silken leaves away. “What brings you out all this way?  Did Oriole lose a squabble with a squirrel again?”

The packleader’s jaw presses against her shoulder blades.  Spider turns and noses along the dark line of Sparrow’s mouth.  Catches the earth smell of the Crown, now, imprinted deep into Sparrow’s fur.  The smell of snow, too, and of Shrike, warm and familiar. 

“Thrush smelled an intruder at the edge of the taiga,” Sparrow says, matter-of-fact.  “Legatus found the remains of a rabbit, too.  I was hoping you’d have time to lend a paw.  The Crown has been hungry.”  Her eyes are sharp, but her teeth are soft, for now.  Not for long, Spider thinks, mulling it over. 

“Shrike?” she asks. 

“He’s busy.” 

“Mmm,” Spider says.  She rubs her cheek against Sparrow’s.  “Well then, it’ll just have to be the two of us.”

-♕-

They aren’t hunters, but this particular intruder leaves an easy trail — here, the ragged pelt of a rabbit, the bloody ribs blooming from the snow like a flower; there, the scrape of pawprints through the snowdrifts, meandering northward.  Sparrow prowls through the wooded hollow, and Spider follows in her wake with a sour wrinkle of her muzzle against the howl of the wind. 

But they come upon the lone wolf suddenly, cresting a barren outcropping to find a lanky gray wolf chewing a bone clean.  He startles at the sight of them — leaps to his feet and snarls stiffly.  His muzzle and paws are streaked with red, but there’s a desperation about him, Spider thinks, that suggests he hasn’t eaten in days before this. 

Sparrow’s stride lengthens. 

Spider, like a shadow, glides after her. 

“Stay back!” the wolf snarls.  His teeth flash shiny in the dying light. 

Later Spider will wonder what it is that he sees in them — whether his fear stems from the chill of Sparrow’s fixed stare, or the quiet intent of their paws across the frost, or the glint of teeth and hungry, impatient breath. 

But they’ve gone over this before at the Spire, rehashing duty and morality and cold necessity.  The gray wolf bristling and pacing, caged by silent stone, might be any other frightened trespasser that has come to the Court before, discounting the stories of the needy land.  But words and bartering, all the polite predecessors of a fair fight, go nowhere when the Crown whispers to be fed.

Sparrow lunges, and the gray wolf screams. 

-♕-

Spider drags him to the Crown, after.  It isn’t far, but the wolf is heavy despite his lanky frame, unwieldy to navigate through the dense, clinging underbrush.  Her breath comes in harsh pants by the time they lay him at the Crown’s center, and she leans against Sparrow’s flank as the packleader arranges the splayed limbs, the reddened mouth. 

“He was weak,” Sparrow says at last, the first she’s spoken since the gray wolf dragged his last guttering breath.  She seems disappointed as she circles the wolf’s body, licks her teeth clean. 

Spider shrugs.  “Blood is blood.” 

“Hm,” Sparrow says.  Her eyes focus briefly on Spider.  “I suppose.” 

“Besides, better weak than a fighter.”  Spider’s lip draws upward.  She peels herself away from Sparrow’s side and noses through the overgrown brush, searching for leafy fronds to lay across the wolf’s cooling body. “It’s bad morale for packleaders to come home injured.” 

“I would hate to dent your herb supply,” Sparrow agrees dryly, but her eyes brighten minutely, too, and after a moment she rises and pads across the clearing to help Spider. 

Together they draw long, dark plants across the red and silver body, create a soft path of leaves and vines from the gray wolf to the Crown.  Sacrifice, Spider thinks as she lays the last frond across the gray wolf’s open, empty eyes, must be beautiful.  The wilds do not always provide something worthy of the Crown’s hunger, but even the most haggard offering may be made beautiful.

Sparrow leans down, quiet again.  Her teeth reopen the gray wolf’s throat, delicate, deliberate, precise. 

She steps away, and the violent spill of blood soaks into the thirsty, waiting earth, and something in the still night and the silent Crown seems, very distantly, to sigh and to settle. 

“Sigil.  Sigil, I saw something today.” 

Oriole’s whisper carries like the flutter of bird’s wings through the fog.  She appears in slow degrees — first the unnatural pale shine of her eyes, and then the delicate gleam of her teeth and the prick of her ears.  You flatten your own ears at her — you’ve heard this before, all the uneasy ways the Court roils like a leviathan beneath you turned into an exciting thing through Oriole’s eyes.  

But she’s always been stubborn, hasn’t she? 

“If you hurry it might still be there.”  Her nose touches the corner of your jaw, cold and gentle.  Her paws tread light along the stone and dirt. 

Even after all this time, you’ve never been able to tell her no. 

-♘-

She won’t tell you what it is, but you can feel an echo of it as soon as you’re inside the Crown, anyway.  The morning light filters down through the fog and the trees all wrong, like a ripple in a pool of water pinned between the branches.  The air smells like stone — not the sun-warmed flats of rock you walk across now, but dark and earthy, like something sleeping has stirred in bedrock. 

“Did you tell Sparrow?” you ask.  

Oriole throws a quick look over her shoulder.  She dances a few steps ahead, light and easy on her paws, her tail a bottlebrush impression of motion through the brush. 

“The Imperium are at the Spire,” she says.

“And the rest of Legatus?”

Rune, with her strange immunity to all the Court’s hungry, improbable movement.  Thrush, with his uncanny navigation of the carnivorous gulfs and treacherous stone.  Larkspur — like you, you think.  With something ugly hidden behind her teeth, making a shield of her claws and her ribs for her pack. 

But you take another step and there is the Crown, a sheer glossy monument extending upward through the leaves, and Oriole’s voice drifts back through the cedar trunks, the sprigs of herbs knotted dense at the base of the obelisk. 

“I don’t want it to go away, Sigil.” 

-♘-

It is a cave that you know wasn’t there yesterday:  You had come along this way with Legatus; you remember the staccato thrum of your heartbeat in your ears and the taste of blood in your mouth and slick on your tongue and the flashing whites of the doe’s eyes as she ran, and the ground had been flat and solid beneath your paws, then. 

But there’s a cave now:  Oriole paces circles around the jagged mouth and looks at you.  Like a puppy waiting for its reward, you think. 

But something about the cave arrests your breath in your lungs.  Creeps cold through the hollow spaces of your chest.  The hungry dark, the sharp-cut rocks cluttered like teeth around it, the dusty marble slab of a tongue veined in gold.  The way it’s crawled and knotted itself up and through the earth at the base of an old redwood tree like a snake, sleek and dark and dangerous. 

“There’s something that whispers inside,” Oriole says, whispering herself.

She’s on her belly now, edging so close to the cave that her paws dip into the milky shadows. 

“I could hear it all the way to the Court.”  

Her eyes shine white and blind up at you. 

“Listen,” she says. 

-♘-

You hear— 

something.

and perhaps there is a part of you that comprehends it, somewhere deep in your gut where the Court’s taken hold and spread like a rot—

but the rest of you shudders to a nauseous revulsion, a gagging terror, and you scramble backwards until your claws gouge rifts through the dirt around the silent obelisk, until the cave dips away behind the underbrush, and Oriole watches you with her bright, pale eyes, saying nothing. 

-♘-

When you go back the next day, the cave is gone. 

In its place is an imperfect divot, an imprint of stony teeth left scraped against the roots of the redwood tree. 

Nothing makes a sound.