Magpie

"Diopside Biewer IV"

Superstition in the pack says that those with white splotched across their pelts are touched by death, the color of their fur bleached away by the brush of death. Magpie, bearing the markings of spirit-sight, is perhaps even more so, his dark pelt marred by broad blotches of white and his sides marked with silver like ribs. He sees the dead in every corner, both a blessing and a curse, allowing him to seek out the wisdom of those long passed, but forcing him to see the spectre of death in every corner.

No land, truly, is untouched by death. A place where nothing has died is as truly unnatural as a place where nothing has lived, for life and death are mates, hand in hand - but it does not make it easier, to live among wolves when half the pelts you see are dead and rotting. Magpie often seeks out the solitude of scouting, learning from the spirits of those who lived and died on the land he walks, for it is easier to speak with the dead when not surrounded by the living, Though he, himself, feels no risk from the dead, the gazes of the living are another matter - for even as crumbling bone and decaying flesh are routine to him, the way others look upon him is haunting.

To know that he is the only one who can speak to the phantoms he sees can be more haunting than the ghosts themselves. To know of the gazes on his back, watching, wondering, even more so. It is a heavy burden, to be the only one who can carry something, and for all that Magpie truly believes that the dead are worth speaking to, he fits in far worse with the living. How could one be happy, surrounded by dead - when one's pelt is bleached from death-touch, when one's fur is marked with deathly silver? The dead have nothing to do but speak, but the living judge, and that is far worse.

In personality, Magpie is a remarkably cheerful and optimistic wolf, though his sense of humor tends to be stunningly macabre. Despite his death-touch, he is young and handsome enough to claim the spot of breeding male within the pack, as Ambergris, his first pack leader, had no wish to breed pups themself. Despite his propensity for long scouting trips, off-puttingly dark figures of speech, and speaking to people who aren't there, he maintains a fairly good reputation within his pack, and is generally considered an exceptionally valuable figure within the pack's ranks.