Wolfstrider Border Patroller Player: Whitney Ware Last Updated: February 15, 2004 Update CIS

Attributes

Current Name: Wolfstrider [1769-1770]
Previous Name: Survivor [1756-1769]
Previous Name: Wolfstrider [1019-1756]
Cub Name: Briar [1006-1019]
Preserver Name: Longwalker Highthing

Soul Name: Seth

Known By:
Chillwind (mother, deceased)
Duskwater (father, alive)
Eyesfire (Recognized mate, deceased)
Halfkin (friend, alive)

Sex: Male
Age: 764
Hunt Blooded: Yes

Eyes:
Average and level; dark brown colour.

Hair:
Dark blond hair, worn shoulder-length. Hair is straight, worn generally one-length with shorter strands falling over his forehead. Moustache and goatee-style beard; cheeks are growing stubble, so he often has that needs-to-shave look.

Facial Features:
Angular features with a stout jaw line, straight nose and short upper lip. Broad forehead, level eyes, cleft chin beneath the goatee.

Height: 4'6" (137 cm)
Skin: Light olive colour, tanned.
Build: Muscular and athletic.

Magic:
Sending (average)
Magic Feeling (average)
Wolf Bonding (average)

Clothes:
Buckskin breeches with fringe along the seams, tucked into buckskin boots (styled like Cutter-cub). Long-sleeved buckskin medicine shirt, with a quillwork or beaded wolf head on the chest, fringe along the shoulders of the shirt's back, and along the back of the arms. In poor weather, adds a hooded skin coat.

Colours Worn: Buckskin tan, weathered leather and forest greens. He's a hunter and a scout primarily, and prefers concealing colours, and clothes that offer some protection from briars and thorns.
Jewellery: None.

Heritage Skills Acrobatics Climbing Direction Sense Diving Fishing: General Hiding Hunting: General Howling Gathering: Basic Lore: Fauna Lore: Flora Running Self-Defence Steath Swimming Throwing Ride: Wolf	Personal Skills Scouting ** Tracking ** Combat * Crafting: Bowyer/Fletcher * Crafting: Carving * Crafting: Drums * Crafting: Spears * Cub Sitting * Decorative: Scrimshaw * Fishing: Scooter * Fishing: Spear * Fishing: Submerged Spear * Gathering: Herbs * Musician: Drums * Cub Sitting First Hunt Supervisor	Weapon Skills Spear ** Bow * Knife
** = Primary skill * = Secondary skill Submerged spear fishing partnter = Surefire

Relationships

Family:
Chillwind (mother, deceased)
Duskwater (father, alive)
Dagwood (half-brother, deceased)
Unborn child (daughter, deceased)

Mates:
Rootmoss (lifemate, deceased) [1199-1476]
Silvergrass (lifemate, deceased) [1199-1476]
Softstone (lovemate, deceased) [1480-1734]
Eyesfire (Recognized mate, deceased) [1735-1736]

Friends:
Soul brother Halfkin; other friends include (but are not limited to) Surefire, Boldscout, Firemoss and Clover.

Role Play

Personality:
Wolfstrider is a quiet but engaging man, who enjoys socializing with his tribesmates but who is never the type to be the life of the party. He has a rough, almost raspy, low-end tenor voice, and speaks in a thoughtful fashion. When he shares it, he has a full-hearted laugh.

Wolfstrider has a steady, loyal, and dependable nature. He views his primary role within the tribe as being a provider and protector. He is very aware of being childless, and sees it as a personal failure - not in the sense that he's burning to swim upstream and spawn this very moment, but rather that he does have a duty he's failed so far to contribute his parents' blood to the next generation, and to renew lost numbers to the tribe. Since he is childless, he views his role as a hunter, guardian and teacher as being of critical importance as his contribution to the tribe's future.

This hunter does have loss-issues to deal with. As a result, he tends to be not simply loyal, but almost obsessively concerned about the welfare of those he cares for. He can be protective - even overly so - and his devotion in a mate relationship can border on the possessive.

Like so many of his tribemates, Wolfstrider's life can be charted in the loss of the ones he's loved. Every woman he's lovemated or lifemated has died. For a long time, depression and self-absorbed obsession with these loses caused him to retreat from the normal daily life of the tribe. He lived in the wolf-caves, preferring their company to that of other elves, and was pitied by his tribesmates for his inability to let go of his grief. For a period of time he wore the name "Survivor" as a badge of his surviving the women he had loved. Later, after overcoming his unhealthy obsession with his own angst, he returned to the name "Wolfstrider," and today is sheepishly embarrassed by his years of self-absorption.

Wolfstrider's nature was most shaped by his mother, Chillwind. As a child, he worshipped his mother and was determined to emulate her and win her respect as a hunter. He was devastated at her death, especially when it was only upon her death he earned a place among the Hunt. His relationship with his father was not was life-guiding; Duskwater has always been a kindly presence in his life, but rarely a demanding figure. Duskwater had already lost one son, Dagwood, who suicided many years before Wolfstrider's birth; Wolfstrider grew up with a certain uneasiness, wondering if he were able to compare to that lost son in Duskwater's eyes. (This was a false perception on Wolfstrider's part.) After Chillwind's death, a younger Wolfstrider begrudged his father his later love relationships, unable to understand how he could lose a Recognized mate yet still love another. Only recently has Wolfstrider been able to respect this, and reconcile with his father over the matter.

Wolfstrider has a restless spirit, and spends much of this time ranging the forests and canyons of the tribe's territory, hunting and scouting their borders for trouble. He is a skilled hunter, and enjoys the challenge of the stalk far more than the taking of prey. He can be counted on to be away from the Holt as often as not, ranging the Holt's borders in search of danger.

Treasures:
A piece of jewellery which was a gift from two of his past lovemates (Rootmoss and Silvergrass) - a hair barrette made of shaped amber with two holes for leather strips to pass through for tying. In front where the leather strip shows is tied two longer leather strips hanging down with feathers and beads. Also treasures his belt knife, which had been Eyesfire's.

History:
Wolfstrider's mother was Chillwind, leader of the Hunt at the time of his birth. His father, Duskwater, is still alive and is an honoured elder of the tribe. Duskwater taught his son how to fish when Briar (his cub name) was very young. Briar bonded with his first wolf-friend (Sniffle) when he was 6, and began hunting successfully at the unusually young age of nine, when he was also recognized early for his skill with the spear.

When Briar was 13 years old, he went out in search for his soul name. When he returned after his soul name quest, he assumed the new name of Wolfstrider.

Chillwind was killed in a hunting accident when Wolfstrider was 45 years old, and he was named to the Hunt upon her death. When Wolfstrider was 193 years old, he entered into lovemating relationship with the soul sisters Rootmoss and Silvergrass. He devoted himself to the pair, and their love relationship soon became a lifemating. When they died 277 years later during a terrible storm, he was again devastated.

Aware of his suffering, young Softstone took pity on him, and within turns, they were lovemates. The relationship lasted for 254 years - until Softstone's death in a fall. Wolfstrider had been late returning from a solo hunting trip, and she had gone looking for him. Wolfstrider took her death as a personal responsibility, and sank into a brooding depression.

Softstone's sister, the willful Eyesfire, sought to break him out of his depression, reminding him forcefully that he wasn't the only one to suffer after Softstone's death. Later, Eyesfire and Wolfstrider Recognized. A turn and a half later, Eyesfire was killed by humans of the Land Loper tribe; she and her unborn cub were burned to death before Wolfstrider and the rest of the tribe could rescue her.

Wolfstrider was overwhelmed with grief. He changed his name to "Survivor" and moved into the wolf caves for his home, and even began holding hallucinatory conversations with the spirit of his unborn child (actually a manifestation of his own death wish, if you want to get clinical about it). The rest of the tribe humoured him and treated him with gentle pity; his close friend Halfkin went so far as to trade soul names with Survivor in an attempt to ease his grief. The grief had become a consuming obsession, however.

But that was to change. In autumn of 1769, Survivor and his wolf-friend Stagmark were ranging far afield during an early season storm. A tree was blown over, and both he and his wolf were struck. Stagmark was killed outright, while Sruvivor woke to find himself trapped, with both legs crushed and the chance of rescue questionable.

The following half day proved to be critical for the hunter. While trapped, he had an epiphany, realizing how he had allowed his grief to consume him and that it had kept him from truly living. Survivor found the strength to banish his own ghosts, and as well as found a renewed faith in life. The hunter was rescued before shock and exposure to the elements could kill him; his first choice upon return to the Holt was to be known again by his earlier name, Wolfstrider. Soon after this, he bonded to a new wolf-friend, Flea.

Wolf-Friend

Name: Flea Sex: Female Age: 2 Rank: Omega

Markings:
Solid black wolf. Average size, dark yellow eyes.

Personality:
Flea is young - and has an immature nature that will make her seem like a pup for years to come. She isn't the brightest spark in the pack - in fact, she might well be one of a dumbest. She is boisterous, intensely curious, and highly energetic. Forgetful, and while she can learn a lesson, it seldom sticks in her head for long. Has an especially strong endurance.