Black Magus

Geri.

***

Three years.

Our charge was three years in our home. Three years in the Silverstream Forest. Three years in our distant world. The longest and shortest three years of my existence.

Our existence.

My pack was small. Composed entirely of Chorian residents. Former residents.

Katheryn was a human who appeared like a run-of-the-mill winter wolf when transformed. She was currently in attendance at the Bardic School of Announcing for the sake of bringing life to the many recordings of fantastic fights hidden in the Archives. Lemeia was also a bard, but a Strifling with blue-black fur and horns that seemed to mirror her ears. A Show Host, she was. Although she gave no hints as to what type of shows she'd be hosting.

Rhonda was also a human. But one with gray-blue tones to her fur coat that seemed to stand on end, always. She was on the path to becoming an artificer, like Ed. Specializing in mechanical engineering to make ludicrously fast vehicles for the mountains, tundra, and taiga. Penny was a dwarf; also an artificer in training but with the intent of becoming an architectural engineer. More like a squat mastiff than a wolf was her appearance. Or, if a wolf, a short and stout one with a braided 'beard' hanging from her frowning snout.

Norsh was a halfling. A corgi-like wolf with blue and white markings that truly made one think she was one of the stout-legged pups. She didn't even have a tail. A boon, in her eyes, as she was a pilot who devoted her all to merging the likeness of a fighter and an artificer in quite a unique way. Lula, a deep gnome and a bard in the School of Sponsorship, appeared as a wolf-like dog that stood nearly as tall as Norsh. Her fur, however, was a deep black with white tones paired with ice-white eyes without pupils. Strangely of all, her tail was the fluffiest and was permanently curled inwards to form a loop atop her bum. A Shiba, according to Amun.

And then there was me. A big-ass winter wolf. The matriarch of the Winter Wolf Conclave. Like Blude and my brother, I led us to Amun's home to reunite with our children. A place I both knew and knew not existed.

Hidden in plain sight within the second sun- as the denizens of the surface called it- existed Eotrom. A mirror to the mortal realm. Tucked within that mirror realm was a mirror of the first world outside, complete with the same name. Mani. A layered world, it was, wherein a forest of silver sat beneath the barren surface. And more sat within that silvery expanse.

There, in the Silverstream Forest, we received the same lessons as my brother in both flesh and spirit, taught by a different celestial wolf. Lycaon was the name of his spirit's first son. The name of my first daughter was Lupa. A wolf of colossal proportions with fur whiter than snow could ever hope to be.

Despite being separated from the summer wolves, we still had to confront the beasts inside us in a similar way. Amun, Etan, Lupa, and sometimes Doyle trained us with their minds rather than their hands, making us come to terms with our dual natures; our twin powers.

The power of winter was of wood and sterility; dying and stagnation. Of the moon. Ice. Despair.

The power of spring was of flowers and fertility; youth and growth. Of the dawn. Air. Hope.

It didn't take long to realize the extent of our new lives after that. Mastering them, however, was another matter entirely. We did so in my world. Brigid. An orb with a floral band of deep dales and winding rivers around its midsection, capped with glacial fields, boreal forests, treacherous tundra, and frozen mountains. That was where we lived. That was where we hunted. Played. Trained and eventually warred against Amun, Etan, and sometimes Doyle. And when we weren't, we were on our scattered moons, woven for every purpose and pleasure imaginable. Except living.

Like everyone else, we received the ArcaTech's blessing to assist us in learning, and yet still took months to become the experts in our chosen fields Amun demanded of us. Science, Technology, Reading, and Writing. Engineering. Art. Mathematics and magic. A bit of history and a lot of philosophy from both his native world and ours. Like everyone else, we then spent months upon months on our mechanical moon, developing skill after skill. Far more skills than our summer and autumnal counterparts.

While they learned how to build and operate those large and lumbering tractors and trains, we remained on our first mechanical moon, wherein we became enraptured evermore with the vehicles created by Ed. We studied and toiled to learn how to operate, maintain, and fabricate them, adapting them to scream through the land, skies, and seas at ludicrous speeds, for we were rangers, and there was no place we couldn't traverse. We were rangers unlike any other, celestial or not, unburdened by distance through virtue of the fueled, magical, arcane, and celestial vehicles we created on our Blue Moon.

In turn, that formed my chosen industry; Aerospace Engineering. That created the Blue Steel Motor Company and Blue Peak Aerospace Industries, and then that prompted the creation of our second mechanical moon, wherein we melded our craft and our knowledge of ranging with our lessons in witchcraft just like the summer wolves were doing with their herbs. With Iris' help, we installed sensors and scanners in our vehicles to target, track, and assess the injured from afar. With Reina and Rickley's help, we installed facilities that could treat the worst of wounds whilst keeping them in a serene state of mind. When combined, we practiced rescuing trauma patients from extremely hazardous environments with the utmost haste.

When combined, we solved the age-old problem associated with witches relocating their patients by creating a unit of first responders. Celestial First Responders with bestial natures.

Even after Katheryn took over the Spring Witch Comet Service and its home moon, Swicks, we forged on. We took our skills and wove a third mechanical moon. Not for the sake of industry or witchcraft, but for the sake of fun. We took it upon ourselves to learn how to build supportive infrastructure on the prior moon, if only to build continent-spanning racetracks and circuits on the new moon, Squeal. In this, we adopted a mirrored industrial role to the likes of Ed, wherein we constructed icy roads, wooden racing tracks, sky circuits, and waterways for both business and recreational purposes; for both Eotrom and the Mortal Plane.

So it was. We went on our paws, our ground vehicles, through the air, and across the water, racing; mastering the use of our creations to save those worth saving and kill those worth killing; pushing the limits of celestial engineering further and further until we eventually created the first fleet of super and then hypersonic craft.

In turn, Lemeia and Katheryn organized, hosted, announced, and broadcasted the debut of the Winter Wolf Racing League to the ManaNet with a celebratory race. Then, we got back to work. We had completed our professional tasks halfway through our charge. Thus, we turned our snouts towards our arcane moon to fulfill the supportive duties for ourselves, the Legions, and the Troupe.

Dubbed Castle Wintercrest- or simply Wintercrest- our first arcane moon was an operator school and licensing center run by the mind of Norsh. It was the first of its kind. Not a course to learn the basics or even the advanced methods of vehicle operation akin to the ones organized by Imperators Ed and Duke. It was a course for the extreme aspects of vehicle operation; how to build them, how to maintain and repair them, and most importantly, how to operate them in the most dangerous environments imaginable. To that end, we made a copy of our racing moon and filled it in its entirety with so-called Catastrophic Arcane Territories. Raging seas with constant vortexes and grand waterfalls spewing from midair. Burning badlands with constant earthquakes and sandstorms for clouds. Chocking forests with floating flora and living lakes. We tailored every vehicle in our fleet to fit every imaginable biome and scaled them to operate within every level of danger one could think of.

Through this, we and the Troupe became experts in creating and using the locomotive tools provided by the Legions; moreover, it gave us the industrial prowess needed to produce them en mass and distribute them to the Legions and beyond. To that end, we made a sister moon to the Blue Moon and automated them both, relegating the first to a world of research and development, while this one, Hora, became our primary manufacturing and distribution center.

The time for our last world to be woven came by the start of the final year of our charge. The ArcaTech's essence linked it to the aforementioned moon infused inside its core. But not for the sake of manufacturing. It was for our roles within the Legion.

Though we would later learn our combat roles within the Elven Devil's Troupe, we knew our non-combative roles in both warfare and peacetime. Thus, we began training for it in earnest. The job was simple. We were rangers. We roamed the fringes of society, acting as scouts, deterrents, or even spies. Our job, in short, was reconnaissance. Therein lay the purpose of our final moon, Eiar. A mountain-sized celestial body turned into an extension of our minds, thanks to Iris.

The result was a communal mind shared by my conclave. A tap of information, sights, smells, and sounds we could drink from and, in turn, connect us to Simion and the three networks. A world of sensors, transmitters, receivers, and other devices linked to us and our equipment for a sole purpose. Cartography.

Our moon, coupled with the scattered Legions' data, Iris' game, and the Map function of the various networks, showed not just the Legion-explored realms in real-time. It showed the territories of those who called it home. It showed their relations with each other; their opinions of the Legions, their rulers, and their laws; cultures and languages; imports and exports; supplies and demands; their prowess with technology and magic. The resources and creatures found within. Everything we could gather information on.

Since Lula's bardic specialty was sponsorship, she fit perfectly in the moon's core, where she scanned the peninsula from shore to shore in search of potential racers, legionaries, winter wolves, enemies, allies, or any such thing to sponsor- giving rapt attention to and narrating their actions as seen by the satellites.

By the blessings of our God and the power born within us, we accomplished these tasks and exceeded the expectations set before us. More so, we excelled at our art. Yet, there was one task left to master. One thing left to train for.

War.