The Hunt Begins...

In the time before time, this sundered world was whole. The Shadow Realm and the material world were one, sharing an indistinct boundary known as the Border Marches. The world was a hunter's paradise that - while not idyllic or always peaceful - existed in perfect harmony. As long as spirits and living creatures refrained from interfering with each other, they could walk among one another as equals. Those who misbehaved or tarried too long where they did not belong, however, faced the wrath of Father Wolf, the foremost hunter spirit. He was lord of the Border Marches, and he sired numerous children. The strongest of those children were the Uratha, the werewolves, whose mother was fickle Luna, the ever-changing moon. Creatures made equally of flesh and spirit, the Uratha were the princes of the Border Marches, whose dominion bridged the regions on either side. To them Father Wolf taught many secrets and imparted a portion of his vast power, yet as his children's star rose, his began its sharp, inevitable decline.

In time, Father Wolf began to falter and the worlds astride the Border Marches suffered. Spirits toyed with creatures of flesh and made them slaves. Creatures of flesh encroached on the spirits' land and despoiled it by their very presence. The world trembled and sickened while Father Wolf struggled to keep up. And as in all wolf society, when the alpha weakens, the entire pack suffers. The Uratha saw this, and though Father Wolf must have seen it himself, he could do nothing to correct it. Therefore, with heavy hearts, the Uratha came together to perform a grim duty. Hunting their faltering and exhausted Father Wolf as they had once hunted by his side, they raised fang and claw against him to bring him down.

Unable to resist his children, Father Wolf fell at last, leaving only the Uratha to fulfill his duties. Yet his death was not without consequences. His final piercing howl shattered the Border Marches, forever separating the world of flesh from the Shadow Realm and slamming down a nigh-impenetrable Gauntlet between them. Crazed with grief, Luna levied a curse on his children for bereaving her of her proud, powerful lover. (Although Luna has since forgiven her children and helped them grow into their father's mantle, that curse still lingers.) But worst of all, the lords of the spirit world turned their backs on the Uratha for what they did. Whether they did so out of sheer outrage or quailing terror is unknown, but the effect remains the same. Only those few spirits who were closest to the Uratha before the Fall of Father Wolf will have anything to do with the werewolves now, and the rest have forsaken them.

You've had the sense at some point in your life that all is not right with the world, that not everything is as it seemed. You can tell that sinister truths hide behind a façade of normality, veiled by the rational, orderly "natural laws" we call science. When night falls, as the shadows grow long and the wind whistles through the trees, you shudder and remember the truths of your ancestors, who were right to fear the dark. In those times, you realize just how alone you are. You feel this way because you've just entered the World of Darkness, where the shadows hide very real monsters.

In Werewolf: The Forsaken, the second Storytelling game set in the World of Darkness, you and your friends tell the story of some of these monsters, namely those abandoned men and women who inherit the legacy of the werewolf. Neither wholly spirit nor flesh, the Uratha (as werewolves call themselves in their ancient language) are creatures of two worlds. Since the beginning of time, they have tended the Shadow Realm while staking out territory in the physical world and ruling it as the ultimate apex predators. Yet for the sacrifice of their ailing forebear, the Uratha have been forsaken by their former spirit allies and consigned to a physical world that knows only fear. Now they can rely only on each other, their mother Luna, and what few spirit allies they've managed to wrestle back into submission. They must stand on the threshold between two worlds swarming with enemies.

Despite their outcast state, the werewolves are not helpless prey. They can assume any of five natural forms, each with its own special advantages. They can heal even the most grievous injuries in seconds. The allies they have regained in the Shadow Realm have given them special Gifts and taught them special rites, each with profound magical effects. Their fickle mother Luna has graced them with her love and divided their slain father's legacy between them, each portion corresponding to one of the moon's five phases. And when their spirit prey tries to escape into the Shadow Realm, they can even pursue it across the Gauntlet that stands between the sundered worlds. As long as the Uratha can keep the disparate urges of their divided souls in harmony (balancing spirit and flesh while also balancing beast and man), they stand to inherit the mantle to which they were born.