Everything

The sept of the River Cave needs help protect­ ing its Anchorhead. For the past several weeks it has repelled attacks from strange spirits from the Deep Umbra. So far it has fought off the assaults but its members need to rest and recover their reserves. The sept asks the pack to protect the Anchorhead in the Deep Umbra, or better yet, to track the spirits back to their lair and destroy them.

The characters find the sept’s Garou and an­ cestor spirits not only battle-weary, but suffering some kind of progressive spiritual malaise from the spirit attacks. To give more than temporary protection to the Anchorhead, they must deal with the intermittent attacks, destroy the spirit nest, and identify and purge the early stages of possession taking hold of the sept.

Umbra hunger for the order and life of Gaia and the Near Realms. The energies flowing between Umbrae are like bait to these creatures, who may use violence, stealth or more insidious means to gain access to the Anchorhead when they happen to find one.

Crossing the Membrane at an Anchorhead is somewhat like stepping sideways. Rather than a reflective surface, the Garou meditates on the connection across the Mem­ brane and rolls Gnosis with a difficulty of 8 for a wild Anchorhead, 6 for a stabilized one. The Storyteller may modify this difficulty according to the use and care of the Anchorhead. An Anchorhead ritually purified after each use would reduce the difficulty by 1, whereas a constant­ ly-used Anchorhead with no down-time would increase the difficulty by 1 or more.

All stabilized Anchorheads — and even some wild Anchor­ heads — develop a theme at their mouths. This theme can be anything that evokes a tunnel or passageway, such as a deep green sea pool where the waters swirl to a central funnel and are drawn down into the depths. Engaging with the theme — the character leaps into the chill water and experiences near drowning — reduces the difficulty by 1. Characters do not have to engage with the theme. They can sense and use the connection between anchors and pass through the passageway — arriving at the destination dry and not gasping for air — but doing so risks degrading the Anchorhead.

Success results in the character passing across the Mem­ brane. If she engaged with the theme she experiences this accordingly — such as being wet and cold as described above. If she did not she simply feels stretched for a moment before appearing on the other side of the Membrane.

Failure on this roll means the character must wait an hour before trying again; others can use the pathway in this time. A botch indicates the character has somehow interfered with the connection. Increase difficulty to use the Anchor­ head by 2 until it is ritually purified. A wild Anchorhead will collapse if disturbed by a botch.

Garou are creatures of both spirit and flesh and must balance their time in both worlds. Anchorheads offer no respite against Disconnection. For this reason septs frequently bind their ancestor or other allied spirits to the Anchorhead for ongoing protection and supplement this with rotating packs to guard and patrol the pathway. The Garou under­ stand the onset of Disconnection with each cycle of the moon, and septs dedicated to maintaining Anchorheads try to minimize the time each werewolf stands guard.

Septs often establish Moon Bridges between the Anchor­ head and elsewhere to reduce travel times. The destination is usually closer to physical reality and helps maximize the time the Garou can spend actively tending the Anchorhead. Most Moon Bridges connect the Anchorhead to the ground level of the Aetherial Realm. Some connect to the homelands of their tribes and a rare few link directly to caerns in physical reality.

Although part of the Anchorhead is housed within the Deep Umbra, the entire construct has enough Near Umbra energy that the onset of Disconnection progresses as if the werewolf was within the Near Umbra. Some Garou take advantage of the Deep Umbra’s immunity to Disconnection (p. 103) to stave off its progression, but this merely delays the onset and does not reset the count. Stepping from the Anchorhead to the Deep Umbra also carries the risk of encountering whatever lurks nearby.

Making new Anchorheads is difficult and dangerous. The Rite of Anchoring the Divide must simultaneously breach the Membrane from both sides, but is not complicated to perform. At least two Garou must cooperate to perform the rite, with one in the Near Umbra and the other in the Deep Umbra. The character in the Near Umbra has the simpler task — the features of the Near Umbra are familiar enough to serve as landmarks. The character working in the Deep Umbra has a much more difficult task. She must locate a reasonably defensible portion of the Membrane, coordinate the performance of the rite at the correct time, and find protections from hostile spirits while she performs the rite.