you were meant to kill him.

"Forgive me. This was my duty, I was raised for this work. My knife was meant for your throat, told it would make everything right again, but then you laughed and you looked so young. And now every time I reach for the hilt, I hesitate. What if they were wrong? What if killing you doesn’t fix the world - what if it breaks it? I don't know anymore."

you tread through his dreams.

"We were in the woods again. The pyres were still warm. You looked at me and said 'she's not done yet.' I never remember your voice when I'm awake, though, only in sleep. I keep trying not to follow you in my dreams - you always wander into the darkest woods, the ones that catch and kill - but I always do anyways. Every time."

you watched him die.

"He took the blade. I saw it go in, right to the hilt. Right below the ribs where breath becomes blood. He fell like stone, hard and final. Didn't scream, just blinked once, then was still. We left him there. Had to. The field was turning red and the fire was already coming up the hill. Buried dozens of brothers, but he’s the only one that got back up again."

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My Name Is Adalwolf

My name is Adalwolf. My people, the Bärvolk — we who are descended from bears and know the Seventy-Nine Sigils of the Longhouses — believe in the importance of names. It was our völva, Yana, who gave me mine for my hair as dark as the hide of Sködýr, and for the blackglass eyes that mark me changeling, mark me witch-wolf, mark me Úlfheðinn¹. My late father, Björnard, who was the ealdorman of the Bärlanshire before my mother assumed his role, wasn’t fond of the name — we are descended from bears, after all, aren’t we? Everyone knows better than to secondsay a name chosen by a völva, though.My name… is Adalwolf… and I have much to live up to — shoes to fill a dozen times my size and a hundred times my years. I’m heir to the Bärlanshire, after all. That’s kind of a big deal, don’t you think? Can you even picture it? Try: heir to all the lands north of the River Cairns, south of the Endless Mile, and east of the Great Karwald. Lands that Father ruled over the with integrity and… and… and modesty? Humility? By the ancestors, that’s… a lot, huh? But, but, but when honour called him to wage war against the chaustlehr who’ve occupied our territory for generations, he didn’t hesitate...

Did he, Adalwolf.

I’m told it’ll come with age, but what if the gods only have so much of the good clay to mould the very best of us? That’s make sense, since elsewise everyone would be as great as him… and Ada, my sister, before they both died in battle — the same one, the last one. Maybe that’s the problem. Maybe we just keep dying too much and they’re running out of the stuff. Maybe the rest of us get what’s leftover and just have to make do. Broken bodies, busted stars…But mother, she… she wants nothing of that life for me. Oh, don’t look at me like that, it’s not like she’s a coward or anything, and there’s none in our lands or our neighbour’s who would say so. It’s just that, well.

…

Yana says that sometimes there’s more courage and sense for her knowing when to weather the ego and when to stay the hand, that it’s the harder choice to make, but then again Yana wanted that war just as much as father — probably more.She’s a hard lady, though. Mother, I mean. Mother, Mantis, Mawhi. Shrewd, I guess, but loving! In her own way. She’s the one who taught me… my letters, I guess. The Ishgardian ones. Etiquette, too. That kind of stuff. She’s also the one… who had us bend the knee when she took the mantle of ealdorman. I hear she’s the only reason the rest of us weren’t hanged.

After father’s body was returned to us.

But I’m — I’m Adalwolf! Adalwolf the Black! Adalwolf of the Bärvolk! Of the Bärlanshire! Adalwolf named by Yana the Wyrm! And... and that doesn’t change just because the road gets hard…!

…so very, very hard, not like what they promise knights in those stories.

Ishgardian stories, I guess, so who knows, maybe if I had the height or didn’t have the tail or the ears it would be different. Maybe most days I wouldn’t wind up hungry, which I guess is better than the days that I end up sick or bleeding. I know a knight’s not supposed to steal, but truth is: I swindled a chicken two days prior and it’s held me up.

Uncle Cynewyrd says there’s no real rules to knighthood, though, save what your lord wants of you, but what does that cur know — may Draghna piss him out, I’ll not be like him. I don’t want to be like him!

The harder these days get, though, the more I end up thinking of home, and even my memories of him feel… softer lately. Like, did he always look so sad? Can’t remember, not like I remember… Yana braiding my sister’s hair… into witch-ladders by the fire! Or… or hwata, steaming in those special, little bowls of water in the corner by the fire. Watching my father and sister sparring in the bailey.

My father standing over me as I scramble in the mud, my ribs cracked by his training sword. How I remember the smell of his hair as I held him tightly— as he whispered to me one last time.

That fire in my sister’s eyes when she finally beat his aging body at swordplay. When she went off to war with him. Only in my dreams, now.Or Ada carrying me around on her shoulders singing: “our little bear, our little bear, full of courage and honour and flair.” Dancing with Cwen on our wedding day. Our hands bound together in fresh reeds and gold and polished stones from dawn to dusk. Her bending to kiss me.

Shame.

Swaddling Czeslawa, my baby sister, while overhearing my uncle talking to her nursemaid: ‘a wife, nearly eight years his senior, and what a shame, that: the boy can barely hold a sword.’

Anger. Rage.

Watching Yana flense a rabbit, drawing her finger through its viscera — tracing runes into my forehead with wolfsblood in frithspottum on a moonless, winter night — the day I left. Teaching me licwiglunga, the Long Names, and how to call on them, that the dead don’t hate us, they just hate being forgotten, same as us. How my father’s blade felt in my hand that night — that it felt right.

And, yes, I remember my first blackout, too. I remember the… shaking and the fear and… and the blood.

But somehow… somehow I still remember their eyes — all of them — most of all, and how now I’m starting to understand what Yana tried to tell me when I was still barely more than a babe: that there are some eyes can eat you.

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Cultural Touchstones

"...people say that the darkness of the Arlwich Highlands is distinct from the other provinces. There is a forlorn backdrop of baying beasts sounding off from the countryside. Adalwolf knows the way [...] plates wreathe the glade in the faint glow and smoke of burning coals and offerings [...] she tried to crawl inside him as gentle as falling snow. Love can have its own ways of biting, though; he still has the scars left by those eyes [...] he sees the wolf grin before she cuts its throat - one clean stroke, the way southerners do on fiddles..."

It's a Cold and Broken 'Hallelujah': 'Love' among the Bärvolk is often viewed by outsiders as volatile, unsustainable, and obsessive, and this applies equally to its platonic, familial, and romantic forms: their myths are populated with countless tales of tragic, blackhearted lovers whose possessiveness tore apart lives and communities only to face similarly-terrible fates at the story's end; mothers lord over their children long after they've become adults and well into marriage; and they practice a form of necromancy because, even in death and after they've wailed their dead and pored over their bones and ashes for days, they still cannot leave well enough alone.Who Conquers the Conqueror Worm: To the unfamiliar, burial rites in the Arlwich Highlands might look eerily similar to necromancy. Ancestral bones are interred either in public necropoleis or private charnel houses beneath a family's lands. However, prior to their death, individuals can consent to have their remains (spiritual or physical) used in various ways posthumously. The most common rites involve the reanimation of skeletons to act as tomb guardians, but can extend to other applications (such as acting as spiritual advisors or imbued into weapons or armour to continue safeguarding their family) should the family have the resources to do so.Thirteen Tiger Teeth in My Talisman: Since their imperialisation by Ishgard, the once-tribal miqo'te have seen their natural, folk religion suppressed throughout the years, but due to their isolated region, this has been imperfect at best. Witch-knight servants and 'völva' advisors form a portion of every fief's inner circle, in secret or otherwise, carrying old ways through oral tradition that has endured to this day.A Country of Orphans and Child-Kings: There's a saying in Ishgard: "if there isn't a rebellion in the Arlwich Highland, then there's three, and if not three, then seven are on the way." Due to their independent and rowdy nature, the regional fiefdoms are often trying to secede from their lieges, sometimes one, sometimes many at a time. This also means that there's an above-average number of young leaders, too, forced to take over after their older relatives get the axe.

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The High-Noble Spirits

The ancestral faith of the Arlwich Highlands is animistic in principle. To the ancient Bärvolk, nearly everything in existence had a spirit, from animals and plants to mountains, lightning, the weather, and natural disasters. Considering many of these things were often at odds with man, it's no surprise that they didn't necessarily believe divinity had their best interests in mind and their folk religion focused more on appeasement than actual worship. As Ishgardian influence started to shape their culture, much of this religion was watered down or filtered out of public society, elevating four Pannu (or 'High-Noble Spirits') above the rest.It is important to note that, in casual conversation, a Pannu's name is not used and instead common epithets take their place when needing to refer to them outside of highly-precise rituals. This is a holdover from their ancient traditions which characterised most spirits as volatile, vain, or simply fickle, and one would not want to draw their attention to them unless it was absolutely necessary.

Draghna.
husbandry, hunting, the natural order of life, the hearth

Draghna, the Great Bearmother and Lady of the Hearth, acts as the Bärvolk’s chief deity. A mother goddess, it is believed that the mythical first Longhouse King of the Bärlanshire (known only as the “Shoemaker King”), laid with Draghna to produce the first Bärvolk, who nursed at her as babes that gave them their great strength. She is also attributed with teaching the people the skills necessary to survive in the bitter cold of the northern winter.

Madjka
war, craftsmanship, poetry and the arts

Brother to Draghna, Madjka is depicted as a white stag. He is a patron of warrior-poets and the arts and acts as an embodiment of the tribe’s fierceness and the reverence of that fierceness. Warriors of the clan will give praise to him before and after battle, and it’s common for an elder warrior to commit ritual and public suicide as a sacrifice for Madjka to ensure their victory.

Uyrhi
loyalty, law, fertility

Raven-headed Uyrhi sees the cracks in society and instructs his people on how to mend them. He is credited with the creation of their earliest legal systems and tribal law. He oversees oaths and rites of fealty, and blesses men and women with fertility. It is said that he is the mild-mannered consort of Draghna, and tempers her noble fury.

Oru
the afterlife, prophecy, dancing

Oru is the first-born daughter of the union between Uyrhi and Draghna. Once Draghna has finished overseeing one of her children in the waking world, she passes the torch unto Oru who shepherds their departed souls into the afterlife. She is a spirit of dance, and it is common for funerals to include elaborate dances and invocations while bodies are burned and the bones collected for the family's under-charnel.

Sködýr

the winter, trickery, apotheosis, lost children

“I am no god, but I was old when the first sapling sprouted and before the stars came. I was here in the beginning, but were they?"Thus spoke Sködýr to his faithful, the völvur, when he questioned their high-noble spirits, and taught them the wildecraft and how to draw forth power from the Long Names. He is a cunning wolf spirit - part Prometheus, part trickster - and his tales are filled with riddles and themes of enlightenment paid at a great price. In their traditions, he is the dreameater who breaks the wheel of fate and sets his faithful free to follow their own road, and it is said that the last Longhouse King of the Bärlanshire bartered with him for a pair of boots that would grant him great, military prowess. In exchange, the witch-wolf would be able to “lay with the lady of the hall tenderly” and the spawn that sprung forth from that union would be raised as the lord’s own. The Longhouse King, blind with greed, accepted these terms.Due to this, although Draghna is often called upon to safeguard the youth, Sködýr is considered the patron of lost children. Among the Bärvolk, though, he is more often appeased than worshipped or thanked, for it is he who brings the winter chill and tests the clan. His servants are the owls and wolves and he is the hunger in men’s stomach when the grain sours, the darkness of the night when it looks like your eyes, the thing that stalks the woods when nothing else stirs or even lives. Where the tribe might love Draghna and Madjka, they they never forget to give the cunning wolf his due."I am no god, but I did eat them."