verbena

   The Verbena hold themselves as one of the oldest Traditions. Their walks through the Sphere of Time (some Verbena call it the River of Time) have shown them that, even in the dark times of pre-history when humanity was but an ember about to burst into flame, there were weavers of magic, twisters of fate that followed their ways and their Traditions -- the roots of their Tree, if you will.
     Though they have journeyed to dizzying heights and have plummeted to great depths, they have survived. As other Crafts, their names now lost to time, have fallen into dust with no fanfare and no mourners, the Verbena have adapted, grown and thrived in the harshest of times.
     Perhaps the best analogy for the Verbena is that of an ancient gnarled oak. The oak's roots reach deep into the bedrock. Its trunk is strong, and yet it has had to grow around obstacles placed in its way as it grew. The branches are many and varying in size and strength, but chiefly, they are flexible and always seek the wind and the sky. The fruit, the acorns, drop to the ground from the branches and start brand new trees, kernels of distilled strength and wisdom from the parent.
     The Verbena are varied and as strong as the ancient tree. There are some who follow the ancient, primitive, primordial ways -- the old runes, the blood-sacrifice, the chanting, the drumming, the turning of the Wheel, the roots of the tree. There are some who, as the tree's trunk, uphold the strength of the tree by following the ancient Patterns as prescribed by the matrilineal Books of Shadow and patrilienal Runesticks which, to this day, must be used in tandem before they reveal their wisdom.
     The Verbena aren't just one part of the Tree, although many see them as those who are following the Patterns of old -- the benders and twisters of fate, those priestesses and practitioners tied to pattern and old symbols. Indeed, that segement is important -- it is their strength. But the real Verbena form the whole of the Tree. Only by considering the whole can you begin to understand that each Verbena is a reflection of it.
    To a Verbena, the body is itself a sacred shrine, and feeling is a form of prayer. A backrub is a brief blessing, while a full-body massage is a sacrament. Sexual intercourse is a major rite, a prayer for Life. The Body is a microcosm all it's own. The ultimate in holistic medicine, Verbena healing attempts to take into the full nature of the illness or wrong done to the body. It allows a Verbena to understand the nature of those diseases by voluntarily taking them into herself and dealing with them.
     The Verbena are about as organized as a bathtub full of drunken cats. There are many different "flavors" of Verbena, from ultra-conservatives who still chant in ancient Norse and Greek and still perform regular blood sacrifices, to those who work to perfect their bodies as the next step on the evolutionary scale, to the free radical liberals who eschew vulgar magick and instead use herbs, motherwit, and positively to heal and do magick.
     From the roots of the tree which touch on the most primal parts of Life to the fruit-bearing branches that reach to the sky of Ascension, it's quite possible that the Verbena's infamous arrogance is deserved, or at least understandable. After all, before there was writing, before humanity used fires to warm themselves, the Verbena taught women and men how to paint blood-pictures to guarantee the hunt. The Verbena asserts that, if all the other Traditions were to suddenly vanish tomorrow, they alone could lead humanity toward Ascension, and they just might be right.

Primary Sphere: Life