{"sf1_id":2236625,"sf2_id":"k1VZwkj1","title":"By the Light Divided","author":"Oliver_Hart","words":3055,"posted_at":"2025-03-21T14:31:48.000Z","tags":["Anthro","Crow","Fox","HMOFA","Human","Human male on female anthro","Religion","Ritual","Waifeather","corvid"],"url":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/2236625-by-the-light-divided","original_url":"https://sofurry.com/s/k1VZwkj1","image_url":"https://cdn.sofurryfiles.com/submissions/thumbnails/cf/9b/cf9b2c5a-044b-4ea2-9ecc-4f273bc2fcc2","description":"So, your scarfing ceremony doesn't go exactly as planned...  \n  \nLives on SoFurry, AO3, and autononymous.io","content":"\\\u003eYou still get nightmares  \n  \n\\\u003eIn fact, as exams came and exams went?  \n\\\u003eAs the last semester of your six years in Kiba’s Foxing Academy draws to a close?  \n  \n\\\u003eThe nightmares got worse  \n  \n\\\u003eViolent, thrashing nightmares; hour-long scenes where you’re stripped of control, thrust naked into your own subconscious without a torch  \n\\\u003eSomething — or someone — is always pursuing you  \n\\\u003eOr, you’re forced to do terrible… awful things to people you’ve never met but are certain you love  \n\\\u003eIf you’re… certain you know what love is, of course  \n  \n\\\u003eSometimes you wonder…  \n  \n\\\u003e…as Echo’s sharp little fangs dig into your gloved fingers…  \n\\\u003e…as a scream of pain boils in your lungs…  \n\\\u003e…sometimes, you wonder…  \n  \n\\\u003e...if the nightmare has you so completely   \n\\\u003eThat you can’t tell  \n\\\u003eWhat’s real and what’s fake  \n  \n\\\u003eYou pull your finger free of Echo’s jaws, then wipe the saliva from your gloves onto your rented ceremonial robe  \n\\\u003eReality settles in like a bullet lodged between your rib fat  \n\\\u003eUncomfortably, to say the least  \n“Listen, Echo, I’ll feed you after the ceremony, okay?” you say in a hush tone, tempered with a slight edge of frustration  \n\\\u003eEcho — your gray and white service fox — turns his little head up towards you  \n\\\u003eHe blinks his ghostly-blue eyes twice in measured response  \n\\\u003eYou get the sense that you just got your last warning for the… morning… (boring!)  \n\\\u003eYour brow furrows into a scowl, and you enter a glare-off with Echo, the animal you’re supposed to have ‘mastered’  \n“I promise, alright? Be good for just a little while longer and I’ll get you a nice sausage roll. You love sausage rolls, don’tcha?”  \n\\\u003eAt that, the small mammal settles back into your arms, his tail flicking like an alarm clock waiting to go off  \n\\\u003eOr a grenade  \n\\\u003eOne of the two  \n“I' swear, you’re worse than a house cat when you’re hungry.”  \n\\\u003eMaybe you shouldn’t have slept through his breakfast?  \n\\\u003eThat little stunt made you late for your scarfing ceremony today  \n\\\u003eNo time to feed Echo  \n  \n“That dream last night was something else,” you mutter after a barely stifled yawn, trying to snap into focus for your literal scarfing ceremony  \n\\\u003eYour nervous hands stroke back Echo’s fur as you struggle to recall the finite details of reality around you  \n\\\u003eLike you would if you were in a dream  \n\\\u003eIt’s… harder than you expect to escape the fine veneer of un-reality glossing over everything, especially after that nightmare you had  \n\\\u003eThe dream last night stretched its legs in your subconscious; broke your legs with hammers and made you watch as it sprinted laps around you during physical conditioning  \n\\\u003eNormally, in nightmares or dreams you’ve got a certain level of control over your faculties  \n\\\u003eBut not last night — last night you fought for control, and woke up feeling concussed  \n\\\u003eNot even your sister could rouse you  \n\\\u003eApparently the neighbors heard her screaming  \n\\\u003eEcho stuck his tongue in your ear, and that was enough to do the trick  \n  \n\\\u003eThe scary part is, you remember little of last night’s dream — not like your normal dreams. Those you remember (and journal) with immense clarity and detail  \n\\\u003eThe nightmare seemed to have just…  \n\\\u003ePoofed away  \n\\\u003eGone in a cloud of alchemical smoke, against a high north-eastern breeze, holding onto its memory like shaping water  \n  \n\\\u003eYou woke up, grabbed your dream journal, eager to jot down what you experienced, and drew an almost total blank  \n\\\u003eAll that came back to you was… sensory details; the kinds of things with no mass or shape, but a definite feeling; an outline of a sketch  \n\\\u003eLike anxiety  \n\\\u003eLike Terror  \n\\\u003eLike love?  \n\\\u003eYes — you think. You’ve never… really been in love  \n\\\u003eCrushes on girls, sure  \n\\\u003eLove, though?  \n\\\u003eNot really  \n\\\u003eBUT  \n\\\u003eThe feeling that you did something terrible to someone you think you love rips you up like birdshot  \n\\\u003eAnd that’s enough to make what you felt so real to you   \n\\\u003ePart of why you were late, actually, was trying to clean up your face  \n\\\u003eYou woke up in tears  \n  \n\\\u003eHeadmaster — and Bishop — Edward Neelan, stays busy at the front of the cathedral, standing on a raised stone platform arranging burnt-orange scarves on the marble altar  \n\\\u003eNeelan always gave you the yips  \n\\\u003eHere he is, a man with an immense amount of power over your life — or rather, he was — dressed to the nines in his ceremonial regalia; seemingly at his most potent  \n\\\u003eNo dice if you fuck this up; safety’s off in front of the crowd of families and students watching you all  \n\\\u003e’Shotgun for a mouth’ isn’t the right word to describe the Bishop — his is more like a marksman’s rifle  \n\\\u003eNeelan taught ‘The Philosophies of Foxing,’ and ‘Foxing: A Storied History.’ Back when he taught your dumb ass, he could have passed as an ordinary professor or Den Master with the clothes he work  \n\\\u003eNow, dressed in orange-gold-trim robes, the sunbeams from the Goddamn skylight nailing him, setting him aglow, you’re forced to avert your gaze  \n\\\u003eToo splendorous  \n  \n\\\u003eCharles, the Bishop’s service fox, displays a little more subtlety. His collar studded, scattershot, with small rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and precious opals  \n\\\u003eNo dangling tags; like all service foxes, his identification is likely etched into the collar  \n\\\u003eThe fox licks his paws, his patient green eyes flickering over to you and Echo for a brief second, as if he’s caught the scent of something   \n\\\u003eEcho stirs in your grasp, like he’s aware he’s suddenly become the target of a very accurate marksman  \n\\\u003eOr maybe Charles   \n\\\u003eYou squeeze the fox like a doll and point your gaze upwards, an evasive maneuver you learned to deploy against your uncle at home  \n  \n\\\u003eAbove you, clean white banners trimmed with orange and gold lace hang like captured ghosts  \n\\\u003eAt the center of the banners sits the lace-outline of a fox, embossed in orange thread  \n\\\u003eA slight draft gives the banners life as it wafts through the vaulted stone ceilings of The House of Penance  \n\\\u003eKiba’s ONE claim to fame, and only Cathedral, mind you  \n  \n\\\u003eThe excited chatter from Kiba’s next generation Foxers does not subside as Edward readies for the scarfing  \n\\\u003eMore pious than God, Neelan carries on by mouthing a prayer, sprinkling the assembled scarves with oil  \n\\\u003eHe sets the glass bowl full of sacred oil on the altar  \n\\\u003eCharles paces circles around the scarves on the altar, impatient for yet another scarfing to be over with  \n  \n\\\u003eWith the rites finished, the Bishop clears his throat to a booming report, a report that carries in throughout the cathedral like a shockwave  \n\\\u003eDo all of Enclave’s cathedrals have this much echo?  \n\\\u003eYou’ve never really been outside Kiba, which is embarrassing for a man your age  \n\\\u003eToo scared to admit that you’re afraid to ride on the night trains required to get you Vigil proper  \n  \n\\\u003eLike dogs tuned to a feeding bell, all attention in the cathedral snaps forwards, centering on the altar  \n\\\u003eFrom your position in the front you can make out the Bishop’s firm expression as he surveys his graduates, like a general inspecting his troops before battle  \n\\\u003eEcho shifts with nervous energy when Neelan’s eyes sweep the two of you, penetrating your thin shell of a rented ceremonial robe  \n\\\u003eSeeing you for who you really are perha-  \n\\\u003eHe pauses, gaze fixed on you for a split second  \n\\\u003e-He moves onwards, gaze passing clean over you towards the back row  \n  \n\\\u003eApparently satisfied, the Bishop gathers himself up, and speaks  \n  \n\\\u003e”Thirty years ago I once stood where you all stand now — at the precipice of a dark plunge…”  \n\\\u003eHe allows silence to follow, his flinty voice lingering like a ghost in the rafters  \n\\\u003e”Thirty years ago, I was one of one-hundred fresh-faced graduates, like you all, standing before my Headmaster in The House of Penance.”  \n\\\u003e”Twenty-six are remain with us today, alive. But there are fates worse than death outside the walls, friends. Drunkenness. Illness. Assisting out-wallers. Heresy. Rebellion. Vagrancy. Those are but some pitfalls those twenty-six Foxers have fallen into. At best, they may reform themselves and spew platitudes before a classroom.”  \n\\\u003eThere’s a light giggle in the crowd  \n\\\u003eHe then turns his chin up towards the skylight, as if addressing God  \n\\\u003e“I stood with my service fox Zephyr for two hours before the other graduates arrived — and I prayed a coward’s prayer. I prayed for the grace necessary to make it through my first week outside the walls of Purgatory.”  \n\\\u003e”For the courage to take the lives of heretics.”  \n\\\u003e”For the strength to protect those I loved most inside Enclave’s walls.”  \n\\\u003eThe Bishop turns his gaze down, his blue eyes momentarily lingering over you and your gloved hands, right there in the front row  \n\\\u003eHe pauses, like he’s about to say something to you…  \n\\\u003eAs if something peculiar caught him off guard just now  \n  \n\\\u003eAnd then, with a sudden conviction, he turns his attention back towards the graduates and their gathered families  \n\\\u003e”But it was not strength, nor skill, that saw me through my time as a Foxer. No. It was my first service fox, Zephyr.”  \n\\\u003e”More appropriately, it was my faith in Zephyr that helped me survive. The very foundation of Foxing is faith in one’s service animal; we simply call it trust to make it more palatable. To strip away the very particulates of God that are innate to Foxing.”  \n\\\u003e“Rewards come to those with faith,” Edward booms. “Faith begets victory.”  \n\\\u003e”Faith in your fox, faith in the paths they may walk, will lead you to Enclave’s gates.”  \n  \n\\\u003eEcho tries scrambling from your arms like a fussy toddler, causing you to panic  \n\\\u003eYou have a lot of faith that Echo is capable of great stupidity — especially when it matters most  \n\\\u003eYou smash the fox against the breast of your ceremonial robes (again, rented, so you better not fuck ‘em up)  \n\\\u003eOther graduates with their well-behaved foxes turn their heads to watch as you wrestle with your service fox  \n  \n\\\u003eThe Bishop bends his lanky body over the altar  \n\\\u003eRising slowly, he looks to the rafters, listening for God’s words in the echo  \n\\\u003e”Scripture says we are a ‘city by the light divided,’ Book of Creation, chapter fifteen, verses one and two. As always, Scripture rings true.”  \n\\\u003eA stray sunbeam pours in from the stained glass window behind you, like a spotlight striking altar. He points a crooked finger at the banner hanging from the ceilings, squinting in the light  \n\\\u003e”Between the light and dark — in this city divided — there is a single sliver of orange and white thread bracing Enclave against all evil.”  \n\\\u003eHis gaze then drops like a fifty-ton weight onto all of you…  \n\\\u003e…lingering on your gloves  \n\\\u003e”You, Foxers, are that thread now,” he says, his cold, flinty voice rattling up your spine  \n  \n\\\u003e”You are the tip of the spear; the very projection of Enclave’s military might given flesh and form. Your scarves represent your responsibility as such.”  \n\\\u003eHe then lifts one garment off the altar, holding it up to the sunbeams, which now cascade in from the stained glass windows to baptize the rest of the scarves on the altar  \n\\\u003eHe holds the scarf like a bird with broken wings, as if it was ready to lift from his outstretched hands and flutter back to the sky  \n\\\u003e”Let these blessed scarves be a symbol of your new rank in the Church; a symbol of your oath to humanity. Wear your scarf with pride; tend to your fox with care; and brace Enclave against all evil.”  \n\\\u003eHe then sets the scarf down on the altar and turns to address the crowd  \n\\\u003e”According to the Kiba’s Foxing Acadmey, you have shown you are all capable Foxers now; proven it in your board exams. Well done.”   \n\\\u003eHe’s about to go on when there’s an enthusiastic round of applause from someone in the crowd behind the graduates  \n\\\u003eAnd now there’s a whistle  \n\\\u003eAnd a “Woo-hoo!” that sounds irritatingly like your sister, Natalie  \n\\\u003eAfter a few LONG seconds, the lone applauseman (woman) is silenced. The Bishop carries on with a dissatisfied grunt  \n  \n\\\u003e“Should you not feel worthy of your scarf, and new rank in the Church, remain standing when your name is called.”  \n  \n\\\u003eSilence booms in the cathedral  \n\\\u003eNobody dares recuse themselves  \n\\\u003eIf you try real hard, you can almost hear your sister Natalie, somewhere in the audience, holding back her excited screams  \n\\\u003eThe speeches, the ceremony, the solemnity of it all must be whittling away at her feeble attention span  \n\\\u003eOr, maybe it’s like the woodpecker of boredom slamming its beak into the bark of Natalie, until she’s all but hollow  \n\\\u003eBoredom is torture for someone like her  \n\\\u003eAbove all, she promised she’d be good — a promise she’s kept so far, at least as far as you can confirm  \n\\\u003eYou have some suspicions about the whistling and clapping though  \n  \n\\\u003e”When I call your name, step forward with your fox to receive your scarf and anointment,” the Bishop says  \n\\\u003eHe retrieves a scarf from the altar  \n\\\u003eYour heart skips in your chest. Given your position in the front row, you’re fir-  \n\\\u003e”Anton, E. Mouse,” the Bishop says as his heavy eyes fall on you  \n\\\u003eYep  \n\\\u003eAnton’s the name, though most people call you ‘Anon’ or ‘Anonymous’ when they’re being formal  \n\\\u003eJust a nickname that stuck like a glue trap when you were a child  \n\\\u003eA nickname you could never shake  \n  \n\\\u003eYou gather Echo tight against your chest and step into the aisle  \n\\\u003eThe procession to the front is short, your boots clicking off the polished stone floors  \n\\\u003eA woman’s voice, to your right, breaks the solemn march to the altar  \n\\\u003e”Yay Anon!” Natalie — your sister — screams, her bright falsetto echoing proudly around the huge cathedral. “Woo-hoo! FAMILY’S FIRST FOXER EVERYONE!”  \n\\\u003eYou recognize that voice  \n\\\u003eA FIERCE blush scours your pale skin, brightening your cheeks to a ruddy red  \n\\\u003eCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAPCLAP  \n\\\u003eThat’s lovely  \n\\\u003eA round of applause from your sister  \n\\\u003eAnd your sister alone  \n\\\u003eNatalie’s cheers follow you up the steps to the altar  \n\\\u003eGod, are there more steps than you remember?  \n\\\u003eFlushing red, you cast out a silent prayer for a lone gunman to pick you off clean from the rafters  \n\\\u003eTo put you down clean, take you away from your sister, this cathedral, the nightmares…  \n\\\u003eYour prayer falls on deaf ears  \n  \n\\\u003eYou step forward, towards the Bishop, trying your absolute best to remain penitent and solemn, as instructed  \n\\\u003eOkay, Anon  \n\\\u003ePut it all aside  \n\\\u003eBe one with the moment  \n\\\u003eYou learned about this concept in Academy — giving in to ‘the dream,’ like an actor on a stage performing his lines  \n\\\u003eThey say it’s automatic in Purgatory, out in the field  \n\\\u003eYou bow your head and slam your eyes shut, embracing the pinks of your eyelids  \n  \n\\\u003eBAM  \n\\\u003eBAM  \n\\\u003eDo you hear drums?  \n\\\u003eShit, maybe you’ll become the first in Kiba’s history to get this far, and then trip at the proverbial finish line  \n  \n\\\u003eBAM  \n\\\u003eBAM  \n\\\u003eBAM  \n\\\u003eBAM  \n\\\u003eYou’re so lost in the tangled circuitry of your overdriven nervous system that you audibly gasp when you feel the touch of coarse fabric grace the nape of your neck  \n\\\u003eWhen you open your eyes, you find a burnt-orange Foxer’s scarf draped around your neck  \n\\\u003eIt’s… heavier than you expected it to be  \n\\\u003eYour new Foxer’s scarf is a tough, yet quality strip of professionally stitched, bronze-orange fabric, the same russet, earthy-red comprising a red fox’s coat  \n\\\u003eIts fringes are tempered white, giving your scarf the impression of fox tails on each end of the fabric  \n\\\u003eIts length stretches almost down to your waistline  \n  \n\\\u003eYou hold up the tip of your scarf, which bears one horizontal white stripe, stitched onto the fabric  \n\\\u003eA sign of your new station as a Foxer — first-rank  \n  \n\\\u003eIn a tired whisper, you hear the Bishop say, “Present your fox, son.”  \n  \n\\\u003eYou snap to attention; too busy admiring the new threads  \n  \nhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1h58d9lHeOs\u0026list=PL9aXlzDRA49Rmp4y6Z9Si9dS2LvmTNY7S\u0026index=27  \n  \n\\\u003eWhat happens next should partially be your responsibility  \n\\\u003eIn a haste you thrust Echo towards the Bishop, letting your fox dangle in your grasp like a gray sock filled with yogurt  \n\\\u003eThe entire cathedral can see your gloves, unbeknownst to you  \n\\\u003eThe Bishop dips his thumb in a small glass bowl of sacred oil  \n  \n\\\u003eEcho’s eyes widened with excitement at this sight, squirming in your hands  \n  \n\\\u003eMaybe it was forgetting to feed him breakfast that could have prevented all of this from happening?  \n\\\u003eMaybe it was the smell of the oil — some meager calories at best — that caused Echo to do what he did that crisp, early autumn morning?  \n  \n\\\u003eIt doesn’t matter. You have no control over things, a constant theme in your life  \n  \n\\\u003eAs the Bishop brings his thumb towards Echo’s forehead, your ‘trained’ service fox unhinges his dumb little jaws…  \n\\\u003eThe Bishop presses his wet finger against Echo’s forehead and smears the oil into the fox’s coat  \n\\\u003e…And snaps at the Bishop’s finger  \n  \n\\\u003eThere’s a pained yelp from the Bishop as Echo’s fangs pierce socket onto his finger  \n\\\u003eA gasp goes up from the assembled graduates and their families  \n  \n\\\u003eThe Bishop’s own service fox leaps down off the altar and bolts towards his master, aiming to use the Bishop like a squirrel uses a tree trunk  \n\\\u003eOh no  \n\\\u003eNo no no no  \n\\\u003eYou don’t need to get the other fox involved now  \n  \n\\\u003eYou wrap your gloved hands around Echo’s jaw and pry the Bishop’s finger free, just in time for Charles to leap into the fray  \n  \n\\\u003eThe orange fox scurries up Neelan’s ceremonial robes and mounts his shoulder, ushering a fiercely protective growl, as if about to take a lunge at your neck  \n  \n\\\u003eThe Bishop yanks his hand away in pain as his other arm moves to contain his own fox; an instinctual response to contain his animal  \n\\\u003eEcho thrashes in your grasp, still hungry and tasting sacred oil rich on his tongue  \n\\\u003eBut you’re not focused on containing Echo  \n  \n\\\u003eYou can only look on in horror as you see the Bishop’s eyes turn away from the small spot of blood now blossoming on his pale thumb  \n\\\u003eSee, the Bishop’s steely glare doesn’t fall upon your face, to study in anguish and anger  \n\\\u003eHis gaze turns down to your hands, where you hold Echo  \n\\\u003eAnd he asks something that at first seems innocuous, but in hindsight should have told you everything  \n\\\u003e”Why are you wearing those gloves?”","series":{"name":"Foxing","previous":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/2234398-what-does-it-take-to-become-a-foxer.json","next":"https://fse.anthro.fr/stories/2238635-they-speak-in-knives.json"}}