The Folly of Actaeon

Diana stands before the assembled sept members, her eyes gleaming with verdant fire as she pauses for three heartbeats, and then begins her tale:

After the hunt, Artemis and the Furies would refresh themselves in a pool deep in the forest. There they would wash away the sweat and blood of the hunt, and then the Furies would honor Gaia and Artemis as the moon's silver light washed over them. The humans knew better than to enter the forest on those nights, for to do so would surely mean their deaths.

There was one man, however, who did not heed the warnings of his fellows. This one, a hunter named Actaeon, thought to steal the secrets that the Huntress had given to the Furies, and to this end, he slipped into the forest and made his way to the pool, where he hid among the trees at its edge, certain he was concealed from the eyes of Artemis and her followers.

As Actaeon watched from his place of concealment, Artemis and the Furies plunged into the pool, their limbs gleaming in the silvery light. As they emerged from the water, one of the Furies lifted her head and tested the air.

"I smell a son of man, sisters," she growled.

Artemis moved a hand, and the branches concealing Actaeon bent away, revealing the man there for all to see. Furious, the Huntress dipped up a handful of water from the pool and hurled it into the man's face. The moment it struck him, he dropped to all fours, hair covered his body, and a pair of antlers sprouted from his brow -- until, where a man had once been, there now stood a stag.

‘You, who thought to steal the secrets that rightfully belong to the Furies, shall now taste their vengeance,' the Moon Huntress declaimed, fixing the stag with cold silver eyes while the Furies around her changed from women into black she-wolves. The Artisans gave a mighty howl, and the stag ran for his life, with the pack of Furies on his heels. He crashed through the forest, desperately trying to avoid the pack, but it was all for naught – the Furies caught him, and tore him to pieces for his effrontery.

The Artisans made sure that the tale of Actaeon was spread far and wide. Even the humans heard of it, and though the tale has come down to them in a different form, it still serves to teach them that the knowledge that Artemis gave to the Furies is not meant to be shared with Man."