Name : Samuel Gilead & Meru, The Coyote
Age : Sammy is in his late 20s, but he looks...weathered. Meru appears to be a young, virile Coyote.
Descriptor : Local and former neerdowell & his completely normal coyote companion.
Appearance : Sammy Gilead is looking a little worse for wear. Years of sleazy living have given him an appearance like the dead end of a deep canyon, all hard lines and deep shadows. His calloused, sore encrusted skin hangs loosely from thin bones, as if clinging on to his skeleton through sheer force of will. Flat watery eyes the color of fish scales peer from a gaunt face, nestled beneath long stringy clumps of unwashed hair. The dirty blonde coils of grease topped by a battered wide brim hat speckled with holes. An alcoholics nose, grown fat to resemble a prickly pear, hangs heavily above a stoutly mustachioed mouth filled with broken teeth, all stained shades of sour yellow and rot brown from years of tobacco and liquor.
Each day he is found lingering about the local saloon, wearing the same tired looking clothes, ratty threads of heavy leather, worn dull and soft from years of use and covered by a thick woven poncho that appears to have been eaten by moths.
Always lurking nearby, is Meru, The Coyote. Unassuming and silent as a ghost, the canid is the color of the moon’s flesh & wood ash. Wiry, long, and prone to skulking in the shadows, the young male coyote is surprisingly easy to miss, particularly when one is distracted by the ghoulish visage of Samuel Gilead. While during the day Meru moseys from shadow to shadow in a distinctly languid manner, he is typically found statuesque, silently judging the goings on of the town with an unsettling pair of eyes which seem to shimmer oddly in the dark. Though the appearance of a coyote is town is unusual and folks are wary, Meru has remained docile and has been allowed to stay, even following Samuel into The Leaky Pitcher on numerous occasions.
Biography : Sammy grew up around these parts. His upbringing is rather unremarkable, hard times making hard people in the little hamlet of Ulysses. His father, a widower in childbirth, had been a silver miner in Earlstead a few days ride from Ulysses, before it collapsed taking the best jobs and a handful of good men with it. With a source of income gone, Henry Gilead took to drinking himself to death, and spent the rest of his short years never more than arm’s reach from a bottle.
Left largely unattended, Samuel had a penchant even as a boy for ruffling feathers, often found stealing whiskey and goosing women beneath their petticoats in the local saloon and brothel, The Leaky Pitcher. The Sheriff did what he could, but in a town like Ulysses there was plenty else goings-on to keep his attention from raising the boy proper.
A troublesome boy became a troublesome man, growing only bolder with age, he began hustling cards, selling snake oil and occasionally taking what wasn’t his by force in the surrounding towns and settlements around Ulysses. Anything for a quick buck, which he would turn around and spend at The Leaky Pitcher when he returned home. It seemed Samuel was destined for little else than following his father's drunken staggers into an early grave.
Still, every frontier town has a morbid need for a neerdowell drunkard, and Samuel Gilead fit that bill. The sheriff sort of felt sorry for the kid, occasionally tossing him in a cell to dry out, several times assuring an angry mob that Sammy would be staying there for a “long time” only to release him again once things settled down.
However, one can only outrun their reputation for so long. Rumor has it that Samuel ran afoul of another sheriff, one Geoffry Lockehart, one who allied himself with The Bricktooth Brothers, a nasty gang of banditos that operated as a sort of additional ‘peacekeeping’ force in Quincy.
Word a year ago was that Geoffry had finally gotten his hands on Samuel, strung him up like a cheap whore and tossed him in a shallow pit somewhere out in the savage wastes of the Texas desert. Nobody seen or heard from Sammy in a time, and life went on, as it always does.
But that didn’t stop Samuel from showing up back in Ulysses a few moons ago after a week worth of rain. Looking as if he’d aged a lifetime with a Coyote the color of a week-old campfire treading quietly in his wake.
Not a soul in Ulysses is quite sure what to make of the duo. Seems every resident has a different version of the truth they’ve invented. Daily rumors are passed in whisper about what’s gotten into the Gilead boy, where Meru came from, or what exactly happened to Sammy out there in the desert.
It was clear to every resident of Ulysses who had known Sam that something had changed. He is now quieter, better behaved in a sense. He's helpful, respectful, and direct, all the things he once was not. Instead, it is now his words, rather than his actions, causing a commotion.
Samuel has claimed on more than one occasion that Meru was called to Ulysses across the sands. He insists to any that will listen that the people of Ulysses must 'be vigilant.' Recently causing more of a stir by interrupting a public execution to yell that both the Mayor and Father George were two vipers which shared a tail.
Such disquieting behavior would easier to dismiss were Samuel not stone sober. True or not, murmurs are spreading through the town. Though much of the attention he's attracting isn't good.
All the while the coyote is a second shadow to Gilead. Ears perked, eyes glimmering.
Coyotl - The Spirit Of The West: - Coyotl has been spoken of in the tales of native tribes for countless generations before Europeans ever arrived in what became considered ‘the new world.’
Coyotl is a reflection of our true selves, representing all the best and worst mankind has to offer. But Coyotl wears many faces, and Meru is but one such manifestation. A solitary filament in a tapestry woven from the feral energy of the American West, he exists among us, equal parts curious and capricious, holding minor domain in our realm.
- Pray For Rain - Meru is able to call to the rain, influencing storm clouds to form. While not capable of causing a torrential downpour or tempest winds, there are benefits to such power. Any good tracker knows mud holds prints better than dust.
- Shadow Walker - The Coyote’s yowling at the moon is a familiar staple in the American West. Due to the kinship Meru shares with Sister Moon, he is able to travel short distances via shadows cast by her light. This ability can give one the impression that Meru is everywhere at once, a maddening trick used for both escape and pursuit in the crisp desert night.
- Pulling On The Strings - At one time, man and Coyotl would converse and sing together, but long gone have those days been. Though the shared tongue is largely forgotten, it is said that when the stillness of death approaches, Coyotl is always there, his language whispered on the wind.
The Spirit of The West is drawn by those who linger in suffering in the wild wastes. Coyotl typically offers a parting gift, a quick death, to end needless agony. But sometimes, when it suites him, he offers more. Those that learn Coyotl's tongue & agree to terms before their life-force fades are said to be able to skirt the grasp of death itself, until their deal is seen through. And in doing so, grant Coyotl a puppet to influence the world of men.
Notable Objects:
- Iron Trinket - Tied to the Meru’s neck, virtually hidden amidst the tufts of fur is a thick cord of rope, affixed with a small trinket curled in a spiral around a strange, metallic stone. There are glinting, deep indigo veins cutting through the polished stone, giving it the appearance of movement, as if its surface were made of liquid.
- Rusted Revolver - Samuel Gilead carries a muddy and rusted firearm. The engraved handle is caked with dirt, but reads "Lockehart." Before he disappeared, Samuel had been a capable and self-sufficient frontier highwayman, but the gun he carries now can’t rotate the chamber or fire a bullet. Nonetheless it remains loaded and tucked in his holster. The boys in the saloon regularly mock him for it since his return.
Fading Memory