Arcadian Huntsman

An Arcadin Huntsman is a True Fae using an Actor form to partake a Wild Hunt.

Overview
Just as many of the True Fae, the Hunter can affect a variety of forms, although he certainly has favorites. He sometimes appears as a giant of a man wearing the head and neck of a massive elk, stag, bull or goat, sometimes with the lower legs or feet of the same. Other times, his face and neck are human as well, boasting broad sweeping antlers or massive sharp horns. His skin may be pale, but is more often dark as night, lit only by the pale gleam of his eyes and a trail of witch-fire.

Regardless of the form he takes, he is a powerful and electrifying sight to behold. More than one legend speaks of a changeling who, when called by name by the Hunter, left her sanctuary and went willingly to his side — and her death — simply by force of his dominating and arresting aura. However, many tales of folklore speak about those who barely escaped the Wild Hunt with their lives, as well as of those who were taken and never seen again. In recent history, the Horned Hunter has rarely been seen in the mortal world, seeming to prefer the supernatural wilderlands of the Hedge for his hunting grounds. Rumors exist, however, of freeholds he has visited. Although the stories vary, certain elements remain consistent.

From the dawn of time, the hunter archetype has played a vital role in the mythologies of human culture. “The Sorcerer,” one of the earliest known cave paintings still in existence, immortalizes the image of a powerful hunter adorned with the sweeping rack of a stag. And the Arcadian Hunter is the epitome of the archetype: cunning, skillful and entirely ruthless in his chase. His manifestation is heralded by the bugle of a hunting horn, quickly followed by the baying of his hounds. Whether in the Hedge or the human world, changelings who hear these sounds are well served to hide. Those who run from the Hunter rarely survive the chase, those who fight him never do.

The Hunter is a True Fae in the form of an Actor. As such, he has no tolerance for the niceties of fae Courts, and his interactions tend to be very straightforward. He sees the world, both fae and mortal, as existing in a hierarchy of predator and prey, with himself at the apex of the food chain.