The Lodge of the Coyote is a Lodge of Mexican and American Southwest Forsaken.
The spirit patron of the Lodge of the Coyote is Coyote.
Overview[]
The Lodge of Coyote is a fairly small, loosely organized lodge scattered across the American Southwest, although recently the lodge's members have begun to spread out to Southeast Asia and other locales where the smuggling of human beings is a lucrative business. Unlike most lodges, which are organized around a spiritual or philosophical ideal, the Lodge of Coyote is almost totally focused on the material. The lodge's members supply a useful service to other werewolves who need to cross the border quietly or move certain objects or substances out of the country with no questions asked, but the lodge's primary motivation is profit.
The Lodge of Coyote was founded in 1946, by several members of the Lobos del Rio pack. The Lobos had been using their unique talents to smuggle humans, werewolves and drugs from Mexico into the United States for years, as a way of funding themselves, but shortly after World War II, the pack, led by the Bone Shadow Irraka Andrew Carlton, began to talk about expanding the pack's operation. The packmembers approached several neighboring packs, especially those whose territory abutted or contained the border, with overtures of alliance and promises of major profits. Reactions ranged from cautious acceptance to violent rebuffs, but after a shaky start, the packs began to work in tandem. Mortal coyotes' operations were absorbed or outright eliminated, and for a time the Lodge of Coyote (which became a formal lodge in early '48 with the binding of Coyote as totem) was the most influential border-running operation in the supernatural underworld. In addition to humans and drugs, the lodge's members moved vampires, other werewolves and even mages. Fetishes and other artifacts "liberated" from museums were smuggled across the borer to Ithaeur and mages alike.
That changed in 1949, when the Bruja vampire gang started moving into human trafficking. The two groups have clashed repeatedly ever since, sometimes even spilling over into open warfare on the streets of the border cities. The lodge was further weakened when the idigam returned in the early '70s; many members of the Lodge of Coyote were killed or captured while attempting to ferry critical supplies and information across the border in both directions, keeping the front-line warriors in the fight. Many werewolves across the American Southwest and northern Mexico still remember the lodge's sacrifice, and accord members of the Lodge of Coyote more respect than their normally mercenary nature might indicate otherwise.
Today, the Lodge of Coyote still operates, albeit on a smaller scale than the members did in their heyday. Their operations remain as versatile as ever, and even though their range is restricted in North America, they have been making inroads in Asia and the Middle East. Lodge members are technically forbidden to traffick in slavery or exploitation, but as that mandate comes from the Lodge's original founders and not Coyote himself, that rule is often ignored.
Membership[]
The Lodge of Coyote is open to Uratha of all tribes, though Iron Masters and Hunters in Darkness are the most common. Iron Masters excel at bullshitting their way past Border Patrol checkpoints, while the Hunters in Darkness are unparalleled trailblazers when it comes to finding paths across the border in the high desert. Likewise, membership is unrestricted by auspice, though many members are Irraka, for obvious reasons. Perhaps surprisingly, the lodge makes an active effort to recruit Rahu, mostly to deal with the Bruja and other rival human-smuggling gangs.
Initiation into the lodge is at once simple and extremely rigorous: the prospective member is simply told to smuggle someone or something across the border, usually from Mexico into the United States, but occasionally the other way around. Depending on how well-liked the applicant is, the cargo to be smuggled might range from a small artifact or a single individual who speaks fluent English to a quantity of drugs or multiple individuals who only speak Spanish. Once particularly disliked hopeful was notably instructed to smuggle a truck carrying 37 passengers, mostly elderly people and small children, all of whom spoke nothing but Zapotec (the original language spoken by the indigenous peoples of Mexico), and approximately 100 kilograms of Mexican black tar heroin. In some versions of the story, the truck dated from the early '30s and had a bent front axle.
In most cases, though, the task is nowhere near that impossible, and membership is granted simply based on whether or not the applicant succeeds. The prospective member must run the whole operation alone, without help from his packmates - he may use them as contacts to acquire information or gear, but cannot call on them for direct assistance. Failed applicants are usually in jail or dead, but in the event that a failure is not immediately apprehended by the law, he may try again (though he may have to wait some time until the lodge has an appropriately expendable cargo for him).
Game Mechanics[]
The following are an overview of the game mechanics.
Prerequisites[]
Cunning ••, Wits ••, Stealth or Subterfuge •
Benefits[]
Members of the Lodge of Coyote are still respected for their lodge's efforts in the war against the moon-banished. Members purchase Allies, Contacts and Status at an experience point cost equal to their new dots in the Merit, rather than new dots x2. The Allies, Contacts and/or Status purchased at this reduced cost must relate to Uratha society.
In addition, Coyote allows members of his lodge to buy Stealth Gifts as if they had affinity with that Gift list.
References[]
- CofD: Shadows of Mexico, p. 44-45
