Journal Entry 149
6th of Lion, 1798 S.C.
Plain of Hasgar, two days south of the headwaters of the Sendra River
The sun is setting and there is little light by which to write. Besides, my fingers are too cold to hold a stylus much longer.
We have traveled just over one hundred thirty leagues in seventeen days. That may not sound like much to those who travel upon Dunarra’s wallways—or any First Consentium road, for that matter—but over open country and at the onset of winter, it is respectable.
The horses have benefitted from the modest pace. Their hooves show little wear and because they have had ample time to graze, none have suffered from colic. And, thanks to S’ythreni’s and Elweyr’s expertise at finding sweetgrass, our fine-gutted mounts have remained healthy and strong.
The only mount which shows any sign of weariness is the ox. Our progress has been at the limit of the fastest movement it can sustain, and that pace has exhausted it. Fortunately, although incapable of a horse’s bursts of speed, it has greater endurance. On any given day, I doubt we lost more than two leagues because of it.
The creature which has cost us the most time is, ironically, also the fastest over short distances: Ahearn’s wolfhound Raun. Although he, too, has admirable endurance, our steady movement has been terribly hard on his paws. As a result, we are compelled to stop far more frequently than we might have otherwise. On the other hand, Raun’s senses—on the trail and at night—detected both enemies and game that we would have otherwise missed. Thanks to him, we had a reliable supply of meat without needing to spend additional time searching for it.
Some of the creatures we have encountered were unfamiliar to me. The most memorable was an undomesticated example of one of the many species now used as titandrays: a bedoq. It was at least fourteen feet at the shoulder, and, like most titandray, is broad-gutted, grazing without concern upon sweet- and sourgrass alike.
We lost the better part of one day when Umkhira detected ur zhog tribal hashes that the rest of us missed until she pointed them out on rocks. She rode ahead and cleared our passage, returning with two days’ worth of food for us and a young male Lightstrider who shall trail us and then tend to our mounts once we enter the Under. When I expressed my appreciation, she explained that neither form of assistance was motivated by generosity. Her people were simply giving us the means to travel through their lands without needing to stop, and to ensure that our mounts would be safely waiting for us so that we could return to our own lands. As quickly as possible.
As cold as it is becoming, I am daily grateful that we are not out on the Graveyard. This route keeps us in the lee of the highest part of the Gur Grehar range, which blocks the rush of cold gusts rolling down from the Boreal Sea. But since we are now verging into a region dominated by various species of Bent, we cannot risk a fire at night. Not only has that been uncomfortable, but it has emboldened various strange creatures to come snuffling around our camp. We had to kill one Umkhira calls a giireyza, and it is like nothing I have ever read or heard about, much less seen with my own eyes. Scaled with chitinous plates, it reminded me of a furred lizard with rows of dark spots where normal animals have eyes. Umkhira explained that it has only rudimentary vision as we think of it but can see the heat of its surroundings with extraordinary sensitivity, making it a particularly dangerous nocturnal hunter. However, after feeling a few arrows lodge in its scales, and one which slipped between them to draw its (purple) blood, the giireyza fled back into the night.
Tonight we are sheltering in a cave with a relatively narrow mouth which opens into a wide chamber. After gathering enough fodder, we shall leave our mounts here, in the care of the young Lightstrider groom who has been following us at a distance as we travel. Hopefully, we will discover our mounts—and him—in good condition when we return.
If we return, that is. We could be detected and overwhelmed while in the upper tunnels, those known collectively as the Undergloom. It is also possible that, like Ahearn and Elweyr, we may be forced down into the deeper, more daunting tunnels called the Underblack. Of course, that is also where the hidden truths of urzhen population recovery are likely to be found, so I cannot help but hope that we may have reason to journey there, albeit briefly.
I cannot write more; darkness is fully upon us.