Forada is only days away. It’s among the largest cities of Etnyben, so the region surrounding it has many more farms and small villages than most of the land. No one in this land, at least no one we’ve met, has ever seen a telef. People hear the loud bellowing from far away, and expect an attack from unknown beasts. They rush to gather their weapons, and end up being relieved to find us controlling the massive creatures. We’ve taken to painting the war stripes on the telefs. If they don’t see us riding the telefs while we’re still in the distance, the stripes let them know people are involved with the beasts, so they’re less likely to run in panic at the sight. It’s somewhat amusing how easily people frighten when confronted with the unknown. However, our goal is to keep from inciting too much of a panic.
I’m not sure what we’ll do with the telefs when we reach Forada. I expect the Sisterhood operatives, and possibly Rar, will board a ship for Atalan. They want to inform the Sisterhood of Jadela’Mar of the unfortunate condition of Tora’Sor and the strange recipe she gave me before she left our expedition. Rar, however, just wants to accompany Krista’Mil wherever she goes. With the jeket skin on his back and the spear in his hand, I have no doubt he will make a good impression on everyone he meets. That will leave Pelmarco and me trying to control five telefs. Neither of us has much influence with Gair, the bull, and I’m not sure how far south they’ll be willing to travel with us on the way to Torheem, so we might end up with the telefs wandering off.
Rar speared an arvdil today, not realizing the fat herd beast belonged to a farmer. He’s never seen an arvdil before, and thought it was just another animal to hunt. The farmer was upset, and Rar was sincerely sorry for the kill. Pelmarco came to the rescue, and paid the farmer twice it’s worth. To keep the slain arvdil from going to waste, the farmer invited us into his house tonight, and his wife is cooking the animal for us to eat.