Goats and Sheep, Mountain Giants

Giant Mountain Goats and Sheep

While far to strong and wild for Humans to subdue, any of these may be domesticated by Dwarf or Giant Folk for wool, milk, and meat and sometimes as saddle beasts or pack-bearers. Perhaps that is because these fellow-mountain dwellers are equally strong and wild. The horns of giant sheep or and goats are strong enough to bash through doors; with a war-horned helmet, a giant goat's butt can be as deadly as the charge of a rhino or elephant. Against smaller foes the goat may slash with its great sharp hooves. Despite their great size, giant goats are nearly as agile as their smaller kin, able to caper and occasionally get in to mischief.

Surprisingly, the secretive and wild Dwarves of the mountains as herd many giant sheep and goats as do the Giants. Whether their herders are great or small, the goats are generally let to range freely, the herdsmens' eyes, whether Dwarf of Giant, as distant as they are watchful. Some mountain shepards and goatherds are said to employ hawks or eagles to watch and herd their flocks.

When evening draws neigh, the wild mountain shepards of the mountains signal their charges, and in they come; the goats seem to appreciate their evening care by Dwarf or Giant, even if they are so wild and fleet as to be untouchable by anyone else. Typical goat-calls include wooden bells which clatter like a wind-shaken stand of dead trees or great horns that moan and wail, but the favorite calls are mallet-struck drum-boulders, which make a sound like thunder. Should a traveler hear any of these, they are advised to seek shelter, for the shepards do not care for trespassers. Any caught observing these secretive mountain Folk, let alone molesting their goats, will be dealt with harshly.

Giant goats' wool and meat may be coarse but their milk is rich. Some say the milk of giant beasts is especially nourishing, and that a young animal or person fed upon, or a concoction thereof, it will grow most healthy, and perhaps even absorb some of the giant size. If this is so, then those mountain Dwarves would be even smaller did they not have such plentiful giant goat milk in their diet.

The goats' bones and horns are useful too. The Dwarves and Giants use them to craft tools. They are much less brittle than, say, Human bones.

Goat, Giant Thunderdome

Thunderdomes

Thunderdomes are actually intelligent, rational Folk, but this does not make them any less wild. Their motivations are purely those of Nature; even if they are Talking Animal Folk, there is nothing domestic or anthropomorphic about their thoughts. This is so even of those Goasts who ally themselves with the wild Folk. Of the mountains.

Thunberdomes are able to manipulate objects surprisingly well. The halves of their split hoove plus elongated dewclaws act as fingers. What the Goats cannot finesse by dexterity, they force with horn-bashing. Some keep dens; Folk who have seen these report that the Thunderdomes seem perfectly capable of using tools when it suits their needs, even if they tend to eschew them.

When strangers enter their range, Thunderdome billies climb to good vantage points to evaluate. While they watch, their concern brews storms overhead. If the billies have any doubt of the utter innocuousness of the strangers, they strike their great horns against the stone of the mountain crags, and so call the thunder down against the strangers.

Thunder kills by shock. The supernatural sound causes direct disruption to the system of those struck. Unlike lightening, thunder is not a jagged line which seeks a single target but a great cone-shaped effect pounding down from the sky. Still, there are some rationalists who insist that the great Goats are not really summoning storms but rather are using a psychic "sonic blast" attack.

If the storms brew sufficiently long and turbulent, they may erupt with lightening as well. That is of no concern to the Goats, who use pure thunder. Curiously, natural lightening will never strike a Thunderdome. While they are not immunity to lightening, even artificial lightening, as from a magical bolt or a high-tech lightening gun, will tend to miss, and do only half or minimal damage if it does hit. The rationalists say that the great Goats actually absorb some of that power, transforming it to reflecting it back as a sonic blast. All agree that a Goat struck by electricity will hurl thunder, whether magical or psychic.

Avalanches, whether of snow or stones, can be triggered by directed thunder strikes (or sonic attacks). Knowing this, the billies set up boulder catches, building traps above vulnerable mountain trails. It is a sight curious and fearful to see billies cooperating, lifting great stones with their horns, carrying them across the mountain face to stack in loose and precarious piles.

While it is the billies who get all the glory, with their much-storied thunder-calling and avalanche-building, it is the nannies who the alpine shepards love. As the billies brew storms to protect their ranges, the nannies draw sweet weather to coddle their kids. When both billies and nannies are working their natural magic, the sky may become a patchwork, with alternate blocks of thundering dark cloud and streamers of brilliant warm sun.

The Goats know the local shepards will do them not harm, and return the favor. Any local who offends the Goats is swiftly punished - by other locals fearing the Goats' revenge as well as by the Goats themselves. Shepards take care that their domestic flocks do not stray in to the Goats' prized grazing grounds and leave offerings of tasty treats and occasionally a tool or blanket for the Goats.

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Last update Apr 4, 2006