Guide - Sirrushes

    
Sirrush Male (left) and Female (right)

Sometimes known as the Mushrush or the Dragon of the Ishtar Gate, this dragonlike beast comes from Babylonian mythology, the same myth cycle that created Tiamat (and, more recently, Skyhaven's eodracs.) It was often used as a symbol of the ruling god Marduk, who slew Tiamat and made the world from her corpse.  When the famed Ishtar Gate was uncovered, it revealed numerous depictions of the sirrush, alongside real (though occasionally extinct) animals from the area.  Some scholars took this to mean that the sirrush, too, had actually existed in Babylonian times, perhaps a last relative of the dinosaurs.  No solid evidence to confirm this speculation has been unearthed, and so the sirrush has been relegated to the realm of the imagination.

Origins
The sirrush is a native of distant Eoterra, the "lost world" of Tirialle from which sagittaries and eodracs hail.  Eoterran legend says that sirrushes were the flawed results of an eodrac clutch hatched out too soon by blundering outsiders, who exposed the jewel-like eggs to sunlight and blood before they had fully formed. (See the Guide entry on eodracs for more on their peculiar life cycle.)  In anger and grief, the mother eodrac turned her chaos magic on the disturbed nest, creating sirrushes from the half-formed hatchlings; they quickly made their first meal from the unlucky interlopers.  Whatever its true origins, it seems to be a fairly old species, though perhaps less common than it once was.  They grow to be nearly half again the size of a large horse.  Males can be identified by their upcurved horns, shorter neck ridge, and the bony spade on the end of their tail.

Habitat
Sirrushes were first encountered by Tiriallean explorers in and around the vast Banded Desert in Eoterra's uncharted interior.  Since then, they have been reported elsewhere, but they seem to favor warm, dry climates.  They are well adapted to desert life, with tough sand-resistant and heat-reflecting scales and minimal water needs.

Feeding
Sirrushes are carnivorous, hunting in the dim hours of the day.  Their large eyes enable them to hunt in near-total darkness, and their scent-sensitive tongue is more accurate than many predators' noses when it comes to sensing prey; oddly enough, their actual noses are almost devoid of scent receptors, adapted instead to filtering out sand and other irritants during .  Sirrushes can pad along in eerie silence for a creature their size, and often deliver the killing bite without their prey ever knowing what hit them.  They are endurant hunters, capable of many hours' tracking on minimal rest and water.  After feeding, they usually bask in the sun; like many reptiles, heat helps with digestion.  Sirrushes obtain much of their water from their prey, but they are also excellent at detecting underground water and digging open waterholes with their pawlike foretalons.

Life Cycle
Sirrush life cycles have only recently been observed, and much is not understood.  Females dig earthen pits and bury upwards of two dozen grayish-brown eggs, many of which seem to be decoys for egg-thieves, and then abandons the nest for a year.  Males often guard the nest at this stage, but with peculiarly erratic behavior, sometimes chasing off everything larger than a housefly, sometimes standing back and watching as animals dig up egg after egg; it is thought that they can sense by unknown means which eggs are "live," and act only to protect those eggs.  The mother returns only to dig up the survivors - usually only about six - and replace them in a shallower nest, where she then tends them almost as a bird, brooding and turning and more than making up for the year's abandonment.  A few weeks later, the young hatch, wild and ravenous.  Frequently, at least one nestmate succumbs to their siblings' hunger.  Mother and father must work to keep the young fed until they age a few months and gain some self-control; in this, they are much like eodracs, who also hatch out savage and insatiable.  Young stay with their parents until they are about five years old, at which point their crests and horns begin to develop.  Until then, it is impossible to determine the gender of the young.  Sirrushes wander for several years until they reach full maturity, and even then they do not seem to hold onto territory unless nesting or rearing young.  Some evidently choose a life mate, while others never do.  Sirrushes are thought to live for at least a few centuries.

Temperament
Sirrushes are initially wary and observant, but their position near the top of the Banded Desert food chain also gives them a certain boldness and willingness to indulge in curiosity; once they've determined that they are not threatened, they can make quite a nuisance of themselves.  As wanderers, they enjoy seeing new lands and learning new things.  Eoterran explorers have been known to befriend sirrushes, earning a valuable partner capable of carrying great burdens and crossing rough terrain with minimal provisions.  So long as they respect their traveling partner (only a fool refers to a sirrush as a mere beast of burden), they will literally go to the ends of the earth.  When threatened, they are fierce and quick fighters, and they extend their protective nature to any beings with whom they travel.  However, they will not stand for neglect or abuse, and will abandon someone as quickly as they befriended them in such instances.

Magical Traits
Whether or not they were actually created by eodrac magic, sirrushes are particularly sensitive to the presence of wild magics and tend to avoid it.  They also are resistant to many common spells.  Sirrush scales are gaining favor as a charm against curses and magical detection spells.  Like eodrac feathers, however, sirrush scales seem prone to disintegrating with little warning; researchers are currently working to identify and preserve the magical shielding properties of the scales.

Other Notes
Sirrushes are subsentient, but only by a narrow margin.  Their thirst for knowledge must be satisfied to some degree by any being who wishes to be their companion; they must receive some manner of mental stimulation, and have something useful to do, or they will leave.  Explorers have trained them to highly complex tasks requiring near-sentient reasoning skills, and so long as praise rather than discipline is used as an incentive sirrushes prove to be eager students.  They appear to be an ideal partner for heroes, willingly carrying a rider and facing down danger and adversity, though they are still very rare beyond Eoterra.  As a footnote, only mature sirrushes have shown any inclination to befriend others; under no circumstances should immature sirrushes be approached, even those who have left the nest, for they are still highly savage and lack control over their impulses and appetite.