Editing Sigil:Kuragh Torrh (section)

== The Torrak ==

The '''torrak''' is the great herd-beast and riding animal of Kuragh Torrh. [[File:Torrak.jpg|400px|right|The Torrak]]

A mature torrak is a bulky plains antelope, broad through the shoulders, deep-chested, long-legged, and armed with heavy backward-sweeping horns capable of killing a predator or an incautious handler. It is less swift than a good horse at full gallop, but extraordinarily difficult to exhaust and sure-footed across broken prairie, stony ridges, and dry riverbeds. Torrak are excellent climbers with fine balance.

Torraks have lived beside the Uragh for so long that clan life is almost impossible to imagine without them. They provide meat, milk, hide, horn, sinew, and transport, and their value is measured as much in usefulness as in prestige.

The Uragh ride torraks for travel, herding, scouting, raiding, and carrying messages between widely separated camps. Some clans have developed strong traditions of mounted skirmishing and pursuit, though the great war-hosts still prefer to settle serious battles on foot.

Torraks are unusually tolerant of the Uragh themselves. Their own warning and challenge calls include deep, rough growls and chest-rumbling vocalizations similar in pitch to Uragh speech, and the animals are accustomed from birth to the low voices, shouted commands, and battle cries of their handlers.

Horses are another matter.

Horses commonly dislike both the scent of Uragh and the deep growling range of their voices. An untrained horse may become restless, refuse approach, shy violently, or bolt when confronted by several Uragh at close range. Southern warhorses can sometimes be conditioned to tolerate individual Uragh, but large gatherings remain difficult for animals unused to them.

The Uragh therefore do not ride horses.

They eat them.

Horseflesh is ordinary food in many clans, and horses are kept for meat, milk, hides, trade, and breeding just as other peoples keep cattle. Southern travelers often find this horrifying.

The Uragh generally find the horror funny.