From the Field Journal of Ambrose Penhallow
The Raiju
The Raiju is what you would get if a summer storm decided it wanted to be a fox. Lean and long-legged, somewhere between a vixen and a young wolf, it trails streamers of pale blue light from its tail and shoulders like ribbons caught in a gale. Its fur stands faintly on end at all times. Its eyes glow a cold white-blue. And when it moves, it does not run so much as happen, leaving a smear of afterimage and the sharp, clean smell of a sky just after lightning.
They roam the storm cliffs and the high, windswept plains below them, anywhere the weather is restless. On calm days they are almost lazy, sprawled on warm rocks like housecats. When the clouds start to gather, they become something else entirely: bounding from the cliff edge and climbing the air in great leaping arcs, as if running up a staircase only they can see.
The Mystery of the “Counting Leap”
The first thing every student learns about the Raiju is the air step, that marvellous trick of pushing off the empty sky. What nobody had told me is that they seem to count. I watched a single Raiju for three stormy evenings, and every time it climbed, it took exactly seven steps before descending. Never six. Never eight. Seven.
The Ventara of the cliff-top hamlets were delighted by my notes and told me, in a sort of sung chorus, that the Raiju is keeping time with the thunder. Each step is a beat, and the seventh is the rest at the end of the bar. A Siren I met down at the coast had a less musical explanation: she said seven steps is simply as high as a Raiju can go before the clouds start to argue with it. When I asked what clouds argue about, she smiled and changed the subject.
On the Matter of Bonding
The old texts are quite right to call them difficult. A Raiju has no use for food, little use for shelter, and no patience whatsoever. Every summoner I spoke to had a story about the one that nearly stayed.
The Ventara are, by some distance, the most successful. They bond through music, and the Raiju seems to recognize a fellow creature of the open air. Their method is to climb to the highest ledge before a storm and play the same rising melody over and over as the thunder rolls in. If a Raiju likes the tune, it will join in with a howl on the final note. If it howls with you three storms in a row, the Ventara consider the matter settled. If it howls over you, it is merely critiquing your pitch.
I attempted this with a borrowed flute. The Raiju listened politely for half a verse, then leapt off the cliff, climbed seven steps into the sky, and was gone. My Ventara host patted my arm and said it was the nicest rejection she had ever seen.
Observed Magical Variations
As with all creatures, the Raiju’s sky-born nature bends to whatever magic runs through it.
Silver-white fur trailing long blue wisps; brilliant eyes.
The classic storm fox. It is never fully still; even asleep, its paws twitch as though running somewhere above the clouds.
Pale grey coat glittering with frost; wisps that fall like sleet.
Its air steps leave tiny platforms of ice hanging in the sky for a heartbeat. I have seen birds land on them, then look extremely surprised.
Charcoal fur with violet static crawling across it; dim, purple eyes.
It only appears during storms at night, and you will usually notice it by the lightning flash that briefly reveals it standing much closer than you would like.
Ambrose PenhallowLorekeeper, Midlands Grand Academy
