From the Field Journal of Ambrose Penhallow
The Snawfus
I walked past my first Snawfus. Let me be honest about that. I was looking for a deer, and what I saw was a little stand of young birches growing out of a mossy mound. It was only when the mound sighed, and the birches swayed in a direction the wind was not blowing, that I realized I had been admiring a creature’s antlers for several minutes. It lifted its head, regarded me with large, calm brown eyes, and a small bird flew out of its crown in protest.
They live in old-growth forest, the deep and quiet kind where the canopy is so thick that noon feels like evening. A Snawfus moves through these places slowly, browsing on ferns and fallen fruit, and the forest seems to rearrange itself politely around it. I have seen roots ease aside from its hooves like a crowd making way for a dignitary.
The Mystery of the “Autumn Shedding”
Ordinary deer drop their antlers each year. A Snawfus, so far as I can tell, does not; its antlers are living wood and simply keep growing. And yet every autumn, the forest floor of Snawfus country is littered with saplings, dozens of them, sprouting in tidy lines along the paths the creatures walk.
The Wika who live on the floating platforms at the forest’s marshy edge told me, from behind their carved masks, that the Snawfus dreams the forest it wants and then plants it while sleepwalking. A Skinwalker I met on the road the following week laughed at this and said the Snawfus is merely shaking off seeds that have caught in its branches, as any tree would in a high wind. When I pointed out that the saplings grew in perfectly straight rows, the Skinwalker said, “So does a farmer’s corn, and nobody calls the farmer a dreamer.” I am not sure that settled anything.
On the Matter of Bonding
You do not bond with a Snawfus so much as with the forest it belongs to. Every source I trust agrees on this. A Snawfus will not leave a healthy wood to follow a summoner around, but it will, over time, accept you as part of the grove.
The Wika are the true experts. Their method is slow and, to a human, maddening. A would-be bonder must tend a single patch of forest for an entire cycle of seasons: clearing deadfall, replanting what has been trampled, leaving offerings of salt and river water at the roots of the eldest tree. The Snawfus is watching all along, they say, through its connection to the roots. If it approves, one morning you will wake to find it asleep beside your camp with a sapling growing up through your bedroll.
I was told by one Wika elder that the true test comes later, when the Snawfus first leads you deeper into the trees. You must follow without marking your path. If you snap a single twig to find your way back, it will know you do not trust the forest, and you will never see it again.
Observed Magical Variations
The Snawfus seems to take on the character of whatever wood it calls home.
Rich brown coat; broad oak antlers heavy with moss and acorns.
The most common. Squirrels live in its antlers year-round and treat it as a perfectly ordinary tree, which it tolerates with great dignity.
Pale, almost silver fur; slender white birch antlers dotted with glowing blossoms.
Seen in moonlit clearings. Its flowers open only at night and give off a soft glow that guides lost travelers toward the nearest road.
Dark, glossy coat; drooping willow antlers trailing into the water.
Lives in flooded forest near the Wika settlements. It stands knee-deep in the shallows for days at a time, and fish shelter in the shade of its branches.
Ambrose PenhallowLorekeeper, Midlands Grand Academy
