In the Darkness, they were forced into pens by a clan of Ogres, who cut off their tails, one by one, to make soup. But the Eskaval used their hiding and escaping spells to flee. In a battle over the meagre lichen in the north, fought against spirit elk, they lost their shining antlers. Zzabur cast a mighty spell to bring any errant Ancient Animals back to the West, but the panicked Eskaval dug their golden hooves into the ground, and used their remaining hiding and escaping magic to resist. Even then, their tongues were pulled and stretched out to ludicrous lengths before the spell was broken. Their hooves now dull and brown, they ran south and east.
Without their Essential hiding magic, their numbers were greatly reduced by monsters and predators, but as the worlds got mixed up and heterogeny via Chaos began to be the norm, they stole much hiding magic from spirit and god animals that had their own ways of staying safe. They became less and less like their majestic cousins who remained pure. They stole the hiding stripes from spirit-zebra, and some of the spirit-giraffe's lookout neck-magic. They took the silent cough of god-leopards and stillness from god-deer. Each stolen bit of magic marked the no-longer-Eskaval with its taint.
The ridiculous amalgam that entered into the Dawn is called the Okapi, and it is hunted by everyone. Their misfortune illustrates to us today that should one be tempted to seek succor from pagans and primitives, the price is always one's Essential nature, and loss of Solace, hunted by the false gods and hungry spirits of the world.
> Do Okapi exist in Glorantha?
> If so how did they come about [there is the immediate MGF idea], and how to the Praxians feel about them?
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