Yrthak

Yrthaks were flying predators who hunted using their "sonic lances". They were considered lizards by the Scaled Ones.

Description
The yrthak was generally described as appearing akin to a winged crocodile, or some sort of sickly dragon. Its eyeless head featured a disproportionately large mouth, filled with yellow teeth, as well as a distinctive twisting horn.

Yrthaks had a yellow-green color, though their leathery wings and large back-fin were noticeably more yellow than the relatively green body and head. Their tough hide and cartilaginous barbs granted them a hardiness in contrast with their frail-looking physique.

The unusual body features of yrthaks made them of particular interest to anatomists.

Ecology
Although omnivorous, yrthaks had a preference for meat.

Habitats
Yrthaks lived in many of Faerûn's mountains, ranging all the way from the Spine of the World to the Sunrise Mountains; specifically, they had been recorded living in the Dragonjaw Mountains, Dragonsword Mountains, Dustwall Mountains, Firward Mountains, Giant's Belt Mountains, Gnollwatch Mountains, Ice Mountains, Icerim Mountains, Nether Mountains, Rauvin Mountains, Thar, Thesk Mountains, and the Walls of Halruaa. They were also found in the wildernesses of the Middledark and Lowerdark.

Outside of the Prime Material Plane, fiendish yrthaks were known to live in the Gaping Maw.

Uses
Gulgars used yrthaks as mounts and beasts of burden. Particularly adept Zhentarim skymages were sometimes mounted on yrthaks, as well.

History
One origin myth held that the first yrthak was once a renowned bard named Brannius of Apollo. According to this story, Brannius sang a seven-day hymn devoted to any deity that would hear his wish to play music for the entire world. Upon his song's completion, a trumpet archon from Mount Celestia and a succubus from the Abyss arrived in front of the bard simultaneously. The archon offered Brannius her trumpet, promising him a rich legacy for ages to come, his songs eventually becoming known the whole world in a distant future. The fiend, on the other hand, guaranteed that her bone horn would enable the bard to reach his goal within his own lifetime. Although the decision was difficult, Brannius eventually accepted the succubus' offer. Before he could reach out and touch the horn, however, the fiend pulled him closer and jammed the horn into his forehead, fracturing his skull. Instead of dying, the bard's body warped into a strange new shape, eventually becoming the first yrthak.

Shortly after the gulgars fled a genie incursion into their territory on the Elemental Plane of Earth for the Prime Material and settled in the Ramparts of Night, they started exploiting the native yrthaks' susceptibility to their sonic attacks in order to shape them into more domestic creatures.

In the, while en route from Gracklstugh to Menzoberranzan, a duergar army led by Horgar Steelshadow IV and Nimor Imphraezl lost 5 soldiers and a pack lizard to an attack by a flight of ythraks. Around that same year, one could find ythraks stabled by the Zhentarim as mounts within the Temple in the Sky.

In Alturiak of the next year, in the Land of Stormweather, three yrthaks hidden on the forested back of a skwalos ambushed the Sorcerer as he attempted to drag the great animal down to Castle Stormweather in order to flense and butcher it.

Notable Yrthaks
A clutch of yrthaks lived in a cavern about away from the Wailing Cliff, subsisting off of the cohabitating deep rothé. By, the mated pair and their young adult twin offspring had overhunted the rothé, so their primary food source was dwindling.

As of, the beholder cult in the Temple in the Sky kept 4 yrthaks in their stables.

Appearances

 * Adventures
 * City of the Spider Queen
 * Novels
 * Lord of Stormweather &bull; Condemnation