Iapis

    More intelligent than dogs, as independent as cats, the iapis are hard to domesticate without magic. Not that people own Sharitarn would give trying.
    Wild sigraxes of tribes on the rain forest like to use them as messengers, because they are capable to produce every song used in human speech and have excellent memory, but to use the animals like that is necessary magic. Since they don't understand what they are saying.      Even in groups iapis rarely attack adult humans. However, given opportunity, they can devour children.
      According to folklore even when born in captivity and after being trained iapis hate human children. They should never be left alone with pregnant women either. A tale popular on both sides of the Sorrowful River even says that female iapis transform themselves into old women to visit riverside communities pretending to be midwives, just to steal the newborns and eat them. In those legends they sometimes don't wait the birth and eat the baby in the uterus, killing the mother in the process.
      In any case, iapis are great watchers, and even better trackers. Their utility largely compensate the questionable reputation.
        In nature the species almost never reach 20 years, but in captivity the can live more than 4 decades. Isn't rare to find a iapi with 50 years sleeping near to his master in Port-Alkavalla. Since the forest men age twice faster than other humans, rarely reaching 30 years, this master is normally far younger than his pet; more often than not the son, grandson, or apprentice of the man who trained that particular iapi.
      Ships transporting pregnant women, babies and/or children to be sold in the Sorrowful beaches usually burn a incense to keep the iapis away. This incense must be burned during all night, but is very effective and not too expensive.                                                             

   Description 

       Iapis have the size and proportions of foxes, except for being 1/3 longer. 
      The body is covered by a leather similar to the one which covers the otters, and it comes in tones of blue or green. 
     The animal has three pairs of legs, being the rear legs fitted with membranes and articulations which allow them to help the tail in give the iapi velocity and maneuverability when it is swimming.
      Their faces and the shape of their heads also remember a fox, but with no ears. Each animal has either  3, 9 or 27 tongues, depending on the sub-species. Those organs are slender and very agile, and move separately when the animal licks something, penetrating deep in small roles (to catch insects, for instance) but braid themselves in a single organ when the iapi is producing sounds. 
  

    Behaviour 

      The specie eat mostly fish and other aquatic animals. Little lizards and flying mammals are also in their menu, as much as tree climbers similar to monkeys easily found in most parts of the forest near to the Sorrowful. Iapis hunt in the Sea Strait and in it's rivers, also between the roots of mangroves common on the Gray-Road and in the Dead-Well Lake. With the same facility they prey in the green layers formed by top of trees. On the other hand the iapi rarely risk leave the Sorrowful to enter open seas.
        On land they are good runners in short distances, but can't run long for long periods.