Done straight up in brush pens, except that wolf, which got a bit of general pen.

This is pretty much ANOTHER attempt to pin down Iraharids, which whilst not a HUGE part of Wrensong, are kinda vital as they're one of the nomadic desert tribespeopleish. Or they live with them. They do not normally shapeshift, though I think they can assume a human guise. Or that might be a select few. Wrensong has Shifters (people able to assume a sapient non-human form or a sapient non-human able to assume a human form) but they vary a LOT and I can't ever write them up accurately.

Aidan is not a shifter, she's a regular human forced to be the vessel for the desert god Aramis. Bonuses of the job include limited polymorphic capabilities, though she can only assume three different forms. One of them is this and the other two are gryphon-like (one is based on a wren and can't fly too well, the other is falconish and is very capable of flight).

She came out a little too small here, your average person's shoulders should come to the same level as the front of hers, or the bottom of her shoulderblades. Normally Iraharids get about a third to two-thirds bigger, guys generally being larger than the girls but there can be exceptions. Dan is just itty bitty nomatter what she is.

Wolf may or may not be a friend.

Iraharid heads are rather beaky, as you can see, with teeth stowed away inside for holding on and puncturing and whathaveyou. I'm not happy with the dentition so I'll probably change it but Iraharids survive in the desert by being broad generalists, so those purely carnivorous teeth are not good. I might add some blunter crushing/grinding teeth at the back, though her chewing ability will be hindered despite having a vaguely mammalian jaw hinge setup. The beak kinda prevents any side-to-side chewing so it'd have to be purely up-and-down or forward-and-back in motion. That being said, their skull design is FAR from solid so I'll probably have to rework that.

They are stocky little dragons with scales that help keep off the heat to keep cool and absorb it when they're cold (deserts can get really cold at night!). Their feet and toes will splay on sand and are tough to protect them from yet more heat. Iraharid mothers will keep their babies cool by digging down to the cooler sand just under the surface, keeping it shaded with a wing as their kids cool off.

Whilst the beak isn't perfect for foraging in sand they can shift it with side-to-side scooping of their heads, and the narrow profile makes it easy to push down into the sand. They can also open their beak and look down quickly into the gap (before it gets filled) to see if there's anythin there. I borrowed that from starlings, which can do the same thing.

They can fly quite fine, though usually reserve it for the evening, early morning or night.

Colours are usually limited to sandy golds, yellows and browns though they can vary from very pale blonde and almost white to very dark, depending on what part of the desert they come from. Their limbs usually end in a darker colour and their crest is usually reddish, though orange and dark brown have been seen. Face markings vary between individuals. Some, like Dan, have just the one stripe from the eye and others have an entirely dark face/beak. Inbetween are various arrangements of stripes. Some spotted/pearled Iraharids have been seen.

The circular patches on the underwing are highly reflective and are a means of comunication and flirting. They are most effective at night, when the flashing can be seen for some distance if the moonlight is clear. Iraharid guys often have more markings on their underwings, though it's not a big deal if they don't.

As for the babies, they are usually a dark brown all over, their protective scale coat not forming until they're about five years old. So they are rather squishy and their mothers are VERY protective of them around strangers. They hatch from ostrich-sized, robin-blue eggs that are buried in the sand to keep them at a steady temperature.

Iraharids are sapient but have their own culture that may appear somewhat alien to us, their values vary from group to group though they all follow the same basic rules, as they do come across one another from time to time. An example would be ladies eating unhatched eggs, as it'd be a waste of resources otherwise. Big, dominant rogue guys will also push ladies off and raid their nests if they're hungry because hey, it isn't their kids that they're eating.

Their main lines of defense are their hide, that beak, their tail and the typical dragony fire breath, which they can manage short but intense bursts of. Claws are too blunt to do much damage, but they will smack somebody about if they're irritable.

HEY LOOK I RAMBLED AGAIN, you've all heard this before I'm certain as I already have an actual Irahari sheet up.