WBY: Cloudrays

Cloudrays are seen as harbingers of good fortune among sailors, pilots, and pirates of Ardea and the Baronies. These gentle creatures eat small fish and residue, using their opalescent body to blend in with the clouds when danger presents itself. They are so finely-attuned to shifts in Residue that they can evade danger, whether from a skyshark, approaching storm, or pitched aerial battle, that they make for cover before the threat can make manifest. So it is that skies where cloudrays frolic are assuredly quite safe, and that observation has evolved into the belief that the cloudrays are bringers of good luck and fair skies. Killing a cloudray is taboo, and stories in port abound of the ignorant fool or hubristic lout who did so meeting a terrible end, beset at every turn by misfortune.

They are curious and playful animals, about as intelligent as a porpoise of the Long-Lost Sea. Druids and rangers can befriend them as Companions, and while they are less-than-capable in combat, their ability to detect danger is unparalleled. They can accommodate all but Large riders, though a special saddle must be used to secure purchase on their mirror-smooth hide. Druids also report that cloudrays use both Residue waves and ultrasonic vibrations to speak to each other over long distances, and their their language is very much like a long, continuous song that members of the pod variously chime into.