Mustelish

They giggle and vanish between shadows like smoke through a sieve, and when they strike, you’ll never see the teeth until they’re red. The Mustelish are a curiously plucky indigenous race of sapient mustelid-folk, possessing lithe, flexible frames built for bounding through forest canopy, diving into streams, or vanishing between rocks with peerless acumen. Aside from being visibly taller than most humans, they are not physically imposing like the Orcish of similar height, the Mustelish are known for a raw, kinetic grace, and swift, biting minds to match. Their society is rooted in small bands within settlements or tribally-affiliated hunting camps scattered across The Grandgleam Forest and, historically, the Elfese region once known as Chikara before Everwealth took it's place. Their long familiarity with the land, and its many cycles of war, rule, and ruin, has made them masters of survival and opportunism. Unaligned in both historical empires and modern politics, the Mustelish have thrived through self-reliance, cooperation, and uncanny evasion. Some view them as tricksters, others as noble loners, but none deny the sting of their spears or the ingenuity of their traps. Their contributions to hunting, toolmaking, and forest craft are foundational to Everwealth’s survivalist traditions, and yet they remain elusive, seen more often in rumor than in city markets.
  The Mustelish are digitigrade bipeds with long torsos, prehensile tails, and soft but dense fur in tones of stone-gray, soil-brown, ash-gold, or deep rust; Some northern kin sport winter-white pelts or midnight black striping. Their hands are long-fingered and extremely dexterous, able to tie knots in tight confines or scale smooth bark with ease or sometimes assist them in quadrupedal bursts of movement. Their eyes are round and forward-facing, typically gold, amber, or hazel. Teeth are sharp, and the jaws powerful enough to crush small bones, though their primary hunting tools are assuredly their weapons; Their claws do just fine in a pinch. Region, diet, and season all influence their coloration, darkening in the cold, thinning in the warm sun. Though many Mustelish avoid entanglement with empire or politics, their talents have often drawn darker interest. Slavers found their dexterity and resilience ideal for labor in narrow or dangerous spaces, mines, siegeworks, scaffolds. Yet no beast-folk proved harder to hold. Their instinct for escape is legendar, scurrying through vents, scaling sheer walls, vanishing into forests or marshes where no hound can follow. To this day, merchants grumble that buying a Mustelish slave is merely renting a runaway, for the woods almost always take them back.