Longlegs station themselves at the edge of things — the tree line, the broken wall, the place where one territory becomes another — and they have been there longer than you have, whatever you think you remember about arriving first. A hare, approximately, except the legs are jointed incorrectly and it moves low and fast like water finding a drain. The hive-mind has no record of them; the nascenti consider this a minor data gap, and I consider that a serious error of judgement.

Van's approach to taming Mentiloth was, by his account, not complicated: feed them, speak to them, do not strike them repeatedly in the head. The xin warriors whose method he was improving were, at the time, being periodically thrown off and killed; Van's mounts followed him about like a small barker pack and rubbed their great snouts against him in affection, and Pondisyke awarded him a gold anklet for transforming the horde's battle effectiveness in a single week.

Mentiloths are drawn to active thought — strong intention, strong emotion, strong concentration. Clearing your mind is the recommended tactic. This is harder than it sounds when something the size of a horse with an acid bite is flickering in and out of visibility two feet from your face.