Geography

The Mounty population is split up into various citystates located in the mountains. Most of these are built directly into the tops of mountains. This is to conserve the flat areas for growing foods and grazing livestock. Roads through the mountains themselves are virtually non existant. The Mounty's rely on a complex system of tunnels within the mountains to get from one place to another.

Mounties live in mountain Halls and each Hall has its own culture. Some of these cultures are closely related and some are very different. Mounties tend to prefer to marry Mounties with a matching fur pattern. This implies that most Mounties do actually have a choice even though they seldom take it. Most Halls are dominated by one to three types of Mounties with small populations of several others just like cities will have populations of most major ethnic groups

As we can see from the map of Rillora, the Mounty territories border on Wolf, Ram, Rabbit, Fox, and Northerner territories. Each of these cultures is going to affect the Halls nearest them to some degree (much like how many south-central and south-western US states have a hispanic influence) though the Fox's aggressiveness would affect the Halls in a different fashion. Expect the Mounties nearest to Rabbits to be more liberal, Wolves would influence them towards conservatism, the Northerners would likely impart a greater degree of spirituality and possibly some animistic tendencies, Halls bordering Foxes would likely have lots of lions and tigers, and lastly, Rams kind of remind me of Canadians, eh?

Biology

Mounties can be any of the 30-40 (counting subspecies) species of cats. They're as small as 4 foot in stature for domestic cat types up to the towering 7-8+ foot tall Saber Toothed Mountain Lions. They can be any species of feline, save the Cheetah which are a little bit different in make and not very adapted to mountain life. The domestic cat types are fairly rare, and considered very exotic by other mounties. They, like the Lynx, Bobcat, and Cheetah are semi Digitigrade. These smaller species are not completely Digigrade, like the Wolf. Their feet are similar in size ratio to human feet, but a little longer and wider, with more padding to support their weight while walking on the toes. They rise up on toes to walk, but typically stand flat footed. The feline tails would be fairly flexible, more so the further away from the base of the tail they get, and could feasibly curl right up on a shoulder.

The smaller felines have cat slit pupils, the larger lions and tigers have full round pupils, although the largest, the Saber Toothed Mountain lions which are also most prominent can dilate their pupils to slits or circles depending on the light and their mood. All of the felines have retractable claws, except the Cheetahs, who are an exception. (Lynx based Cyanthians are listed under Alpines as that is where they are typically found, but it is possible for Lynx to be raised among the mounties.)

Psychology

They are a very laid back people in a rush to do nothing.

Politics

As far as Inter-species politics goes, the Mounties most resemble Switzerland. They don't want to get involved in other peoples problems, and they don't want other people to get involved in their problems, but are allies to the Wolf nation and trade openly with all in food and medicines.

Their system of laws is based on a Monarchy and traditions run strong among the Mounties.

There is a custom among the Mounty that any other Cyantian child found and not claimed is to be reared in the King's home as his own child. This is done to provide an ambassador to that particular child's species. Something that is very useful in trade as they look like who they're trading with, but were brought up in a priveleged life under Mounty customs and laws. This has so far lead the current king of the Mounties to have five children, four daughters and one son. Brix, his full daughter, Sar, his son, Alexandera, adopted female human, Silver, adopted Silver Fox, Tira, adopted White Fox. Alex's parents had lived with the Mounty's their entire lives until a fire claimed their lives and Alex as a tiny baby was rescued by the King himself. Only children from other species are brought in if they are found to be adopted . They are accepted fully into the family and can never be disowned. - they are equal to their natural born siblings and do have titles. Not all of them will end up with the royal family - the cut off age is two years of age. Anyone older is usually handed over to be trained as a servant or taught something useful. The entire deal behind the mounties keeping these cubs is to use them as their voice to others.

Among the mounties a cheating spouse is merely made to NEVER be able to marry another and child support is VERY heavily enforced. If they don't pay, they go into hard labor to pay. Of course,... they might also get 'branded or scraped'. There was a small problem in the beginning with males having lots of kids, going on to have more and leaving the females to take care of them without a lot of help. Each society had to deal with it in one way or another,.. mostly at the hands of the females who in some cases are LARGER, heavier and stronger than the males. They didn't like it. They changed it. Actual deaths as results of this are pretty nil. They might get one a year of someone just so enraged they would do something like that... normally being caught in the act is enough.

They do have their own set of general laws that apply to all mounties, then laws which vary from citystate to citystate.

They are heavily influenced by Judaism and Christianity, more influenced by Judaism and then their own developed culture. Their laws are very old testament,.. so are their punishments at times. They have judges set up in each community who hears the complaints of the people and decides what happens with them. Judges are appointed by the King and corruption, while it occurs, is very strictly dealt with. The Judge is not allowed to accept anything from the community, but from the Central Hall only... and Mounties tend to be into each others business and take offense at others getting away with something they couldn't. Not all, but most.

Judges cannot hand out sentences of death. That is only up to the Central Hall. They can however, sentence someone to a set period of enslavement and sell them. They are usually accompanied by an archivist who keeps track of all of the rulings so that they are not abused. The judges often also have a couple of mounties who will serve as their 'forensics/CSI ' team. The judge, btw, is seperate of the community's law enforcement agencies. If a judge recommends a death penalty *Which is only handed out in severe cases such as the perpetrator actually CAUGHT in the act of murder.* the perpetrator is sent to the Central Hall.

In rare occasions, depending on the severity of the punishment, the judge will hold a court if he is unsure of how to decide on a case and have jurors decide... who are from another community and do not know the accused.

Everything is on paper and documented and recorded. Basically, among Mounties, if it's not written down and documented, it never happened. Verbal contracts are not valid.

There is a Common Law and it is not deviated from very often. It takes all the communities to decide to change something and well... the Common Laws are things most don't want to change, like stealing, murder, etc.

They all have organizations for cubs to be involved in, the most common ones are those that teach protective arts/combat and survival skills. They are often far more challenging and sometimes more dangerous than scouts would be here. More than one cub has broken a bone or two. None of the Cyantian groups believe in being really soft on their children. Broken bones happen. It's kinda like a right of childhood. Nothing truly serious. Precautions are taken to avoid accidents, but they can still occur. They do keep cubs who are clumsy and just not coordinated enough to do dangerous events from them.

Economy

They like to keep to themselves when hostility flares, but are allies to the Wolf nation and trade openly with all in food and medicines.

Family

There are no social taboos that would prevent the different Mounty subspecies from interbreeding other than most parents prefer that their children marry into their own spots and stripes. In addition there are certain practical considerations that ensure that most Mounties choose mates of roughly their same size. Mounties are however capable of mating across all size divisions. Traits mix as they do in most hybrid species. (I.E. some children resemble the father, some resemble the mother, and some are an even mix. Mounties are also one of the only Plantigrade species to be capable of mating and producing offspring with a Digitigrade species. This is not common, as the children are typically born with deformities, but it does happen. It also means that the occasional Mounty is born with Digitigrade feet, due to past interbreeding. Mounties generally consider scent to be the primary trait when determining how attractive a mate is. Physical isn't as important as scents - scents are first. They are actually quite happy to have their females mostly well built and a little fat, what we'd consider full figured. Grooming is important, of course. Mixed parentage would be a turn off, as are odd colorations, at least for attractive purposes. Following this, most will look for a match to their own markings.

Technology

They embrace technology and use it in everyday life when speed is called for.

The Mounties don't use Shivae as much as the others do. Transportation from city to city is usually done via horseback, underground as above ground travel can at times involve encounters with the vicious and highly territorial Arturrel. It also helps them avoid travelling through extreme conditions. Because of the underground roads, the cities are never disturbed by mass amounts of snow.

Mounties tend to have a lot of tame scythetails. They're more useful to them than to wolves because of their size. They use them as herding animals and pets since they tend to not be as mischievious and troublesome as Shivae.

Mounty Technology is for the most part similar to the Wolf technology, but in almost all respects a little lower.