Shepherd Roads of the Eastern Ridge. Annual Survey
The shepherd roads of the Eastern Ridge are not institutional routes. They were not built by Fort Kael, they are not maintained by Fort Kael, and they do not appear on any officially sanctioned map. They are documented here because they exist, because people use them, and because several of them pass through territory that the Route Authority is required to monitor.
The Eastern Ridge shepherd community has used these paths for longer than the institution has existed. The annual survey. conducted since Year 412. is not an act of governance. It is an act of record-keeping. The distinction has been noted in every survey report for four hundred years. It has never been formally resolved.
| SURVEY DATE | Days 78–84 of Year 811 |
| SURVEYING OFFICER | Survey Officer Aldric, assisted by two contracted guides from the ridge communities |
| PATHS DOCUMENTED | Fourteen active paths. Three paths noted in Year 810 survey no longer in use. Two new paths identified that do not appear in any previous survey. |
| SHELTER STRUCTURES | Eleven abrigos. dry-stone shepherd shelters. documented. Seven in serviceable condition. Four in disrepair. None maintained by the institution. |
| FOOD CACHES | Multiple granite rock hollows used as food storage. locally called Arcas do Pão. Contents not inventoried. Not institutional property. |
| ASHWASTE PROXIMITY | Three paths approach within ████████ leagues of the current Ashwaste boundary. Shepherds using these paths have been verbally advised of the proximity. Two of the three paths show evidence of continued use. |
The two new paths identified in this survey follow lines that the contracted guides could not fully explain. When asked who had made them, the senior guide. a woman who gave her name only as Marta. said that no one had made them. She said that the sheep find them, and that the shepherds follow the sheep. She said this as though it were not remarkable.
Both new paths run in a direction consistent with the Ashline corridor documented in survey reference ████████. This observation is noted here without interpretation. Interpretation is outside the scope of an annual route survey.
I asked what she meant. She said that the paths were there before the land changed. That the sheep walked them then, and that the sheep walk them now, and that the land between the path and whatever the Ashwaste is remembers something the institution does not.
I have written this down because I do not know where else to put it. It is not a route observation. It is not an anomaly report. I am not certain what it is.
The Route Authority recommends continued annual surveys of the Eastern Ridge shepherd roads. The recommendation has been made in every survey report since Year 412. It has been accepted in every year except three. The reasons for those exceptions are not recorded.
The sheep find the paths. The shepherds follow the sheep. The institution follows neither.
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