"Wh- what do you want to discuss?" Tali asked nervously. He swallowed, but didn't dare let his eyes waver from the gaze upon him.

"Please," the voice said in a stretching tone. "Do come in and take a seat."

Tali's eyes darted briefly to the chair to the side, but when he looked back a figure was stepping out of the shadows. It turned out to be a lizardfolk male with scales of pitch that seemed to suck in the murky light under a crack in the roof that he stepped into. The late afternoon sun didn't fall in and simply scattered an ominous light from the sides of the cracks above. The figure gestured to the floor in front of him as he settled down, crossed his legs and brought his tail into his lap.

As the lizardman sat there in clothing not dissimilar to that of the lizardfolk in the village, Tali took in the sight of him and the staff he'd sat on the ground at his side. It had a skull on the end, and his neck was adorned with bones, but also claws that looked oddly large.

"Well?" the lizardman asked, cocking his head to the side to look at Tali with one eye more than the other. It was then that he realized he hadn't moved from his spot and was quite tense. His spear was gripped tightly in both hands before him as if to ward off evil, which he was almost certain this lizardman was. He didn't want to hasten his own death however, as inevitable as he knew it was, so he stepped forward.

He found himself sitting and matching the lizardman's pose in front of the remnants of a half burned fire that was between them. It was a familiar pose that he took naturally like many times before when he was to speak before an open fire. He then sat there patiently across the unlit pit.

"I've been watching you, hatchling; though I suppose that term will not be accurate soon enough. I am called Kalda, and you may address me as such. Be not afraid." the lizardman called Kalda said in what could loosely be called a friendly tone.

"I- I'm Tali. Apprentice shaman." Tali responded with a stutter.

"Ah yes, I presumed as much. You've also been watching me, yes?" Kalda asked with a sly grin. Tali startled at the revelation.

"I didn't think anyone lived out here, with the Night Terrors about I mean." Tali deflected, his words speeding up a bit with anxiety.

"Ah yes, your master must have had much success erasing me from village memory, it seems. Had you not stumbled out here, they may have learned in a more unpleasant way soon enough, though. How is little Velda's health these days, anyway?" Kalda asked innocently. He'd nodded his head in exaggerated resignation at the news he was unknown, but the light of mischief came back to his eyes as he asked after the village shaman.

The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

Tali was startled once again, though he didn't show it as overtly this time. Referring to his master as 'little'; there should be no one that old. Kalda's eyes flicked to Tali's tail and back as the tip twitched on the stone however, which made the umbral lizardman light up with amusement as he began to chuckle.

"It's quite alright, young one. I bear your master no good will, but you... You I'm greatly interested in. I've been away from the village for a long time, but I have not simply ignored it all this time. I bear a great grudge against your people for ousting me, and surviving out here for most of my life is not what I would call living." he growled out as his anger grew the more he spoke one the past.

"But you, you have a gift. I was surprised when my raptors came to me speaking of the smell of a singular clutchling. I couldn't have dreamed of a better portent of my great return!" Kalda shouted to the ceiling in jubilation, arms out stretched and head thrown back.

Tali idly imagined pushing his spear tip through the lizardman's throat in the his tirade, but was instead taken by a vivid memory of a snout full of teeth and predatory eyes upon him as he stood with an old wooden spear in front of a clutch of hatchlings. He also remembered the look in his master's eyes afterward.

"Why is me being alone so important?" Tali asked, his head down in shame and contemplation. He was surprised to learn he'd spoken aloud when he looked back up and saw Kalda looking at him again, his eyes warm, indulgent even.

"We are akin in that regard, young one. Those like us, we aren't meant to be according to tradition. We mark a change on the horizon. I've felt it. You've felt it. I was cast out because of it. I would see you assist me in correcting that." he said simply.

Laid out so plainly, Tali wanted to believe the lizardman. Sparse though his words may be in that revelation, it resonated with him nonetheless.

"I-" Tali started.

"Do not make promises you are unwilling to keep, young one. I need not hear your answer today. Return to your village. Ask little Velda about me. Know that my return shall come, and great change shall be had. Tell her this, or not, it matters not to me. I would not see you against me when the time comes, however. I can teach you much, and teach you of things Velda will not. We are not like them." Kalda said with finality. After a moment he grabbed his staff and used it to lever himself up, a sign of his age Tali hadn't seen from the intimidating lizardman yet.

"My raptors will see you out. I must rest now. I have not had a proper conversation in ages." he said as he turned back to the darkness which spawned him.

As the lizardman was walking away, Tali didn't know what to say. He hadn't really said anything. Was that all just the ramblings of an old lizardman? What did he mean by change? These questions ran through his head until he was suddenly blinded even though the sun wasn't quite visible anymore. After he brought his arm down from his face, he was met with the nose of a Night Terror inches from his face, causing him to stumble back.

The raptor didn't move as it looked at him. Tired of being surprised all the time, he collected himself and marched off the way he'd come. Despite his resolve, he jumped again when his sleeve was tugged and he turned to see it in the mouth of a Night Terror who simply pointed him a bit to the right and proceeded to follow him.

With that, Tali trudged home through the swamp, uneasy security of his escort allowing his mind to drift on what to do with what he's learned out here and how to act when he got back to the village. Kalda was right; he felt something on the horizon, but he couldn't pin whether it'd be good or bad.