Most of the hoyi were warriors and workers, but there were two other types Kaz hadn’t seen anywhere else in the nest. The first were even smaller than the workers, and had wings, flying from place to place inside the vast cavern. Kaz didn’t know what their purpose was, but they mostly circled the last hoyi and brought her food, so perhaps they were minions of some kind.
This last hoyi was clearly the queen. He wasn’t sure if he should be surprised or not when he realized she had a core, and black and white ki cycled through her massive body. This was the first creature with a core he’d seen since entering the mosui-controlled levels, and it was deep in their territory. Did they know she was there, and allowed her to remain for some reason? Or was she simply not exposed to the fulan, so she had managed to avoid being contaminated?
Whatever the case might be, she, like the servants, had wings, but they were far too small to lift her bulk. In fact, her abdomen was so large that it seemed difficult for her to raise it from the floor, though she did, and each time, one of the gleaming white orbs dropped from the bulbous tip.
Kaz probably should have realized that they were eggs. There were many kinds of insects in the mountain, and so far as he knew, they all laid eggs. Most of the eggs were elongated, rather than round, and all the others he’d seen had been significantly smaller, but the glossy gleam of their surfaces were similar.
As the queen laid each egg, it dropped into the waiting jaws of a worker, who stepped to the side, waiting with others who also held a white orb. There were eleven in the current group, and when a twelfth joined them, the queen lifted her head, clicking together mandibles as long as one of Kaz’s legs. The now-familiar call rang out, and the twelve egg-bearing workers moved, forming a line and scurrying directly toward Kaz.
Realizing that he had no choice, Kaz took one final look around, his eyes lingering on the cracked and frosty set of stairs to the left of the queen. He had never seen functional steps in such poor condition, not even in the very top levels of the mountain. Their golden veneers were missing or buried beneath layers of ice and dirt, and some of the steps had crumbled into rubble. Still, they led up into a gap in the ceiling, and ‘up’ was the direction Kaz needed to go.
Stepping out and to the left, Kaz kept his back against the wall as the workers proceeded inexorably toward him. There was a stone column not too far away, and Kaz crouched down as he scurried toward it, not even turning his head to check if any of the hoyi had noticed him. Only when the column stood between him and most of the cavern did he dare look around again, seeing the last few workers vanishing into the tunnel he’d just vacated.
His stomach grumbled at the sight of the delicious-looking eggs, and his fist tightened around the hilt of his knife as he wondered if it was too late to go after them. Perhaps he could pick off the one in the back, stealing the egg for himself. Last time, the final warrior had clearly expected one more worker than had arrived, but had simply gone back alone, so surely it wouldn’t be a problem if the same happened again?
His paws twitched, taking a half-step back the way he’d come, before he shook his head. Dett had said that the workers would call for help if they were attacked, so unless Kaz managed to kill the insect silently and instantly, he would soon find himself caught between warriors flooding out of this cavern, and coming from the main tunnel as well. He wasn’t here to steal an egg, he was here to save Li, and anything else came in a distant second.
Cautiously, he moved forward, firmly putting both eggs and worker hoyi from his mind. When he reached the column, which stood fifteen feet or so from the stone wall, he pressed up against it, trying to think rock-like thoughts as he peered around the left side.
The workers stood in a small group, not even shifting their feet as they waited for their opportunity to carry an egg. The servants flew from the queen to a pile of something that glittered with a coating of frost over something red. At first, Kaz thought it was more of the red crystals, but that didn’t make sense, since the bugs seemed utterly uninterested in the large crystals that nearly coated the walls and ceiling of the chamber. Then, when one of the small servants carried a piece to the queen, Kaz could see that it was a chunk of frozen meat, and he shuddered.
Nausea swirled in his gut, finally chasing away the hunger left by hours without food followed by the mesmerizing sight of the eggs. He turned his eyes away as the queen began to eat, and as he did, something out of order caught his attention. Kaz frowned, watching. Warriors walked their precise paths, back and forth, while servants fetched food, and workers stood, silent and still as frozen carvings.
Except one. One single worker, smaller than the rest, scurried around. In fact, it was so small that Kaz had dismissed it as one of the servants, but it had no wings. It circled the area in between the other workers and the queen, tapping its antennae gingerly against the ground. Each time it touched one of the other hoyi, it froze, tapped again, then moved on. If Kaz could assign emotion to a large insect, he would say it looked worried, perhaps even frantic.
It seemed to be searching for something, but without eyes, it had to use its antennae, which was a slow process, requiring it to touch every inch of the smooth stone floor. Kaz, on the other hand, pushed a bit of ki into his eyes, quickly locating the missing object.
An egg.
The gleaming opalescent orb had rolled away and become lodged beneath a small ledge of rounded stone at the bottom of the pillar closest to the queen. Her bulbous abdomen even brushed the column as she shifted, clearly preparing to produce another round of eggs. The worker scurried back out of the way as the queen brought her jaws together, producing the first round of loud clicks that echoed throughout the cavern and the den.
Kaz watched as the process of egg-laying repeated, his mind whirling as he tried to think of how he could possibly get that egg. It was practically underneath the queen as she laid her eggs, and there was no way she or one of the workers wouldn’t touch him if he tried then. No, his best chance was while she was eating, and the workers were in their tidy group.
The greatest danger would be if one of the servants, who had no pattern of movement, unlike all the other hoyi, wandered in his direction. That, and the very real possibility that the queen had some ability that could detect him, either because of his core or his heat. He would have to come far closer to her than he’d like during the process, but he’d have to move almost as close to reach the stairs, so it didn’t add that much more risk to an already dangerous plan.
Quietly, he settled down, tracking each warrior who crossed between his hiding place and the egg. Once he was certain he’d memorized the creature’s patterns, he concentrated on the winged servants instead. The other hoyi, perhaps because of their lack of eyes, repeated their previous actions without the slightest variation. These insects, on the other hand, flew on and off the queen, crawling on and around her apparently at random.
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It took Kaz another full cycle to realize what they were doing. They actually seemed to be grooming the queen, as well as feeding her. Their antennae flickered over her body from top to bottom, and every now and then one would pick something up in their jaws, immediately lifting away and flying off to a distant part of the cavern, where still more workers waited. One of these workers would touch antennae and jaws to those of the servant before scurrying away down a nearby tunnel.
Kaz had no idea what the servants were finding on the body of a queen who must surely be as perfectly clean as Lianhua after one of her baths, but that didn’t matter. What did matter was that he had found the pattern, such as it was. So long as none of the servant bugs found the thing they were looking for, they would remain with the queen, their focus utterly on her, and not at all on any creeping kobolds nearby.
The next time the queen finished laying her eggs, Kaz put his plan into motion. The warriors around the outside of the cavern had the furthest to walk, and so their routes were longer, and easier to work around. He was able to keep a good distance between them and himself, though it was strangely eerie to walk directly in front of an insect that would slice him in half if it had any idea he was there.
He stopped at the first column on his path, barely managing not to sigh in relief. He was now surrounded by hoyi, but the columns seemed to be a sort of safe space. The paths the insects walked went around them, so if Kaz could reach one, he could take a moment to ready himself for the next section.
By the time he reached the third column, enough time had passed that the queen was ready to lay more eggs. This didn’t really matter before, because only the workers and servants changed their behavior when she did, but by now Kaz had crossed half of the cavern, and he was close enough that the servant insects would pass over him on their way to the pile of meat. That meant that this was actually the best time for him to move, since they didn’t feed her while she was laying, but Kaz found it difficult to force his paws to move.
From here on, there were more warriors, and they had shorter paths, which meant they turned around and came back more quickly. The gaps between them were small and brief, and Kaz couldn’t afford to hesitate even once.
Closing his eyes, Kaz pulled the red ki that had been keeping him warm down into a small ball in the center of his chest. Instead, he pushed the same black and white ki the queen used into his skin, feeling it instantly grow colder. He didn’t think the ki itself was causing that effect, or Chi Yincang would produce frost just like the hoyi, but the air around Kaz suddenly had a chill that hadn’t been there before.
Kaz shivered. He had hoped that this combination of ki would help him avoid detection if one of the warriors drew too close, but he hadn’t counted on it actually making him colder. Without the warm flow of red ki, his fingers began to feel like frozen lumps, rather than the nimble digits he was used to, and he was afraid he might trip over his own paws if he tried to walk. The hoyi might be able to function at this temperature, but kobolds couldn’t.
Exhaling, he saw that his breath was so cold that it wasn’t even visible in the chill air of the cavern any more, and he released some of the tight grip he was holding on the red ki in his central meridian. Being less noticeable was good, but not if he froze to death in the process.
Sliding around the column, Kaz found himself less than fifty feet from the queen. She was about halfway done with this round of eggs, and if he didn’t want to wait for the next, he needed to go. Glancing to his left, he saw a warrior approaching, as another one only a few feet further away crossed, going in the opposite direction.
He tensed, watching each chitinous leg impact the ground. Not yet. Not yet. Now!
Launching himself forward, Kaz nearly brushed the abdomen of the closest warrior, his eagerness causing him to move slightly too soon. He twisted to the side, sliding between two more warriors, then froze as one crossed two feet behind him as another walked in front of him, momentarily boxing him in between four of the enormous insects. He trembled, clamping down on red ki and surrounding himself with black and white as all four warriors paused, antennae twitching in his direction.
His heart pounded so hard in his chest that he thought they must sense the vibrations, but somehow they didn’t. With synchronized movements, the quartet continued on their rounds, but that momentary delay had been enough to throw every bit of Kaz’s careful plan into disarray.
He was too late to cross between the next pair of passing warriors, but if he waited, another would walk right through the spot where he stood. Instead of trying to run for it anyway, he frantically shoved his knife into its sheath, pushed all the extra ki he had into his legs, and jumped.
Flying over the warriors, Kaz flailed his frozen arms, switching the flow of his red ki back on as he tried to get some feeling back into his frozen fingers. The last column, the one by which the queen stood, was just ahead of him, and beyond that was the stairs. The trajectory of Kaz’s improbable, if not previously impossible, leap would land him on the bottom steps of his ultimate goal. If he simply continued as he was, he could be out of the hoyi nest in less than a minute.
Instead, he reached out, digging ki-strengthened claws into the stone of the frozen column as he passed. A loud crack rang out through the cavern, and every single hoyi burst into frantic motion. Warriors raced along their paths, somehow not quite running into each other, even as workers scattered, vanishing down the tunnels ringing the chamber.
Kaz clung desperately to icy rock as the servants rose from the queen’s body in a cloud. Black and white ki pulsed from her core, sinking into the small bodies of her attendants, and a shimmering shield formed between them, linking each of them together into a protective dome. Kaz was astonished at the perfect formation as they hovered, only their wings moving as the warriors made sure the cavern was empty of everything except insects.
For the first time, the queen began to move more than necessary to simply produce more eggs. She took two ponderous steps, her insectile shield moving with her. Unfortunately, she moved toward Kaz, and he had to pull up his paws quickly in order to avoid touching the uppermost shield bug. This left him dangling by the claws of his hands alone, and even with his ki concentrated in them, he wasn’t sure how long they could bear his weight without snapping.
The queen moved past, taking her cloud with her, and many of the warriors followed. That left one small insect still scurrying around: the little worker who had dropped its egg. It hadn’t gone with the rest of the workers, instead choosing to redouble its efforts to find the egg it had lost. Anxiously, Kaz watched as it moved closer and closer even as the queen and her warriors moved further away, and finally he wrapped his legs around the column as best he could and slid down.
Somehow, even in the midst of whirring wings, clicking chitin, and chittering jaws, every bug in the cavern heard Kaz’s paws hit the ground. Heads swiveled toward him, mandibles stretching wide, as Kaz’s hand darted into the overhang and snatched out the little round egg. He had thought it would be cold, but somehow it wasn’t, the roiling ki inside reaching up to meet his almost eagerly.
Whirling, Kaz ran for the stairs, hearing warriors rushing at him from every direction as he did so. His paws hit the bottommost stair, and if he had been facing other kobolds, he would have been free and clear in that instant. Somehow, he didn’t think the hoyi cared that the steps were supposed to be neutral ground, so he continued bounding upwards, taking two and three stairs at a time, though his ki was rapidly draining away.
Just before he passed through the gap in the ceiling, he dared to glance back, seeing that the stairs behind him were solid blue with bugs. Still, he implemented the very last part of his plan, reaching out and grasping a long red crystal protruding from the ceiling right next to him. It snapped off in his hand, and he clutched it to his chest as he continued running for his life.