“I saw Oda many times,” Ratre said. He didn’t open his eyes, and if he hadn’t been speaking, Kaz might have believed he was asleep. “When she was little more than a pup, fresh from her spirit hunt, she came to see Enght, the chief of the Woodblades. I wasn’t much older than her, and I remember thinking that the color of her fur was beautiful.”

His mouth twisted, and he turned his head away a bit, as if shamed by the admission. Kaz remembered Oda as a tall, thin female, her silver-blue eyes gleaming with the fire of ambition as she ranted about her latest plan. Her red fur had been streaked with silver around the muzzle and down her chest, but his oldest memories showed her in glossy crimson, her eyes bright, though even then she always seemed at least a little angry. Still, Ratre was right. She had been beautiful.

“She came to ask for one of Enght’s sons as mate. Enght refused. Oda was likely to become chief of the Magmablades, but the Woodblades treated their males well. None were given unless they wished to go. Enght told Oda that if she wanted Ghazt, she would have to convince him first.”

The name bit into Kaz’s heart like the knife that hung at his waist. Cold and sharp, it twisted until he thought he would never breathe again. He must have made some sound, because Ratre’s eyes opened, and he looked straight at Kaz, smiling slightly.

“When I first saw you, I thought he had returned from the ancestors. His fur was almost the same shade of blue, and you have something of him in the shape of your nose and the tilt of your ears. His eyes were pure silver, though, and he was broader in the chest and shoulders. Still, I wouldn’t be surprised if one of your ancestors was a Woodblade, and not too far back, either.”

Jul snorted, looking at Kaz. “I thought the same, though I didn’t know this Ghazt. A few of the male puppies who escaped the fire have blue fur, but none as true as this. They’re adults now, and all have been mated to females with recent Woodblade ancestors, in hopes of getting a female pup with Woodblade powers. You’ll be able to pick your mate from a dozen willing females once you arrive in the Deep proper.”

Kaz’s eyes widened as he realized what had been going on. This must be why Berin and the other Goldcoats were so interested in him. Berin herself already had a mate, but in a tribe this size, there must be dozens of available females, and surely one of them had some Woodblade blood. Or perhaps they wanted to offer Kaz to the Goldblades, who had been the Woodblades’ closest allies. Berin had called the Woodblades and Goldblades ‘cousins’, so they probably had the best chance of bearing a Woodblade pup.

His heart thumped as he thought of another female, one who had risen from the Deep not that long ago. Pilla, chief of the Copperstrikers, had made an oblique offer to take him as mate, even though he was still a puppy. Had she wanted him for the color of his fur, and hoped that he would be flattered enough to accept? If she had blue-furred pups, she could trade them for a chance to return to the Deep, or a blue chief might even be able to become a direct subsidiary of one of the great tribes by taking one of their sons as mate.

Then there was Zyle. Kaz’s fur had been gray when they met, but the old male had certainly recognized the Woodblade knife in Kaz’s pack, and perhaps the Broken Knife hilt as well. He had even given Kaz the old knife and sheath as a way to hide it in plain sight, but that in itself must have been some kind of test. The knife wouldn’t fit in the sheath unless Kaz removed the blue stone on its tip, but only a female Woodblade should be able to do so. What did Zyle know, and how?

On his shoulder, Li shifted, her wings raising as if to shelter Kaz from the too-sharp gazes of the males inside the hut. He could feel her flipping through his memories, examining his interactions with other kobolds as they descended through the mountain. How many of them had known Kaz’s blue fur likely came from a Woodblade ancestor?

He stilled, eyes widening as Li settled on images of Kaz, asking Oda over and over if he could go on his spirit hunt. He had pleaded until he could sense that she would strike him if he didn’t stop, and still she had refused. Katri had been allowed to go, and months had passed since then without any sign that Kaz would be given permission as well.

But warriors could be traded, while puppies couldn’t. Each time Oda declared luegat on a tribe, that tribe had the right to demand something when they won. That might be food stores, which was why the Broken Knives were so often hungry, or goods, like their silver bell or the knives they had brought from the Deep. But most often, it was males.

When the Broken Knives left the Deep, several of Kaz’s uncles, Oda and Rega’s brothers, had come with them. By the time they left the mid-levels, only a few of those uncles remained, because Oda lost them all to failed luegats, or traded them for safe passage. The moment Kaz became an adult, Oda could - likely would - lose him.

Oda had manipulated him to the very last, keeping Kaz as a final piece in whatever twisted plan she’d concocted. She would have kept him under her thumb until the moment she needed him to play his role.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“So she convinced Ghazt to be her mate,” Kaz finally managed, voice hoarse. “But how did that lead to her wiping out his tribe? Did she want her puppies to be the only Woodblades left?”

Ratre frowned, ears cocking in confusion. “She didn’t mate with Ghazt. She gave him gifts, visited him almost daily, but he refused her every time. He was wiser than the rest of us, who saw only a strong, attractive female who seemed utterly devoted to him. But then he died.”

Again, Kaz lost his breath, and woozily, he wondered how many more times it would take before he simply fell unconscious. His ki-infused lungs might not allow that, but at the moment, he thought it might be restful to simply close his eyes and shut out the rest of Ratre’s words.

“The Woodblades and the Goldblades often worked together, and Enght’s brother was mate to Leyla, the old Goldblade chief. Their son, Vrau, was the same age as Ghazt, and they often went mining or gathering together. But one day, a badly injured male returned to the Woodblade den, saying that they had hit a pocket of explosive gas while mining, and everyone else in the group was dead. That male himself died soon after, but they were eventually able to find the site of the disaster. I was among the group that did, and it was-”

Ratre’s voice cracked, and he shook his head. “I’ve seen terrible things since then, but I was young, and it hit me hard. We weren’t even able to retrieve enough of them to howl them to the ancestors properly.”

Another memory rose, of Ghazt warning a very young Kaz about this exact possibility. Obviously, he had survived, but how? Or… A possibility rose in Kaz’s mind, one that was almost as horrible as the scene Ratre must have witnessed.

If Oda had indeed killed her own sisters, as Berin had implied, what was to stop her from doing something similar to steal Ghazt? In the Deep, where every part of the caverns and winding passages was mapped and safe, there was no way a powerful tribe would just accept that the chief’s son had vanished. No, Oda would have to make it look as if he’d died, then hide him somewhere until he was bound to her as her mate, which would happen after she became pregnant with his pups. Was that how Katri and Kaz had come to be born?

“For a while after that, Oda vanished. We all thought she was in mourning, but when she reappeared, she was changed. Furious. She demanded to speak to Enght, and though Enght was the kindest female I’ve ever met, they came to blows. Both were injured, and Enght could have declared luegat for it, but for the sake of peace and Oda’s mother, she chose not to. Then, only a few months later, the chief of the Magmablades died after eating spoiled meat, and Oda came to power. You know the rest.”

Jul sat back, shaking his head. “Of all the ideas I’ve ever heard about why Oda hated the Woodblades so much, thwarted love wasn’t one of them. I suppose she believed that if she’d been allowed to take Ghazt as her mate, he wouldn’t have been out mining, and so wouldn’t have died.”

He huffed a melancholy laugh. “So much lost for one female’s selfishness. But what tribe were you with, that you saw so much of this?”

Ratre turned away from Jul’s sharp eyes, then sighed and said, “It doesn’t matter any more. My entire tribe is gone, wiped out by monsters in the mid-levels, or taken by the mosui. I tried to find any other survivors, but there were none. I suppose I’m as rare now as young Kaz, in my own way.”

He sat up, the stump of his leg sliding off its bed of moss and thumping softly to the stone floor. It was cushioned by the mamu-soaked webs, but he yipped slightly, reaching down to rub the leg. Staring at the remnant of his limb, he muttered, “My tribe were the Woodclaws, only raised up from the Rockclaws two generations earlier. Ghazt was my cousin, too, since his great-aunt was my grandmother.”

His hands fell down beside him, fists clenching in the moss on which he sat. “We were the most trusted of the Woodblade’s tribes. We were chosen to protect them because of how fierce our warriors were, and yet we grew lax, assuming that the Deep was safe. I remember standing guard outside the Woodblade den, laughing and throwing the bones with my brothers. We missed every sign that something was wrong, and when the Woodblades died, we were too late.”

Jul gave a small bark of surprise. “I remember your tribe. When your grandmother chose to leave the Woodblades and take a Rockclaw mate, it was all anyone could howl about for weeks. All the males from the lesser tribes kept an eye on the females from the greater, hoping that one of them might be inspired to do the same. I heard your chief chose to leave the Deep after the Woodblades were killed, but I didn’t realize you all went with her.”

Ratre nodded. “It was shame enough when we believed their deaths were an accident, but after the Goldblades proved that Oda had them killed, we couldn’t stay. Our chief, Nika, told us we could, but no one did.”

“So why have you returned, Woodclaw?” Jul asked. It could have sounded accusatory, but instead it held nothing but genuine curiosity and compassion.

Ratre hesitated, then pointed at Kaz. “I saw him. It reminded me that we Woodclaws were meant to protect the Woodblades, and he’s as much a Woodblade as any I ever saw. When Eld said he was heading to the Deep, I knew I had to come, to defend him, even if it meant my life.”

He shook his head. “Though in the end I was nothing but a literal burden to him, so now I suppose it would be best if I just let him go.”

Impulsively, Kaz reached out, touching the back of Ratre’s hand in much the way Lianhua touched his when she was trying to make him feel better. “Come with me,” he urged. “I don’t need a guard, but I do need wisdom. I don’t know anything about the Deep other than what you’ve just told me. I don’t want to be taken, or mated to anyone. Help me stay free, and you’ll have saved at least one,” he nearly said ‘Woodblade’, but managed to adjust it at the last moment, saying, “who bears the blood of the Woodblades.”

Ratre looked at him, eyes gleaming with moisture, and for the first time Kaz realized that their gray held a distinct shade of blue. “All right,” the older male said. “I’m yours until you tell me you no longer need me.”