A dozen puppies ran in circles beneath Li, barking and leaping up toward her dangling tail-tip. This was particularly amusing because not all of them were kobolds, and the tiny round-pups rolled and tumbled like fluffy toys.
Over the last day or so, Kaz had learned quite a bit about these new little creatures. Like the adults, their flat hands and long claws weren’t good at fine movements, but these young ones hadn’t yet learned to assume that others would do the difficult things for them, so they tried everything. They never seemed to become bored or frustrated, which meant that eventually they could usually figure out a way to do whatever they were attempting.
Kaz would often find one sitting somewhere, carefully trying to piece together a toy that some rambunctious kobold had torn apart. They used their nose-tentacles almost like fingers, but since they couldn’t use eyes and tentacles at the same time, it was a challenging task. Still, they succeeded more often than not, simply through sheer tenacity.
They were also far more resilient than one would assume from their small size. They were compact, but solidly muscled, and when hit, they pulled their extremities tight against their bodies, simply allowing themselves to roll to a halt. As soon as they stopped, they just popped back up again, and went right back to doing whatever they’d been doing. They didn’t seem to mind being played with like toys, and some of them would even waddle out into the middle of a group of kobold pups and hunker down, ready to be batted around.
Honestly, Kaz liked the little creatures, and his only real difficulty lay in the fact that almost none of them could speak intelligibly. Their voices were so high that it was hard to differentiate between the sounds, even for Kaz. That made it difficult to know what they needed, and most of the kobolds just offered them various things until something was accepted.
That is, until Kaz tried to teach the oldest one, Vakhus, the rune for ‘food’. Vakhus became very excited, and scratched several more runes into soft limestone with one long claw. After that, all of the puppies learned the runes for ‘food’, ‘water’, ‘play’, ‘tired’, and, eventually, ‘happy’ and ‘sad’. Now the round-pups would trundle over to the appropriate rune and sit on it - or, in the case of ‘tired’, sleep on it - until someone older noticed and helped.
The time had passed remarkably quickly, and neither Kaz nor Li really wanted to leave. Unfortunately, even if they had time, eventually others would find out where they were, and their mere presence would destroy the fragile sense of peace that had been built in this place. So now Li was playing one last game of chase with her admirers, while Kaz checked over a few pups who had injuries of one kind or another.
Most of these were a result of the kind of rough play young kobolds indulged in, but some had broken bones or other injuries that hadn’t been cared for properly during their time as slaves. Most of them had worked in the yumi fields, which was relatively safe work, but even with a good leader like Eld, there was a limit to what could be done without a healer.
“Try that,” Kaz said, and a green-furred pup cautiously put weight on his left paw. His tail immediately began to wag, and he nodded.
“That’s much better,” he told Kaz. “I’ll definitely be able to catch Squeak now.”
The pup had twisted his paw when a little mosui called Squeak had turned his awkward run into a downhill roll on the far side of a broken stalagmite near the den. Not expecting such a maneuver, the kobold pup was quickly reminded that he wasn’t as well-padded or spherical as his smaller friend.
“Maybe you should let Squeak try chasing you for once,” Kaz suggested, straightening. “Or you could play with a toy together, instead.”
Without acknowledging this suggestion, the puppy took off, barely limping on the paw Kaz had healed. Kaz hadn’t quite healed it all the way, since he wanted the puppy to be a little more cautious in the future, but it shouldn’t swell or cause any real pain from now on. Kaz watched as he leaped into the fray, and chuffed a small laugh when Li dipped down to gently bop him on the nose with the tip of her tail.
“You really are a healer,” Dugo said in his quiet voice as he came to stand beside Kaz.
Kaz’s ears twitched. “You thought I was lying?” It could have been a serious question, but he put enough humor into his voice that even the cautious younger male shouldn’t be able to miss it.
“Not…exactly,” Dugo admitted, ducking his head. “But I heard what you did to Zhangwo, and I didn’t think power that could tear out someone’s throat from across the city could also heal.”
Well, that was one Kaz hadn’t heard. The puppies loved to share the howls they’d heard about ‘another kobold named Kaz’, and though he was fairly certain at least half of them had been made up right before they were spoken, Dugo wasn’t that type.
Kaz sighed. “That’s not what happened. There was a kind of weapon Zhangwo wanted to use on my friends. I just took control of it and used it on him instead. I was in the right place at the right time. Anyone could have done the same.” Not entirely true, but not entirely false, either, so he only allowed himself the smallest twinge of guilt.
Dugo frowned, but nodded. Male kobolds understood weapons. Power belonged to females alone, at least as far as most were concerned, but anyone could put their hand to a weapon and kill their enemy. “But you healed Trig’s paw, grew back Drel’s missing teeth, and fixed Strem’s broken tail.”
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And the tail had been difficult. It had broken and then healed badly, not only causing the pup quite a bit of pain, but also making it almost impossible to wag or tuck properly. Kaz had to use his ki to re-break it in exactly the right place, then heal it correctly, all while using mamu to block the pain.
“Yes,” Kaz agreed. Simply being able to stay in one place and help others the same way Rega once had made him feel warm and satisfied. Now if only he knew how to make the kind of paints Ghazt had used, he would also have tried to paint a mural for the pups. All that remained of the charcoals and paints Lianhua had given him were stubs and mostly-empty tubes, and he wanted to keep those in case he needed them to help him form an image again.
Dugo cleared his throat, then touched it with trembling fingers. “Do you really think you could make it so I can breathe more easily?”
Kaz nodded instantly. He’d been watching the brown pup closely, and by now he could actually hear the way Dugo’s throat closed when he was gasping for air. He’d had only the vaguest idea of what to do when he’d offered, but now he was certain he could help. “Are you willing to let me try?”
The other kobold glanced around at the happily playing puppies, then nodded jerkily. “Will it…hurt?”
By now, Kaz had taken a couple of groups of puppies into the dead pools to gather. They weren’t old enough to spend a whole day working, but they needed to learn about the plants that grew there, as well as some of the dangers they needed to watch for. He’d taken the opportunity to fill his pouch with some very rare plants, including a good amount of mamu, which numbed any area it touched.
Pulling some out, he handed it to Dugo. “Chew this, but don’t swallow it. Just make sure your mouth is numb. And don’t bite your tongue.” Not only would mamu upset the stomach, enough of it could actually make it hard to breathe, so it was rarely used for pain in or around the mouth. This was probably going to hurt enough that Kaz didn’t want Dugo to try to tough it out, however.
Dugo had undoubtedly been warned not to ingest mamu, but he did as Kaz said, letting the wet mass fall from his mouth when he was no longer able to feel his tongue. Kaz immediately summoned a ki-light and set it just behind the other kobold’s front teeth, so light was cast on the interior of the mouth.
Sure enough, the soft tissue at the back of the mouth was drooping over the opening to the throat. Kaz gently prodded at it with a claw, but Dugo didn’t seem to notice. Raw mamu wouldn’t last as long as the boiled and reduced liquid most healers preferred, but Kaz had no intention of lingering over this.
Summoning his red ki, he burned away a small part of the excess skin, cauterizing it as he went so there was almost no blood. The smell was unpleasant, however, and Dugo’s eyes were already starting to look a little wild. Once Kaz was certain this would work, he quickly sliced away more of the extra tissue, then flooded the area with blue ki, holding together the skin and healing the burns he’d created while fixing the original problem. His ki-light now revealed a throat that looked much like any other he’d seen, though the area where he’d removed the extra skin remained red and angry-looking.
Kaz started to pull back his ki, feeling that he’d done all he could, but hesitated. He was leaving, and while he didn’t think there was any way for this to open up and begin to bleed, if there was one thing Rega had taught him, it was that a patient could always find a way to undo a healer’s hard work. So he reinforced the blue ki, pulling the flesh together and convincing it to join into a single piece, then used black ki to cool the angry redness. He knew that had been the right thing to do when Dugo breathed a small sigh of relief.
Satisfied, Kaz released the small ki-light, then said, “Close your mouth and swallow.” Dugo did so without any visible discomfort, and Kaz nodded. “You can chew a very small amount of mamu if the pain becomes bad, but I don’t think it will. Don’t swallow the juices, and try not to let the puppies see you do it.” Puppies were told that mamu was never, under any circumstances, meant to be put into the mouth. Healers did so, of course, but that didn’t change the fact that puppies could be counted on to try anything they saw an older pup doing, especially if they’d been told not to do that thing themselves.
Dugo nodded. “Is that all?” His voice was subtly different, missing a sort of liquid snort that had been there at the end of certain sounds, and he looked startled.
Kaz nodded. “That’s it. Stick to soft food for the next several days. No insects, and definitely no bones. Drink lots of water.” He wasn’t entirely sure why water was helpful, but Rega always told every patient to drink water, even if they were there for a broken claw, so Kaz dutifully repeated her words.
“Can I run now?” Dugo asked, looking like he might take off the very moment.
Kaz held up a hand. “Give that a few days, too. You can do your gathering, but move slowly and take breaks. When you do start to run, do a little at a time until you find your new limits.”
The other kobold looked crestfallen, his ears drooping even more than usual, and Kaz found himself patting his head. He quickly snatched back the offending hand, but Dugo didn’t even seem to notice. “Thank you, Kaz,” Dugo said. “I hope someday you can come back to visit us again, and I can show you how quickly I can run.”
And maybe by then Kaz would have figured out how to help with the one leg that was shorter than the other. Could he create a sort of shoe that would make them both match? Or would Dugo be happy enough with just being able to breathe?
The dragon landed on Kaz’s shoulder as they watched the joyful homecoming. Kaz and Li had known this was coming, but there was a definite feeling of regret that their brief stay was over.
“Yes,” Kaz said, tilting his head so his forehead touched her side. He would make sure of it. Somehow.