The city consisted of the same lacquered streets and glittering buildings as before, all still covered in the red glow of ki-crystals. The feeling of it was entirely different, however. It was like Kaz had gone from a tribe like his own, where everyone was quietly and desperately obedient, simply trying not to draw too much attention to themselves, to a tribe like the Copperstrikers, filled with worry and hope all at once.

The biggest change, however, was the kinds of people he saw hurrying through those streets. Before, it was almost entirely mosui, sometimes walking on their own paws, but more often carried in chairs on the backs of kobolds with matching brightly colored fur. Some husede had been there as well, looking harried but not afraid, but the only kobolds were the ones used by the mosui.

Now, the balance had shifted. The majority of people were husede, looking much the same as they had before, though their shoulders were straighter and they strode along at a comfortable pace, rather than scurrying from place to place. But there were a good number of kobolds here as well, and of all fur colors. They wore clean, new-looking loincloths, and though many of them were still thin and scarred, they no longer looked beaten and exhausted.

There were no mosui at all, even when Kaz shifted his vision to see the smudges of mana inside the buildings they passed. Mosui were small, even by kobold standards, while most husede were Kaz’s height or slightly taller. All of the mana he saw occupied a husede-sized space.

Li asked as Orko led them along a path Kaz had walked once before. He was beginning to believe he knew where they were going, and was curious to see if the same female was there when they arrived.

Orko snarled slightly. “The adults live in a few buildings on the husede level. There are only ten or fifteen of them.”

Kaz almost stumbled. He had no idea how many mosui had been living here, but it had to be many hundreds. Enough to make up several large tribes. And they were all dead? Or had some of them run when they realized that Zhangwo had been killed and their control sticks weren’t enough to turn back the fury of those they’d oppressed?

Li said, her body shivering against his. He held her close, remembering not only what it felt like to be collared and controlled, but to be trapped in a tiny box without food or water, terrified that he was about to die. Once their full connection was restored, they had shared both experiences, and Kaz had to admit that not one of the mosui either of them had encountered had seemed redeemable.

“What about their pups?” he asked, almost afraid to hear the answer.

“There are more of them,” Orko said. “I don’t care much about them one way or the other, myself. I was in the mines, and the mosui never went there. It was all kobolds and husede, and while I met more than my share of cruel kobolds, I certainly know there are many of us who aren’t like that. Same with the husede, I suppose. Claikni’s not all bad.” He glanced at Kaz before offering, “The female at the stairs.”

Kaz nodded. How many was ‘more’? Were there only thirty or forty mosui left alive, and more than half of those were puppies? There couldn’t be too many, or this Vakhus wouldn’t be able to care for them all. When Zhangwo and the mosui had been killing his own people, he hadn’t cared what happened to them, but now he was very glad that Lianhua had asked for their lives to be spared.

Li said, for him only.

That was a thought, and a good one, but here in the mountain Kaz was surrounded by too much ‘kobold’, all the time. If he knew someone well, he thought he might be able to pick them out if he was close, but the only mosui he’d even spoken to was the one who captured him, and he didn’t even know its name.

he told his dragon, then paused as Orko turned and walked inside a building. Sure enough, it was the same place Kaz had come to be assigned a job, but when he stepped inside, he saw that it had changed a fair bit. The metal rods had been ripped from the wall, leaving cracked holes, and instead one of the mosui’s metal tables stood in the center of the room. An enormous book atop it, its leather cover dyed a deep red. One thing that did remain the same was the short husede female behind the table. She had her hands on her hips, and was staring at Orko, who looked completely at ease as he silently stared back.

The husede turned to Kaz as he entered, her expression shifting from exasperated to questioning. Then her eyes fell on Li, and she gasped, stumbling backwards until she hit the wall with a painful-sounding thump. “Dragon!” she gasped, and Li perked up.

the dragon exclaimed, lifting her head and staring at the husede.

The husede female blinked, obviously taken aback by Li’s words, or perhaps by the fact that the dragon had spoken at all. She looked at Kaz. “Don’t you know what that is? It’s small now, but you should kill it before it grows larger. They’re monstrous beasts who care for nothing other than filling their bellies!”

Li hissed softly.

Kaz shifted his grip on Li, turning his shoulder toward the husede and summoning a shield for the first time since entering this level. He didn’t like this talk of dragon-killing. “No one outside even seemed to notice Li, other than a few glances.”

The husede was sliding slowly across the wall in the direction of the stairs. “That’s because they don’t read the old stories. I do. I know how we ended up in this mountain, and it wasn’t because of the mosui. We ended up serving them, but it was dragons who took us from our home. The stories are…horrific.”

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Kaz winced. There was no doubt in his mind that she was talking about Qiangde and his court. Qiangde had carried away anyone he thought might help him learn how to ascend. Those with cores had been used in his experiments, but Kaz didn’t know why the ancient dragon had wanted the husede. None of them even had cores, at least not that Kaz had seen, but he supposed it was possible that they could develop one and ascend, so perhaps they had simply been an easy source of material to study.

Li was no longer pleased with the husede’s reaction, and shrank back against Kaz. she said. And there was something in her voice when she spoke these last two words that resonated, almost humming as they hung in the air between her and the squat, frightened female.

Slowly, the husede relaxed, her dark eyes searching, rather than alarmed. “I think you mean that,” she said softly.

Li agreed, and Kaz nodded with her. There was no way Li would ever be like Qiangde. She was fierce, but not cruel, and though she demanded respect, she was also willing to earn it.

With a soft sigh, the husede took a single step back toward them, then glanced at Orko, who had watched this exchange with a strangely intent expression. “Orko, if you’re done, you should go back to the stairs,” she said tartly.

Orko shrugged. “It’s about shift change.”

She rolled her eyes. “Not for another hour. You know how this works. If you don’t do your job, you only get the minimum, and they’ll take a day off.”

A low rumble came from Orko’s throat. “You think kobolds don’t know about doing what they must for the tribe to survive?”

She took another step forward. “I know you do,” she said gently. “And you’ve worked enough, for long enough. But if someone reports you-”

“And who’ll do that, Kedia? You?” he growled.

“No!” Kedia said, settling her hands on her hips again. “But if something dangerous comes down those stairs and you’re not there to fight, you know you’ll regret it.”

Kaz almost told them that nothing dangerous could use the stairs anymore, but then he remembered that kobolds still could. If an infected female or a group of desperate males tried to come down, the Fire ki wouldn’tstop them.

The ragged fur on the back of Orko’s neck slowly settled back down. “I suppose,” he rumbled. “Grel’s barely more than a pup, and Claikni’s pickaxe is bigger than she is.” Neither of those things was true, but Kaz said nothing as the scarred gray male turned for the door. He didn’t even bother with a farewell yip as he pushed back out onto the bustling street.

Kedia shook her head. She met Kaz’s eyes, and managed a small smile, though Kaz noticed she still kept the table in between herself and them. “Orko was in one of the bad mines. Hardly anyone else made it out. He should be allowed to rest, for a while, at least.”

Kaz tilted his head. “If it helps, he probably wouldn’t. We kobolds work from the day we learn to walk on two legs until the day we die.”

The husede’s smile faded, and she looked down at the thick book that lay on the table in front of her. “I know,” she said. “No one ever needed to make you work. It’s what you do. If the mosui had simply opened this city to you from the beginning, some tribe would have been willing to come here and mine in exchange for nothing more than the safety the city provides.”

She was right, and that was yet another part of the tragedy that had lain at the heart of Kaz’s mountain for centuries. Rather than comment on that, however, he asked, “What would happen if Orko didn’t work?”

Kedia grimaced. “The Council has decided that everyone - from independent youth to adult - has to contribute in order to earn food and a place to live. It’s not a terrible system. At least people can choose what they do, for the most part. If someone is unable or unwilling to do their job, however, they have to leave after nine days, and during those nine days, they’ll only receive a small amount of food. The minimum. If someone repeatedly tries to work for one day, then not work for eight, they just start deducting days from their nine, even if they’re not consecutive. That’s where Orko is now.”

She laid a hand on the book. “Speaking of which, Orko brought you here so I can record your name and where you’ll be staying. If you plan to remain here longer than nine days, you’ll have to take a job, but I can help you find one you like.” She glanced at Li. “I don’t know what they’ll want to do about the…the dragon.”

Li told her, and Kedia flipped open the book with a hand that barely shook. Dozens of pages fluttered from one side to the other, and then she picked up a pen Kaz hadn’t even noticed beside the bulk of the book. Dipping it in a small pot of ink, she leaned forward and wrote Li’s name in the smallest runes Kaz had ever seen. When Lianhua told her to pick, Li had chosen the runes for ‘fly’ and ‘gold’ as her written name, but Kedia used the simple rune that sounded like Li’s name instead. Neither Kaz nor Li corrected her.

“I’m Kaz,” Kaz told the husede. She wrote down the simplest version of his name as well, which was fine since he hadn’t actually chosen his runes yet. The pen hovered over the page, and finally Kedia looked up.

“What tribe?” she asked. “Even if you think they’re all dead, I should write it down. If someone else does make it here, I can tell them where you are, and if one of your tribe members is already here, I can help you find them.”

Kaz’s tail swayed gently. She sounded genuinely concerned, and he remembered her helping him when he came here shortly after he was captured. She’d tried to get him assigned to the yumi pools rather than the mines, and she was the only person to offer him help in finding Lianhua and Li, by telling him they might be in ‘the tower’. Of course, while she was much the same, his fur was gray then, so it was no wonder she didn’t recognize him.

“Thank you,” he said, “but I have no tribe now, and I know where my former tribe is. There’s no one here for me. Though…do you keep track of visitors as well? Do you know if any Redmanes are in the city right now? And are Dax, Eld, and Nogz of the Bronzearm tribe still on the yumi levels?”

Kedia’s heavy black brows rose up toward the braids that started at her hairline. “No Redmanes have come here in days. And all of the former Bronzearms now live near the pools. But-” Her eyes narrowed as she examined him, lingering on his bare, unscarred throat. “Have you been here before? Are you one of the kobolds who left right after the battle?”

Kaz’s ear twitched. “I have been here before, and I did leave shortly after Zhangwo died,” he agreed cautiously. Not cautiously enough, however, because her eyes touched on his fur again, widening.

“You’re the kobold who killed Zhangwo!” she exclaimed. “Or the one the other kobolds howl about, anyway. Kaz, with the blue fur, a male kobold with the power of a dozen females. You supposedly ripped out Zhangwo’s throat with your teeth, or perhaps clawed out his guts, or sometimes-”

Kaz’s ears were flat by now, and he whined softly as he said, “None of that is true. I…helped. That’s all.” He glanced toward the door, trying to decide if he’d learned as much as he could here, when he thought of something else. Opening his pouch, he pulled out the piece of leather he’d taken from Zyle’s hut and lowered his shield before placing his burden carefully on the table.

With gentle fingers, Kedia picked it up, her eyes scanning the small, carefully drawn runes that covered it. “Oh,” she said softly, then turned more pages in her book until she came to a section near the end. Meticulously, she copied each rune down onto the page, then handed it back to Kaz.

“Next time someone heads for the Deep, you’ll want to send that with them. Or,” her eyes touched Kaz’s blue fur and Li’s crimson-gilded golden scales, “perhaps you’re planning to go there yourself. Either way, you should give that to someone from one of the great tribes. It’s a list of the dead members of a tribe called the Woodjaws.”

She sighed, shaking her head. “I don’t know much about kobold politics, for obvious reasons, but I talk to a lot of kobolds. I know the Woodblades were killed years ago, and given the tribe name, I’d guess these Woodjaws are one of the ones who left the Deep after that happened, for one reason or another. I don’t know the Woodjaws’ story in particular, but they’ll have family down there. Someone who can howl them to their ancestors.”

Kaz bowed his head, carefully rolling up the piece of leather and returning it to his pouch. It was longer than the pouch, and Kedia watched with barely concealed interest as it disappeared. “Thank you,” he said. “Are the platforms between levels still running?”

She nodded, and Kaz moved toward the door, only to pause once more as he thought about the promise he’d made to Ogden. The husede seemed to know how to fix the platforms, and they’d likely be interested to know there was another of their kind on the mountain, especially one who hadn’t been born there. But if Kaz told the husede about Ogden, he would be taking away Ogden’s right to choose his own path. So, in the end, he simply said, “Fair howls,” and left.