Once they reached the Nine - the central levels in the entire mountain, where the mosui city had been built - Kaz and Li saw an instant change. There were guards standing at the bottom of the stairs, and all around them, the stones were stained with the dark marks left by fire. Someone had definitely been working hard to clear away the remnants of the fulan. Was it only the presence of the shiyan that had prevented them from continuing upward?
When Kaz saw the guards, he stopped, offering a short howl of question. There were four male kobolds and a single husede female, and they all jumped at the sound, spinning to look toward the stairs they were supposed to be guarding. The husede stepped forward, clearing her throat before calling up, “Who are you?”
Li said from her place on the stairs behind him.
Li hadn’t wanted anyone to know they were in the city until after her crystals had been acquired, but Kaz was curious how well the kobolds and husede were working together, and they would have had to avoid everyone for several hours at least to reach the crystals. He was sure they could slip away long enough to get to the mine or the processing level once they were in the city.
Kaz’s fur color made it difficult to pretend to be anyone else, and Li’s presence would give away the truth even if he tried, so he said, “I’m Kaz. I was here when-”
The four kobold warriors had hung back as the husede spoke, taking their traditional role of supporting a female, even if she wasn’t of their own kind. Now, one with rich yellow fur stepped forward, his ears perked forward as he peered up at Kaz. His eyes caught on Li, who was partially hidden by Kaz’s legs, and his tail gave a single pleased wag.
“Kaz! The Woodblade who killed Zhangwo!” he said. The other three males stared, their eyes wide, while the husede female’s gray skin paled slightly. “I’m Gral. You’re welcome here,” the kobold said, “but you’ll have to wash in the pool before you can go any further. We don’t want any more fulan entering this level.”
The husede shifted her large, heavy pickaxe from one hand to the other, looking unhappy. “We’re not supposed to let anyone in without the Council’s approval.”
Another of the males - a scarred, gray-furred warrior with a missing ear - grunted. “And they haven’t let anyone in since we kobolds started to outnumber you husede.”
“That wasn’t why!” the female exclaimed. “Every time a kobold came down, we’d have a fresh fulan outbreak from all the spores in their fur.”
“Which is why they have to wash now, and we don’t allow anything to grow in this cave,” the older male growled, then stepped between the husede and the stairs. Deliberately, he turned his back on the female, showing his lack of deference. He had a wide band of bare silvery scar tissue around his throat, so he must have been one of the miners, while Kaz suspected Gral, the younger male with the bright yellow fur, had probably been a servant in a mosui home.
“Come on,” the gray warrior said, ignoring the others. “Water’s over here.”
Now that the protections were on in the stairs, Kaz was certain that no live spores lingered in his fur, but it wasn’t worth arguing with these guards. They were following the rules they’d been given, though it was obvious there was some dissent amongst them.
He and Li found that ‘the pool’ was actually a shallow natural basin with several water containers arrayed around it. While Kaz and Li stood in the basin, the guards threw water on them until both kobold and dragon were thoroughly soaked. The water drained away into a nearby crevice, which probably went to one of the in-between levels, where no one lived. If there was a fresh outbreak of fulan, Kaz would look to cracks and crevices like that, not the stairs.
Li watched the water swirl away with woeful eyes.
When Kaz’s fur was only slightly damp, he said, “Is this level clear of fulan, then?”
The guards exchanged glances, and once again it was the gray-furred warrior who spoke. “They make a sweep of the areas around the city every day. The husede have some stuff that burns hotter than firemoss oil, so if they find a patch starting, they can destroy it, and the spores, too.” There was grudging admiration in this admission.
Kaz nodded. He’d have to find out what that stuff was, and if there was enough he could take a little. He pointed upward. “Why haven’t they cleared the other levels, too? It wouldn’t keep reappearing if there wasn’t any left.” Given that spores could still linger in the between-levels, that was a little too simplistic, but it would still be better for everyone if all of the true levels could be cleansed. Plus, any kobolds still alive above might have a chance, but only if potential rescuers moved quickly. Tribes usually kept a few weeks of food stored in their dens, if possible, but even that would have run out by now.
The kobold’s eyes all slid toward the husede, whose cheeks went slightly purple. “That’s the Council’s decision, and they say we need to take care of ourselves first.”
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Kaz’s eyes narrowed. “Who’s on this Council?”
“Lady Lothitsdottir and her son, Qiyi Thabilsson,” the husede said promptly, but Kaz had the impression that even she didn’t like them very much.
“And Dax, of the Bronze City tribe,” the gray-furred male said. “Though half the time he doesn’t go to the meetings, or so I hear.” The other warriors shuffled uncomfortably at this, but no one contradicted him. That didn’t sound like the Dax Kaz knew, though, so it was fortunate that he’d already planned to find the other male while he was there.
“There’s a Bronze City tribe?” Kaz asked, instead of following up on the gray male’s comment.
Grel nodded. “That’s what we call the kobolds who’ve decided to stay here, rather than going to the Deep or trying to find their old tribes.” For a moment, his youthful face grew solemn. “So far, no one who’s done that has returned.”
Kaz nodded agreement, while the other males just stared at her, either astonished that she’d spoken or simply unable to refute her words. She was right. There was no way the male members of a tribe would leave their females behind unless it was obvious those females had gone mad, like the Sharpjaws. Even then, they only remained where they were because the last female had ordered them to do so. Otherwise, they would have returned and been killed beside - or by - their mates, sisters, and daughters.
That reminded him, though, and he asked, “Do the Redmanes come often? And have you seen any males from the Sharpjaw tribe? Or females?”
The gray male’s lip lifted as he let out a low snarl. “No females,” he said, “other than the Redmanes. They come down the other stairs, though, so I don’t know if any of them are here now. They were here a lot, in the beginning, but I think the Council chased them off, too.”
“Sharpjaw doesn’t sound familiar,” Grel added. “But there’s a husede who writes down the name and tribe of every kobold who makes it here. If someone leaves, she writes down where they plan to go. If they stay, she puts down where they built their hut. Most of us live on the level with the yumi fields.”
Kaz’s ears perked up. “Where is this husede?”
“I’ll take you there,” the gray-furred warrior said. “It’s about time for shift change, anyway.”
The husede looked like she might argue, but the older male didn’t even glance at her as he walked past. Kaz followed, summoning a ki-light as they left the red-lit cavern at the base of the stairs. For the first time since entering the mid-levels, he didn’t stop to renew the arch on his way by.
The tunnel beyond the cavern was large enough that Li could fly, but once they left the passage that led from one flight of stairs to the next, she’d have to walk or ride on Kaz’s shoulder. Their guide watched Li’s swooping turns with the closest thing Kaz had seen to pleasure on his face. Obviously, Li’s ability to entrance kobolds hadn’t faded since they left the mountain.
Only when they turned away from the large tunnel and Li flew back to Kaz, allowing him to carry her now that they should be in relatively safe territory, did the older warrior speak again. “My name is Orko. I used to be a Bronzearm, but now I’m Bronze City. You’re Kaz?”
Kaz nodded. “I’m not actually a Woodblade, though. My father was, but I’m…not of any tribe, now.” This wasn’t the first time Kaz had denied having any tribe at all, but he still felt a stab of pain at the words. Katri might take him back, and he knew any of the Great Tribes would accept him, though the only one he was even vaguely interested in was the new Woodblade tribe. He couldn’t join them without taking on the role of chief, whether he wanted to or not, so it was better to claim no tribe.
Orko’s pale gray eyes slid to him, but the other male didn’t comment. Kaz felt those eyes linger on the thin ring of golden fur around Kaz’s throat, but Orko also didn’t mention the lack of a necklace. Perhaps that was because the other male’s necklace was little more than a string of knots, with almost no bones or teeth remaining, and perhaps it was because the kobolds here had been through more than enough to qualify any of them as adults. Either way, it was refreshing.
Orko didn’t seem inclined to say anything at all, however, so eventually Kaz asked, “Are things going well? In the city?” He could already tell that the answer was ‘no’, at least to some extent, but he was hoping for more information.
Li was less patient than Kaz. She stared straight at Orko and demanded,
Orko’s step hitched, and then he gave a growling laugh. His shoulders relaxed a bit, and he shrugged. “Not all of them. There are a good number who… They slip, sometimes. Forget they don’t command us any more. But then they remember, and you can tell they regret it, even if they don’t say so. The youngest ones, especially. But that Thabil and her son-” He shook his head. “The only good thing is that they treat their own people almost as bad. Give them just enough that they don’t ‘elect’ someone else.”
The gruff warrior said ‘elect’ like he couldn’t decide if he liked the taste of it. Kaz remembered something about this from before he left. Lianhua had mentioned that the kind of system the husede were putting in place allowed for leaders to be replaced if they did a poor job. It took a large portion of their tribe to choose to remove them, however, and Lianhua claimed that the former chiefs simply became normal members of the tribe and remained in the den. That seemed unwise to Kaz, since their mere presence would be a point of enmity in a tribe that needed to be united in order to survive.
“What about Dax?” Kaz asked.
This time Orko’s shoulders actually slumped for a moment. “He’s outnumbered. There are two husede to one kobold, and they always ‘vote’ together.” Again that hesitation over the new word, though this time Orko definitely looked like he’d tasted old meat.
Orko actually growled softly. “There are a few. Mostly pups. The husede didn’t want anything to do with them, but there was a kobold who saved one of the pups, and he gathered the rest of them up. He acts like a den-mother, teaching them howls and making sure they eat.”
Kaz could feel Li’s conflicting emotions. She hated the mosui for what they’d done to her, but she also liked puppies, and didn’t want to think of them dying, even if they were mosui. He stroked her neck and said, “We’ll have to meet this male. Do you know his name?”
“I think it’s Vakhus,” Orko said.
Not someone Kaz knew, then. He hadn’t met all that many of the kobolds who’d been captured by the mosui, but for some reason, he’d thought this male might be one of those. Hopefully, he really wanted to help the few remaining mosui. Kaz would definitely have to check on this Vakhus. Zhangwo had encouraged the mosui to do evil things, but that didn’t make them evil. Perhaps puppies raised without any mosui adults could learn to be better. The mountain was their home as well, after all.