Kaz continued to follow the same path he’d used with the humans, stopping only briefly to rest and eat. He didn’t even feel tired, but Li wasn’t used to walking so much, and she still insisted upon walking so they were both ready to fight, if necessary. Only after he’d built a small fire from firemoss did she curl up beside him, staring into the flickering orange flames. The fire produced a lot of smoke, which was why kobolds made and used the clean-burning oil that they squeezed from the plant, but they weren’t going to stay long enough for that to be a problem.

she asked, as Kaz placed some toufa wrapped in jiao on the hot stone floor beside the fire.

With a deep sigh, Kaz stroked her neck. “I’m fine. I didn’t know why Katri was angry with me, but the fact that she sent me off to be killed or captured told me we would never be friends again. If we ever truly were. I’m just glad she didn’t try to kill me herself. I wouldn’t have been that surprised if she had.”

Li asked, gingerly prodding a sizzling mushroom with a long claw.

Kaz chuffed. “I’m glad to know the truth. And I know it’s not my fault that I forgot, but I feel stupid. There are so many things I would have done differently if I’d only remembered that Rega was my real mother. Even if I didn’t know Father could use ki, didn’t understand what that meant for me, I would have-”

His voice broke as he thought about his kind, gentle ‘aunt’, who had given up the right to call him son in order to keep him safe. What must she have thought when he never said anything to her, never touched her, even in private? He treated her as a wise elder, a den-mother, and his aunt, but he could have leaned against her, hugged her, even for a moment. Yes, there had been times when she held him, but only as she did for all the pups.

Li asked, nosing his hand until he began petting her again.

Kaz started flipping the mushrooms with his free hand, but he was thinking hard. At one time, he had assumed that all tribes were like his, to a greater or lesser extent. Now he knew there was a great deal more variation than he ever would have guessed, but he thought that for the most part, den-mothers were more strict than kind. While they all cared for their charges, their job was to keep the pups safe, teach them the howls, and send them back to their parents at the end of the day. Rega and the Stoneborn den-mother, Nadi, seemed to be the exceptions.

“I think she truly cared for all the pups, but you’re right,” he said. Looking down at Li’s curving red horns, he suddenly felt a deep rush of affection and, more, pride. Not pride for anything he’d done, but pride for how she’d grown in the short time since she’d hatched. “How did you get to be so wise?”

Li’s neck arched, firelight glinting from her scales, and she sniffed softly. She cocked her head, cool vapor curling from her mouth as she looked at him.

Kaz laughed, tail wagging as he plucked the steaming fungus from their spicy parcels. He divided them between himself and Li, then added some dried meat he’d acquired from Raff’s house. They stored a truly enormous amount of food there, so he doubted they’d miss a little. The two of them ate in companionable silence before Li fell asleep by the dying fire, her head on Kaz’s shoulder.

=+=+=+=

Li only slept for a little while, and when she woke they set off again. They could hear the sound of Ogden’s platform from several tunnels away, the chain rattling and scraping as he pulled it up and down. Kaz was happy to hear it, since it meant the husede was still there. He knew it hadn’t really been that long since he’d last seen the older male, but it felt like several lifetimes, so he was glad to hear the rather eerie noise echoing through the passages.

When he reached the top of the wide pit, Kaz gave a low howl, letting Ogden know that he was waiting. The rattling, which had been silent for a while, started up again, along with Ogden’s soft muttering. As the platform came closer, Kaz called down, “How much gold does it cost for a ride?”

The chain paused, and Ogden groaned. “Not another gharaklin. Why is this mountain suddenly filled with humans?”

Kaz chuffed as the top of Ogden’s shiny head came into view. Kaz was using a ki-light like the ones female kobolds made, warm and flickering like fire, rather than burning pure as the sun. The reflected light made Ogden’s gray skin look orange, and the broad white teeth of his grin seem bloody.

“Kaz, pup! I didn’t expect to see you again, unless it was when you came back up.” He glanced around curiously, probably looking for humans, until his eyes landed on Li. His fingers spasmed, and for the first time in Kaz’s memory, the chain slipped from his powerful grasp. He caught it again a moment later, but grunted as the links bit his fingers, drawing bright crimson blood that dripped onto the chain and down the hole through which the chain passed.

Quickly, Ogden pulled the piece of metal he used to lock the chains from his belt and slid it into place. That done, he opened a slim pouch at his waist and pulled out a wad of zhiwu web. Before he could pack it into the filthy wound, Kaz jumped down onto the platform, followed by Li, though the dragon took the opportunity to stretch her wings in the wide open cavern first. She stayed away from the ceiling, and landed beside Kaz as he grasped Ogden’s thick-fingered hand.

Leaning forward, Kaz sniffed the wound, taking in the scent of rust and blood. Not surprisingly, Ogden’s body held a thick fog of mana, and from the density, Kaz suspected the husede was somewhere in the Iron-body level of cultivation, whether he had intended to reach it or not. Unfortunately, that wasn’t enough to keep such a large, heavy chain from breaking the skin.

Ogden tried to take his hand back, but Kaz held onto it easily, gently pushing blue ki into the wound. A few large chunks of rust popped out of the broken skin, and Kaz wiped them away. Only when he was sure the wound was clean did Kaz release his grip and take a small piece of jejing from his pouch. He rolled this between his fingers, gently breaking the fibers to release the pungent juice, then packed it into the wound, which was no longer bleeding. By now, Ogden was watching with his mouth open, not even trying to resist.

Kaz held out his hand, then blinked when there was no response. Looking up, he said, “Web?” and Ogden placed it into his hand. Carefully, Kaz rolled the strip of webbing around the injury, leaving a soft white swathe across the gray, dirty skin. He could have put more power in, healing the small wound more completely, but Rega had taught him that doing too much could prevent the patient from learning wisdom as a result of their mistake.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“There,” he said, backing away. “That should heal cleanly.”

Ogden shook his head, flexing his fingers carefully. “What in the gods’ names happened to you, Kaz?”

And only then did Kaz realize what he’d done. He’d never had any intention of hiding his abilities, since as a male without a female, he would be viewed as an interloper at best, and a possible prize at worst. Proving that he didn’t need a female was the best way to keep anyone from doing something they would regret. Still, he hadn’t meant to be quite so blatant about it. He’d just gotten so used to being himself that he’d acted without thinking.

Li said, though he could tell she was amused by his consternation.

Ogden’s head whipped around, and he stared at the dragon. “It talks?” His deep voice cracked into something close to a pup’s howl. “I’m too old to think I’ve seen every beast in this mountain, but if that thing talks, it’s no animal, so what is it?”

“This is Li,” Kaz told him, wagging his tail gently. “Li, this is Ogden. He was one of my first friends. I met him when the Broken Knives lived nearby.” Li knew all of this, of course, so telling her was mostly for Ogden’s benefit.

Li inclined her head, spreading her wings to catch the light of Kaz’s ki-orb. Hopefully, Ogden didn’t notice when she licked a drop of the husede’s blood that ended up in front of her snout. Kaz gave her a meaningful look, and she flicked her tail innocently as she straightened.

she said, And she was telling the truth. Ogden had met Kaz when he was a frightened, confused puppy, and made sure he was returned safely to his tribe, so Li already liked this particular husede.

Ogden started to scratch his head with his injured hand, then grimaced and said, “And I, you, but what are you? I mean, I know what you look like, but…”

Li sniffed, releasing twin streams of vapor from her nostrils. she told him, with the tone of someone stating the obvious.

Ogden coughed, glancing at Kaz. “That is what you look like,” he admitted, “though I’ve never seen one in person. Young husede are taught to avoid them, because one was rather famous for stealing away those who were foolish enough to wander the surface world. That was centuries ago, but my people are long-lived and slow to forget.”

Kaz nodded. “That was probably Qiangde. He took them for one of his servants, who built a city in the mid-levels, and made slaves out of them. Their descendents live there still, but both Qiangde and the servant, Zhangwo, are dead now.”

Ogden pointed below them with a finger that shook only slightly. “There are other husede in this mountain? Ones who were born here?”

Kaz nodded. “I was going to tell you, in case you wanted to go meet them. There are several hundred, at least. The last I heard, some of them were planning to return to wherever their ancestors were stolen from, but others wanted to continue living in the city, along with the kobolds who helped free them.” It was quite a bit more complicated than that, but he didn’t have the time or the inclination to explain the rest.

Ogden shook his head, then stared searchingly into Kaz’s eyes. This could have been interpreted as a challenge if Ogden was another kobold, but the husede didn’t look threatening, only confused and a little worried. Finally, the other male blinked and looked away, moisture rising to gleam in his eyes, though none fell.

“I don’t even know how long it’s been since I last saw one of my own people. Thank you for telling me,” he said at last.

“Will you go?” Kaz asked. He was planning to visit the mosui city briefly, if only to gather more ki-crystals for Li. While he couldn’t take a whole tribe of kobolds with him, Ogden’s presence certainly wouldn’t slow him down, and might even make things easier, since the husede was intimidating even to a warrior.

Ogden glanced away. “I don’t know, pup. My life here may not be perfect, but I have friends, a task, and a home here. What would your people do if I just up and left? I’ll have to think about it.”

Kaz nodded, then looked at the thick chain that passed through the platform, once going up, and once going down. Now that he could see mana, he could tell that his guess had been correct, and this platform was probably once very much like the ones in the mage school and the xiyi base in Cliffcross. This one was more basic, and the platform was larger than most of those, but there was no denying the similarities. Maybe all of the shafts like this had once had platforms, but over time many had broken or simply been taken apart by kobolds who couldn’t use them.

Reaching out, Kaz touched the chain itself. He still couldn’t use mana, but there was no control pedestal here to convert ki to mana anyway. Instead, he pushed a little ki into it, first trying each color, and then different combinations. The metal didn’t respond, so he crouched, examining the pedestal instead. Carefully, he scratched away the filth and rust that had accumulated on it, exposing cracked and broken crystals.

Ogden had watched all of this with bemusement, and now he said, “What are you looking for, pup? I admit, this old platform is filthy, but frankly, you kobolds’re constantly carrying ore and other things onto it, so I gave up trying to clean it years ago.”

More likely the husede had never tried, given how thick the crust of filth was, but the hard surface had probably protected the crystals from claws and other damage, leaving the color and pattern of the crystals barely discernible. Kaz pushed a tiny spark of ki into one, and it flashed a dim yellow before fizzling out.

“There are platforms like this in the human city I visited,” Kaz said, standing up. “They use power to control them. There’s something like it in the mid-levels city as well, but those are more advanced, and seem to be able to move from one place to another without actually traversing the distance in between.” He was pretty sure that wasn’t quite right, but that was what anyone other than him would experience, so he wasn’t going to try to explain it.

“I think if I replaced all of these crystals with fresh ones, it would be usable again. The others have to convert mana to ki, but-” He saw the look on Ogden’s face and just said, “Kobolds could use this themselves if it was repaired. Probably.”

Ogden chuckled, the rumbling sound echoing down the shaft below them. Howls had been rising up for a while now, other kobolds growing impatient at how slowly the husede was responding. “Well, if you figure out how to fix this old thing, then I’ll decide whether I should visit this city. Otherwise, I have a job to do.” A job Kaz knew he enjoyed, no matter how much he complained about it at times. It wasn’t a life that would make Kaz happy, but Kaz wasn’t Ogden.

Li nudged his leg, and when she spoke this time, he knew it was only for him. The words were teasing, but there was a note of seriousness behind them.

he said softly, stroking her head. He had to admit he was a little worried about that, but a strong enough female should be able to do it, for a while at least.

Li gave him a dubious glance, but didn’t argue as Ogden tugged the metal rod from the chains and began lowering the platform into the depths, hand over hand. Kaz turned to the husede and said, “I don’t want any trouble with the Graybellies, so Li and I are going to disappear. I just wanted to let you know I’m still alive, and tell you about the other husede. I’d appreciate it if you don’t let anyone else use this corner of the platform.”

Ogden’s brows climbed as Kaz leaned over and picked Li up, promptly vanishing behind her camouflage. Kaz grinned as he said, “Don’t drop us,” and Ogden shook his head, laughing again.