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A week later, Crane finally stirred. His small family was quick to gather as he sat up.

When Crane’s helmet fell, Nala was the first to move, though she was slow, to pick it up.

Looking weary but pleased, Crane held out his arms for his ino and grinned wide.

“She’s lovely.”

“Yes. I fed her and kept her safe for you,” Indel said. “She’s good and strong. She has trouble running. That is the reason she was thrown away, but she can run and she tries to often.”

She was three times the size that Crane knew.

Nala stood to the side, holding the helmet in both hands. Crane looked up at his own hair when he realized it was bare.

“My—”

“I have it,” Nala choked out. “I...I can keep it over here till you need it.”

“No need for that,” Boon said. “Another one’s growing.”

Indel chuckled. “You are strong.” He broke the newly forming scales and said, “Once you go out into the sun and let your scales dry, they’ll stop forming. How do you feel?”

Crane held his belly. “Hungry.”

“Good. Boon can—”

“I can.” Nala interrupted. “I...I will. I’ll get some things. I’ll get some.”

Indel followed Nala out of the barn, leaving the two brothers to talk. Boon started breaking Crane’s scales only for them to grow back.

“You two will clean that,” Indel reminded them, closing the door.

He found Nala by the stone wall, digging around aimlessly. This was where she hid the most bitter-sweet roots for fear Boon might get to them.

“Na’am?”

Nala startled. “Oh, Mana.... I will hurry. Don’t worry. The best ones are right here.”

“Sit with me for a moment, Na’am.” Indel hoped the affectionate greeting would put them both at ease, but Nala still looked fearful. “It won’t be long.”

Two fat roots in hand, Nala stood and rested herself on the wall. She glanced at the barn now and then.

Despite the promise of being speedy, Indel found himself unable to speak.

Nala’s voice sounded weary when she said, “I made a mistake.”

Indel tried to put her mind at ease. “I think your injury to him caused the fast rejuvenation. He was terrified. We discovered the slug in time. So in a way, you did help him. If those scales had come in with that thing still attached to him...I don’t know if he would have survived.”

“Do not say that,” Nala pleaded. “I was dreadful.”

“But I understand why. I bear responsibility as well.”

Shaking her head, Nala muttered, “No.”

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“Yes. He was looking under himself because of that slug and you...mistook it for something else. So you struck him, as if you were striking yourself.”

Nala gave no reply and although Indel longed for a denial, he knew one was far off.

“So I ask you, do you hate him?”

A sharp shriek came from Nala’s throat as she clenched the roots in her fists.

“Do not say that.”

Indel muttered, “You give him less. You give Boon so much more than Crane. You give me more, yet you take half as much for yourself. You put Boon above all else. You refuse to recognize that Crane is a force of nature. He will be a strong king—”

“He’ll never be king!” Nala turned to him. “King of what? King of who? Who will follow a king with no tail?”

Indel had no answer at first, but one came with no forethought. “Crane is a Leveler king. The strongest I’ve ever heard of. Stronger than even me.”

“He has no tail.”

“It is shorter than most, yes.”

“He has no tail,” Nala growled.

Indel growled back, “He doesn’t need a tail.” They both glanced to the barn then quieted. Indel was calmer as he said, “You have no faith in him.”

“I want to protect him,” Nala said. “I want to protect him from taking on something beyond him. He’s overconfident and always goes beyond his limit, beyond his reach. I cover him up from others so no one will laugh at him. You want him to be king and try to mate and produce short-tailed offspring or worse yet, females see his tail and laugh or whisper and he’s forever known for ridicule. I want to protect him from that. So no, maybe I do not give him as much as Boon but it’s only because I don’t want him to forget how others will see him. He is not the same. He does not look the same and if he has Boon’s arrogance along with that important flaw, then he’ll live his life in pain, praying for respect and acceptance that will never come.”

Eyes fixed on the soil, Indel listened with practiced patience. He believed all that Nala said. He believed every word, but that didn’t help fight back the dread bubbling up inside him.

“You don’t know what it’s like,” Nala said. “You don’t know what it’s like hiding something about yourself that you can never change, can never hope to change. At nights while you slept beside me in your roost, I dreamt of jumping as high as others, swimming as fast. Of bearing young. I dreamt of being whole. And nothing will give me that again. If someone had reminded me from the start of what I was, I would not have dared dream it.”

The roots in hand, she picked at the leaves.

“The way you took me. The way you loved me, I went to your roost as proud as ever. I felt so bold and special. But I heard the whispers. And I heard the old tongue used to mock me. But it was too late to cover up, then. It was too late, and if you’d shunned me even a little, as you should have, I would have been spared that. And I am a mere female Summoner. What will that mean for a male Leveler?”

Indel said nothing. He sat there, feeling only brave enough to catch the hem of Nala’s robe without the Summoner noticing. He’d taken note of the taunts too, but they were never when Nala was in earshot. And he’d shut those Levelers up.

“And you say now you want him to be king? What if he can’t produce as much? A tail means the cycles continue. What if his cycles are less? What if he simply hasn’t many and exhausts the few he’s got?”

“He can go through the cycles,” Indel said. “He’s proven that today. His rejuvenation is fast and ravenous. He can survive. Of that I have no doubt because that is what just happened. He pushed through so quickly that no one could even see it. He is strong, and he is steady. He has power and he’s unafraid. He is a king, a true king.”

If Nala had a faster reply, it might have been less fretting.

The clicks that sounded in the back of her throat spoke of rage and betrayal.

“If you have any affection for me.... If you have even a small fraction of affection for me, you will not do this. You will not be so cruel to him. You will select Boon as king and be done with it.”

“Fear runs you,” Indel said. “It does not run me. I will make my decision when I am ready. In the meantime, you owe Crane an apology. A proper one. And you need to explain what happened.”

“Explain?” Nala met his gaze. “Explain how? And when he asks me how I came to the idea that he was romping with himself, should I explain that my own actions are why I know of this possibility?”

Indel nodded. “I understand but at least explain to him that he’d done nothing wrong.”

Nala returned his glare for some time until she slid from the fence and said, “He’s hungry. I must hurry to prepare the food.”

With a sigh, Indel followed after her. He wasn’t all that surprised when Nala entered the barn without saying a word to either of the boys. She made the food, and gave Crane so big a helping that he laughed.

“This is great. I don’t deserve it, Aza, but thank you.”

Nala nodded as she sat. When Boon tried to take some from Crane’s plate, Nala slapped Boon’s hand and said, “You have your own. Be satisfied with it. Leave Crane with something nice for once.”