The Broken Knife

Playing with the pups was surprisingly enjoyable. A group of them would tumble over one another, growling and snapping, right up until they all fell asleep in a pile of puppy fuzz and tiny snores. Only a few were old enough to speak more than a word or two, but they seemed to understand when he told them to stay nearby, and though they were wary of him at first, they soon included him in their games.

He was actually drowsing with a pile of pups surrounding him and Li draped in a warm, sleepy loop around his neck when the bell rang for dinner. The pups immediately resumed their play battle, exactly as if they had never been asleep, and he chuckled as he picked a particularly exuberant male up by the scruff of the neck.

“No running off,” he told the pup gently. “You’re getting too far away.”

The pup wriggled wildly, then huffed a sigh and nodded. Kaz set him back down, smiling. When he looked up, he saw Nadi looking at him, her head tilted to one side as if trying to figure out the answer to a riddle. Kaz’s ears instantly drooped, and he reached up to cover Li with his hand.

Nadi shook her head. “You’re good with them. And you don’t seem too bad when you’re not worried about your fuergar.”

He let his tail wag, though he didn’t lift his ears. “Pups are fun. No pups in my tribe.”

She stared at him for a moment longer, then said, “This is your tribe now, and we have lots of pups. Too many.”

Shaking her head, she looked around at the puppies. “Many of these are orphans. I’ve been taking care of them, along with some of the older ones. They’ll be back in from gathering soon, and then we’ll all go to eat.”

Pups ate after the adults, which meant the den-mother also ate last. It was natural, since the adults couldn’t protect the young ones when they were starving, but Kaz had spent many, many nights curled up around a grumbling belly. He looked longingly in the direction everyone else was moving. Delicious smells drifted from that direction, and his stomach growled.

Nadi huffed a laugh. “Don’t worry, there’s plenty. We have to go further to find food on this level, but it’s so safe.” She shook her head. “We barely even need to send males to guard the gatherers now. The older pups can kill most things on their own, and the fuergar-”

Her eyes drifted to Li, and she snorted. “Even the strongest ones are like babies. And they run from the first sign of resistance.”

Kaz nodded, letting his ears perk up a bit. “Fuergar babies,” he agreed. “Cute.”

The female closed her eyes and rubbed her muzzle. “Listen to me, talking to a numb-mind. Nadi, you’ve been spending too much time alone with the puppies.”

Looking at Kaz again, she told him, “Stay near me tonight. I’ll have to send you out with the gatherers tomorrow, but if you don’t do well, maybe they’ll let me make you my assistant. You’re big, and we lost so many warriors in the vara… They’ll want to take you, but if you’re no good, it’s a possibility.”

Her eyes narrowed on him, and she said slowly, “Do you understand, Kaz? Tomorrow, you gather, but don’t be too good at it, all right? It’s okay to just hang back and watch.”

Kaz’s tail wagged. “I can just watch.”

She patted him. “That’s right. Just watch.”

=+=+=+=

Dinner was good. They were served a rich stew of meat, mushrooms, and well-seasoned lichen. Some kind of thickener, possibly weiba powder, was used to create a dense consistency that sat warm and heavy in his empty belly, making him want to fall asleep.

The older pups were hungry too, and cautious of the newcomer, so they all sat in near-silence as they ate, until the smallest of the gatherers, a female of perhaps eight years, finally asked, “Why do you have a fuergar?”

Kaz half-turned away from her, shifting so his body blocked her view of Li. “Friend,” he said, letting a bit of his stew dribble from his mouth.

The little female stared at him, blinking, until Nadi said, “Kaz is a numb-mind, Yumi. Do you remember what I told you?”

Yumi’s lip curled slightly. “Yes. But why does he have a fuergar?”

Nadi sighed. “Jek brought one back a few years ago, too. So did Pim.”

Yumi held up a finger. “Pim’s bit me!”

“And you ate it,” Nadi reminded her.

The female pup turned a contemplative gaze on Li, and Kaz hunched away from her, covering the little dragon protectively.

“It didn’t taste good raw,” Yumi finally pronounced, and that seemed to be that. Conversation turned instead to what they had gathered that day, and what might happen with the Blackbows. Not many of the pups really seemed to understand the situation, but Kaz was able to glean a bit more information about what had driven the Stoneborn from the mid-levels.

Apparently, a powerful tribe called the Bronzearms had recently come up from the Deep. Like most Deep tribes, they believed themselves better than those who lived higher in the mountain, but this tribe seemed to have the strength and numbers to enforce that belief. What could possibly have forced such a strong tribe to flee the Deep was something the Bronzearms refused to speak about, but there were whispers that they had made one of the most powerful tribes angry by refusing to give them something they wanted.

Unfortunately, the Bronzearm tribe had decided that if they could no longer live in the Deep, they would dominate the mid-levels. The best way to control any territory was by taking over the stairs and passages between, which they began to do, spreading like a particularly virulent patch of fulan, a rot that could infect many types of moss and lichen.

The Bronzearms called luegat on several tribes at the same time, a thing the pups talked about with hushed amazement. They won every battle, too, causing the losers to flee ever higher. Eventually, when no one would accept their luegat any longer, they simply declared vara, which was what had happened to the Stoneborn. Many of their adults, male and female alike, had died protecting the retreating tribe, and though they were still powerful for the upper levels, they hadn’t been able to maintain a pawhold in the mid-levels.

Nadi called a halt to this talk when several of the little pups began to whimper, emitting the little howls that they used when calling for their parents. Gathering these up, she cuddled them close, petting them until they calmed, while the older ones returned to a discussion of the difference in taste between various mushrooms. Somehow, even this devolved into an argument, which Nadi stopped after a large green male pinned a smaller peridot one to the ground.

Finally, the evening bell rang, and Nadi sent all the pups with families home with a relieved sigh. There were still almost a dozen pups left after the others had gone, however, of which the eldest was Yumi. The female pup still seemed fascinated by Li, and she crept closer to Kaz every time he looked away. He was fairly certain that only his height was keeping her from grabbing for the dragonling, so he made sure to stand as stiff and tall as he could while he followed Nadi to where they would sleep for the night.

Their hut was among the ones that hadn’t been finished yet, and as they drew closer, he could see why. It seemed that the Stoneborn had been taken at least partially unaware by the attack of the Bronzearms, and had to leave many of the larger bones and pieces of leather behind. The low walls were made of a pieced-together patchwork of smaller scraps of leather, but it kept the pups corralled well enough that Nadi could sleep without worrying that her young charges would escape. The top was left completely open, however, so none of them would have any privacy that night.

Pilik, the male who had sent Kaz to Nadi, stopped by, and the two adults stepped far enough away that Kaz, greatly daring, had to push power into his ears so he could eavesdrop on their conversation. They were obviously discussing him, since they kept casting glances in his direction, and he needed to know if they suspected he might be something other than what he appeared.

“Are you certain?” Pilik asked.

Nadi tilted her head. “He’s definitely odd. I’ve never met a numb-mind who can seem so normal one minute, and so much like a puppy the next. He does well until someone asks about his fuergar, and then-” She shrugged.

Pilik looked toward Kaz, lip lifting from his teeth. “You’re too soft. You should just kill it. If he’s really a numb-mind, he’ll forget all about it in a week. We need more warriors, not more pups to care for.”

Nadi glanced around, then laid a hand on Pilik’s arm. Kaz blinked. It was clear the two weren’t mated, or they would be wearing matching necklaces. Nadi shouldn’t even be standing as close as she was, much less touching the male.

“Trust me, Pilik. You remember Kir. I was too young to protect him, and he died on his spirit hunt. I don’t want that to happen again. This pup could still benefit the tribe, if we just accept what he is and isn’t able to do.”

Pilik stared down at the hand on his arm, then shifted a half step away, sliding out of her grasp, though he didn’t say anything. Finally, he sighed. “I’ll do what I can. He’s just an abandoned pup. He’ll be forgotten in a day or two, if he doesn’t attract attention to himself.”

Nadi’s tail wagged gently. “Thank you, Pilik.”

The tall male bowed, a little deeper than he should to such a low-ranking female. “Bright howls, Nadi.”

“Bright howls,” Nadi said, and watched as Pilik walked back toward the densest gathering of huts.

Kaz, who was already lying on the ground surrounded by heaps of snoring pups, blinked up at her as she returned, opening and closing the half-finished door with a soft thump. Nadi crouched down beside him, reaching out and running gentle fingers over the thick lock of fur between his ears.

“Remember,” she murmured, “just watch tomorrow.”

He nodded, and she slipped away, extinguishing the dim light that rode the leather bracelet wrapped around her wrist. He heard her lie down nearby, and a few of the pups rolled in her direction, tossing out tiny hands as if they wanted to be sure she was there, even in their sleep. Tentatively, Kaz reached out and stroked one just like Nadi had petted him, and the young male whimpered and reached up to touch his hand.

It was strange. Kaz’s tribe had been so small for so long, with few pups and a constantly dwindling number of adults. It seemed like everyone he had ever cared about had died or been traded, except for Katri and Rega. Thanks to Oda’s near-complete lack of interest in him, he couldn’t remember the last time she’d touched him. Once Katri got old enough to understand the difference between his status and hers, she had stopped sleeping beside him, and rarely touched him except to nip or pull at his ears when he didn’t follow her instructions quickly enough.

Rega was the one who had held him when he whined, told him stories, and played with him. She had been den-mother, in spite of her strength, because she liked the pups, and no one else had time for any of the young kobolds except their own offspring. Looking back, Kaz could see that she had spent more time and attention on him than any of the others, including the females, including Katri, and he wondered why. Had she simply liked him, felt sorry for him perhaps? Or had she truly sensed something different about him, something she wanted to protect?

His fingers twitched toward his pack. He desperately wanted to dig out the knives again, examine them more closely. An image of the page of the chief’s book Katri had been looking at back in the Longtooth den flashed through his mind, and he closed his eyes, trying to hold onto the memory of the runes scrawled on the vellum. He would have to ask Lianhua about them. If he ever saw the human female again.

He felt Li shift on his neck, sensing the worry that flooded through him. He hoped Lianhua was well, and that she would be able to convince the others to wait for him. He could stay with the Stoneborns, who seemed willing enough to take him in, but he didn’t want to.

Kaz wanted to know. He wanted to understand why he was different. What he could do. Why Rega had given him the knives, and what they meant. He didn’t know if his link with the dragon was changing him, or if it was simply part of leaving his tribe and traveling with the humans, but something in him was shifting, and he was no longer content to live the life of a simple kobold male, trapped in the web of expectations that surrounded him.

Li trilled softly, and a tired sense of pleasure flowed through their bond. It seemed the dragon, at least, appreciated the paths his thoughts had taken. Dimly, he sensed a pulse of energy, and a picture surrounded him.

Blue. Blue as far as he could see. Wind rushed over his scales, and his muscles flexed as powerful wings beat a lazy rhythm. High above, a pure golden light gleamed down, warming his flesh. He flew through a sky the dragonling had never seen, and Kaz had only glimpsed out of the mouth of the dragon’s cave. He was light, like he’d borne the weight of the entire mountain, never aware, but always present, and had finally shed it like an outgrown skin.

It was perfect, and as he tumbled into sleep, he thought he could fly forever.