The Crucible of the Dragon God

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'Wadaladalla!' the archer cried and span dramatically toward her, knife raised. Then — rather too theatrically, Kali thought, he suddenly leapt back and pointed at her wound, uttering a shocked variation on his usual cry that sounded like: 'Wululadadalula?'

The yazan stared where he pointed, and then moved forward to crowd around her.

What? Kali thought. What?

Had she suddenly grown a second head in her cleavage? Had the cloth come loose from her bits? Then she looked down to where Slowhand pointed, and gasped. She guessed that she'd never really thought too much about her recuperative abilities — just wondered at their presence — and, as a result, she'd never really studied them in action, but now she realised for the first time just how dramatic they were. Right in front of her eyes, the shallow wound that Slowhand had inflicted was sealing itself, healing in seconds.

Not for the first time, Kali thought, what am I?

But her concerns about her own abnormality were immediately replaced by a more pressing one. Namely, the implications of what had just happened for her current predicament. Slowhand had pulled a surprise card from up his sleeve, that was for sure, but the question was, how was he going to play it? Was he going to try to pass her off to these yazan as some kind of God? She sure as hells hoped not, because Twilight's mythology was littered with cautionary tales of why that kind of hubris was really, really not a good idea.

Slowly, she looked up at the faces of the yazan, and gasped again. For a second she wondered whether it was a trick of the light, but Slowhand's words seemed to suggest otherwise.

'That's why it had to be you, Hooper,' he said. 'Because you're different… like them.'

Her mind reeling, Kali was only dimly aware that the yazan were backing off, gesturing to Slowhand in a way she guessed meant 'release her'. But, as momentous as what she had just seen had been, something else niggled at her as Slowhand freed her from her chains.

'Hold on just one farking minute,' she said, and gestured at the pillar and chains and the hides that barely garbed her. 'If you knew this was going to save me, why didn't you just slice me when I was paralyzed. Why all this pantomime?'

Slowhand coughed. 'It was, erm, a tribal elder thing. Tradition. Yes, tradition.'

'Really? And which ones are the tribal elders, then?'

'The elders… yes,' Slowhand said, hesitantly. He moved his finger slowly round the cave and pointed at the yazan who stood near the entrance. 'They would beeeeeeeee… that lot over there.'

Kali folded her arms and tapped her foot. 'I see. They don't look very elderly to me.'

Slowhand paused. 'Yes, well. They like their elders, er, young.'

'It was you, wasn't it? The pillar, the chains, this costume. You said you wanted to do the sacrifice your way. Great Gods, you never miss a trick, do you? Hells, I'm surprised you didn't have me oiled.'

'They only had yuk fat.'

'You are a pervert, Killiam Slowhand.'

'I know! I can't help it!'

'Well, I can't help this.' Kali retorted. She booted him in the groin once more and, as the archer crumpled into a wheezing heap, turned and smiled at the yazan. 'Sorry. Tradition.'

The yazan accepting her as one of their own, now, Kali was permitted to leave the cave only to find herself in another, larger one. This appeared to be some gathering place for their people. Here, she found herself reunited with Aldrededor and Dolorosa who, despite their raised eyebrows at her garb, were, like the yazan themselves, comfortably seated around the fire whose glow she had seen from the pillar. She saw the reason for the shadowy altercations she had witnessed, too. The ex-pirates and the yazan were all gnawing heartily at chunks of roasted meat and, on occasion, some of the yazan tried to snatch Dolorosa's meat from her. The older woman was having none of it — as a rapidly unsheathed knife and a snarl proved — and, while Kali could appreciate her hunger after her ordeal, she found it quite disturbing how easily Dolorosa slipped into the tribal way of life. She smiled as the tall, thin woman winked at Slowhand as he hobbled in from the other cave, a greasy mass of dribble running down her chin.

Kali's smile faded, however, as she sat amongst the group, and it was replaced by a look of puzzlement. The yazan were different, all right. Human, yes, but sitting next to her was a man whose eyes were the colour of Long Night. Across from her, a woman whose skin was scaled as if her blood ran cold, and, next to her, another man whose skeleton, in places, grew outside his skin. She couldn't be sure but it looked as if one of them even had gills.

'Slowhand,' she whispered as the archer, maskless now, settled beside her, 'who are these people, what the hells is going on?'

'I don't know, but there are more like them, in caves all around here. Even some who are able to heal like you. Heal others, too. Believe me, I was in quite the mess when they brought me here.'

Kali looked at him, concerned, but found herself staring instead at his Endless Passion tattoo. Was it, she wondered, anything to do with the younger female yazan who was blowing kisses at him from across the fire?

'Oh dear,' she said, giving her a hard stare. 'Still, you certainly seem to have settled in.'

Slowhand harumphed, embarrassed. 'Yes, that. Look, I told you, Hooper, they were thinking of offing me. I, er, had to bond with them.'

'Bond with them? Right. And tell me, Killiam Slowhand, how many times, exactly, did you bond?'

'Hooper, it wasn't like that!' the archer protested, then reddened. 'Besides, she's… different too.'

'Pits, Slowhand, I leave you alone for a few weeks and suddenly you're setting up home with some tart with what, an extra orifi — ? Oh, no, don't tell me, I don't want to know. I mean, it just occurred to me, even that chant of theirs — that unka-chakka — is the opening to that pitsing song I hate isn't it? Isn't it!'

'So ever since I've been in a stupor, because of that lass named Kali Hoooooper…' Slowhand sang, and smiled. 'Truth is, Kal, I didn't feel much like coming down out of the mountains because what was the point? I thought you were dead.'

There was something in Slowhand's tone that made Kali falter. 'You're serious, aren't you?'

'Never more so.'

'I thought you might be dead too.'

'Well, I'm not,' Slowhand grinned. 'So… how you doing?'

'Oh, you know — shit!'

'Shit?'

'No, sorry, I…' Kali began and then trailed off.

Because, while Slowhand's unka-chakka had been nagging at her, something else had too. The name of the people they were with. The yazan, they called themselves. Despite her knowledge of ancient languages — elf, dwarf and human — she had never heard such a name before. There was, though, an elven word which was spelled differently but pronounced much the same. Only it wasn't a name, it was a description.

Yassan.

It meant changed.

She couldn't help but think of her own past, of how she had been found as a babe by Merrit Moon in that long lost and sealed Old Race site — and how different she had found herself to be in the time since. Just like the yassan. Neither she or the old man had ever found out where she had come from but could she have come from here? Was she really like them?

She shared her thoughts with Slowhand.

'Doubt it,' Slowhand said. 'There's a reason these people have never left the mountains, a reason their culture remains stagnated. Thing is, if they leave the mountains, they die.'