Boab released a soft moan as he leaned his head against the cool scale-skin of his god. The wall of scale-skin seemed to burst from the snow-covered ice beneath his feet, continuing upwards many dozens of sed above his horns. Wandering where he was, Boab looked around for a leg, tentacle, or fin he recognized, but whenever he thought he might recognize something in the distance his vision swam, and his head throbbed something fierce.

Giving up Boab rested his head against his god’s side again, cool flesh against his feverish forehead gave him a moment's relief. As he rested eyes closed, he traced the outlines of the thick cartilage plates beneath the surface the off-white blubber-skin of his god. He still marveled at the size and thickness of each scale, years of proximity did nothing to take away from the awe in him whenever he tried to comprehend the size of the deity. Some scales were so large and ancient that the blubber-skin no longer stretched across, leaving patches of dark red scale-bone exposed. Each of these irregular holes was wreathed in a layer of dark purple inflamed flesh that shed large flakes of wet dead skin.

Leaning back Boab tied to spot the sun over the back of his god but the clouds were too thick and low this day to even guess where the sun may be. He wondered if the god’s spikes would be long enough to cut into the clouds above but no matter how he tried he couldn't get his eyes to focus enough to see.

The effort of straining his eyes had caused a fierce pain in his head, throbbing from behind his eyes all the way to the tips of his horns. Had it been long enough? He reached for his hukar at his waist, hands trembling with desperation and fear. Had he waited long enough?

The first time he had tested his gods’ powers he had been a boy of barely 15. Thinking on that first euphoric time, mind muddied by the fever and the need, he could almost feel the strength he had once commanded. A boy hardly in his teens he had been the only one of his tribe to survive the god’s patronage. And what did he do with it? He killed, and burned, and died a thousand times, by the end he returned to his tribe pushing a sled filled with the small corpse of a child and the scalp of every man woman and child from the Umbata tribe.

With a jolt Boab released the image of a tiny smiling corpse covered with a mat of blood, hair, and flesh from his mind’s eye. He must not have waited long enough. The visions only came when he could still feel his god's power. How long had it been? One day? Two? If this is how he was to feel with some power still within him would he die without it? Where was his hukar? Did any of it matter? In a moment of sobriety, he realized he was scratching his god with long broken talon like nails attached to wizened wrinkled liver spotted hands. What had happened to him? He remembered many of his early fights. Drinking deeply of his god he could rage and burn for days, leaving anyone who opposed him broken in the snow behind him. How long ago were those glory days? How long had it been since he last left the side of his god suckling like a deformed pup?

His head burned, not the cleansing fire of a god coursing through his body, but the burn of a man waking from a night cradling a skin of suka. His bones felt like they were made of ice. His skin crawled with tiny creatures stripping his skin from the flesh beneath.

He woke with a start reeling trying to stand up and run from the creatures tearing at his flesh. His body barely remembered which muscles were used to support his weight when he finally brought himself to his feet, he clutched his throbbing head as his weak legs gave out below him. As he fell, he cried out reaching for his god, hand grabbing the hilt of his hukar protruding from the wall of flesh in front of him. Unfortunately, this didn't stop his descent but did do a little to slow the fall, before the knife slipped out of his god. Boab fell to the ice crying out as his arm broke and twisted against the ice beneath him as he tried to stop his fall. Still holding onto his hukar with his good hand, he lay there sobbing to himself and cradling his broken arm. His cries were interrupted as he felt something warm trickle onto his head.

Blood.

He looked up, no longer caring about his age or brokenness, he saw the fat drop of blood drip from the long gash his hukar had left in his god's side.

He could have avoided it. Simply moved his head an inch away. The drop would have splashed harmless against the snow.

Moving closer and opening his mouth his last sober thought was "Has it been long enough?"

A single drop of copper tasting blood landed on his tongue. The fire spread from there as if he had tried to swallow a burning oil wick. Racing down his throat and filling his belly he screamed louder than any man he had killed in battle, louder than any woman whose children he tore apart in front of them. He screamed like a man burning from the inside out.

Just as he thought that he had finally tried his luck one too many times the fire passed leaving him with the low smolder that was all the blood blessed him with now. But even this is enough he thought to himself flexing his now whole again arm as he sat in the snow besides his god. Removing the many layers of hide and fur that covered him he bared his chest to the cold and enjoyed the glow of a low fire burning in his chest.

Taking stock of himself he ran his now youthful hands over his body, feeling the strength of the muscles pulsing slowly in rhythm with the light coming from his fire heart. Seeing the light of his fire heart radiate through his scale-skin he could trace the lines where the scales beneath his skin met by the bright red lines that seeped light through his pale white skin. Content with his strength he ran his hands through his scale-mane. Starting from the back of his head, between his horns, and flowing down to the base of his short tail in the back, completely covering neck and shoulders in the front. Long central scales made up the bulk of the mane on his back, each of these scales reached about half the length of his forearm and only a finger's breadth wide while many of the other scales covering his chest and neck were half as long but twice as wide and much thicker. Feeling the heat build within him Boab flexed his back raising his mane in what would usually be a threatening way, each scale lifted off his back making his mane look many times larger than it looked lying flat on his back. However, this served a different purpose for Boab. As his scales raised he became clouded by the steam released from beneath his scales as his body tried to vent some of the heat that was building inside.

Placing a small bone bowl to collect the drippings of blood he settled content leaning his back against the familiar cool scale-skin of his god. Closing his eyes as he let himself be taken by the visions of death and fire, he began humming a song his mother had sung to him as a boy. Picking up his hukar from the snow besides him he spent the next several days in a daze dipping his blade into the blood and licking it clean over and over again. He occasionally would eat fistfulls of snow to keep him alive, but he partook in no other sustenance besides the blood. He continued his ritual for three days till he began to feel the fire build to something even venting his scales wouldn't help. Then he knew he would have to stop lest he let his god’s fire take him that day.

So again he began to wait. At first there was no pain, just the great fire burning within his chest. But like any fire that burns too large it began spilling out of its confines in his fireheart, scorching every nerve in his body, leaving nothing but the pain of old burns his gods power left him. Burning, feverish, broken and crying softly to himself Boab repeated the same question over and over in his head till it began spilling from his mouth in a soft burble.

"Has it been long enough?"

"Has it been long enough?"

"Has it been long enough?