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Race: Draconian

Bloodline Powers: Improved Strength+, Rending, Firebreath+

Greater Mysteries: Fire (Noble) 6, Wind (Noble) 4, Sound (Advanced) 2

Lesser Mysteries: Heat 4, Oxygen 4, Embers 4, Pressure 4, Current/Flow 4

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Wind rushed and swirled down the hillside, touching every rock and blade of grass as it brushed past Samazzar. He let out a breath, feeling the warmth cloud the air through his magic before it was blown away with the next gust.

“How much further is this dirt gulch?” Paklen asked from Samazzar’s side, her spear balanced across her shoulder. “We’ve already camped once and it’s almost noon. If we don’t arrive soon, that means we might be stuck out here for another night. The Crone only gave us 3 days worth of food. I doubt the rest of the kobolds will be happy about having to miss supper.”

“No one is missing anything,” Samazzar replied. “If we do end up having to spend another night, there are three rabbits hiding in the grass on this hillside right now. There’s also at least one pheasant and a fox, but they’re far enough away that I’d have to spend some time sneaking up on them to bring them down.”

“Hear that,” Paklen said cheerfully over her shoulder to the rest of the kobolds. “Samazzar says that there’s plenty of food and that we won’t go hungry!”

He glanced over his shoulder. Tarxis looked miserable, holding his spear in both hands while he tried to keep an eye on the hillside and the sky simultaneously. Behind him, another two kobolds wandered along aimlessly, their bows unstrung.

“Plus,” Samazzar remarked, “We’re already there.”

“Isn’t that right,” he continued, swiveling his head around to lock his gaze on a clump of grass. “You can come out any time now. You aren’t fooling anyone.”

The grass shifted and a kobold popped its head out of a hole in the ground, quavering slightly. Ordinarily, no one would have been able to spot the depression without actually poking around in the foliage, but unfortunately for the petrified scout its hiding spot was as effective as a bonfire at hiding itself from Samazzar’s senses. The creature’s body heat and the hole itself screamed at him from the otherwise uniform and natural landscape.

“Aren’t you supposed to blow that?” Samazzar asked gently, nodding at the animal horn clutched in the creature’s shaking hands. “There is a war party approaching your tribe after all.”

The kobold gulped. She nodded nervously, clutching the horn to her chest.

“Go ahead,” he said, crossing his arms. “I’m not going to stop you. We will wait right here to confront your chief.”

“Little dragon,” Paklen interjected uncertainly. “I know that you’re the chief and all, but I’m wondering how many raids you’ve been on. Usually if you have the element of surprise you don’t let the enemy’s scouts warn them that you’re attacking. It kinda defeats the entire purpose of a sneak attack.”

“Dragons do not sneak,” Samazzar replied. “We go where we want, take what we want and do what we want. Right now, I want the dirt gulch tribe’s undivided attention. Our new friend is going to do all of us a favor and give us that attention.”

“Isn’t that right?” He prodded, giving the scout a toothy smile. “You are going to cooperate and summon reinforcements, aren’t you?”

She licked her lips once, shivering like a leaf in a gale before she brought the horn to her mouth. The sound of the horn wasn’t anything impressive. More a loud grunt than anything, but Samazzar could feel it echoing through the nearby hills.

Most importantly, a half league away, near the bottom of a dry riverbed, he could hear answering sounds. Shouts and thuds as large clods of dirt fell away, revealing a trio of burrows dug into the dirt. Kobolds began to pour out grabbing crude weapons as their warriors readied themselves.

“Suit yourself,” Paklen replied with a shrug, planting the butt of her spear into the ground and leaning on it. “I think this is all a terrible idea, but you’re the chief. If you want to fight an entire tribe with only the five of us, I guess that’s your call.”

“The four of you won’t be needed,” Samazzar said, unmoved. The first of the defending kobolds were scrambling over the edge of the gulch. Just as he thought, they were armed with little more than sticks and slings.

“Other than their shaman and chief,” he continued evenly, “they can’t even harm me. Unless they have used an elixir, a kobold doesn’t have the muscle to damage me through my scales with a club. As for the slings? Those are intriguing weapons, but absolutely useless against a wind practitioner. No, the four of you are here so that we can call this conflict a battle rather than what it actually is, me overpowering the entire tribe on my own.”

Paklen rolled her eyes.

“You certainly have the arrogance of a dragon, I’ll give you that Samazzar.”

More of the defending kobolds were running toward them, slowing as they approached the interlopers. The new arrivals shared confused glances as they approached, unsure as to the situation, but unwilling to be the first person to attack the draconian that towered over them.

Samazzar’s head jerked up. A much bigger kobold, almost to his shoulders, led a pair of smaller, robed companions up the river bank. One clothed individual had their robes dyed a crude red while the other was a more earthy brown. Unlike the rest of the nervous and disorganized band, the three new arrivals were moving at a slow, measured pace.

The red robed kobolds held a lantern in his right hand. Samazzar could feel the tiny flickering candle flame hiding inside its carefully polished and maintained metal frame. Around the iron and clouded glass, the mystery of fire swirled, ready to expand the oxygen and grab hold of the flickering light at moments notice.

A practitioner. The chief had brought his shamans.

He smiled at the approaching trio, baring enough teeth to intimidate the smaller reptiles around him. Samazzar reached out with his mind, battering his way through the shaman’s understanding of the mystery of fire and moving the oxygen away from the quietly burning wick.

Samazzar couldn’t outright crush the fire yet. He was still four baptisms away from that level of mastery. Still, he had the ability to grow or diminish the mystery, and fire needed fuel to live and oxygen to breathe.

The practitioner glanced down at his lantern in horror before locking gazes with Samazzar. The flame snuffed out.

Immediately, the shaman began whispering to the taller kobold. Samazzar tapped the mystery of sound, eyes losing a hint of focus as he turned in to their conversation.

“-practioner!” the red robed figure hissed. “Given how far away he was when he overwhelmed me, he has to be an acolyte at the very least, but I don’t see him carrying a lantern.”

“And that would mean that he’s either overly confident or a magus,” the leader replied grimly.

“Or both,” the shorter brown robed female chimed in. “For what it’s worth, I haven’t felt him touch the power of soil. He might be able to overwhelm Zallin, but I should be able to use my magic freely.”

“Against an acolyte or a magus?” The red robed kobold, Zallin asked incredulously. “Soil is an advanced mystery while fire is noble. You could certainly help in a battle, but the ability to shift dirt and drop him into a hole won’t do much if he can simply start all three of us on fire with his mind. It simply won’t work fast enough.”

“I’m a magus by the way,” Samazzar called out to the hurriedly whispering trio as they reached the halfway point from the river bed. “At least in fire. I hope that answers all of the questions you’re asking each other right now.”

The ten ordinary kobolds shifted a step back, bringing their sticks and slings up defensively as if the draconian was going to pounce on them and begin shoving the smaller reptiles into his mouth.

“See!” Zallin hissed. “A magus! If he was the same size as us, the two of us working together might be able to bring him down, but as things stand, he can use his magic to keep us on the defensive while he stomps over and rips our arms from our sockets.”

“The warriors behind him are wielding iron weapons and wearing leather armor,” the chief replied unhappily. “I have my sword, but no one else in our tribe has weapons that can match them. Unless our slingers can take their warriors down before they reach us, we are in for a tough battle.”

Samazzar doubled his smile. Even though his group was outnumbered over two to one, the defending kobolds began chattering nervously amongst themselves. More than one glanced over their shoulders, looking for the easiest route of escape if things were to go south.

Finally the chief arrived. He met Samazzar’s eyes defiantly, and mentally Samazzar raised his estimation of the kobold a notch.

The man wore a shortsword in a crude scabbard on his back. The blade wasn’t terribly sharp or new, but it had been lovingly maintained, rust routinely scrubbed clean and coated in animal grease until it shown in the sunlight.

At his side, the soil practitioner squared her tiny shoulders. Samazzar’s previous display had cowed Zellin, but she didn’t seem to mind. Rather, he could feel the dust in the air around her moving unnaturally. It wasn’t quite a defensive barrier, but at the same time, he suspected that any attempt to attack the young kobold would lead to a blinding sandstorm.

He waved his hand, pushing the dirt away with a gust of wind. She didn’t give up, instead clenching her jaw and drawing more dirt from the ground up into the air, readying her magic again.

“Allow me to introduce myself,” Samazzar said, willing the wind to continually blow away the dirt and grit while he talked. “My name is Samazzar and I am the ruler of a nearby kobold tribe. I am here to challenge your chief for the leadership of this tribe. I don’t particularly want to hurt anyone, but if you force me to, you will find that I am more than capable of violence.”

The chief ambled up to Samazzer, leaving both of the practitioners with the rest of the tribe’s warriors. He was tall for a kobold, almost as tall as the average human. Samazzar still towered over him, but compared to the rest of the kobolds, he was notably larger and stronger.

“I take it you are the chief of this tribe?” Samazzar asked politely.

“I reckon I am,” the kobold drawled, making no effort to draw his sword. “You say you’re here to challenge me to a fight, but the way I see it, the rite of challenge is reserved for a kobold from the same tribe. You look a might bit tall to be a kobold, and last I remember, there wasn’t nobody that looked like you in our tribe. Doubt you’d even fit in one of our burrows.”

Samazzar simply stared at him, reaching out with his will to summon a ball of flame into being above the opposing warriors. His mind wrapped itself around the fire, splitting it into twelve fistsized spheres that flew quietly through the air until they were hovering above the two practitioners and ten ordinary defenders.

“I think that the rule of challenge applies to me because I want it to apply to me,” Samazzar replied, barely keeping the strain from his voice.

That was the problem with becoming a magus. He could create fire from nothing, but doing so taxed his focus more than manipulated an entire inferno. It was a useful trick to gain an advantage over an enemy, but if Samazzar wanted to use it more than a couple times in a conflict, he would have to double his efforts at training his willpower.

But the kobold chief didn’t know that. All he could see was a draconian towering over him controlling a dozen spells at once.

“I suppose it does apply to you,” the chief said calmly, turning slightly to look at his warriors. All of them had dropped their weapons, and other than the two practitioners their eyes were as wide as dinner plates.

“I’m just wondering why you want to rule our tribe,” he continued. “We don’t have much, and what extra we have is traded to the forest folk so that they can pay tribute to the orcs. If you already have a tribe, it seems like staying here to manage us would be a lot more trouble than it’s worth.”

“I don’t plan on staying here,” Samazzar replied. “I plan on having your tribe follow me back to our caves. There is plenty of room for more kobolds, but that’s only the beginning.”

“I’m building a city.” His eyes gleamed, almost outshining the flames under his control. “I’ve been to human lands, and what they’ve accomplished is breathtaking. Wealth and luxuries that you can only imagine line the streets, and all but the poorest peasants go to warm beds each night with full bellies. All because they work together and learn skills.”

“Erecting walls, planting crops, brewing potions, and forging steel.” Samazzar could feel the zeal building, but he made no effort to stop. “My siblings and I have learned those secrets and more. I want to create a world where every kobold is full and healthy so that they can pursue the mysteries and the secrets of their bloodline.”

“Beyond our blood, we may not be a noble people with a storied history, but kobolds have potential. No one expects anything from us because we’ve never been given a chance to succeed, but I know that if I am given a chance, I can create a society that rivals anything in the human lands.”

The chief sighed, he reached up with a claw, causing all of the kobolds behind Samazzar to tense up and ready their weapons

“That’s all fine and good,” the kobold chief replied, “but you need more than a dream. You say that you have learned how to farm? My people farm a little. The problem with farming is that it’s slow. Will you have enough food to keep the kobolds you gather alive? Medicine? I don’t know if you are aware, but if too many kobolds start living in the same burrow, they all get sick. Even if you can keep us all healthy, how will you keep them safe from the hunting cats that patrol the mountains?”

“You’re strong,” he continued with a shrug, “but I don’t know how well you’ve thought all of this out. There’s more to leadership than just being able to start people on fire with your mind.”

“Chief Barsa,” Zallin called out nervously, his eyes glued to the ball of fire hovering in front of his face. “In many tribes, being able to start people on fire with your mind is all that it takes to be the chief. Especially if you’re strong enough to grab the other contenders but the ankle and dash them against the ground until they stop moving. That’s also a fairly common and impressive power move.”

“Aye,” Barsa responded laconically, not bothering to look at his shaman. “He’s big and he’s strong, no doubt about that, but it sounds like he’s dreaming bigger than the usual warlord.”

“I’d like to think so,” Samazzar replied thoughtfully. “I can assure you that my first action was to build defenses that would keep my people safe from mountain lions and storm crows. I have taken some steps toward solving the rest of your concerns. Our crops are already planted and they will be ready to harvest soon. If there is a food shortage, we will hunt the rats of the great depths and the game of the forest to make up the difference. As for illness? I am far from an expert, but I’ve learned a bit about sanitation. On top of that, our tribe has at least two alchemists. We should be able to brew remedies for any common malady.”

The chief stared at him for a couple of seconds. Not speaking as he looked Samazzar up and down. Finally, the big kobold broke his stony expression grinning back at him.

“Y’know, I never caught your name,” He began.

“Samazzar.”

“Samazzar,” the chief replied, nodding slightly. “Good kobold name. Anyway Samazzar, I didn’t have a chance to bring it up, but I have a bloodline gift too. Nothing that will let me win a sword fight or climb the tallest mountain, but still something that I’ve found more useful than anything that straightforward.”

“Oh?” Samazzar replied, his interest piqued.

“You see Samazzar,” Barsa continued. “I have a dragon’s eye for treasure. It helped me find my sword buried in the dirt under an old battle site as well as a couple nuggets of gold, but it’s so much more useful than that.”

He pointed at Samazzar, grin widening.

“The ability thinks of people as resources too. It’s a lot less precise, but I can get a vague feeling for talent and ability just by looking at someone, and right now boy, you’re shining like the sun.”

“Then I take it your tribe will be joining mine without a fight?” Samazzar asked, mind reeling as he thought through the implications of Barsa’s ability.

“Now, now” the chief replied, hold up both of his claws as he motioned for Samazzar to slow down. “No chief has ever given up his tribe without some sort of contest, and I don’t intend to be the first.”

A frown clouded Samazzar’s face as he loomed over the smaller kobold. The fires in front of the rest of the tribe flared, doubling in size and brightness in an instant as he lost some of his iron control over them.

“None of that,” Barsa assured soothingly. “Way I figure it, you’ve already proven the power of your magic so there’s no need for you to challenge Zallin as shaman.”

“I agree!” The fire practitioner called out. “I am suitably impressed. Samazzar’s control of the mystery of fire is ten times what I am capable of. Please don’t kill me.”

“As for me,” the chief continued, “I don’t know that we need to actually fight or something. That seems wasteful. Still, there should be a contest of strength to prove you’re capable of wresting the tribe from my claws.”

“Oh?” Samazzar asked, letting the balls of flame in front of the rest of the tribe disappear as he crossed his arms in front of his chest. Almost immediately the mental strain of maintaining so much magic at once disappeared.

Basra grinned again.

“How about we arm wrestle for it?”