The lizard did not know how long Master Sai led them through the blighted forests and monster-infested caverns of the Shadowed Vale. The sun did not shine there, and time seemed to pass in fits and starts within the nightmare anyway. Master Sai was looking for a way out, and the only way he knew to find one was to search every corner of the entire Vale. The Vale wasn't terribly large in the grand scheme of things. Slaughter Canyon probably wasn't much more than half a kilometer long. But no path in the Vale ran straight; the opening of the canyon and the raising of the mountains had broken the ground, and improbable outcrops and gullies made travel slow at best.

  The orc had not told the lizard any of this, of course. Not even his name. But the mental shackles that bound them passed information as well as commands. Once the lizard realized he could listen in to the orc's active thoughts through the shackles, he'd stopped fighting against them so much. Not entirely. He still wanted to tell the orc he would follow without the shackles. That he wanted out of this place just as much as the orc did, and he knew their best chance was to do it together.

  But the orc couldn't hear him. Or, perhaps, wouldn't.

  The oddest tidbit that the lizard picked up through the shackles was his own name. Or, at least, the name the orc thought when he was issuing his commands. He never said the name aloud. He never spoke any name for the lizard except "slave." But when he was thinking about the lizard, he was thinking about Nichalchihuitl.

  The lizard understood the name; it was a fairly basic Draconic name meaning "He with Legs of Jade." But the lizard could not understand why the orc would associate that name with him. For one thing, he was quite red, from the crown of his draconic head to the tips of his reptilian feet, and that definitely included his very non-green legs. His primary scales were a rich maroon, and the larger plates that ran from his chin, down his torso, through his legs, and along the underside of his heavy tail could charitably be called dark pink. The name didn't register in the lizard's own memory either. But it was the name Master Sai had given him, and, since he had no better options in mind, it was the name he had decided to think of as his own.

  On one of their trips back to Somber Tune, Master Sai took them back into the egg chamber to ask Coatl-ome what she knew about the Eternal Nightmare's stars.

  "We're not friends, Wulfgar," Coatl-ome spat. But then she put down her work and turned on her stool to face the lizard. "But speaking of friends," she said, "you've kept that one around for a while now."

  "It's reliable," said Master Sai, considering the lizard. "Sit."

  The lizard took a seat at the table. Both Master Sai and Coatl-ome watched him. Which felt awkward, but he couldn't speak.

  "I never liked the quezpalli," Coatl-ome said. She flicked her tongue at the lizard. “Too independent for my taste. It's best to keep them tightly shackled."

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  "You're not shackled," said Master Sai. He did not take his eyes off the lizard.

  Which meant he did not see Coatl-ome clench her fists. "I," she said in a controlled voice, "am not a quezpal."

  "You never liked that the lizards were children of the Abriasha instead of children of Syn like the other wyrmkin," Master Sai said. Still he stared at the lizard, and the lizard could do nothing but stare back. "That they had the capability for true independence."

  "It was theft," Coatl-ome said with a snort. Faint wisps of smoke trailed from her nostrils. "We sacrificed blood and the unhatched to create weapons of war so we could avoid extinction at your kind's hands." She jabbed a talon towards the lizard. "Instead we got rebellious children."

  Master Sai wandered around the table and stood directly behind the lizard. The lizard could feel him there but couldn't tell what he was doing. He struggled against the shackles. "I never understood while Anitle didn't kill me when he had the chance," said Master Sai. The lizard paused its mental thrashing. Who was Anitle? And why would somebody be named "Nothing?" But Master Sai continued speaking, his voice meandering, without focus. "From the very first time I freed him from his shackles, he called me master. He stayed with me until he finally got himself killed trying to protect me. Always tried to look out for me, in his own way."

  Coatl-ome looked past the lizard to where Master Sai was standing. Her eyes were narrow. "You seem very lucid today," she said slowly.

  "I can't understand why anybody would care about me," Master Sai said. The shackles felt very loose for some reason.

  But the lizard did not try to break them. He tried instead to tell Master Sai that he cared. That he understood the orc's desire to be free.

  "Wake up," Master Sai commanded, and the shackles fell away.

  The lizard gasped. His thoughts, free of their chains, raced. He couldn't keep up. He turned around and looked down at Master Sai. The orc looked back up at him. He should say something. He knew words. But how were they supposed to be put together? And how did he make them come out of his mouth? "…Thank you," he stuttered.

  "You will help me escape," said Master Sai. "And you will be free of Syn in return."

  The lizard nodded. "I will serve, Master," he said, still stumbling over speech.

  "What's your name?" Master Sai asked.

  "I thought research subjects didn't have names," said Coatl-ome. She sounded very bitter.

  The lizard cocked his head at Master Sai. Did the orc really not know his name? "Nichalchihuitl," said the lizard.

  Coatl-ome groaned. "You named it 'Green Legs' again," she said. "This one's not even green!"

  "I'll call you Nichal," said Master Sai.

  "Thank you, Master," said Nichal. "It is a good name."

  Coatl-ome snorted again. Nichal thought he almost saw flames that time. "It can have the bed in the back, I guess," she said. "Since I expect you're going to abandon him at some point."

  Nichal frowned at the Great One, but Master Sai didn't seem to care about what she'd just said. "Good," said the orc. "Now. We have to use this broken compass to find the token the Eldritch One needs to make a bomb to summon the tunnel out of this place from the future. You hold the compass."

  Nichal blinked at the simple, shiny compass Master Sai held out to him. He understood all the words that Master Sai had just said—at least, he thought he did—but they didn't seem to make sense in the way the orc was using them. Nichal glanced over at Coatl-ome, eyes wide, but the golden lizard just sighed and bowed her head. Nichal swallowed. "Of course, Master," he said. "I will follow anywhere."

  He needed to get better at words, especially if he wanted to have any hope of understanding what in Serinor Master Sai was talking about.