Jon Son-of-Jon, whose grandfather was Raul the Finder, snarled and spat, roaring in the face of the muutanti. Grimacing with rage, he hurled himself against his bonds, snapping like a wolf at the hideous man's throat.
The muutanti grinned evilly, his face splitting open like a suppurating blister to reveal a mouth of teeth like broken, brown-yellow columns. His rasping chuckle had the sound of a thousand years of rust being scraped from rough metal.
"It was a hearty chase. You are stronger than the others we have caught!" the muutanti said, licking his warty lips with a black tongue.
"I am Shinchireh! We do not fear muutanti," growled Jon Son-of-Jon, with the fury of his grandfather Raul in his voice. "Give me my sword, you hideous demon coward, fight for your life!"
Once again the muutanti laugh, a chuckle which devolved into a croaking fit of coughing. When he recovered, he drew in a deep breath, swelling his barrel-like chest to reveal disturbing keloid scars. "You are a wild one! We Sons of Batsha appreciate such a struggler. I assure you, you shall have a warrior's death."
A wretched muutanti, his face twisted into a strange knot with a babbling mouth, hobbled to his master's side. This was one of the barely functional, idiotic creatures who were born too weak to serve as warriors- it was common to use them as slaves and messengers, where true men would not do. The trembling creature began to stutteringly whisper a message to the larger muutanti.
Jon's aggressor turned from the slave-mutant with a pained expression across his ugly mask. "It is good news for you, manchild. You are not to be eaten yet (though I hunger greatly). We have a feast upon our hands!" A burly, bluish-skinned muutanti came forward and gagged Jon with a length of tarry rope.
Muutanti clustered about the jagged edge of the high rocks upon which they had gathered, to stare down at the grey path which the Ancient Ones had sliced through the mount. The peak was silent, the muutanti being hushed of their usual hootings and strange vocalizations. His sensitive ears picked out the distinctive pok-pok of lizards' paws against Ancient-stone, and the rumbling of bent wooden wheels. A human voice tunelessly droned a Yushani peasant prayer-song:
"Hey, Lord Sun, hey-ey-ey
Hey, Lord Sun, shine your rays upon my brow
Hey, Lord Sun, hey-ey-ey
Hey, Lord Sun, be friendly, oh God,
Hey, Lord Sun, hey-ey-ey
Hey, Lord Sun, don't let the muutanti eat me..."
Jon was up, out, whipping his hard and lean arms around the neck of the blue guard and crushing his spine with little sound. Panther-like, he crept towards the edge, where the muutanti had gathered stones and spears to fling down upon the traveler below.
"Hey, Lord Sun, my heart is for you
Hey, Lord Sun, my face is for you
Hey, Lord Sun, hey-ey-ey
Hey, Lord Sun, hey-ey-ey..."
Snap. A muutanti fell limply back against Jon's body with a stifled snarl, his head twisted too far sideways. Jon took a length of black metal from the fire, and held the glowing-hot end over the master-muutanti's head.
"Hey, Lord Sun, rise up, oh God
Hey, Lord Sun, hey-ey-ey..."
The song cut off with a high, sharp cry, and Jon heard the startled hiss of a pack-lizard as he hurled the broken-skulled muutanti over the edge. The line of monstrosities leapt into confused action- Jon was assaulted by feebly-flung stones, and thwacked with a spear's haft. With a bull-roar, he smashed in amidst them and took up a broken blade, whirling blood about him in a gory storm.
An old man's voice jabbered in an eastern tongue which Jon barely knew.
"Die, muutanti demon!" Jon roared.
In his mind, the grim voice of his grandfather Raul the Finder said:
In the ancient days, the Old Ones brought down fire from the sky to test the strength of men. This is the way that we forge swords out of shovels.
As he sank his fingers through the poxy eyes of a snarling muutanti, Jon bellowed his agreement to the hot sky.