Twenty-Two: Mali Dance

Lilith’s defiance was doomed, a candle guttering in a mountain wind.

The Little White Dragon’s role as the Coining Festival’s opening act was set in stone; unless calamity struck in Lamter, she’d still have to take the stage and dance, even if she didn’t want it a thousand times over.

She’d never learned to dance, in her last world or this one. Lilith and dance were oil and water; ask her to dance and she’d sooner draw the Ancient Ark and give you a sword dance.

In short, beyond a strong body and some natural flexibility, the Little White Dragon was a raw stone, no different from a total beginner.

So when Nidhogg led Lilith to the Mali Church at the foot of the Holy Mountain, dread pooled in her gut like cold rain, and she felt like a convict marched to the scaffold, ready to keep Louis XVI company under the blade.

“Do I really have to learn to dance?” she asked at the doorway, her voice a brittle reed, hoping Nidhogg would suddenly discover a talent that bloomed in an instant and spare her.

“If you’ve studied elven traditional dance or the orcish Druids’ ritual dances, I can apply to exempt you from training,” Nidhogg said, his words as flat as carved slate. The sound made Lilith droop like a rain-soaked pup.

“Fine,” the Little White Dragon murmured, eyes lowered, resentment pooling like ink.

Her last bit of struggle failed like a wave on rock; she swallowed her shame like bitter tea and followed Nidhogg into the Mali Church.

She had pictured uniform, rank-heavy, eerie garb, like the Void Sect she’d seen in Morris, dark purple capes fluttering like night wings.

Instead, the Mali Church’s members wore everyday clothes, and without Nidhogg murmuring names in her ear like a guide-wind, the Little White Dragon would’ve thought she’d wandered into a market.

In fact, it felt like a market, with elves and outsiders trading in small knots, coins flashing like fish scales as they bartered.

“Is this really a church?” she asked, stunned, her mind a map that didn’t fit the terrain.

“Of course,” Nidhogg said, easy as street chatter. “Mali is the god of the marketplace. She doesn’t load her followers with odd rules. Only classical old-timers love dusty scrolls of regulations.”

More terms tumbled from his mouth like pebbles, and fog drifted over Lilith’s mind, but she didn’t ask—if Nidhogg didn’t offer it, there was a reason carved in stone.

“Besides, elves are free and open by nature, like wind through pines, the opposite of humanity’s conservatism,” he went on. “Mali truly doesn’t mind traders everywhere in her temple; she welcomes trade as a stand-in for devotion.”

“But she won’t tolerate other activities in her commercial zones; gods are gods, and quirks cling like incense smoke,” Nidhogg muttered, voice lowered like a secret in the alley.

“Oh,” Lilith said, nodding, her understanding still wrapped in mist.

“Alright, we’re here. This is your instructor for the coming weeks—Rand, one of Lamter’s finest dancers,” Nidhogg announced, words pointing like a fingerpost.

Lost in tales of the mythic age, she hadn’t noticed they’d reached the practice hall, where a slender elf stood like a young spruce, his face cut clean as a leaf.

“Hello,” she said, careful as a cat on snow; dragons don’t call someone “teacher” lightly, so after a long pause she settled for a dry greeting, like a sip of plain water.

“Hello,” the elf replied, turning to face her and studying her with his one remaining eye, while a black eyepatch covered the other like night over a moon. The weight of his gaze seemed to seep from the patch like a hidden star, and the bare eye felt blind, cold as stone.

“Good stock—have you trained in dance before?” he asked, words neat as trimmed grass.

Lilith shook her head, and he nodded as if he’d known, a pine bowing to the wind without surprise.

“I know the habits of dragonkind; just call me Rand, honorifics as you wish. The Coining Festival begins soon. Until the day before it starts, you’ll report here. I’ll pour my knowledge into you like water into a jar, enough that you won’t shame yourself—or Lamter—on that stage.”

His tone was firm, like a drumbeat, and shame was the last taste Lilith wanted to swallow. Since she couldn’t dodge dance, she listened hard, etching each word into her heart like ink on bark.

“Before we start today’s practice, I’ll give you a brief introduction to Mali Dance,” he said, clearing his throat like a flute warming. “I won’t dwell on how the Mali faith spread through Lamter; today we’ll talk about how Mali Dance, that emblem, evolved here like a river changing its course.”

“Modern Mali Dance—the version I’m about to teach—differs greatly from the style that first reached Lamter,” Rand said, like two branches from the same tree. “The present form leans closer to the Druids’ ritual dances, the prayers they offer to nature.” “It grew from Lamter’s elves, who hunted and gathered for ages—once we prayed to the God of Mountains for food and peace, now we pray to Mali for prosperity and wealth, like fields turning from seed to coin.”

“So before we practice, I must test your affinity with nature,” he said, pausing like a hawk mid-flight.

“In other words, I’ll initiate you with a Druidic rite—the Eye of Nature; be ready,” he said, and the words fell like dew.