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Lung-Jiao had been asleep for a long time. In the mists above the swamp he guarded, only the same old spirits whispered of the days when the world was still young. They had long since grown tired, weary of the new world in which demons and gods were no longer needed. Humans had created their own gods and demons, which were easier for the clay-born to understand. And so Lung-Jiao, of the swamp dragon lineage, had also laid down to rest.

Now he awoke.

The hasty, stumbling steps beat an irregular rhythm on the narrow path that wound through the moor, in some places barely recognizable to humans and often only a step away from the deceptively shimmering swamp holes. Further away, not yet in Lung-Jiao’s small realm, he felt the heavy boots of the pursuers striking the ground, faster and with longer strides than the delicate feet of the young girl the men were chasing.

Lung-Jiao rarely interfered in the affairs of the clay-born, but he had never allowed injustice to be committed on his land. He glided up to the surface through the cool, soft ground. He greeted the sun, which he had not seen for many centuries, let the mud drip to the ground, and, after the sun and wind had erased the last traces of his origins, cast himself into a fitting dream.

Only now did the young woman, who had been rushing straight toward him, notice him. She let out a quiet cry, tried to stop, and fell awkwardly to her knees in front of him. “Master, I beg you, help me!” she gasped, wrapping her arms around the knees of the samurai whose form Lung-Jiao now wore. The men behind her had now crossed the edge of the swamp, and although they must have already seen Lung-Jiao’s human form, they did not stop.

Lung-Jiao began with the leader. A quiet word was enough to ask the path to open up before the approaching stranger. The swamp dragon hoped the others would give up, but the cries of the drowning man, who tried in vain to grab one of his companions by the boots, seemed to spur the remaining men on even more. The fear of death still reverberated through the moor, drowning out the soft murmurs of the spirits, as they continued to rush forward. Now Lung-Jiao no longer hesitated. When the swamp opened up again before them, all the pursuers were pulled into the depths. It took only seconds for their cries to fade away.

For a moment, Lung-Jiao had the feeling that the young woman could see through the veil that hid his true form. But then, as she threw herself against his chest, still sobbing and gasping, the thought slipped away. Without his intervention, his human hand wrapped around her waist and held her tight, and Lung-Jiao felt that he had slept long enough.

He did not need to ask her, but Lung-Jiao did not want a servant who fulfilled his wishes without ever being asked about her own desires. That might be enough for mortals who had too little time on earth to attain a higher level of wisdom.

Lung-Jiao, however, asked the young Mei, and she did not hesitate for a moment. She went with the foreign samurai into the swamp, where he created a house of clay and words, and she did not hesitate to cross the threshold into her new home.

The swamp dragon never asked her what she suspected, what she thought she knew. Perhaps she thought he was a wizard, perhaps she recognized his true form, but whatever she saw, she seemed to like it. And Lung-Jiao, of the swamp dragon lineage, enjoyed her warmth, which drove the old chill of the marsh from his blood and spirit. On some days, his accidental human form felt more real than the body he remembered from times long past. On those days, he listened in vain for the whispers of the spirits that gathered around the clay house in the swamp. When he trained with the sword, he exercised his mind in a human way, and his love for the human woman Mei became more human with each passing day.

As the moons turned into years, Lung-Jiao began to forget. The sun sometimes burned too brightly in his eyes, which had once stared without blinking into the deadly flames of the fire dragon Ti-Fong. The wind ruffled his hair and stole the warmth from his skin. And when chunks of clay fell from his home, Lung-Jiao knew no other way to help himself than to make provisional repairs. As the years turned into decades, Lung-Jiao grew older.

He did not care.

It was Mei who finally left, as hastily as she had entered his life, as if she feared losing her courage otherwise. When Lung-Jiao awoke that morning and felt the old woman searching her way out of the swamp, while the spirits followed the trail of her tears, he understood for the first time what human love felt like, and for the first time, the heart he had only borrowed ached.

He hesitated only a moment before shaking off the dream. At first, he did not understand who he was or what his task was; for a heartbeat, his limbs still felt strangely short and clumsy, not made for life on the ground. But soon his scaly body glided effortlessly through the swamp again, and he watched over Mei’s steps until she reached safe ground. Then he allowed the clay that formed a house in the middle of the swamp to flow back into the unity of the earth. He listened to the spirits telling their same old stories from ancient times in tired voices, and he gave them a new story.

Then he felt that he had been awake long enough. Slowly, Lung-Jiao of the swamp dragon lineage fell asleep. When the time came, he would wake again.