Sen stared up at the forest canopy and just ignored the smoldering corpse of the giant hawk next to him. He was tired. He was hurt. Plus, he’d have to keep traveling, despite the fact that night was all but on top of him. Sen reasoned that he’d earned at least two minutes of just staring up at the sky. After five minutes, a huge cat face loomed over Sen.

“Thanks,” he muttered. “Damn bird would have crushed the life out of me without you.”

The big cat regarded him for a moment, then gently batted at his chest.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m getting up.”

A minute later, she came back and batted him much less gently. He wanted to yell at Falling Leaf, but he couldn’t keep laying there with his leg bleeding. Sen pushed himself up and did his best to get a look at his wounded calf. He couldn’t really get an angle on it, but given that it was still dripping, he assumed that the bird had cut him pretty deep. He pulled out some of the medical supplies Ma Caihong had insisted that he bring along. He’d honestly thought she was overdoing it when she’d heaped the supplies on him. He didn’t think so anymore. He’d been gone from the house for all of one afternoon and part of a morning and managed to get himself injured already.

He cleaned the wound as best he could with a wet cloth, and then slathered a thick ointment onto it that Ma Caihong had said was for cuts and punctures. That became an instant regret as the ointment felt like it was burning down into his flesh. Sen had to clench his jaw to keep from screaming. The sensation didn’t really pass, but Sen got used to it enough that he could tie a bandage around the wound. That hurt so much that his vision went all dark and splotchy around the edges. Sen sank back to the ground, his chest heaving at the agony in his leg. Still, he knew he was forgetting about something. There was something else that Ma Caihong had said to do if he used any of the medicines that she gave him. The answer floated up out of the haze in his head.

“Cultivate. She told me to cultivate.”

Wiping the sweat off his face, Sen gave himself another thirty seconds to not think. Then, he started cultivating again. The qi rushed in from all around him, into his dantian, and then out into his channels. The circulating qi must have activated something in the ointment because Sen’s calf felt like he’d just shoved it into an inferno. There was no stopping it that time. Sen screamed. Then, he passed out.

***

“Damn bird. Damn Ma Caihong. Damn mountain,” Sen growled under his breath as he trudged through the forest.

Where it had seemed green and alive during the day, it all just looked like shadowing hiding places for predators in the dark. When he’d finally come around, it was a mixed blessing. The ointment had healed his leg enough that he could stand and even walk on it, although he suspected that any kind of running was out of the question. On the downside, it had been dark out. Falling Leaf had insisted that he harvest the beast core from the bird, which had been a chore and a half in the nonexistent evening light. He had asked the big cat to go and find them somewhere safe to set up camp. He’d asked more out of hope than any belief that she’d do it. Yet, the ghost panther had surprised him by vanishing into the dark. By the time he’d finally managed to find the core inside the bird, the cat had been back for a while. He’d only taken enough time to clean the gore off the core, his hands, and his arms before he gestured for her to lead the way. They had to move at Sen’s pace, which meant they’d been walking for most of an hour. Well, Falling Leaf had been walking. Sen had been tripping and stumbling over things for most of that hour.

When the cat finally sat down in a sheltered spot, Sen didn’t even have the energy to be paranoid. He put up his tent in a stupor, crawled inside, and dropped off to sleep almost immediately. Yet, it only felt like a few minutes had passed before he jerked out of his dreamless sleep. Whatever sleep he’d gotten, Sen wouldn’t have called it restful. His eyes burned. His body felt lethargic. Yet, he could see something that looked like light peeking through the flap of the tent. He dragged himself over to it and pulled the flap open. He found Falling Leaf laying on the ground right outside his tent, her eyes tracking back and forth over the surrounding area. She looked back at him and then yawned.

“I know. I know. It’s your turn.”

Sen hauled a bit of food out of the storage ring without even bothering to check what it was. He gave the cat some and then sat down on the ground next to her. They ate in silence, and then the cat went almost immediately to sleep. Sen tried to organize his thoughts. When that failed, he decided to pick three priorities and deal with those. The first thing he did was test his leg. It wasn’t fully healed, but he thought he could probably run on it if a life-or-death situation cropped up. He just wished that he believed that he’d get through the day without that situation happening. The much more likely scenario to his mind was that he’d spend half time traveling and the rest having to kill more of the local spirit beasts.

“You’d think that Master Feng’s rampage would have sent them all into hiding for a while,” he said to no one.

Even the ghost panther didn’t twitch at the noise.

The next priority he set for himself was cleaning up his gear. He rolled up his bedroll, which he didn’t even remember taking out of the ring. The tent came down next. It took him a little while to get it folded back up. Then, those went back into the storage ring. He glanced over at Falling Leaf. She was breathing slowly and steadily. Sen had no intention whatsoever of moving out again until she was awake. Uncle Kho and Ma Caihong had been right. He wasn’t ready for this. He wouldn’t quit on it, but also wouldn’t be stupid either. The big cat was clearly watching his back for him. He idly wondered how many beasts she’d scared off that he didn’t even know about. Sen was honest enough with himself to admit that he wanted, maybe even needed, that safety net to convince himself not to turn around and go back.

Sen set himself one final task to do while he waited for the spirit beast to finish her nap. He cleared a spot, gathered some dead wood from nearby, and built a little fire. Then, he pulled out a metal kettle and settled in to make himself some tea. He reasoned that, if nothing else, it would help soothe his nerves.