“Did you really just feed that cat some of your breakfast?” Feng asked in a voice that was half-amused and half-exasperated.

Sen shot to his feet. He hadn’t thought about what Feng would think of him just giving away part of the fruit. Would the man be angry? Sen wondered if he was about to be punished. It was a monumental effort of will to remain still.

“Yes, master,” he answered.

Feng eyed Sen for a moment. “Care to explain why?”

“I, well,” Sen stumbled to explain. “It didn’t eat me. I thought it deserved something for that.”

The cultivator looked startled for a second before he threw his head back and roared with laughter. The sound boomed through the trees, joyful and uncomplicated. The cultivator was bent over at the waist and slapping his hands against his legs before he finally got his laughter under control. Feng stood back up straight and wiped at his eyes.

“Of all the reasons,” Feng said, shaking his head. “Of all the reasons, that might be one of the purest ones I’ve ever heard for trying to make friends with a spirit beast.”

“I wasn’t,” Sen protested as he eyed the semi-visible cat. “I wasn’t trying to make friends. Spirit beasts are dangerous, aren’t they?”

Feng gave Sen and the cat an appraising look. “Yes, spirit beasts are all dangerous. But, and listen well my young disciple, that doesn’t mean that every spirit beast is dangerous to you. If you treat them all like they’re bloodthirsty man-killers, they’ll respond with violence. Yet, spirit beasts can also offer you wisdom, boons, and even power, if you can befriend them with the right kind of heart. They are also wise. If you meet them with trickery in your soul, they will know.”

Sen wasn’t sure he really understood Feng’s meaning, but he nodded anyway. “Yes, master.”

Feng gave him a smile that said he knew that Sen didn’t understand, but the cultivator didn’t offer more of an explanation. “Alright, it’s time to head out. Pack up your things.”

All Sen really had was the blankets, so he folded them up and handed them to Feng. The cultivator waved his hand at the blankets, and they vanished into the storage ring. The cultivator eyed the remaining coals before he doused them with water and covered the ashes with damp earth. Sen watched the process with open curiosity. He knew very little about how or why things were done beyond the walls of the town.

“Any kind of fire, even coals, are dangerous in the woods. If the wind kicks up, it could set the underbrush aflame. This forest stretches almost unbroken for hundreds of miles. Can you imagine the devastation if it burned?”

Sen honestly couldn’t imagine what hundreds of miles of burned forests would look like or what it would do to anyone living nearby. Still, he had seen burned out homes in the town. He tried to imagine that same kind of destruction on a massive scale. He shuddered. Feng noticed the shudder and nodded. Without another word, the cultivator started walking in that strange way he did that ate up distance. Sen jogged after him, casting a furtive look back at the campsite. The ghost panther was gone.

***

The morning had evaporated into early afternoon. Sen expected that he would feel the same terrible weariness and awful hunger that had plagued him the day before. Yet, it didn’t come. He found it a little easier to keep pace with the cultivator. It wasn’t easy, but it didn’t leave him wrung out and certain that he would die either. By mid-afternoon, though, his stomach was growling at him. It wasn’t painful, just insistent. Feng had said to remind him about food, but Sen hesitated. He didn’t really know the cultivator. The man frightened Sen a little. It wasn’t Feng, in particular, but there were stories. Cultivators who killed people who annoyed them. Cultivators who destroyed towns and even cities for perceived insults.

While Sen had few cares for the people he’d left behind in the town, Grandmother Lu was still there. He didn’t even want to imagine the cultivator killing her because Sen had annoyed Feng. As if to spite him, his stomach gave off a loud gurgle. Feng stopped short and looked around.

“What in the world was that?” Asked the cultivator.

Sen felt his cheeks burn a little in embarrassment. “It was me, master.”

Feng looked back at Sen with a mystified expression. “You made that noise? Why?”

Sen’s cheeks felt even hotter. “It wasn’t me. It was my stomach.”

Feng’s confusion evaporated into annoyance. “Didn’t I tell you to remind me about food, boy?”

“Yes, Master.”

“So, why didn’t you?”

Sen considered lying, but he thought the cultivator might have some way to know. “I go without a lot of days. I also didn’t want to make you angry. I was worried you might destroy the town if I did.”

The cultivator grimaced at those words. “There’s a clearing up ahead, it’s as good a spot as any to take a break.”

Sen followed the man to the clearing. There were a few rocks big enough to sit on scattered around the area. Sen sat down on one, and Feng absently handed him some rice balls and a melon almost as big as Sen’s own head. Then, the cultivator made his tea set appear. The man focused on the tea set as Sen made short work of the rice balls. His stomach stopped making noises at him. Sen regarded the melon, perplexed about what he should do with it. If he had a knife, he could cut it, but Sen had never owned a knife. Sen almost fell off the rock as the ghost panther seemed to materialize out of nowhere right next to him. The big cat eyed the fruit with curiosity. Sen clutched at his chest and could feel his heart pounding wildly.

“Maybe a little warning next time,” he hissed at the cat.

Feng looked over at Sen, saw the cat, and snorted.

Sen sighed, looked at the beast, and hefted the melon. “If you can get this open, you can have some.”

Sen felt the air move and looked down at the hand holding the melon. The big fruit split in two, severed cleanly though the center. He was so startled that Sen nearly dropped both halves. He stared at the melon before he felt the cat looking at him. He held half of the melon out to the cat.

“A deal’s a deal,” he muttered.

He felt the melon lifted out of his hand, while he concentrated on his half. It still wasn’t exactly ideal, but Sen made do. He scooped pieces of the melon out with his fingers and ate it. The taste was light and sweet. He had never tasted, never even seen, a melon like it before. He wondered where the cultivator had gotten it. Sen glanced over at the cat. It was lying on the ground nearby, absently licking the perfectly clean melon rind. Sen wondered how the cat had managed that without fingers. Feng eventually came over and handed Sen a cup of tea before settling on a nearby rock.

“I’d like to tell you that you’re wrong about cultivators, that they don’t go around killing people or destroying things for no reason or bad reasons. I can’t, though. Some cultivators are arrogant. I was like that when I was young. Some of it is because of the sects and how they train people. Some of it is just that people are people. I’ll have to teach you about all of that eventually. Fortunately, some of us grow out of it. For now, just remember this part. I give you my oath that I will never punish you for doing what I ask you to do. I will certainly not punish other people for you doing what I ask you to do. Do you understand, Sen?”

Sen looked down into the tea. Some of what his master said made sense. Some of it left him cold. He understood the most important part, the promise that had been made.

Sen nodded. “I do.”

“Good,” said Feng.

Then, they both fell into silence, sipping their tea, lost in their own thoughts.