I Abandoned My Beast Cubs for the Protagonist... Oops?-Chapter 128: The Snake Who Slept Too Long

They ran for about three minutes.

Then Zhāo Yàn’s ribs made a compelling argument for stopping, and he stopped, grabbing a tree with both hands and breathing in a way that was not dignified but was necessary.

Han Shān stopped beside him. His ears were still flat. His white fur was standing in several directions that fur was not supposed to stand. He was breathing hard.

They looked at each other.

They looked back at the hole.

The snake had not followed them.

What had followed them was the sound, a long, loud, elaborate sound that started as a hiss and became something else entirely.

Something that was, if Zhāo Yàn was being honest with himself, remarkably similar to a yawn.

The biggest yawn he had ever heard.

It went on for quite some time.

Then silence.

Then, from the direction of the hole, the very specific sounds of something very large rearranging itself. Cracking. Shifting. The wet noise of a creature changing shape, bones finding new configurations, scales becoming skin.

A figure stood up from behind the grass.

He was tall. Broad shouldered. His hair was dark and slightly flattened on one side in the specific way of someone who had been sleeping on it for an indeterminate amount of time.

His robes, dark green and clearly expensive at some point in the distant past, were rumpled beyond redemption and had grass stains in places that suggested the hole had not been a recent development.

He had scales dusting his cheekbones and the backs of his hands, dark green catching the afternoon light, and his eyes, when they finally focused, were the same yellow as before but considerably less terrifying now that they were attached to a face that was making an almost sheepish expression.

He looked at the two cubs standing at the tree line.

He scratched the back of his head.

"Ah," he said. His voice was deep and slightly rough with disuse, like a door that hadn’t been opened in a while. "Cubs."

Zhāo Yàn’s tails began, very slowly, to separate back into three.

"You were in that hole," he said, with great accusation.

"I live in that hole."

"That’s a terrible place to live."

"It’s temporary." The man rolled his neck, producing a crack that echoed through the clearing. Then his shoulders. Then his back, a sound like a tree falling. He winced, pressed a hand to his spine, and exhaled. "How long has it been?"

"How long has what been?"

"Since I shifted." He looked at his hands, turning them over, apparently checking that they were correct. "I lose track sometimes. When I sleep deeply." He looked up at the sky, squinting. "What season is it?"

Han Shān and Zhāo Yàn looked at each other.

"Late summer," Han Shān said.

The man’s brow furrowed. "I went in during early spring."

"That’s," Zhāo Yàn calculated, "about four months."

"Mm." He didn’t sound alarmed. Just noting it. "That’s a bit long."

He stretched his arms above his head, his entire spine cracking again. He was not, Zhāo Yàn was recalibrating rapidly, a feral creature driven half mad by too long in beast form. He was just very, very recently asleep and slightly creaky.

"You scared us," Zhāo Yàn informed him.

The man looked down at him. A slow smile spread across his face. "Did I? I apologize. I heard something fall into my home and I woke up and—" he paused, "—I may have hissed before I was entirely conscious."

"You hissed a great deal."

"I’m a snake. It’s reflexive."

Han Shān had moved, slightly, to a position that was not quite behind Zhāo Yàn but was definitely using Zhāo Yàn as a visual reference point. His eyes were tracking the snake beastman, as he couldn’t trust him.

"Hello," the snake beastman said, simply.

Han Shān said nothing.

"He’s cautious," Zhāo Yàn said.

"Sensible," the man said, without judgment. He looked back at Zhāo Yàn. His eyes dropped, briefly, to the bandaging visible at Zhāo Yàn’s side where his sleeping robe had shifted again during the running. His eyes dropped. "You’re hurt."

"I’m fine."

"You’re bleeding through your bandage."

Zhāo Yàn looked down. He was, in fact, bleeding through his bandage. The running had apparently reopened something that had been in the process of closing.

This was deeply inconvenient information that he had been hoping to deal with later, preferably in private, preferably after convincing himself it wasn’t happening.

"It’s from last night," he said, with dignity. "The Hollow Boar."

The man’s eyebrows rose. "The Hollow Boar. The one the senior warriors have been trying to hunt for three months. I heard the noise, when I shortly drifted out of sleep."

"We addressed it," Zhāo Yàn said. "Together."

He gestured at Han Shān. Han Shān looked at the ground.

"I like you," the snake beastman suddenly announced, nodding in approval. He pressed a hand to his chest and bowed. "Mò Lǎo. Of the River Valleys. It is a pleasure to meet two cubs who address things."

Zhāo Yàn’s tails swept back. He drew himself up. "Zhāo Yàn. Of the Eastern Hills. Fox of exceptional—"

"Cultivation," Han Shān said quietly, from behind him.

Zhāo Yàn’s ear twitched. "Yes. Exactly."

"Han Shān," Han Shān said, to the patch of grass. Then, apparently deciding this was insufficient, he looked up. "Northern Peaks."

Mò Lǎo thought to himself. "A long way from home, snow leopard."

"Yes."

"Alone?"

"Yes."

"Brave."

Han Shān said nothing, but his ears, very slightly, came forward.

Mò Lǎo turned his attention back to Zhāo Yàn’s side, thinking. "I know someone. Not far from here. She’s very good with wounds. Better than whatever you did with that bandage, which is, if you’ll forgive me, not good."

"It’s functional."

"It’s charming. It’s not functional." He had started walking while he talked, which the fox lord considered strange since he hadn’t walked in months. "Come. It won’t take long."

Zhāo Yàn did not move. His tails swished. "I’m not supposed to go further from the village."

"Yes," Mò Lǎo agreed pleasantly, not stopping. "I imagine you’re not supposed to do quite a lot of things."

Zhāo Yàn pouted.

Han Shān appeared at his shoulder. His voice was very quiet. "Your mother will be upset."

"My mother is already upset."

"More upset."

"She has a finite amount of upset. I may have already reached the maximum."

Han Shān looked unconvinced. His eyes trailed to Mò Lǎo’s retreating back.

"She can heal his wound?" Han Shān asked.

"That’s what I said," Mò Lǎo called back, without turning around.

"Hmph," Zhāo Yàn said.

He walked forward.

Han Shān followed, one step behind, his ears forward. His eyes stared at the trees with more force than necessary, as though he was expecting something to pop out and eat them.

"Who is she?" Zhāo Yàn asked, falling into step beside Mò Lǎo.

"A friend." He smiled, warmly. "She’s very kind. Very warm. She will probably feed you something. Fair warning, she talks quite a lot."

"I talk quite a lot," Zhāo Yàn said.

"You’ll get along wonderfully then."

Behind them both, Han Shān said nothing. But he had stopped examining the trees quite so vigilantly. He was listening, instead, to the sound of Mò Lǎo’s unhurried voice and Zhāo Yàn’s immediate, enthusiastic response, and he slowly started to relax.

The forest path wound ahead of them, dappled with late afternoon light.

Somewhere along it, apparently, was a woman who talked too much and healed wounds and did not know yet that she was about to meet two cubs who would, in a few years, become part of something she could not yet imagine.

None of them knew that yet. 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

They just walked.