Sen stood on the opposite side of the road from Glimmer of Night. The two were tossing a spent beast core back and forth. Well, thought Sen, I guess it’s tossing for us. In reality, the core was zipping back and forth between the two so fast that it looked like a vibrating blue rope connected their hands. Still, it was more interesting than just standing around and waiting. Sen had a suspicion about what was going to happen and about fifteen minutes later, he was proven right as a little girl toddled into sight with an expression of grim determination fixed on her features. It took her longer to see Sen with her mortal eyes, but her face lit with joy the moment she did. She ran at him with her little arms and legs pumping for all they were worth. Sen sighed and tried to decide on the right course of action.

From the moment the villagers had been freed from those cages, the girl, who Sen finally learned was named Liu Ai, had simply refused to be separated from him. She’d sneak away from the other villagers to go look for him. On the rare occasions he slept, he’d invariably wake up to find her sprawled across his chest and gently snoring. He’d eventually concluded that it was just safer to keep her close at hand than having her looking for him in the wilds. While he considered the area where they were traveling all but tame, it was a different story for mortals. A child that small could and would get eaten by something if she kept leaving the group. By the time they’d gotten back to the road, he was getting worried.

He’d escorted them to a nearby village where one of the people he’d rescued had a few family members. It was also big enough that absorbing a few more adults and one child shouldn’t be an issue. Particularly since they had the money from the bandits. It wasn’t a fortune, but it was enough to let them start new lives. Sen had planned to leave Liu Ai with the other rescued villagers. They, at least, knew her a little bit. When it had become clear that he meant to leave her behind, the girl had been inconsolable. Left with no other recourse, Sen and Glimmer of Night had simply left. It seemed that the girl had not only evaded the adults that Sen had expected to take care of her but everyone else in the village. People who should have been mindful of children wandering beyond the relative safety of the village.

The problem was that if she had done it once, it was entirely possible that she would do it again. Except, next time, Sen wouldn’t be waiting just down the road. Sen was rubbing at his eyes when the girl crashed into his leg and started trying to hug the leg and do a little dance at the same time. She beamed up at Sen before she looked across the road.

“Hi, Glimmerite!” she cried happily.

It was apparently the closest she could get to the spider’s actual name. Sen had worried that Glimmer of Night might be offended, but he’d seamlessly adapted to the mangled form of his name without comment. The spider lifted an arm and waved at the little girl.

“I’ll be right back,” said Sen to the spider before hoisting the little girl up.

Her lip started quivering as soon as she realized that Sen was carrying her back to the village.

“Don’t wanna go to the village. Wanna go with you,” she said in a tiny voice, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears.

Sen knew that it was a terrible, terrible, horribly awful idea to bring her with him. What did he have to offer a little girl? A life of constant fear and cataclysmic dangers she had no hope of defending herself against. On the other hand, if the destruction of her village proved anything, it was that there was no promise of safety if he left her behind either. He wrestled with the decision as he walked back to the village. When he got there and did not find people frantically searching every nook and cranny for the missing child, he felt his anger flare. He marched up to the house where the rescued villagers were staying and, not trusting himself, he knocked on the wall of the house. The entire structure rattled. The older man who had been the sole surviving elder of the town hesitantly opened the door. He looked from Liu Ai to Sen’s furious eyes and went pale.

“Get her things and bring them to me,” ordered Sen in a voice that quivered with rage.

***

The rest of the trip back had been a learning experience for Sen. There had been one heart-stopping moment where he’d put her down for a second to buy some fresh fruit from a stand. He’d turned around to give her a piece of the fruit, and she’d just been gone. Sen had almost lost his mind in worry before he remembered that he was a damn cultivator and washed the entire town in his spiritual sense. She had been less than a hundred feet away. He’d all but flown to where she was only to find her in an alley, hiding behind Glimmer of Night. The spider had bodily lifted a man by the throat and pinned him to a wall. Sen lifted an eyebrow, but he’d come to have a little faith in the spider’s instincts for danger.

“What happened?” asked Sen.

Ai thrust a finger at the stranger. “He hurt me!”Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Sen could see where bruises were starting to form on her arm. He gave the little girl a serious nod. He crouched down and opened his arms. Ai ran over to him. He gave her a quick hug and picked her up. Glimmer of Night glanced over with what Sen was pretty sure passed for a questioning look from the spider.

“Do what you think is best,” said Sen. “Catch up when you’re done.”

Glimmer of Night nodded, and Sen carried Ai away from what he imagined was either going to be a grisly death or something that was nearly a grisly death. After that, Sen made sure he kept track of Ai in his spiritual sense at all times. He also discovered that getting children who could talk back to take elixirs was difficult, even if it was entirely for their own good. He’d been forced to rework the elixir so that it tasted like something she would drink. Not that bruises were necessarily going to be the end of the world, but Sen saw zero need for her to have them if he could fix it. That part had been almost amusing. What hadn’t been even the tiniest bit amusing was when she woke up screaming in blind terror and needed to be held until she could fall asleep again. I should have killed them all, thought Sen.

On the whole, though, Sen expected that Ai found the trip pretty easy. She couldn’t keep pace with them, so he and Glimmer of Night took turns carrying her. At first, Ai would giggle and laugh as the landscape blurred around them. Later, Sen was amazed to discover that she would fall asleep. He didn’t think he could have fallen asleep moving at those speeds under someone else’s power. It was a profound display of trust. Maybe it was earned trust, though. After all, he and the spider had shown up.

At one point, Sen had spotted a farmer meandering down the road with an ox pulling his cart. He’d insisted they stop to say hello. The farmer had been startled when they seemed to appear out of nowhere and kept shooting furtive glances at Glimmer of Night. Even the ox had eyed the spider warily before shooting a questioning look at Sen. He’d just nodded. Apparently taking Sen’s approval as divine truth, the ox mooed at the spider. Glimmer of Night waved at it from two feet away. Sen had chatted with the farmer for a bit while Ai gleefully sat on the ox, petted its head, and hugged its neck. Then, he’d bought everything in the cart without haggling over the prices as a way to thank the farmer for indulging them.

Eventually, though, they turned off the road and headed back into the wilds. Ai had been nervous at first, unaware that the three of them were moving inside a bubble surrounded by Sen’s killing intent. When nothing terrible happened after the first few hours, she relaxed again and started pointing at all the interesting things, like big rocks and tall trees. Sen just nodded and agreed that they were indeed very impressive rocks and trees.

***

Fu Ruolan was giving Sen a decidedly flat look. She had taken Glimmer of Night’s presence in stride. Sen suspected that had a lot to do with the fact that the spider had lost interest in the group discussion almost immediately and wandered off to poke at an odd-looking flower. She had not been nearly so understanding about the presence of Liu Ai. Fortunately, the girl was largely unaware of the battle of wills happening around her. She was too busy hugging Falling Leaf’s leg while the ghost panther looked down at the child with more than a little panic on her face.

“Why did you bring the child here?” demanded Fu Ruolan.

The nascent soul cultivator was making an obvious effort to keep her voice calm to avoid scaring the little girl. Sen had known this was going to be an uphill battle, so he bit back on the usual sarcasm he used when people asked him questions he found ridiculous. Instead, he gave the answer that was both true and most likely to get him the result he wanted.

“She has no one or no one I could find. Her family is gone. Her home is gone. She needs somewhere to be for right now. Somewhere safe. Can you think of a safer place than the domain of a nascent soul cultivator?”

Fu Ruolan’s eyes flicked over to where Ai was dragging Falling Leaf by the hand to look at the flower that had caught Glimmer of Night’s attention. Her expression softened, if only slightly.

“I suppose not,” admitted Fu Ruolan.

Sen pounced on the moment of weakness.

“It’s a temporary solution. I’m only here for a handful of years. Besides, I’m not deluded. I’m no kind of parent. I have no business whatsoever trying to raise her. I will try to make other arrangements for her. Better arrangements.”

The nascent soul cultivator’s lips pursed as she made an objection even she didn’t really seem to believe.

“The wilds are no place for a child.”

Sen lifted an eyebrow. “Are you saying that you’d let something happen to her?”

“Don’t be stupid. Of course, I’m not going to let anything happen to her.”

Sen did everything in his power to keep his expression calm and neutral. Fu Ruolan was not fooled. She rolled her eyes.

“Don’t be smug,” complained the nascent soul cultivator.

“Sorry,” said Sen. “It could be worse. At least she’s adorable.”

“You were probably adorable at that age, too. Look how you turned out.”

“A dashing hero who saves little girls from bandits? Yeah, I’ve really come down from being adorable.”

She shot him a skeptical look before she sighed. “No, that’s fair.”

The pair stood there and watched as Ai demanded that Glimmer of Night pick her up. The spider dutifully lifted her from the ground and settled her on his hip. Falling Leaf turned and shot Sen a look that was easy to read even from a distance. What in the hells were you thinking? Fu Ruolan snickered.

“What?” asked Sen.

“I’m just taking comfort in the knowledge that your wife over there is going to give you an earful about this.”

“She’s not my wife.”

“Sure, she isn’t. You realize that I’m not going to go any easier on you just because you brought a stray home.”

It was Sen’s turn to snicker.

“What?” demanded Fu Ruolan.

Sen just smiled a little as Ai ran up to them to thrust a tiny wildflower at Fu Ruolan. The nascent soul cultivator looked taken aback. Helpless before the power of innocent adorableness, she leaned down and took the flower.

“Thank you, little one,” she said, before shooting Sen a death glare. “Not one word.”