Kai woke before the sun.
Although the blazing orb had yet to peek over the horizon, the glow it casted was already enough to light up the sky.
Then, the sun crested the horizon.
Kai felt a bit strange — his body felt light, his mind alert in a way it hadn't for weeks. There was a quiet hum in his chest, not a sound but a… presence, barely noticeable. A faint pulse, warm and steady, as if something inside him had stirred with the coming day.
He sat up, rubbing at his sternum. Weird. Must be the sunlight.
The horizon glowed pale gold, the first rays of morning breaking across the forest. For a moment, as the sun crowned the trees, the warmth inside him swelled. His heart raced, his breath deepened, and an inexplicable energy filled his limbs. It was almost intoxicating.
He closed his eyes to soak in the feeling.
Then, just as quickly as it had come, the sensation faded into the steady chill of winter air when the sun fully rose. His body settled. He frowned slightly.
"...Huh." He shook his head. Guess I'm finally recovering.
He stayed sitting there, watching the sky burn into brilliance. Birds trilled somewhere in the trees, the world slowly waking. The snow here was sparse, scattered in little mounds beneath the shade, nothing like the suffocating white of the mountains they'd escaped. For the first time in days, he allowed himself to think beyond the next hour.
We can survive here. At least for now.
A quiet rustle behind him broke his thoughts.
"Mmm… Kai?"
He turned to see Asha pushing herself upright, hair tousled, eyes half-closed. Her voice was still heavy with sleep.
"You're up early," she murmured.
"I just… woke up," he said. "Felt… good. Better than usual."
She arched an eyebrow. "Good? That's rare."
He chuckled. "Yeah. I think it's this place. Feels… lighter."
Asha rubbed her arms against the cold, then looked out at the morning light. "It is warmer here. Not much snow left."
Kai hesitated before speaking. "We should… take a day. Rest. Replenish. Make what we can while things are peaceful."
She considered, then nodded. "Agreed. We need tools, food, water — and I want more rope."
---
They made their way down to the stream together, hide boots squelching in the damp soil.
"Drink first," Asha said. "We'll need it for the work ahead."
Kai knelt by the bank, cupping cold water into his mouth while Asha did the same. "Still clear. Guess this comes straight from the mountain runoff."
By the time he was rinsing his face, Asha had already rolled up her sleeves. "I'll collect fresh bark."
She began peeling lengths from a nearby tree, the fibrous sheets curling away in her hands. She piled them neatly on a rock, then set about stacking stones into a small basin beside the stream, letting water fill it.
"What's that for?" Kai called from where he stood midstream, spear in hand.
"Soaking the bark. It'll be easier to strip into fibers later."
He grinned. "Efficient as always."
---
Kai's first throw missed, but the second hit true. The fish writhed, silver scales flashing. By the time Asha had finished her little pool, he'd caught three, his rhythm improving.
Asha stayed near him, searching the undergrowth for familiar leaves and stems. When she spotted the serrated green leaves and purple-stemmed stalks she remembered, she smiled faintly.
Thornshade. Good. These will do.
They were named as such due to its jagged edges and the plant's preference for shaded forest undergrowth.
She crushed them between smooth rocks, releasing a sharp herbal scent, then smeared the paste onto her cuts. It stung sharply, but the cooling relief followed quickly.
Finally, she covered them with large leaves that adhered to the paste.
The herbal knowledge she learned from her life in her old tribe was still useful.
By the time Kai called out, "Six! Think that's enough?" she'd also found a few oddly-shaped stones that might serve as crude tools.
"Plenty," she replied, standing.
---
Back at their high ledge, Asha began arranging kindling while Kai took a wedge-shaped stone to chop the small tube-like tree he'd dragged back. He spotted it nestled behind overgrown shrubs on their way back and immediately chopped it down.
His strokes were steady, measured, breaking the trunk into equal segments. Hollowing out the soft core with sharp-edged rocks, he crafted the beginnings of water flasks.
When Asha's fire was steady, she threaded fish onto stripped sticks to roast over the flames. She also applied some ground herbs she plucked to enhance the flavor. The smell soon drifted through the air, warm and mouthwatering.
Kai, meanwhile, fitted crudely carved wooden stoppers to the flasks, then burned the insides with a flaming branch to harden the surface. When done, he cooled the flasks in the stream and filled them with fresh water.
Finally, they could carry water again.
They sat together to eat two of the fish as a late breakfast, savoring the warm flesh with an herbal taste.
"Feels almost like the old days," Asha said between bites.
Kai smirked. "If the old days involved cliffs, wolves, and sleeping in the open."
She laughed softly. "We've had worse."
---
With renewed strength, they worked into the afternoon — rope-twisting, plant gathering, weaving a basket out of flexible cane, shaping more stone blades, making spare tools, and catching five more fish.
Now with rope available, Kai found a strong branch to use as a haft and the dragon scale as a blade to create a new and improved hatchet for himself. The scale has proven to be stronger than any stone after all.
By evening, they'd also made two more flasks and ate the remaining four fish caught in the morning for dinner.
They saved two of the caught fish for tomorrow and prepared the other three to smoke overnight.
That night, the little camp was filled with a warmth that had nothing to do with the fire.
Kai lay flat on his back, staring at the dark, ash-streaked sky, a satisfied heaviness in his belly. First time in days I'm not thinking about my stomach.
Beside him, Asha let out a small sigh. "Feels strange, doesn't it? Not going to bed hungry."
"Strange in the best way," Kai replied, rolling his head toward her.
She plucked a bit of charred fish skin from between her fingers and flicked it at him. "Don't get used to it, fisherboy."
He caught it against his chest with a mock gasp. "Fisherboy? Excuse you. Did you not witness the master at work? I'm destined to be the greatest fisherman in these mountains."
Asha smirked. "Right. The same fisherman who nearly fell into the stream chasing a fish that wasn't even looking at him."
"That was a tactical maneuver," he said solemnly. "Keeps them guessing."
"You mean screaming. You scared away half the catch with your singing."
"That's not true." He sat up just enough to start humming—loudly and off-key.
"Stop—" she tried, but she was already laughing, and her laughter was infectious. Soon they were both clutching their sides, breathless and grinning.
As Asha propped herself up, her slightly disheveled hair and loosened tunic that revealed her ample cleavage made Kai catch his breath.
Noticing her son's heated gaze, Asha smirked and started teasing him by pulling her tunic further down, revealing even more skin as she stared back while biting her lower lip.
Kai gulped. After eating his fill, he was filled with energy.
"You know what you're doing is dangerous, right?"
"Oh? How is this dangerous? Will a beast attack me?" Asha teased, her tone laced with an undisguised allure.
Kai's eyes narrowed as a lewd grin spread across his face. "You're asking for it, dear mother."
Without suspense, Kai quickly stripped off his and her clothes before diving into her inviting flesh.
Moans of pleasure resounded through the night as mother and son made passionate love, reconfirming their entangled relationship again and again until they passed out in a sweaty mess.
---
When dawn found them, the mood lingered—light and easy.
After enjoying a breakfast of fish with herbs wrapped in large leaves, they sat cross-legged in the pale sunlight, weaving rope from fibrous strips of bark.
By midday, they'd wandered into the surrounding woods, filling their basket with herbs Asha recognized by scent and shape. "Thornshade," she murmured, holding up a stalk with serrated leaves and a purple stem to show her son. "Good for cuts and bleeding."
They found berries that stained their fingers red and nuts they cracked open on the spot.
Kai even set up a simple snare using rope, sticks, a heavy rock, and some berries and pieces of leftover fish as bait.
As the day wore on, Kai realized he felt… lighter. Not just from the food, though that certainly helped. In patches of the forest where the undergrowth was thick and the leaves shimmered with life, something in him seemed to hum faintly, a quiet warmth pulsing in his chest.
Strange…
"You're smiling at nothing again," Asha said as they walked.
"Just thinking," he replied.
About what, she didn't ask, and he didn't tell her—because he wasn't sure himself. Maybe it was just the relief of eating well and resting. But the feeling lingered, like a low note under the day's laughter, impossible to shake.
When they reached the stream again, Asha knelt to drink, then stripped her clothes and stepped into the shallows with a sly glance.
"Don't," Kai warned.
Too late—she splashed him in the face.
"Alright," he said, also stripping and wading in after her. The cold hit like a slap, and they both shrieked before devolving into a wild exchange of splashes until their teeth chattered.
They proceeded to wash each other off of all their muck and grime from last night.
However, a mischievous Kai would focus on washing and scrubbing certain curvaceous areas of her body, much to her chagrin.
To return the favor, she hugged him from behind without letting go and vigorously polished his lower region clean until an arc of white formed in the air.
After drying off in a patch of sunlight, Asha patched tears in their clothes with steady hands while Kai went to check the snare he'd set earlier.
When he returned with a plump rabbit dangling from one hand, Asha arched a brow. "Beginner's luck?"
"Skill," he corrected, handing it to her.
She skinned it with practiced care, humming quietly. It wasn't much, but together they made it enough.
On the way back, something caught Kai's eye—a glint in the dirt. He crouched, brushing aside the soil until his fingers closed around a small shard of obsidian, smooth and sharp-edged, fitting neatly in his palm.
"Find something?" Asha asked.
"Just a rock," he said, tucking it away. But it felt more than that—solid, purposeful. Might be useful later.
---
As dusk fell, they rested by the fire. Kai went over all the new tools they created and supplies they gathered.
There was one lidded woven basket lined with broad leaves and attached shoulder straps made of rope.
Inside, individually wrapped in large leaves were a number of edible berries and nuts, three deboned smoked fish, more thornshade, edible herbs that can be used for cooking, a dozen tubers dug up from the dirt, a recently skinned rabbit pelt, and extra rope made from bark fibers.
Laid out nearby were four cylindrical stoppered wooden flasks with rope tied around them into handles, five knives, four with crudely sharpened stone blades of different sizes and the fifth having an extremely sharp obsidian blade, two hatchets, one with the dragon scale and a larger one made from stone where the other end can be used as a hammer, and two wooden spears with sharpened stone tips.
There were also two conical hats made of cane and broad leaves with a rope chinstrap and the soles of their worn hide boots were reinforced with rough bark and rope.
Fully stocked and equipped, Kai felt satisfied and had a greater sense of security. This was even more than what they started with back when they had to escape the mountains.
As the two finished a meal of roasted rabbit and nuts, a not too distant, low howl rolled through the forest.
Kai and Asha exchanged a worried look.
"Wolves," she said quietly, her hand holding onto Kai's.
Kai nodded. "They're still out there. Looks like we can't stay here. We move tomorrow. Somewhere safer."
She shifted closer to her son, arm wrapped around his, her voice firm. "Tomorrow, then."
Above them, the half the night sky was obscured by dark clouds. She prayed that these brief, happy days would not be their last.