Ru Meng took everything out of his father’s leather backpack and laid it on the ground, hoping to make it a little more comfortable. There were still a few pelts left inside, which he laid over the backpack. He pulled his father, who was slipping in and out of consciousness, over the makeshift bed and examined his wounds. The cut to the throat was right beside the larynx, avoiding all the major arteries. His father didn’t seem to be having any breathing difficulties either. The cuts on each limb also appeared non-lethal; he had been sliced only in the crook of his elbows and in his heels. The bleeding had largely stopped.
Ru Meng took out his waterskin and thoroughly cleaned his father’s wounds, trying his best not to make it hurt. He then found the bandages he had been using and wrapped the wounds tightly, hoping that they wouldn’t fester. He tore a piece of cloth off of his shirt and soaked it with water, before placing it over his father’s head.
After he made sure his father’s condition had stabilized and his breathing had returned to normal, Ru Meng hopped down from the crevice and retraced his steps, carefully and subtly erasing the tracks they had left behind.
When all was settled and done, Ru Meng finally had time to sit down by his father, crouch into a tiny ball and consider what came next. He wasn’t quite sure what to do, but he knew an injured person had to eat to recover. Ru Meng searched through the contents of the backpack that he had turned out and started organizing them.
First, he looked for the rations. His father had smoked most of the edible meat from the prey they had hunted. Ru Meng was relieved to find that there were enough pieces to last them close to a week. A week should be long enough for his father to recover, at least enough to tell him what to do next. He also found four full pouches of rice and one which had been partially emptied. Rice was valuable down here, his father had told him, because it didn’t grow down here. It was so valuable, in fact, that it was used as currency in place of coins. Sometimes, when they had been hunting, his father would cook a little rice in water and oil to make a thin gruel, which they would enjoy piping hot out of the kettle with pieces of jerky. It made the salty taste a lot more tolerable and the gruel always made his stomach feel warm.
Ru Meng recalled the few times his father had been generous enough to cook rice ‘properly’. This was the correct way to cook and eat it, his father explained, they would eat it every meal, with lots of other dishes, instead of portioning it out like this. His father had started crying then, but didn’t explain any further. It was always on the day his mother died.
Ru Meng found a pouch of salt as well. He put the food in a corner of the small cave and covered them properly to make sure they didn’t get wet. He looked for the kettle. It was a small kettle his father had used over the past week; something he always brought with him when he went out. It was good for cooking rice gruel, but also to boil the water before they drank it. Fortunately, Ru Meng didn’t have to go looking for another water source. He chose this place as a shelter because he remembered there being a creek here. He found a few other tools as well; the skinner knife his father used for skinning and a larger carving knife. There were also the iron marbles, the rope, a bundle of string, a scant few strips of bandages, a small pair of bells, two ceramic bowls and several pieces of wood. The bells were usually used to set up a small tripwire alarm, while the wood he had seen his father used for starting fires and as a medium for his wood spells.
He put all these tools in another corner of the cave and looked at what was left. Four light talismans, two worn-out books and a strange device. The device had a glass surface and two leather straps on each end. Ru Meng examined the device curiously, but couldn’t determine what its function was. Still, noting that it was probably something valuable, he carefully put it into an empty pouch and placed it somewhere safe. The books, on the other hand, were filled with his father’s writings, mostly incantations for certain spells and his thoughts and reflections on them. His father wrote a book like this for him to study when he was at home alone. That book, like the few other things they used to own, had been left behind in their old home. Ru Meng was a little sad at the thought of that, but it felt nice, organizing these things. He felt calm and at peace when he did it, like things would turn out alright after all.
When he was done setting everything aside, Ru Meng grabbed the kettle and carefully climbed down the crevice, staying as quiet as he could. He kept the light talisman under his shirt as he ran to the small creek and filled the kettle with water. He was planning to make some rice gruel with jerky in it. It wasn’t until Ru Meng returned to the cave with the kettle that he realized the problem at hand. He had no way to start a fire. His father usually heated the pot with magic and even when he needed to start a fire to distract a prey or smoke meat, he would use magic for that as well.
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Ru Meng sat down helplessly, racking his brain to think of a way around the problem. He knew there were other ways to start a fire without magic, but he didn’t know what they were. He went through all the tools from the backpack again, hoping to find something that might help, but there was nothing. That was until he remembered the strange device from earlier. He took it out from the pouch and flipped it over in his palm. He still didn’t understand what it did. It was cold to the touch and it didn’t seem likely that it would be useful in any capacity. He looked at the glass surface again and saw that there were some symbols etched underneath the surface, but he didn’t recognize them.
After some pondering, Ru Meng decided to try using the device. Gingerly, he pressed it against the kettle, keeping his body as far away from it as he could. He didn’t know what might happen. It could even explode! Nothing happened. Next, he tried wrapping its leather straps around the kettle, but they weren’t long enough. Ru Meng settled for tying the straps on the kettle’s handle. He waited around for fifteen minutes but nothing happened. After a while, Ru Meng contemplated striking the device against the kettle, hoping it might help. Ultimately, he decided against it. Glass broke easily and he didn’t dare to break something that his father owned. Ru Meng reluctantly came to the conclusion that the device was completely useless and placed it back into the pouch.
In the end, Ru Meng remembered how he and his father would sometimes cuddle up on the colder nights to get warmer. He hugged the kettle tightly as he searched through his father’s book for the Spell of Metal-heating. It seemed like they would have to settle with jerky for today.
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“Lan.Leng.Dok.Sum, Yüt.Gan.Din.Mun.”
A boy’s voice echoed softly in a small cave.
Ru Meng had found the spell he was looking for with ease and had been practicing all this while, with no signs of success. He didn’t know how long had gone by since he sat down and started reading the book, but he had already slept once and been hungry enough to eat three pieces of jerky already. He changed his bandages on his own as well.
He had a lot of time to himself. He was always reciting the spell, but he found the courage to explore the nearby tunnels a little more. He told himself it was to prepare an emergency escape route, like his father had taught him to always do, but he liked the adventure. He found a particularly large rock that looked rather like a man’s face and decided to give it a name. Xiao Shi. ‘Little Rock.’ Ru Meng wasn’t very good at naming things.
Sometimes, Ru Meng would catch himself having too much fun and return to the small crevice, where he would focus on practicing the spell again. He had duties to do. Things he should be doing, like taking care of his father. He would soak a piece of cloth and place it over his father’s head; or try and pour some water into his father’s mouth when his lips looked dry, though he stopped doing that after his father started coughing up the water one time. He wanted to make his father eat something, but his father couldn’t chew while unconscious, and he couldn’t do much else without being able to cook.
Ru Meng didn’t quite understand why, considering how dire their circumstances were, but he felt a weight cast off his shoulders, a weight he had been carrying for a long time. He should feel more upset, now that they had lost their home, but in truth, he felt a little relieved, as if he had been freed from a cage. Every time he felt like this however, he would remind himself of his place and go back to his studies or taking care of his father.
“Lan.Leng.Dok.Sum, Yüt.Gan.Din—”
Ru Meng’s incantations were interrupted by a weak moan. He turned to his father and saw that he was finally opening his eyes. Ru Meng felt his heart sink a little, but he quickly scrambled over with a waterskin and put it to his father’s lips. There wasn’t much water left, not until he found a way to boil it, but he had saved a portion of it for his father. His father drank the water greedily, but winced slightly when he swallowed.
His father still seemed a little out of it, so Ru Meng slowly explained what happened and their current situation to him. His father nodded meekly and brought one hand to his head and rubbed it. That was as close to praise as his father had ever gotten. His father tried to get up on his hands, but his injuries were still fresh and his hands wouldn’t listen to him. His legs didn’t work either. Left without a choice, his father nodded in the general direction of the kettle.
He opened his mouth to tell Ru Meng to fetch it for him. There was no sound. His father looked down in his disbelief. Ru Meng understood his intentions, however and quickly brought the kettle to him. Not willing to give up, his father raised one hand with much effort and put it on the kettle. He tried to recite the Spell of Metal-heating. Not a single sound. He tried again. Still nothing. He tried harder this time, straining with all he had. The veins on his head bulged. A singular croak was all he managed, before he started coughing violently.
Blood spattered across Ru Meng’s hands. Ru Meng stroked his father’s back and offered him water to soothe his pain. His father had to lie down after that strenuous effort, but there was something broken in his eyes. Ru Meng made his father rest, offering him some jerky to recover his strength. Father and son chewed in silence, letting the magnitude of their quiet revelation pass them by.
Chia Song Yu had lost his voice.