Lily chastised herself as she made her way back to camp. How had she gotten so far away from their hammocks? She had only been playing for… uh… How long again? Uncle Vath was going to kill her if he woke up and found her gone. She strained to remember the angle of the early morning sunbeams through the foliage when she set out. Maybe an hour had gone by? Maybe more. She picked up the pace.

Lily lightly hopped from roottop to roottop. Her securely-tied pouches clattered wildly as she executed a series of particularly difficult jumps. The sound bounced oddly off of the moss-covered trunks all around her. Lily stopped to listen and the sound lingered longer than it should have. It felt as though the trees were drawing closer in, compressing the echoing clamor of pouches and bangles that no longer moved, and compressing Lily alongside.

As the racket faded the forest somehow dimmed even as the sun began its morning rise. Lily was intensely aware that the quiet that now filled the glade she found herself in was not the natural quiet of a healthy forest. No insects chittered underfoot. No squirrels argued over prime nesting space. No wind disturbed the branches overhead. Were the animals and insects hiding from her? No. She’d seen mice bigger than her deeper in the forest. It was something else.

Lily couldn’t see nor hear anything moving. She crouched down. Controlled her breathing. She let her eyes shift out of focus to get a better sense of the world around her. Over… there, a couple hundred paces in the direction she had been heading, was the solid break in the local essence that signified their campsite and her uncle’s artifacts.

Here and there, small tremors sent minor ripples across her perceptions: the trembling of minor prey animals hunkering down in fear. Fear of…. Oh. Darn.

“Good morning Uncle!” Lily said brightly. “You’re up early!”

Uncle Vath smiled at her as he emerged from behind a tree right next to her. Lily turned sharply, and pointed at him. “Right behind me! Just as I suspected!”

Auntie Dane Esther, who sometimes read stories to the local kids at meetups, had the weirdest candle holder Lily had ever seen. Said it came from some faraway city down south. Instead of a candle, you put a burning piece of wood on it, and the smoke flowed downwards rather than up! The smoke would pool in this little dish, and once it reached the top and overflowed, it would all surge out of the pool and once and

Whoomph.

Once it hit the ground.

That was what it was like when Uncle Vath stopped trying to hide. The natural essence around him was blasted out of the way in a bubble shockwave before it lost momentum and came boiling back in. It crashed against the invisible barrier a few feet outside of him before settling, only to be disturbed again as he walked up and put his hand on Lily’s shoulder, bringing her inside the barrier.

Lily shuddered slightly as an invisible pressure against her skin she had barely registered was swept away. Uncle Vath smiled at her before putting one finger to his lips and crouching down. Lily mimicked him. If he was out in full force, there were more threats here than just him.

Uncle Vath’s hand tensed slightly on her shoulder and Lily let him turn her thirty degrees to the side. Like she had been taught, she slightly unfocused her eyes, not looking at any one particular thing, and let her subconscious alert her to inconsistencies.

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The canopy overhead was thick, but the sun still broke through in certain areas, beams of sunlight highlighting dust motes and small flying insects and-

There!

A dull cloud of common brown mushroom spores drifted lazily in the still air, passing in and out of sunbeams. But what had kicked it up? The air was still, and all the animals and insects were hunkered down.

Lily scanned the bases of the trees in the direction her uncle pointed her. Not ten meters away from the cloud of spore was a large cluster of common browns at the base of a moss-covered giant oak. One mushroom on the edge had been crushed and lazy wafts of spore curled up out of its remains.

A short gust of air from above parted the cloud into two whirling streams. Wait that didn’t make sense-

Suddenly the scene snapped into focus. Standing above the mushrooms, one paw crushing the poor guy on the right and previously completely unseen to Lily, was a beast out of legend. No, a Beast out of legend.

Lily was tempted to think of it as a cat, but was afraid it could hear her thoughts and get offended. This Cat was taller at the shoulder than her uncle. It had a mane of bright green… was that moss? Hanging around its throat and it’s fur was-

The Beast met Lily’s eyes.

It’s fur was beautiful and soft and regal and and shiny and Lily sincerely, pleadingly hoped that it could not read her mind. She began to tremble.

Uncle Vath leaned in, his face appearing in her peripheral vision. Smiling. He patted her twice firmly on her shoulder before standing up, squaring off against the giant cat. The Beast’s eyes had locked onto her uncle as soon as he began to move and Lily had the strangest idea that it hadn’t seen him yet either.

The man and the beast stared levelly at each other for a few moments. Finally the cat snorted one final time, fully dispersing the cloud of spores, and with a flick of its tail was gone. Lily hadn’t even seen it start to turn.

Her Uncle’s hand dropped onto her shoulder again, but this time his grip was like a vice.

“Let’s go back to camp. And have a talk along the way.”

Lily could only nod. She wasn’t supposed to roam off on her own and she knew it.

“Maybe I haven’t been as firm in this as I should have. Or maybe you just weren’t listening when I was trying to teach you.” Lily’s objections were silenced by his increasing grip, nearly hurting her.

“Death is a constant risk. Sadly both here in the forest, and outside as well. Your reckless disregard this morning could have cost two lives. Did that not occur to you?”

“Well?”

Lily took a moment to compose her answer. She had a feeling there was a correct one.

“No.” She finally said. “I did not think. I was excited and let myself become distracted. Because at the time it seemed more fun.”

“And was it fun?”

“It was, until it wasn’t.”

Her Uncle laughed ruefully at that. “And?”

“Aaand” Lily drew the word out. “I disagree that two lives could have been lost. You could definitely have beat up that mean old cat!” Lily should the last part proudly, but still glanced around just in case. She had expected her uncle to laugh along but he didn’t. Instead he sighed.

As they walked up to the tree that their gear was tied up in, he turned her around and crouched down in front of her, a hand on each of her shoulders.

“Yes, I would have. Lily, when I woke up and saw you were gone, then saw that cat, I drew the obvious conclusion and damn near killed it. If you hadn’t come back when you did, that beautiful creature would be dead, and that would have been your fault as well as mine. Maybe it had siblings. Maybe it had a girlfriend.” Lily wrinkled her nose at the last part. “Our actions affect far more than just ourselves. We cannot afford to be this shortsighted, this selfish.”

“Yes Uncle. I…. know better. Knew better. And will be better. I am sorry.”

And then, Uncle Vath being Uncle Vath, he hugged her.