Falling Leaf just stared at Sen with those green of hers for a while, her hand gently stroking Ai’s hair as the little girl slept in her lap. That sleep was peaceful, for which Sen was deeply grateful. The awful nightmares of the first couple of months had slowly faded away, largely Sen suspected, in lockstep with Ai’s increasing feeling of safety and security. These days, the nightmares were the rare exception. To Sen’s immense relief, those nightmares often featured imaginary threats conjured by the girl’s imagination instead of the far-too-real human monsters of her past. Sen’s eyes were drawn back up as Falling Leaf shook her head.

“What does the foolish human girl expect you to do? The guilt isn’t yours.”

That had been Sen’s general feeling about Wu Meng Yao as well, but there was something comforting in having the ghost panther agree with him. He’d been wrestling with the problem of what, if anything, he should do about the sect cultivator since he left her and Shen Mingxia back at the inn. It was strange to have such different reactions to two people. Wu Meng Yao had immediately made herself into an issue, albeit a very minor one on the scale of Sen’s usual problems. He’d been certain that she’d drag some huge calamity in her wake that would inevitably require him to do things he’d rather not do. The reality was much more mundane and annoying than disastrous and deadly.

He’d actually been happy to see Shen Mingxia. It was a relief to know that she had escaped the kind of unwanted attention she’d faced in the sect before. Based on her advancement, she’d been the recipient of some good training, good luck, or both in the interim. Sen could even allow himself a tiny bit of satisfaction that he’d played some small role in making that happen. Sen was willing to admit that the woman’s reaction to Ai might have disposed him to like her a little more than he otherwise would have. Of course, Mingxia had been willing to simply say a heartfelt thank you and leave it at that. If she was harboring some of the same feelings as Wu Meng Yao, she did a much better job of hiding them. As for what Wu Meng Yao expected from him, that was the mystery.

“I really don’t know,” admitted Sen. “I can see where she’s coming from, a little bit, but I don’t think it’s my problem to deal with. On the other hand, I don’t want sect members in town all the time, bothering people, or bothering me.”

“Then give her something to do. Some task that she won’t like that will eventually make her leave. Or, better yet, a task that will drag her away for a long time. Send her after a difficult-to-reach treasure.”

“I don’t know where to find any treasures. Where am I supposed to send her?”

Falling Leaf sat in thoughtful silence for a while before she smiled the kind of smile that makes people shiver.

“Send her to the Mountains of Sorrow. The Caihong said that there are many caves and many treasures hidden near the peaks of those mountains.”

Sen lifted an eyebrow at the ghost panther. “I’m fairly certain that Uncle Kho said that there were also all kinds of monsters crawling around near those peaks.”

“What better test of her sincerity?” asked Falling Leaf.

“I’m so glad you don’t get angry with me all that often,” observed Sen. “Well, I suppose I have to send her after something.”

“Just tell her that it’s a shadow qi treasure that she’ll recognize as soon as she sees it.”

Sen mulled it over. “So, you figure that they’ll go looking, realize how stupidly dangerous it is, or realize I sent them there just to get them out of here, and go home?”

“They will if they have any sense,” said Falling Leaf.

“What if they find something?” asked Sen.

Falling Leaf rocked her head to each side a few times. “Then, I imagine that you’ll get a shadow treasure with no effort.”

Sen laughed gently and shook his head. His gaze shifted when Ai stirred a little.

“Do you want me to take her?” asked Sen.The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

The ghost panther didn’t actually hiss at him, but Sen got the impression it was a close thing. Instead, Falling Leaf gave him a flat look.

“She’s fine where she is.”

Sen lifted his hands in a placating gesture. “I was only offering. Just trying to be helpful”

“If you wish to be helpful, fetch one of those tedious history scrolls that the Kho gave you and read it to me. Since it seems I am truly to be stuck in this form forever, I should make an effort to know some of your human history.”

Sen was startled by the request but did as he was asked. Reading it out loud wasn’t that much better than reading it in his head, but Falling Leaf remained attentive. She even asked questions from time to time. After they put Ai to bed, Sen brought out his writing kit.

“I thought you were done teaching me,” said the ghost panther.

“Done is a strong word. You know enough to get by, but it’s a skill you need to practice occasionally.”

“Very well,” said Falling Leaf, sitting down at the table. “What shall I write?”

“You heard a bunch of that scroll earlier. Write down some of what you remember.”

That earned Sen a skeptical look, but Falling Leaf dutifully picked up the brush and began writing. At first, he just watched the characters appear on the scroll and marveled at the crisp control that went into forming them. After a little while, though, Sen really focused on what Falling Leaf was writing. Sen couldn’t be sure without going and getting the scroll he’d been reading, but it appeared that Falling Leaf was writing what she’d heard nearly verbatim. Sen’s memory was good. In fact, it was very, very good compared to his mortal days, but he didn’t think he could have pulled off the feat he was witnessing.

“You remember all of this?” he asked.

“I was listening carefully,” she said as she turned to look at him. “I always listen carefully when you speak.”

Sen felt inexplicably nervous under that look and shifted in his seat. Then, Falling Leaf broke the moment when she continued.

“You should try it sometime.”

“Very funny,” said Sen as Falling Leaf smirked to herself.

***

Wu Meng Yao looked a little horrified at Sen’s words.

“You want me to go to the Mountains of Sorrow and retrieve a treasure from one of the peaks there?”

Sen nodded. “Yes. That’s about the size of it.”

The woman swallowed hard. Sen did his best not to look at Shen Mingxia because she was giving him a very skeptical look.

“Which peak?” asked Wu Meng Yao.

“I don’t know exactly which peak. It’s supposed to be one of the peaks near the main pass through the mountains. I mean, if I knew exactly where it was and how to get it, I’d just go myself.”

“Do you have any other information?” asked the sect woman.

Sen was starting to feel bad about the whole subterfuge, but he carried on with it. “It’s a potent shadow qi treasure. It’s in a cave. You should expect terrible weather, powerful spirit beasts, and probably some dangerous formations and qi traps. It’s perfect for a fresh core formation cultivator. I get a treasure. You’re freed from your debt. Everybody wins.”

Wu Meng Yao’s brow furrowed. “Do we need to leave immediately?”

Sen wanted to say yes. Oh, he wanted to say it so very badly, but he’d seen the map. There was basically nothing between where they were and where he was sending them. No major cities. He wasn’t sure there were even any towns or villages. Sen might want them gone, but he wasn’t cruel enough to force them to travel in the dead of winter to places where there simply was no shelter. After all, they couldn’t simply raise a galehouse and hole up for a month if they needed to. He shook his head.

“It’ll hold until spring, I expect.”

A tiny little part of Sen hoped that she’d decide to go back to Emperor’s Bay until the weather broke, but it wasn’t to be. She offered him a relieved smile.

“Well then, we’ll just have to find ways to make ourselves useful around here until then.”

Sen tried to smile back and almost made it. Wu Meng Yao stood.

“I’ll get us something to drink,” she announced.

The moment she was gone, Sen felt Shen Mingxia’s eyes boring into him. He looked over at her and did his best to maintain a calm, neutral expression.

“There’s no treasure, is there?” she demanded.

“Oh, there’s definitely treasures up in those peaks,” said Sen.

“But not the one you’re talking about.”

Sen said nothing.

Shen Mingxia glared at him. “Are you trying to get me and her killed?”

“What? No. Your job is to wait until you get to the mountains and then tell her that I’m a cruel liar who sent you after a non-existent treasure.”

Shen Mingxia opened her mouth and the only thing that came out was a baffled, “Why?”

“Because it’s not my job to fix her guilt,” said Sen.

She Mingxia frowned but eventually nodded. “Okay. I can see that. But why all of this? Why not just say that to her?”

“Do you really think that if I just say, this is not my problem, go home, she’ll actually do it? Because that would make my life so much easier.”

“No,” admitted Shen Mingxia. “There’s almost zero chance of that.”

“That was what I thought. This way, I waste a bunch of her time and send her on a fool’s errand. You put a stop to it before it gets really dangerous. She stops feeling guilty and just thinks that I’m an ass for doing that to her.”

“You are an ass for doing this to her.”

“As a wandering cultivator, you work with the tools you have. Besides, it’s not like I have anything real for her to do. You’re not dealing with a sect here. It’s just me. I don’t have jobs or missions or whatever you call them to hand out to people.”

“Still, this was the best you could come up with?”

“Figure out something better,” said Sen. “You have until spring.”