Shao came to lying on a hard floor. A hard floor that bounced. A rush of cold air across his face opened his eyes. He squinted up to see stars and realized they were in an open truck, the warped boards of its sides barely higher than the seats. One good bounce and any passengers not holding on would’ve been thrown off those benches. Sparrow and Lian sat with their backs against the cab of the truck. The skies were clouded, the moonlight hazy. He felt a blanket being pulled over him.

Crusted with sleep, his eyes refused to open fully. Sunrise. Or was it sunset? They had to find shelter for the night. Or was it daytime when they had to hide away? He pushed himself to a sitting position on his elbows.

The truck had stopped at a crossroads. Lian and Sparrow were talking to a group of peasants. Most were men but there were a few women in the group. Donkeys and carts, handbarrows laden with baskets and sacks. The peasants’ wide hats of woven bamboo cast eerie shadows on the hard dirt road. Their leader rode majestically on the back of a large water buffalo, looking down at Sparrow, nodding at her words.

“We’ll give you a ride though it’s out of our way,” a low growling voice said. “As far as Ouhai, but no farther.”

“Thank you, King of Beasts,” Sparrow said. It was her voice, he was sure of it. But also different. A sweet, shining sort of voice.

Then as Shao’s eyelids closed, the peasant talking to Sparrow changed. Now he loomed above her, twice the size he had been a moment ago. A savage face framed by long, fiery locks of hair, mounted on a tiger the size of an ox. Behind him, the peasants and their animals were gone, replaced by a procession of tigers, wolves, and leopards. Giant apes pushed handbarrows piled high with burlap bags wrapped around the roots of young saplings. A portable forest of cypress and gingko, golden larch and pink cassia.

And Sparrow. He could only see her back, but her entire figure shone with a cool, unearthly radiance. He wanted to shout out, warn Lian and Sparrow about the wild animals, the savage man. But he collapsed, exhausted. Doubting what he’d seen. Certain he was delirious.

Someone lifted him as easily as though he were a leaf and set him down. Laughter and crude comments, rough voices. A blanket thrown over him. He felt the air sweep his cheeks, the rolling rumble of wooden wheels beneath his aching body.

WHEN SHAO OPENED his eyes again, he was able to sit up. He was also ravenous and thirsty. There was a bowl of tea on the table beside him, tepid but quenching. The door opened, and Sparrow entered, carrying a plate that she set down on a wooden stool by the bed.