The mist was thinner that morning, pulled apart by a gentle wind that swept down from the northern cliffs. It carried the faint scent of pine sap and cold stone, fresh and clean like water drawn from the heart of the mountain. Li Wei stood barefoot outside his home, arms spread wide as if he could embrace the whole sky. His breath steamed in the chill air, and dew clung to his lashes like tiny stars.
"Haaaaaa!" he yelled, voice cracking in boyish triumph. A flock of birds scattered from a nearby thicket, wings thrumming the air. Li Wei grinned, proud of himself, as if he had just defeated an invading army with nothing but his voice.
The village, still slow to wake, murmured with soft sounds: the clatter of a pot lid, the creak of a door, the faint snore of Old Jin from two houses down. Smoke curled from chimneys, rising lazily into the pale sky, disappearing into the mist that hovered just above the rooftops.
His mother's voice drifted from within their small home. "Wei'er, your shoes—again?" she called, half exasperated, half amused.
Li Wei danced on the balls of his feet, shaking off droplets from the grass. "Shoes are for markets and manners! The earth likes my toes."
A short silence, then a chuckle. "Well, tell the earth to scrub your toes before breakfast."
He laughed, bounding over the stone step and into the warm, herb-scented interior. Their home was modest: walls of packed earth, a thatched roof patched with cedar bark, and a single window that framed the eastern ridge like a painting. The hearth crackled gently. Dried mushrooms and stringed peppers hung from the beams, and in the corner, a shrine to the mountain spirits stood quietly adorned with incense and folded paper prayers.
As he sat, his mother placed a bowl of steaming rice porridge in front of him, dotted with slices of dried plum and a drizzle of honey. He gobbled it up with cheerful abandon, licking the last bits from his chopsticks.
Outside, the mountain called. He could feel it in his chest, a gentle pull like a fish on a lazy line. After breakfast, with a quick bow to the shrine and a shouted promise to be back before dusk, Li Wei darted out again, sling bag slung over one shoulder, a bamboo fishing pole in hand.
The forest greeted him with whispers. The bamboo swayed with a rhythmic rustle, like the breathing of some ancient creature. The stones underfoot, worn smooth by centuries of wind and rain, were cool and familiar.
He followed the narrow deer trail, winding through ferns and mossy trunks. His steps were light, practiced, though now he remembered Yao's words from the day before:
"A rabbit knows it's being watched. A tiger makes no sound until it strikes."
Yao. The old man had stayed the night in the corner of their home, wrapped in that patchwork cloak of his, snoring like a contented bear. There was something odd about him, Li Wei had to admit—not odd in the way of drunkards or madmen, but in the way his eyes seemed to glint like sun on wet stone. And the way he moved, without a sound, as if the air parted for him rather than resisted.
Li Wei found himself hoping the old man would still be there when he returned. He had so many questions—about the gods and demons Yao spoke of, about Qi and energy and the way he had caught that clay cup before it fell without even looking.
Reaching the stream, he settled onto his usual rock. The water was clear today, sparkling in the slanting light. He cast his line with a satisfied sigh and let the world slow.
Time passed, though he could never tell how much. A fish tugged once, twice, and he pulled it in with practiced ease. A fat river trout, scales gleaming like silver coins.
He was gutting it when he heard the voice.
"A poor catch. You're not listening to the current."
Li Wei looked up, startled. Yao stood on the far bank, balanced atop a narrow branch of an old pine tree, arms folded inside his sleeves.
"How did you—?"
"Walked," Yao said. "The question is, how did you not see me coming?"
Li Wei flushed. "I was concentrating."
Yao laughed, hopping lightly to the ground. "Concentration is good. But awareness is better. You've ears, haven't you?"
"Yes. Two of them. Very clean."
"Then use them. The forest is always speaking."
The old man knelt beside him and plucked up the trout, examining it. "Good knife work. You have hands like a weasel. Slippery, but quick."
"Is that a compliment?"
"Of course! Weasels are clever."
Yao sat cross-legged and drew something from his cloak: a small, oiled cloth bundle. Unwrapped, it revealed a simple flute, carved from dark wood.
"Do you play?"
Li Wei shook his head. "I've whistled on reeds before."
"Then you'll learn. Every forest has its song, but few know how to answer. Music is breath made visible."
He handed Li Wei the flute. It was cool to the touch, smooth, and lighter than expected.
"Try."
Li Wei put it to his lips, blew a wavering note. It was thin and squeaky.
Yao grinned. "Again."
He tried again. A little better.
"Not bad. A squirrel might fall in love."
They spent the next hour that way—playing, laughing, listening. Yao never corrected harshly. He only offered stories: of a time when a flute's song could call rain, or charm spirits from their stones.
"Is that true?" Li Wei asked.
Yao smiled. "What is true? The mountain was once a sea. The stars were once fish. Truth is the shape of a story told too many times."
Li Wei frowned, brow furrowed.
"But that doesn't mean it's not useful," Yao added. "Let a story guide your hand, and your hand will learn faster than your mind ever could."
The sun rose high. They ate wild pears and roasted the trout over a smokeless fire Yao built with two fingers and a muttered word.
When they returned to the village, the air was turning golden. Li Wei's mother raised an eyebrow at the soot on his cheeks and the smell of fish in his clothes, but she said nothing. Yao bowed to her politely, then wandered off without a word, vanishing around the bend of the old road like mist drawn by the wind.
That night, Li Wei lay in bed staring at the ceiling. The flute rested beside him, and he held it close like a talisman. In his mind, he replayed the stories Yao had told: of silent monks who leapt between raindrops, of beasts that walked in dreams, of men who breathed stars.
And though he knew they were only stories, some part of him—small, stubborn, and secret—believed them.
Or wanted to.
Outside, the wind carried a faint tune, like the breath of a flute across still water.
Li Wei fell asleep smiling.
By dawn, the forest wore a sheen of silver mist, the world hushed under its blanket of damp.
Li Wei stirred from sleep in a slow roll of blankets, limbs tangled in dreams. A corner of his straw mattress was damp where the roof had leaked—just a trickle, but cold enough to make him grumble and squint up at the ceiling's patched thatch with sleepy suspicion.
His house, a modest thing of pine logs and stone, breathed around him. It creaked as it always did in the morning, like an old man waking his joints one by one. The scent of wet earth and burning pine from last night's fire lingered in the air.
Yao was gone.
Not just missing from the mat he had claimed beside the hearth, but gone. Not a blanket out of place. Not a soot-print or soggy sandal by the door.
Li Wei blinked and rubbed his eyes. "Old man?" he called softly, voice still sticky with sleep.
Nothing answered but the patter of rain on leaves.
He shuffled to the door and pushed it open.
The forest outside greeted him like an old friend leaning close. Cool mist wrapped around his bare ankles, and the scent of bamboo and moss and damp stone filled his nose. It was beautiful—the kind of beauty he didn't notice unless he remembered to stop and look.
And Yao was standing atop the fence.
The wooden fence behind their home wasn't much, just old logs lashed together with vines and crooked nails, meant more to suggest a boundary than enforce it. And there was the old man, perfectly balanced on one narrow rail, his long white robes unmuddied by the wet, arms folded as if he'd been waiting.
Li Wei's jaw fell slack.
Yao raised a single finger to his lips, then beckoned.
Without a word, the boy stepped barefoot into the mud and padded toward him. Rain beaded on his shoulders and trickled down his collar, but he didn't notice.
"What are you doing up there?" he whispered once he was close.
Yao smiled that maddening smile. "Learning."
"Learning what?"
"Balance." He lifted one leg and now stood upon the rail like a stork, calm as stone.
Li Wei frowned. "You're just showing off."
"I'm showing you," Yao said, "that the world is not as still as you think. The fence moves. The wind pushes. The rain shifts your weight. Stand still in the chaos, and you learn something most never do."
"You're crazy," Li Wei muttered.
"I'm alive." Yao's eyes gleamed like wet jade. "And so are you. Come. Try."
The boy glanced at the rail.
It was slick. It was high—well, high enough for a ten-year-old boy to crack his pride, if not his bones.
But something in Yao's voice made his feet itch. Made his heart thump a little quicker.
Li Wei clambered up onto the lowest beam, arms stretched wide for balance. He wobbled immediately.
"Easy," Yao murmured. "Don't grip the world like a fist. Feel it like a breath."
Li Wei exhaled. Rain kissed his cheeks. The wind stirred the bamboo in long, sighing sweeps. The rail shifted beneath him, not much, but just enough to be real.
He stood. Shaky. Unsure. But upright.
Yao nodded with quiet approval. "Good."
They stood like that, side by side, saying nothing. The village behind them lay still. A rooster crowed late and half-hearted. Smoke began to curl from the homes.
The world continued its turning.
After a while, Yao dropped lightly to the earth, making no sound in his landing. Li Wei tried the same and landed with a loud squelch in the mud.
"Too stiff," Yao chuckled. "You move like a squirrel with a stick up its tail."
Li Wei wrinkled his nose. "I thought squirrels were fast."
"They are. But they don't fall into puddles."
They returned to the house, dripping but oddly energized. Yao stirred the embers and added dry sticks from some hidden stash Li Wei hadn't noticed the night before. Soon, a small fire was coaxed to life. Water was set to boil in a dented iron pot.
Li Wei sat cross-legged near the flames, hands outstretched.
"Why were you really out there?" he asked.
Yao was silent for a long while, stirring the pot with a carved wooden spoon. Finally, he said, "I wanted to see if you'd follow."
Li Wei blinked. "That's it?"
"No." Yao's voice softened. "But it's where we start."
The soup was plain—mushroom, wild greens, and thin noodles—but warm and filling. Li Wei slurped his third bowl with gusto, glancing often at the strange old man now dozing in a sitting position, his back against the hearth.
"Old people are weird," he muttered, and Yao's eyes snapped open.
"Weirdness is the spice of wisdom," he said, not bothering to sit up. "Now hush. The forest will call soon."
Later that day, the rain stopped. The sun, pale and bashful, peeked from behind clouds and gilded the bamboo with watery gold. Steam rose from the earth like spirits ascending.
Yao and Li Wei walked the forest paths, silent at first. They moved slowly—Yao often pausing to touch a leaf, to smell a tree, to listen.
Li Wei mimicked him. Tried, at least.
"What are we listening for?" he asked.
"Everything," Yao said.
"That's not very helpful."
"Good."
Li Wei sighed. "You're the worst teacher."
"You're the worst student."
They smiled at each other, and continued on.
As they passed deeper into the woods, Yao began to speak. Not loudly. Almost like the forest was listening too, and they shouldn't wake it.
"In the old days," he said, "this mountain belonged to the Sky-Touched Clan. They were gentle folk, masters of wind arts. Could leap from tree to tree without breaking a twig."
Li Wei's ears perked. "Is that real?"
Yao tilted his head. "What is 'real' to you, boy?"
"Something you can see. Touch."
"Hmm." The old man scratched his beard. "Then dreams aren't real?"
Li Wei opened his mouth, then shut it.
"I had a dream," Yao said, voice barely above a breath. "Once. A long one. I dreamed I was a man who walked through a thousand lives. I dreamed I was a bird, a beast, a spirit in the clouds. And then I woke… here."
The boy squinted at him. "That's not a story. That's nonsense."
Yao smiled. "It is both."
They passed an old shrine tucked in the crook of a stone outcrop. Moss-covered and crumbling, it bore the carving of some forgotten spirit—worn smooth by wind and time. Li Wei bowed automatically, hands together, head low. Yao did not.
"You don't believe in the mountain gods?" the boy asked.
"I believe," Yao said. "But not the same way you do."
"What way is that?"
Yao didn't answer. He simply walked on, and the bamboo closed behind him like a curtain.
By the time they returned, dusk had fallen. Orange firelight danced in every window. The village murmured with quiet life—meals being shared, children being scolded, fires being stoked for night.
Li Wei felt something strange in his chest. Like a breath that hadn't quite finished.
That night, Yao played the flute.
He sat by the fire, fingers sure on the wooden instrument they had carved together days earlier. The tune was slow, mournful, as if the mountains themselves were weeping somewhere deep within.
Li Wei sat cross-legged nearby, chin on his knees, listening.
The notes seemed to coil through the room like smoke. The flames flickered oddly. Outside, the mist rolled closer to the windows.
"Old man?" Li Wei whispered.
The old man did not stop playing, but he nodded.
"Who are you really?"
Yao's tune rose sharply, then fell into silence.
"Someone who once believed he could be more," he said. "Then learned to be less."
Li Wei didn't understand. But the fire crackled, and the rain whispered again on the roof.
And the boy slept without dreams.