The Moment Between Flying and Falling

Book 4: Chapter 16

When the child awoke, Jinghe fed her some porridge, before asking her a couple of questions about her name, her parents, and where she came from. The child replied that her name was A-Liu, that she had no parents, and she came from the wild fields.

"Do you not remember your parents... at all?" Jinghe asked softly.

A-Liu shook her head meekly, then opened her mouth for some porridge. Her eyes opened wide as they stared at Jinghe, a sense of admiration filling them. Yanbo could practically see the stars shining in them. When Yanbo commented so dryly, but quietly so only Jinghe could hear it, Jinghe gave her a roll of the eyes.

"Are you getting jealous of a little child?"

"No." Yanbo raised her chin slightly, and Jinghe scoffed softly to herself. When Jinghe looked back down at the child, Yanbo stopped raising her chin and knelt down next to Jinghe to look at the child.

"Who are you?" A-Liu asked.

"My name is Lin Jinghe." Jinghe answered. "This is Cui Yanbo."

A-Liu looked at Yanbo, not fazed at all by her stone-cold face and intimidating aura. In fact, she reached out and grasped one of the braids hanging down the side of Yanbo's face, and tugged, causing Yanbo to stumble forward. She would've fallen flat on her face if Jinghe hadn't helped support her. Yanbo's eyes widened.

"You-!"

A-Liu seemed rather confused about Yanbo's reaction, but Jinghe let out a small laugh.

"In the future, don't randomly tug at stranger's braids. They won't be very happy." Jinghe told A-Liu, and she nodded, looking thoroughly chastised, bowing her head slightly.

"But... I can tug this jiejie's braids, right?" A-Liu asked. Yanbo was about to say an 'absolutely not!' when Jinghe interjected.

"Of course you can!" Jinghe said with a smile. Yanbo had half a mind to knock her in the head, but then, she saw A-Liu's big, toothy grin, and felt rather reluctant to do so.

"Fine." Yanbo huffed.

***

Jinghe entered the temple with a basket on her back filled with her day's purchases from the market, mostly thinking about the health of the child, and from her hand hung two round bottles of wine. Yanbo looked up at Jinghe with a slight raised brow, and they both knew that they were both remembering what had happened those hundreds of years ago, when Jinghe got drunk.

Jinghe cleared her throat. "I thought you should try some of the wine here. It's very good."

"No, thanks, I don't drink." Yanbo replied.

"You haven't even tried the wine of this town yet! It's definitely comparable to the wine of the heavens!" And a lot stronger. If you still don't get drunk from this wine... when am I ever going to be able to investigate that birthmark on her back?

"No, thanks." Yanbo repeated.

"Just try one cup! I promise you'll like it."

A-Liu scampered up beside Yanbo and tugged at her sleeve. "What is it, what is it? What did Jinghe-jiejie bring back from the markets?"

Jinghe suddenly felt a sense of irony. She was hundreds, probably even thousands of years older than that little child, yet the little child still judged by appearances and called her jiejie.

Yanbo considered this. "Only if you drink with me." She finally answered.

Jinghe thought about the prospect. "Fine!" She knitted the strings of space together to create a squat, wooden table and two drinking cups. They both sat down next to the table and Jinghe poured them each a drink. Just to humor Jinghe, Yanbo decided she would actually drink this first shot, only to find that it was very strong. Shortly after, she began to get a fuzzy head.