Chapter 6: Xuezhao

On the sixth morning, Zhiyi woke to a tiger sitting on her chest.

"Xuezhao," said Lei Juehan from the other side of the bed. "Get off."

The tiger did not.

She yawned, showing teeth as long as Zhiyi's fingers, and settled her chin on Zhiyi's collarbone.

"She has bitten a dozen people in my service," the war god said. "She has never once sat on anyone."

"She likes me."

"She likes you better than me."

He sounded so wounded that Zhiyi laughed, and it shook the tiger's head up and down.

"Don't laugh," he said. "She'll take it as encouragement."

He was propped on one elbow with the blanket at his waist, hair loose, the white streak bright against the dark.

The fern on his chest was smaller than it had been on the first night.

Six finger-widths of skin were clean.

Zhiyi looked at them, and then at him, and something in her chest turned over.

"I'll make breakfast," said Lei Juehan.

"You'll what?"

"There is a kitchen behind the hall. I have used it."

He had used it.

She watched in silence as the most feared man on Mount Canglang tied a cloth around his hair.

Then he boiled noodles in a black iron pot.

He pulled them out with chopsticks and laid them in a bowl.

He ladled broth over them, and a green onion, and a boiled egg, set exactly in the center.

"Eat," he said, and put it in front of her.

She ate.

It was the best bowl of noodles she had eaten in her life.

"You didn't expect that," he said, watching her.

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