The morning after the jaguars arrived, Thousand Fang woke to chaos.

Bai Yue stood at the edge of the eastern fields, a cup of cold tea in her hand, watching a jaguar elder walk directly into a drying rack. The wooden frame collapsed. Drying fish flew everywhere. A passing crane beastman slipped on a fish and knocked over a basket of tubers. The tubers rolled downhill and tripped a wolf carrying water. The water splashed onto a cooking fire.

HISSSSS.

Smoke rose. Someone coughed. Someone else started yelling.

"THIS IS FINE," Elder Zhao shouted from somewhere in the middle of it all, his voice cracking. "EVERYTHING IS FINE. WE ARE FINE."

A jaguar cub ran past him chasing a butterfly. Then another. Then three more. They had not been this free in five years. They did not know what to do with freedom except run.

"THE BUTTERFLY IS GETTING AWAY!"

"CATCH IT!"

"THAT’S A BEE!"

"AAAAAHHHHH!"

Bai Yue took a long sip of her cold tea.

Beside her, Mo Xiao appeared like a shadow, his arms crossed, his amber eyes tracking the chaos with the expression of a man who had already given up.

"They broke the grain store," he said flatly.

"What?"

"The jaguars. They were trying to ’help’ organize. Someone knocked over a shelf. Now there’s millet everywhere. The snake twins are eating it off the ground."

Bai Yue closed her eyes. "Are they at least eating it off the ground?"

"They’re rolling in it."

"Mo Xiao."

"They say it’s ’texture exploration.’"

She opened her eyes. "I’m going to pretend you didn’t tell me that."

"Smart."

The morning continued in this fashion.

A jaguar hunter, unfamiliar with Thousand Fang’s terrain, attempted to take a shortcut through the marsh. He sank to his waist in mud. Rescue efforts took an hour and involved three panthers, a very long vine, and Zhāo Yàn providing unhelpful commentary from a dry rock.

"Push! No, not like that. Like this. No, you’re doing it wrong. Let me demonstrate." He did not demonstrate.

"ZHĀO YÀN."

"I’M MORALLY SUPPORTING."

The snake twins, Shé Yì and Shé Èr, had appointed themselves official "Jaguar Integration Specialists." This meant they followed the new arrivals everywhere, offering unsolicited advice and occasionally stealing their food.

"That’s not how you skin a rabbit," Shé Yì said to a bewildered jaguar woman.

"You’re holding the knife wrong," Shé Èr added.

"It’s a spoon," the jaguar woman said.

"Exactly. Wrong."

She stared at them. They stared back with innocent, slit-pupiled eyes. She gave up and walked away. The twins followed.

By midday, poor Elder Zhao had developed a tic.

His left eye twitched every time a jaguar walked past. And they kept walking past. And past. And past.

"How many of them are there?" he demanded.

"Forty-seven," Yàn Shū said, consulting a scroll he had been keeping since dawn. He had appointed himself official census-taker. "Forty-eight if you count the one who hasn’t come out of the tent yet. I believe she is napping."

"She’s been napping for four hours."

"Trauma recovery requires significant rest."

The elder’s eye twitched harder.

~

By evening, things had settled.

Not completely. Nothing in Thousand Fang was ever complete. But the jaguars had been assigned sleeping areas. The grain had been swept up. The mud-covered hunter had been extracted, washed, and was now sitting by the fire looking deeply embarrassed but otherwise unharmed.

The tribe gathered for the evening meal.

It was a massive affair. Extra logs had been dragged to the central fire. Furs were spread on the ground for seating. The smell of roasting meat and wild herbs filled the air.

And in the center of it all, holding court like a golden sun, was Cāng Jì.

The Dragon Prince had been ambushed.

The cubs had swarmed him the moment he sat down. There were six of them now: Miao Miao, A-Li, Xiao Hei, Fēng Yá, the tiger cub, and two wolf pups Bai Yue barely recognized, one of them was A-Wù, all grown up from the tiny fluffball who used to lick her face.

They climbed Cāng Jì like he was a jungle gym.

"Shiny dragon! Shiny dragon! Look at me!"

"I’m taller than you now!"

"You’re sitting on his foot. That doesn’t count."

"Does too!"

Cāng Jì sat perfectly rigid, a muscle twitching in his jaw. A wolf pup was dangling from his left arm. Miao Miao was attempting to braid his golden hair. Fēng Yá had somehow wedged himself between Cāng Jì’s back and the log, where he was pretending to be invisible.

"I am," Cāng Jì announced to no one in particular, "an apex predator."

No one acknowledged this.

"An APEX PREDATOR."

"We know, Uncle Sparkles," Yòu Lín said, walking past with a plate of meat. "You’re very scary. The children are terrified. That’s why they’re using you as a climbing structure."

Cāng Jì’s eye twitched. But he didn’t push anyone off.

Bai Yue hid her smile behind her cup.

Across the fire, Rui Xuě was not having a good evening.

The snake twins had cornered him.

"So," Shé Yì said, sliding up on his left, "Miao Miao kissed you."

"I don’t want to talk about it."

"On the CHEEK," Shé Èr added, sliding up on his right. "In front of EVERYONE."

"It was a greeting."

"It was a DECLARATION."

"She was excited. We were gone. She missed us."

"She kissed you."

"SHÉ YÌ."

"She kissed you and you turned into a tomato," Shé Èr continued, utterly unbothered. "Your ears are still pink. Look. They’re pink right now."

Rui Xuě’s hands flew to his ears. They were warm, and he cursed internally.

"I’m going to eat somewhere else."

"No you’re not."

"We have MORE questions."

"Where did you go? Did you see ghosts? Did you fight any more monsters?"

"Did Miao Miao kiss you BEFORE you left or AFTER you came back? Asking for science."

"I hate both of you," Rui Xuě said flatly.

"No you don’t."

"We’re family."

"Family asks about your romantic prospects."

"WE ARE NOT HAVING THIS CONVERSATION."

But his ears stayed pink for the rest of the meal.