The sun rose over the Valley of Whispering Water, casting long, golden fingers across the meadow. For the past two days, Lin Wan and Wang had been using a small, shallow cave near the waterfall as a temporary camp. It was cramped and smelled of damp earth, a constant reminder of the life they had left behind.

Wang was already awake, standing at the cave entrance and sharpening his bone-knife. He looked out at the valley with wary eyes

"Wang," Lin Wan called out, crawling out from the pile of furs. She stretched, her joints popping. "We’ve spent enough time planning. Today, we start the real work. I don’t want to live in this damp hole forever. I want to build a ’House’, our home"

Wang turned, his brow furrowing in that way it did whenever she used a word from her world. "You mentioned this before, Wan’er. A nest made of trees and mud. But won’t the rain just wash it away? A cave is stone; stone is strong, it won’t be washed away by the rain."

Lin Wan walked over to him, picking up a stick and smoothing out a patch of dirt on the cave floor. "Not if we build it the way my people do. We aren’t just piling mud, Wang. We’re going to create something called ’Cob’. It’s a mixture of the earth, but it becomes as hard as the mountain once it sets."

She began to draw a circle in the dirt. "We’ll build it in a dome, like a half-egg. It’s the strongest shape. It supports its own weight so we don’t need giant stone pillars, for support."

Wang knelt beside her, watching the stick move. "And how do we stop the ground from eating it when the sky rains?"

"That’s where you come in," Lin Wan said, looking him in the eye. "I need specific materials. Not just anything. First, I need large, flat river stones. . . as many as you can carry. We’ll lay them in a circle to create a ’Foundation’. It keeps the walls dry."

She pointed to the riverbank. "Then, I need the fine, grey sand from the bends in the stream. Not the coarse stuff, the fine powder. And most importantly, I need a massive amount of that long, tough ’Iron-grass’ that grows near the cliff base."

Wang blinked. "The grass? It’s too tough for the females to weave. Even the beast grazers won’t eat it."

"Exactly," Lin Wan smiled. "It’s strong. In my home town, we use iron rods to keep buildings from snapping into two. But we don’t have it here, so we’ll make do with the next best thing, So, that iron grass will be our ’bones’. When we mix the clay, the sand, and the grass together, it creates a strong connection that won’t crack."

Wang was silent for a long moment, processing the logic. It was strange, entirely outside the inherited memory of the Leopard Tribe, but it had the ring of truth to it. "You want me to bring you stones, sand, and iron grass."

"And lots of water," Lin Wan added. "I’ll handle the mixing and the shaping. You provide the strength."

" Talking about water, we need something to store the water with, cause we need huge quantity of water, for day use, like drinking, cooking, bathing and most importantly to build the house."

"But wan’er can go to the river to wash up. . ."

Wan’er teased him, "Would you like if someone washes me bathing in the shadow, won’t it be better if I do it indoors"

Wan’er saw the words click, as Wang’s eyes glazed over with fury at the thought of another male seeing his mate’s body, he could barely share with new couple brothers, to share with outsiders was definitely out if the question

"What do you want me to do?"

It would be better if it was a wooden barrel, but there’s no time.for that, so they’ll use the next best thing, a stone barrel, so wan’er told Wang what to do, which he did under an hour, three Stone barrels was made.

After, roasting two rabbits that Wang had hunted that early morning, they had their breakfast. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

Wang stood up, a rare flicker of excitement in his golden eyes. He liked having a mission. He liked that she was building a future with him, rather than mourning the past. "I will bring you a mountain of stones, Wan’er."

Throughout the first and second days, Wang was a whirlwind of silver-furred energy. He shifted into his beast form to drag massive loads of flat granite and baskets of sand Lin Wan had fashioned from vines. Lin Wan, meanwhile, worked until her hands were stained grey and red, treading the clay and sand together with her bare feet, mixing in the chopped Iron-grass until the ’Cob’ was thick and malleable.

By the morning of the third day, the foundation was set. A perfect circle of heavy stones sat in the meadow, waiting for the walls to rise.

"I’m going to the far side of the valley," Wang said, strapping a leather harness to his chest. "There is a patch of Iron-grass there that hasn’t been touched by the wind. It will take me until mid-day to gather enough for the roof dome."

"Be careful," Lin Wan said, leaning in to give him a quick kiss. "Don’t overwork yourself."

Wang grunted an affirmative, shifted, and vanished into the treeline.

Lin Wan sighed, wiping sweat from her forehead with the back of a muddy hand. She walked back into the depths of their temporary cave to grab the last gourd of water. The cave was deeper than she had initially thought, twisting back into the cool darkness of the cliff.

As she reached for the gourd, she froze.

The silence of the cave was broken by a sound that didn’t belong to the wind or the waterfall outside. It was a heavy, deliberate footstep, the sound of weight settling on stone.

Thump. Thump.

It was coming from the very back of the cave, where the shadows were absolute.

"Wang?" she whispered, her heart starting to hammer against her ribs. "Is that you? Did you forget something?"

No answer.

Lin Wan backed away slowly, her eyes straining against the gloom. Suddenly, two orbs of light ignited in the darkness. They were golden, huge, unblinking, and filled with predatory intelligence.

Something was in the cave with her. And it wasn’t Wang.