After a few seconds, the low growls died, leaving behind a suffocating silence.
Darkness crowded closer, but Guang's locked grip with Ming's small hand never softened.
A heavy weight pressed into his shoulder—the broad, unmistakable palm of his father turning him gently around. Lin looked at them and smiled. "Don't worry, kids," he murmured. "Stay close, do exactly as I say, and we'll make it out fine."
Even though those words came from someone who wasn't a safe space for them, it was enough to make them calm.
That was until a booming voice echoed in the silence. "Lin??? Is that you?"
Footsteps crunched through the brush, and Lin swung around to face them.
The branches snapped back to let a man through.
The light peeking through from the forest leaves made the man's brown hair gleam silver, and looking closer, they could see wrinkles across his forehead and beneath his eyes.
