Chapter Text
Far to the south in China, deep in the bamboo forest was a small village. High above the village far up in the mountains there used to be a huge palace. The king and queen of the palace had been named King Hou’shang and Queen Tali’xio. Their daughter’s mate and husband Huang had once been a mercenary and had helped out a lot of people on the far Eastern shores. As for their daughter Hijuan, she had been a general, the first in her family, before she ever married Huang. Both of them hadn't liked the idea and for a long time, neither of them bothered to communicate with the other. That was until bandits attacked the villages and they were forced to put their bickering to a halt to go help out. It was strange, but during that time they began to fall for one another.
Five Years Ago
Huang yawned as he got out of his bed in one of the many guest rooms that the king, Hou’shang, and the queen, Tali’xio, had let him stay in while he was here under their watchful gaze. He had been told by his own king in his homeland many miles to the east that this would unite all of the tribes and that it was a tradition that dated back centuries. To him, he didn’t care. It wasn’t like their precious daughter didn’t have any suitors. When he had arrived here hours ago and after walking through the village below and up the long, precarious trek just to reach the palace he had spotted several various tiger males from different species inside the village and even passed some while getting here. The largest had obviously been a Siberian male that was named Shun, but even he hadn’t caught the eye of the princess. Although the larger male tiger had been able to duel against her fairly well when she asked him to fight her, he had greatly underestimated the South Chinese Tigress and he lost. He had been greatly irritated at himself as he had left.
Huang walked down the long hallway and stopped at the open door to his right, looking out at the village far below them that could just barely be seen. Movement to his right made him look down into the courtyard below and he observed silently as he saw that Hijuan was in the middle of training. It had been interesting to him to learn that she was a general. Regardless, he still didn’t have an interest in her. It was clear to him that she was hard to talk to after witnessing many of the suitors failing miserably to speak with her properly. So, he just chose to do the opposite and ignore her.
Hijuan felt eyes on her while she focused on honing her fighting skills, but she ignored it like she did with every male who had come here for her hand in marriage. She was mildly intrigued, but that was all. Her amber eyes narrowed as she swung her sword at the end of a fallen tree that was on a pulley-system of the sort. The long log would swing down towards her and she’d jump to avoid being hit by the thing while using her sword or even staff to fend herself off from arrows that were shot at her from the guards. It was simple. It allowed her to utilize her actual feline abilities which helped in an actual battle.
She watched as the tree came swinging towards her and she leaped upwards at the right moment, running along the log as it still swung in the air and quickly brought up her sword, using the blade to deflect the arrows off it as they also came soaring through the air at her. Every single arrow was deflected and she did a flip in the air when she got to the end of the swinging log, spinning gracefully until she landed on the ground with the blade of her sword in the soil while she was crouched. Rising to her feet, she pulled the sword out and put it back into the weapon rack that was at the edge of the training area.
Huang huffed under his breath, not admitting to himself that it had been impressive, and turned away from the window as he walked down the hallway and to the stairs. He descended them and walked outside, breathing in the bitter cold air. He was a South Chinese Tiger like Hijuan, but his parents had adopted him since both of his biological parents had been killed by a tsunami that had hit their village where they had been living before he was born. There were very few of them left in the world, he couldn’t help but notice. Not unlike the Bali, Javan, Indochinese, Sumatran, Bengal, or Malayan tigers he’s come across. The only other tiger species that wasn’t around anymore at all was the Caspian tiger. His adoptive parents had been both Bengal tigers which were highly common. Many who had ever been around all of them often assumed he was the same until he told them otherwise.
He stiffened when he heard the gong ring out in the air and he looked up at the top of the palace, spotting a small feline holding the mallet which had struck the 19th century gong. That meant danger was coming. He immediately began running on all fours down the stairs and down the mountainside to get to the village, knowing that the people would need help. Behind him, he heard Hijuan’s parents speaking with their daughter about helping, which she agreed to do.
Getting to the village, he was met with chaos and the strong smell of smoke in the air. He hurried to help a dog that was closest to him trapped under a large wooden beam which he guessed had once belonged to part of the house that was burned down. Grabbing the end of the wooden beam, he let his mind go blank from worry or even slight fear as he stayed calm and used his strength to lift the beam off the dog.
Once he heard the dog say, “Thank you.”, he let go and the beam dropped onto the ground with a thud. He looked at the dog and saw that he wasn’t badly hurt.
“Go find somewhere safe to hide," he said.
The dog listened to him and took off running. He looked back at the direction of the palace just as Hijuan came to the village, her face hiding her fear as she narrowed her eyes upon seeing bandits. The large group of bandits were destroying everything possible and even attacking the villagers. He watched as she threw herself into the fight instantly, going after a bandit that was close to her. Taking his sword out of its sheath that was strapped to his back, he joined in on the fight as well.
He admired Hijuan's resilience and strength to continue to seek out anyone in need of aid all the while defending many tigers and other felines from bandits that got in her way; putting her fighting skills to good use. He glanced at her in the heat of the battle while he had parred a bandit’s sword that the wolf had swung at him. He was impressed by how she moved so swiftly as she launched herself at one of the bandits and kicked him a couple of times in his stomach, knocking the dumb coyote on his back. Turning back to the wolf, he shoved the scrawny male away with his own sword that he was wielding and swung it at the wolf’s head. The wolf was actually smart enough to duck, but he tripped over the weight of the sword at his side and he fell onto the ground.
Huang let him be, turning around and running with the sword gripped tightly in his hands as he spotted a leopard rushing up behind Hijuan who was fighting off three bandits by herself. She didn’t notice the other feline while she was too preoccupied with the three males; one another wolf, the second was a coyote, and the third was a crocodile.
He blocked the leopard’s blade with his own as the female swung her sword towards the back of Hijuan. He kicked with his foot at the leopard, knocking her feet out from under her, and shoved her away from Hijuan, growling and lashing his tail protectively. He sheathed his sword then and got into a fighting stance that was similar to that of kung fu masters.
When he had been a cub, his adopted parents had each been taught by some of the best kung fu masters around after seeking refuge in a monastery to the far North. They learned from the masters themselves and then began teaching him alongside the masters when he was old enough. For the next ten years, he trained in the ways of Kung Fu; adapting and coming up with some new moves that his parents hadn’t taught him. Then, they left and journeyed to their new home which was to the far East. There they lived in a city beneath a palace where a king and queen who were cheetahs resided. City life was well and he adapted to it easily; often helping the guards go after criminals and making a name for himself as a mercenary.
The leopard looked at him like he was insane as she seemed to smile sinisterly, gripping her sword tightly as she rushed towards him while swinging the blade down towards his head. To her shock though, the massive male tiger grabbed onto the blade with both of his hands on either side of the blade. He glared at the leopard and while keeping his hands on the blade, he then kicked out with his back feet, hitting her in her face and knocking her down onto the ground. He tossed the sword away and glared down at the female leopard.
The leopard met his eyes, glancing behind him and smirking when another bandit came rushing towards him with an axe in the fox’s hands. Turning to the fox, he risked a glance over his shoulder but the leopard had disappeared. Looking back at the fox, he got knocked over onto the ground by Hijuan who was now facing off against the fox bandit as she stood in front of him; snarling as she was crouched down.
“Huang, get on your feet and help me.”, Hijuan said, glancing down at him before turning her amber eyes back to the fox. She leaped at the fox, taking the canine by surprise and fear, and knocked him down onto the ground. While she kept him pinned beneath her, she hit him in his face with a series of punches and even scratched him a few times until he yelped and she reluctantly let him flee. She jumped onto her feet and together she and Huang fought side by side as they continued to fight off the rest of the bandits.
Once there were no more bandits, they separately went around helping aid the villagers who had been harmed or injured during the battle. A young liger male had been hurt the most; not being used to living in a village away from any sort of captivity and he had several wounds on his sides and his face. The liger was lying with his back against a wooden crate next to a house that had been ransacked by the bandits Hijuan noted as she walked over to him, kneeling down to check if he could even see as blood was running down his face and into his eyes. She noticed that there was an all white tiger and another tiger-lion hybrid who were holding onto one another as they could only stare down at the liger. They seemed to be unsure of what to do. Looking back at the liger, she blinked and sighed.
“Who-who is it?”the male asked, his nose flaring and his fur rising up along his arms and his neck as he struggled to see through the blood that covered his face. He looked around as if that would help, but it didn’t.
Hijuan gently placed a hand on his shoulder and used her sleeve to wipe the blood away from his eyes as she spoke to him in a motherly tone, “Shhh, it’s okay. My name is Hijuan. I’m here to help you.”
When she was done, the liger blinked a few times before his amber eyes focused on her face and he blinked at her gratefully.
“Thank you”, He said, wincing in pain then when he remembered about the wounds he had gotten from trying to fight some of the bandits that had destroyed the house and had attacked the tigon and his mate, the white tiger. He looked at them and the white tiger knelt down, kissing his forehead like a mother would do while she said, “Thank you, Li’shun. If you had not been fast enough, we might not be alive.”
“I’ll go get the healer to take a look at your wounds. Stay here.”, Hijuna ordered to the young liger who hadn’t seemed to have listened as he stood up then.
“I can walk.”, He said, looking down at the female south chinese tiger. He felt slightly dizzy, but he didn’t let it show.
In spite of how much larger and taller he was, Hijuan wasn’t intimidated or anything. She narrowed her eyes and said harshly now, “You’re staying here until I get back with the shaman. Your wounds need tending to and I can’t do that.”
The male tigon came over then, seeming far smaller than an average tiger, and spoke up, “Li’shun, you really should listen to her. She’s the next heir. I am sorry, your highness, Li’shun is not aware of how things are in this village. Allow me to introduce myself, my name is Jou’ang. You see, he had been born in captivity as was I. However, my parents Dài ān hào and Junn, were different species. My father was a tiger while my mother was a lioness. For Li’shun, it was the same but his dad had been a lion and his mother a tigress. Although we have sort of the same backstory, Li’shun lost his parents only a year ago and ever since then he fled captivity before coming here. He has only managed to survive because of myself and my mate here, Brin’shan. She taught me how to survive in the wild and when we met him, we taught him.”
“I see, well Li’shun while I appreciate that you seem to be...concerned, it is unnecessary when you yourself are the one hurt, not me.”, Hijuan told the young liger as she looked up to meet his eyes after looking at the tigon and listening to what he said. She blinked and turned back around then, walking away and going to find others that were in need of assistance.
Li’shun watched her walk away, looking down at his two new friends and saying, “I hope someday to be her mate. Our kids would be great, don’t you think so?”
“Um...Li’shun. You must not be aware of this, but well our kind cannot have offspring.”, Jou’ang told him as nicely as he could. Their type of species were not able to bore offspring in a natural way. He thought that the liger’s parents had to have informed him of that like his own parents had done with him, but it seemed they hadn’t.
The hopeful look that was shining in the liger’s eyes faded as he turned to the tigon and said with a scrunched up nose, “What? What do you mean?”
Before Jou’ang could answer him, Huang walked past them saying simply in a blunt tone of voice, “You really don’t have an idea why?” He looked confused and then realized that the liger was young, possibly still in his early teens in spite of his size, and he sighed. Walking over to him, he put a hand on the liger’s forearm and said, “Your kind, young kid, is not capable of producing offspring even if you had a mate of your own. It means that you will never have any because you have something in your dna that does not allow it. Plus, she’s already had many males up at her palace. It will be wiser to let this one be.”
Li'shun looked down at the tiger, noticing that he was the same kind as Hijuan, and said as he met the male’s amber eyes with his own, sorrow showing in them as the words finally seemed to sink in. He looked past Huang to the beautiful South Chinese Tigress and then back down at Huang, his shoulders slumping downwards and hung his head.
“I am sorry young one, but sadly that is how life goes.”, Huang told him gently. He removed his hand from the liger’s shoulder and then watched as Hijuan returned with an ocelot healer at her side. The small feline looked up at the liger with huge eyes in shock. Blinking, she instantly began working on giving him herbs after having him sit down for her.
“You did well out there.”, Hijuan said to him, which was the first in a long time of them both ignoring each other. He looked at her and walked away from Li’shun, Jou’ang, and his mate Brin’shan. To his surprise, the princess walked beside him. He was silent for a while as they walked, looking around at the destruction of the village. He stopped and turned to her, speaking.
“Thank you, your highness. They will need help rebuilding this as it had once been. I had not planned on staying here any longer, but I refuse to leave these people like this.”, Huang told her, glancing over at the other tiger.
Hijuan met his eyes and stared into them for a while before she turned her head away and replied, “I will inform my parents. I have heard though that mercenaries usually leave after being in a place for sometime, I had assumed that was to be the same case with you.”
“That is true, but I can see that these people need more help.”, Huang responded, looking at a family of bobcats who were struggling to carry all of their belongings away from their burned down house. He exchanged a quick glance with Hijuan and they both went over to help out. The two of them were unaware that Li’shan had been watching them with narrowed eyes.
*******************
Years passed and Huang and Hijuan had become far closer. They spent time together when they could outside of Hijuan being a general which had been quite a surprise to her parents, but he had been supportive of her. He did still notice though that Li’shun hadn’t seemed to get over his crush he had on Hijuan so there were often confrontations that he had to deal with between himself and the young liger since the younger male was still insisting that he’d have Hijuan as his mate.
As time went on, Huang and Hijuan finally ended up becoming mates and one night they grew closer.
Over the next three and a half months, Hijuan was still able to perform her duties for the most part. During the last twelve days however, Hjuan’s belly began to become larger as though she had eaten a whole pig. Because of this, she was unable to do her duty as the general. So, she was on bedrest for the rest of the following days while another general took her place. Yet, she still continued to move around inside the palace until she ended up in Huang’s old guest room which still had his scent even though he wasn't there.
Tali’xio was the only one who understood that and had only spoken once to Huang when he had questioned why his wife and mate would not stay in one room at the palace.
“She needs to rest, so why is she constantly moving?”, Huang asked as he had returned home one evening after travelling across the world to help out some people in another place that needed his help.
“When a mother is ready to have her children, she must find the proper place to have them. In the wild, it’s no different. She will be fine though, go and speak to King Hou’shang. I will make sure that she is fine when she finally has your children.”, Tali’xio told him gently. That seemed to calm him down as his shoulders relaxed and he walked off to go find the king while she stayed and walked to the room to check up on her daughter.
Li’shun, the young liger that took a liking to her, showed up one evening when Huang had left hours ago. He had tried down in the village to speak with Hijuan prior to now, but everywhere he looked there was Huang all the time. Now perhaps was his chance. He quietly walked up the long and grueling path until he reached the palace at the very top. His breath billowed out in front of him as he walked up the steps and was met at the top by the king himself.
“King Hou’shang, it is an honor to meet you sir. May I have a word with your daughter, Hijuan?”, he said, formally as he bowed to the king.
“My daughter cannot leave her room. She is on bedrest, young man.”, King Hou’shang replied. He had heard a lot about this liger from both his own guards as well as his own daughter and Huang. He could even see in the liger’s amber eyes that his words were not something he had been hoping to hear.
“Might I ask what ails her? Is she ill? I would not mind going to fetch her some water or some herbs from the healer.”, Li’shun replied, his tail twitching.
“She is expecting cubs soon.”, King Hou’shang told him, watching with years of experience how the liger’s calm demeanour changed to one of irritation as the male’s ears folded back against his head and his eyes narrowed.
“I see.”, Li’shun replied, regaining his calm composure and meeting the eyes of the King. He looked at the doors of the palace longingly and then turned to the King, his eyes narrowed again as his body became rigid and stiff.
The King met the liger’s gaze with one of his own, his own body stiffening up as he waited to see what the young male would do.
“If you go back now, you will not have to deal with me or her mother. I may be the king and while I am a very experienced warrior, her mother is going to be far worse to deal with if you choose to go down this path.”, Hou’shang warned him.
Li’shan didn’t care. He let out growl and ran at the older tiger with two knives drawn.
Meanwhile inside the palace, Hijuan was close to giving birth. Her stomach contracted and she grabbed onto the bed, digging her nails into the sheets while her mother watched for signs of when the firstborn would come out.
Back outside the palace, Hou’shang dodged a blow that would have cut him deeply and he rolled to the left as Li’shun came down with his two knives, slicing at the air though much to his dislike. He rose back up to his feet and kicked his back foot at the liger’s head, catching the young male off guard.
Li’shun stumbled backwards and one of his knives was knocked out of his hand by King Hou’shang when the older male kicked at him again.
He snarled and gripped the other knife tightly in his large hand, swinging it at the King’s face who backed up to avoid being cut. Unfortunately though, the King had backed up too far and he lost his footing on the solid ground, missing the stone pathway and fell down into the mountainside behind it, his body disappearing beneath the clouds and mist.
Li’shun paused at the top, gazing down into the mist and clouds as he listened for any sound of noise coming from below. Nothing was heard. He turned around and after finding his other knife, he headed into the palace in search of the Queen and her daughter, his prize.
Far below the palace on the edge of the cliff Hou’shang was only knocked unconscious. He awoke upon hearing two different sets of screams echoing from above him in the palace. One that belonged to his beloved wife and one that came from his daughter as she birthed her children. Rising up onto his feet, he remembered having built and constructed tunnels underneath the palace as an escape route. He found the opening and began running down them on all fours, knowing it would be the only way to get back to the palace faster.
Inside the palace, Li’shun watched with cold eyes as the Queen weakly tried to defend herself against his knives that he stabbed into her side. She growled fiercely and kicked at his leg, making him fall onto his knees while she used her other leg to kick him in the side of his head.
In the bed, Hijuan had already given birth to six of the seven children. The final cub was about to be born and she despised that she was useless right now, watching in horror, anger, and sorrow as her mother tried to fight back against Li’shun. Sadly, the fight didn’t last long even though her mother had been a highly well-known fighter and warrior. She could only watch as Li’shun delivered the final blow to the elder tigress before he stared cruelly down at the six cubs who had already been born.
Li’shun growled at them all and right as he was about to do something so terrible, he was knocked onto the floor of the room by Huang. Snarling up at the male tiger, he acted quickly as he leaped up onto his feet and grabbed all six of the newborn children in his arms. They mewled for their mother, not being able to see yet.
Li’shun met the eyes of their parents before he jumped out the window and ran off into the night. Huang ran after him, hoping to get to his children in time but he did not. When he eventually found Li’shun and their cubs, they were all frozen in the snow. Rage filled his entire body and he lashed out at Li’shun who was pleased with himself.
Huang tackled the larger feline into the snowy ground and swiped his claws across the liger’s face, actually blinding him this time, and continued to tear the liger apart until the liger finally stopped breathing and his blood spilled out into the snowy ground underneath him.
Huang rose to his feet and turned to look at his children. He fought against the tears that formed in his eyes as he walked over and began burying them all until they were covered. When he was done, he returned back to the palace to face his wife.
Walking back into the room, his pain was erased when he heard the wailing of their final cub. His sorrow was replaced by the tiniest amount of joy at the sound. He smiled as Hijuan introduced him to their daughter, little Tali’xihou, who was named in honor of Hijuan’s parents.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_
When Tali’xihou was older, a pack of wolf bandits had attacked their palace. Hijuan told him of the tunnels beneath the palace and they used that to escape, following a very precarious path along the edge of the mountain as Hijuan carried Tali’xihou on her back in a satchel.
They took their time and eventually made it down into the bamboo forest that was around their palace and the whole region. They looked around and spotted a small opening in a hollowed out tree that was large enough for themselves and their cub. Hijuan went inside first, taking the satchel off her back and pulling Tali’xihou out of it whom she began feeding.
Huang decided to look around to ensure that they were safe. The sound of wolves howling in the distance made him tense up, his claws coming out and his body tensing up. He flicked his tail back and forth while he turned back to the hollowed tree where Hijuan was hiding with their daughter.
Glancing back at the small clearing, Huang and Hijuan noticed that the pack of wolves surrounded them; their lips curled back as they all snarled and growled at him.The others in the pack looked for a way to get to the cub. He glared at them while lashing his tail back and forth. One of the wolves rushed at him, but he jumped over it and kicked it in its back while he was landing back down onto the ground. The wolf stumbled forward, tripping over a fall log and hitting its head on a stump. Some of the other pack members rushed towards him and his mate.
Hijuan had placed Tali’xihou in a small nook in the tree so it couldn’t be reached as she had gone outside to help her mate. She released a low snarl from her throat as she glared at the wolves watching as a few decided to be stupid and run right at them. Her claws came out and a small smirk appeared on her mouth as she noticed the fear that gleamed in the eyes of the wolves who were running at her. She leaped over two of them, grabbing their tails with her hands and swung them around; sending them flying backwards into the other members of the pack while Huang handled their leader who was doing well at not getting hit by the alpha’s sword. She then launched herself across the small clearing at the remaining wolves and began assaulting them with her fists as well as using her claws and even biting them too. They yelled and cried out in pain before they managed to get away, running off into the forest.
Huang looked at the rest of the wolves who were all running away after Hijuan had attacked them. When the alpha swung the sword towards him, he shifted to the side and dodged the blade. The blade missed his body by an inch, striking the ground and getting stuck in the soil. He moved around to the side of the wolf who was trying to get it free, but it was so stuck in the ground that it wouldn't budge. Quickly, he delivered hard punches to the wolf’s side.
One of the other wolves in the pack that had been injured by Hijuan, circled back around and made a quick sprint towards the tree where the cub was while he was fighting with the leader. The wolf, a female in the whole pack, made it to the tree and searched for the cub. She finally found it and grabbed it down from the hole that Hijuan had put it in. In the meantime, Huang continued to fight off the leader.
When he noticed the female wolf running back towards the rest of the pack with the cub clutched in her arms tightly.
“She’s got our daughter!” He yelled to Hijuan.
Hijuan grabbed a long wooden spear that one of the wolves had and threw it at the female wolf. The end of the spear impaled itself into the robe of the female wolf’s shoulder and she got stuck to a tree which allowed Hijuan to run over and take Tali’xihou from her arms. While holding her cub in her grasp firmly, she then continued to kick at the female wolf before the she-wolf ripped her clothing free and ran away with the alpha following her.
Hijuan held Tali’xihou against her chest and took off running through the forest, not really sure where they were going but right now anyplace was better than here. Huang stayed at her side the whole way. She slowed down and they hesitated before they stepped out of the forest, into another open clearing. At least a hundred feet from them was the Bau Ghou Orphanage. The sky had grown darker and thunder clouds rolled across as lightning flashed. Rain began to pour down on them. It made the Bau Ghou Orphanage seem more daunting.
Both tigers walked up to the orphanage; the rain that was pouring down caused Huang to put the hood up of the robe that he wore while Hijuan didn’t seem to care. They looked down at the cub and then at one another when they stood at the main door to the orphanage.
“It'll be safer for her than constantly having to fight off those wolves. She will be safe.”, Huang said, reaching out with a hand and gently touching the cub’s face.
“Little Tali’xihou. May your father and I see you one day again, my fierce daughter.”, Hijuan told the cub who reached out to touch her face. Her eyes brimmed with tears, but she forced them away. She set the cub down on the step and then both tigers ran back to the forest leaving the cub all alone.
The cub wailed for its parents alerting the Bau Ghou Orphanage caretaker of its existence. The caretaker opened the door and looked down at the cub, glancing around for the parents but saw none. The caretaker picked the cub up and brought it inside.
-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-_-
Twenty years passed and the village below the palace that Hijuan and Huang were all in charge of was forced to flee due to a pack of wolves taking residence and making matters worse for them. Most of the villagers fought, but there were too many casualties that not even the best healers could mend. Sadly, they and all of the people in the village that remained fled. Hijuan ended up getting separated from Huang along with the rest of the villagers when she stopped to help out a young family of bobcats who had fallen behind the large group. The palace had been destroyed as well.
She stayed with the family until some of the wolves had shown up. Telling the family of bobcats to hide, she turned and prepared to fight the pack. Lightning flashed in the sky overhead as thunder boomed and rain began to fall from the dark clouds. The flash from lightning illuminated the forest just as one of the wolves leaped at her. She backed up, using her tail to keep her balance, and struck out with a punch to the wolf’s face. The wolf flew backwards and hit the ground hard.
Other wolves then attempted to attack and overthrow the tigress, but they never succeeded. She fought them all and managed to escape, running North until she came to a mountainous region. She stopped at the bottom of an icy cliff and looked behind her hearing the wolves howling as they tried to find her. Looking back up, she searched for any foot holes in the cliff before noticing a rope. Not having any other options, she grabbed the rope and a bucket popped up out of snowy ground underneath her feet. She was lifted up to a wooden platform.
Her body ached and her side stung from hits and bites she had gotten from the wolves when she was fighting them, but she kept moving down the platform and wooden walkway not knowing what she had come to until she realized that this was some kind of hidden village. Walking through the stone archway, she was astounded and surprised to find a large group of pandas. She looked at them all and one of them she guessed was their leader.
Approaching the male panda, she collapsed onto the ground a few feet in front of him and her eyes closed. When she woke up again, she was lying on a mat inside one of the guys in the village and a female panda was tending to her wounds. She remained silent until the leader of the village came to see her.
“My name is Li, this village is my family’s home. What happened to you and how did you find us? Did my son Po, tell you?”, Li said to the female tiger when he came into the hut to check on her.
“Who? No, I was…I was running from wolves who had attacked my home and other people. I didn't know where I was going until I came here.”, Hijuan said, grunting when the female panda had to use stitches on one of the bite marks left by a wolf on her side.
“I am sorry. Do you have a name? Any family? Here, you can leave them a note so they know you're safe and healing.”, Li said, grabbing a quill and scroll which he gave to her.
“My name's Hijuan. I…I do have a family. I don't like to talk about myself, but you seem…kind. I got separated from them when I went back to help a bobcat family escape from the wolves, distracting them and allowing the bobcats to flee to safety.”, Hijuan told him, taking the quill and scroll from him.
She seemed to hesitate before she began writing on the scroll, taking her time as she did her best to ignore the pain in her side. When she was finished, she turned to him and handed him the scroll saying simply, “Give this to that little red panda we have all heard of. If you wish to inform him of this too, you can for you have my permission to do so. This is for my daughter, Tali’xihou. I do not know if she is still alive, but she looks very similar to me.”
Li took the scroll from the South Chinese tigress and said, “You must have had a good reason to give your own daughter away. I…I understand what that is like. I will give this to Master Shifu, my son Po is one of his students. He might be able to find your missing daughter. I hope one day you can be reunited with her like I was with my son Po, who had been born as Little Lotus before he was adopted by a goose that gave him the name of Po.”
“I did. It is nice that you understand. Little Lotus? Hmm. That is an interesting name for a panda. Po seems to fit him better.”, Hijuan said.
“It does, but I still call him by his birth name sometimes and he's a good kid so he doesn't mind. I have to go make some food for the rest of the village, but I can bring you something to help you feel better. You should probably rest now, Hijuan.”, Li said, smiling at the tigress.
Hijuan smiled back a tiny bit and then felt exhaustion come over her. She closed her eyes, unable to keep them open any longer and fell asleep.
Days turned into weeks before Hijuan was fully healed and was able to return to her people. She thanked the secret panda village and personally thanked Li privately in his hut. She had walked across the village to where his hut was and found him sitting down with his eyes closed.
After a few minutes, he opened them and looked over at her.
“Hijuan. You're leaving, aren't you?”, He said.
“Yes. It has been very kind of you to take care of me when I was unable to, but now I must return to my own people in our new home. I was informed by a messenger that they've made a home inside the mountains just west of the Valley of Peace. There's a cave that they have created into the workings of a new village. I must leave now. Surely you understand.”, Hijuan told him in a formal manner.
“I do. I'm glad that you are better. I’ll still make sure that Master Shifu gets your letter, Hijuan. Travel safely.”, Li said, bowing to her when he finally stood up.
Hijuan bowed back to him before she turned around and left. Many days later, she made it back home.