Li’s Master

“I can hear you hiding,” the man in the chair said, not facing to look at the subject he was addressing. The teenager shrunk deeper into the bushes he spied from, making an unfortunate amount of noise as he did so. The sitting man, thin almost to the point of being emaciated and clothed in red military regalia, craned his neck to the boy and laughed. “Intriguing. You clearly really want something, but you still don’t know whether its worth seeing me about.”

He scanned for any movement whatsoever. Nothing.

“No matter, I’ll stay here with my tea until you make up your mind. I’ll make sure my soldiers don’t hurt you if you decide to leave,” he said, turning back to his view and grabbing his small unornamented porcelain cup that was venting steam into the clear blue sky. This high up the hillside, he had a god’s eye view of his surroundings. The hills around spread out like a mountain range, with dots of villages and deep scars of forest decorating them.

- Li tries, but he fails, Li tries again and almost comes up, but is spooked by Jamie coming in, finally shows up a third time

- Francois tells Li to sod off because nobody should be a soldier if they can help it, but decides to keep him on after Li …

• Perhaps Li reveals his spiritual sensitivity somehow?

- Francois goes to see people in the forest about turning them to the royalist cause

- Francois then goes to see his former partner, who does not enjoy having a republican around

- Francois finds out Li was eavesdropping and gets aggro, causing Li to fli

- More spiritual forest shit happens when he flees. Maybe he transitions into the spirit world or something

- Meets Siv and helps her out