"I want you to declare him my son, for if I survive, that's what he will be," Lan Zhan says without a second thought. It's already done in his mind, and this can only end in two ways. "His origins matter not. He is mine."

They keep walking, the wind becoming heavier with moisture where there is no lake or stream here. There is the rustle of wildlife in the distance, where there should be none.

"If I survive the lash, bring me to the jingshi. When I am able I will cross this border between this world and another, fetch him, and bring him here," Lan Zhan continues as he finally stops, looking across the copse-- to where there is still daylight across a Scottish heather beyond dense trees that should not exist here. "If I do not, he will be spirited away to another place, to be raised in a world not his own."