Chapter Text
Shen Qingqiu paused at a sound in the surrounding bamboo grove and startled when it was nothing more than a cat which walked out. His shoulders untensed, hand drawing away from his sword hilt. He had worried it would be an ambush from his shixiongs, or a Bai Zhan raid out so deep amidst the forest. He hadn't expected a cat.
The cat was not starved the way most on the streets tended to be, corded with muscle and visible bones. It was a rather plump cat, if not fully grown, and its grey, splotchy-white fur looked clean and silky soft.
Shen Qingqiu crouched, reaching a hand for the cat. It yowled, but did not protest much as Shen Qingqiu petted and turned it this way and that, commenting drily that it was a rather cute, pampered thing.
Most cats scurried away at unfamiliar hands, but this one was naive enough for him to grab.
When the cat dared wriggle in his grasp, leaning its back against his arm, Shen Qingqiu frowned.
It's a boy, Shen Qingqiu thought with narrowed eyes and sudden, incredible distaste.
He considered dropping the cat.
“It'll need to be neutered,” Shen Qingqiu muttered absently as he petted the cat’s sides.
The cat yowled in what sounded like alarm, which Shen Qingqiu found deeply amusing.
“Such a pretty little thing should have known better than to let someone get their hands on you,” Shen Qingqiu scolded. If the cat hadn't wanted to be caught, he morbidly thought, then why did it stay?
Shen Qingqiu patted and prodded at it for a whole minute and yet it still had not run off.
Shen Qingqiu adjusted the cat so he wasn't holding it by the scruff of its neck. He picked the cat delicately, making a cradle in his arms, and decided to take it to his woodshed.
Shen Qingqiu wondered if the cat had gone through any hardships at all, or if it was well-fed so high in the mountains. It had no collar or mark of ownership, so he wondered if it had ever been beaten or left to die. Perhaps it had been abandoned, recently enough that it hadn't lost the life in its eyes.
The pleasantness of a solitary walk and of finding a cute cat on the peak declined. Shen Qingqiu wandered the abandoned paths through the bamboo forest absently scratching the fur behind the cat's ears until it was dark.
Then he returned to the woodshed, where he had little food and water to offer.
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Shen Qingqiu's cat was a vicious little thing, always watching him warily but following him around nonetheless. When Shen Qingqiu attended class it waited hidden away, and when class ended it found its way back to his side. When older disciples of Qing Jing chased Shen Qingqiu down, the cat knew to run away.
The cat was welcome to come and go whenever it wanted, Shen Qingqiu had told it. Being a cat, it hadn't understood a word of what he said. Shen Qingqiu hoped the concept got across nonetheless.
He was not fond of men, but Shen Qingqiu felt more kinship with this male cat than he did with even Yue Qingyuan.
Qi-ge might be able to shake off the dirt he was raised in but Shen Qingqiu would not deny what he was, even if he hated being looked at like an animal. Who better to spend my time with than another beast? Shen Qingqiu thought. At least if the cat judged him it would not be based on exaggerated peak rumours.
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Qing Jing peak was vibrant during the day, the sounds of scholarly arts constantly straying across the peak. At night, the peak took on a more sombre mood. Shen Qingqiu found it easier to concentrate on his duties in silence, and so kept most of his written work for the night.
During the day Shen Qingqiu focused more on his own studies, chores, and teaching responsibilities, and at night he finalised written assignments and feedback for junior disciple’s work.
Ever since getting a cat, which he refused to name out of a stubborn sense of unity (‘I was given a number for a name, I doubt a cat would do well under those circumstances’), his night shifts had gotten less stressful. Whenever the cat would wake from a nap it would wander over to Shen Qingqiu and snuggle into his lap, dragging his attention away from work.
Shen Qingqiu imagined something as lazy as a cat could not imagine why Shen Qingqiu did not laze around as much as a cat might. Whenever the cat tried scratching at his ankles or pulling him towards the scraps of cloth Shen Qingqiu used as a bed, he ignored it.
“Your bed is over there,” he would remind the cat, pointing to the smaller bundle of clothes and single pillow he had arranged for the cat to sleep on.
When Shen Qingqiu visited the Warm Red Pavillion, the cat followed along, meowing in distress as if it wanted the comfort of the wood shed instead of the teahouse establishment. Ridiculous, Shen Qingqiu thought, but who was he to judge a fellow beast?
Perhaps the cat really hated the smell of tea or the sound of music. Though, if that were the case, he wondered why it would choose to live with him in a wood shed on Qing Jing peak.
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Shen Qingqiu didn’t want his woodshed to get dirtier than it needed to be. Though the cat had the awful tendency to shed (just another reason to castrate the damned animal), bathing it helped a little.
Shen Qingqiu had little bottles of soapy oil he would slather onto the beast. Enjoying its suffering as he lathered the cat and dunked him into the bathing pools was truly the brightest point in some of Shen Qingqiu’s days. The awful screeching yowls and scratching truly spoke to Shen Qingqiu’s heart, a non-intrusive presence he became used to indulging in his space.
Shen Qingqiu loved learning the arts and did so with such fervour that his shizun had acknowledged him before his official entry to the peak, but even he tired of doing the same schedule day after day. He could go on missions alone, but had no motivation for it. He could visit other peaks when his duties called for it, but there was no one he would spend time with.
“Stop moving or I’ll kill you,” Shen Qingqiu sighed when the cat struggled too much in his grasp. Perhaps he was squeezing it a little hard against his chest, but it was late afternoon and he didn’t have any other company as he walked around the bamboo forest in the dark.
It wasn’t that the cat would often comply with his simple demands, but the peace of mind the creature gave him was unique. No one had reprimanded him for keeping a cat. When months passed without an owner showing up, Shen Qingqiu embroidered a ribbon to go around its neck.
It was a cute, useless creature that kept him company.
Unwittingly, Shen Qingqiu decided the cat was the best possession he had.