The water feels good. This is a good stream. After much time of walking under the sun, Ruh feels overheated and stretched. He submerges and listens to the current, fish flowing where they go, the splash of the young ones playing. Dar would protest he isn't a child, but he is not listening to Ruh right now, and he would be in error to say so.

Ruh flicks his ears and lifts his head back into where breeze can travel. Night comes. He is not hungry yet. He may hunt with new light.

Dar's clumsy human is laughing too loudly—man noise, the kind that brings other men and troubles besides. But Dar doesn't seem to mind. Dar, Ruh considers with a lazy snort, is deserving of Ruh's name sometimes. He leads the fawn into danger. That is what rests at the soul of the other human. Too caught up with looking at the world, wide-eyed and stumbling, smelling like grass and joy and increasingly of Dar's world—a tottering fawn, not strong, not headstrong, not like them. This is the one called Tao, which Dar says means "the way," which Ruh finds meaningless. There are many ways, after all. But then, Tao is only one.

Tao often speaks to Ruh as if he can understand. Sometimes he touches Ruh's head, a friendly pat. Sometimes they communicate through Dar—teasing, mostly. Ruh finds dark pleasure in nipping at the human. Not for hurting, but for teaching. Little ones need teaching.

Tao is speaking to him now. Crudely human words, but Ruh can understand. Affection, a trace of ruefulness; he's being complimented again. Ruh lets his eyes fall halfway as if to sleep, to show his pleasure. He likes being complimented. He knows if he rumbles, the odd fawn might even scratch his ears, but for now the water is cool and the space around him is too pleasing.

Dar tells Ruh, in the secret way only Dar can, "Careful, he might start thinking you like him."

Ruh repeats it back word for word, and Dar half-scowls, flustered. There are some human things that Ruh understands. He pads up onto the bank, shaking the droplets from his coat—it is time for a nap, and time enough to leave Dar to stare at their shared burden with the distant, hungry eyes of a predator.