CHAPTER 335: 335: LESSONS IN THE GREEN BOWL

---

Kai paused while taking a breather and continued, "You want the wind to carry scent away, not into your shelter. You want rain to run around you, not under you."

She followed him, a pace to his right. "Back to the wind," she repeated softly. "Let the water pass."

"Watch the trees," Kai went on. "If the branches curve all the same way, you are in a wind path. Avoid it unless you have no choice. If there are young plants growing near old trunks, the soil holds water. Good for foraging. Bad for sleeping unless you raise the bed."

She nodded and knelt, pressing her palm to the soil as he had. "It is cool. The shade keeps it."

"Here," he said, and pointed to a notch where two roots braided and bit down. "The ground drains away from this seam. Set your shelter on that line."

He walked her through the next steps slowly, not because he needed to go slow but because her hands needed to learn. He showed her how to test branches with a twist instead of a bend so they would not snap in her hands. He showed her how to choose wood by its sound, how a dead branch that held a dry heart gave a sharp hollow note, and how a green branch answered with a duller one. He had her collect three kinds of material: spines and stick as a frame, the long flexible shoots that would become ties, and the broad dry leaves that would shingle and shed.

"Do not cut living bark where you sleep," he said, as she reached for a smooth young stem. "Strip a vine instead. The tree whose skin you take will remember you in the night."

She lowered her hand. "I do not want the forest to hate me."

"It is not about hate," Kai said. "It is about debt. Take what you must and pay it back with care."

They dragged two thicker poles to the notch between the roots and planted them there, leaning to meet at an angle. He had her lash the cross with a figure eight tie, showing her how to work the vine so it clenched as it dried. She fumbled once and laughed at herself, not in shame but in recognition that hands become truthful only through repetition.

"You will make a better knot tomorrow," he said.

"I will make this one again tonight so that tomorrow has something to beat," she replied.

He approved of that.

They stacked the ribs of the shelter in a fan, working down from the ridge along the windward side, then mirrored it along the leeward. The A frame took shape with a patient logic. Ikea’s face changed as it rose. The line of worry that had lived between her brows since she had spoken her name smoothed a little, as if the simple fact of a roof coming into being delighted some part of her that had never been allowed to swing a hammer.

"Now leaves," Kai said. "Start at the bottom and lay upward so water runs over, not through. Place them like scales." He demonstrated. "And do not forget to thatch extra over the door. Doors are where the weather falls in love with you."

She learned quickly. Her placements were clumsy for ten leaves. They were correct by twenty. By the time they finished the first side, her hands were moving at the pace of thought rather than the pace of fear. He showed her how to weave a mat of the same leaves for bedding so the damp would not climb into her bones. She wove, tongue caught lightly between her teeth in the focus of it, and then set the mat inside with a small sound of triumph as if she had smuggled a prize past a sleeping guard.

"Fire next," Kai said, and her eyes lit as if he had offered her a crown. "Hearth placement is a decision, not an afterthought. You will set it where a small draw pulls smoke away from the shelter. If you cannot find a draw, build a rock wall waist high a few steps from the door and use it to lift the smoke. Never burn against a living trunk."

"I wanted to," she admitted. "I thought the tree would be a friend and share warmth."

"It will, and then it will die," he said. "Friendship with trees is not the same as friendship with people."

She accepted the correction without flinching.

He collected tinder fines and let them fall through his fingers. "You want things that take a spark as if they had been waiting their whole lives for a reason to burn. Shred the inner bark of this dead limb. See how it curls. Make feather sticks with your knife. Shave but do not cut through, so the curls cling and catch. Breathe gently into the bundle and listen for the sound of a small animal waking."

They sat on their heels, the tinder pile between them. He worked a fire bow only long enough to show her the motion, then pulled back and let her try. The first pull squealed. He adjusted her grip. The second set caught dust and sent a thin smoke line up. She leaned in as if the smoke were a dancer performing for her alone and blew with the kind of care that belongs to people who have been told their whole lives that they are not allowed to break things. The coal glowed. She fed it curls. Flame rose like a polite guest standing to greet a host.

"I did it," she whispered.

"You did it," he agreed.

They let the first flame burn down to a bed of coals and then fed larger sticks, not branches so thick the fire would choke on them. He showed her fatwood and the way resin makes it burn hotter and longer. He taught her the rule of three sizes always ready so that fire could be fed without panic. When the flame stood steady like a well trained soldier, he took her into the trees again to talk about food.