Mizuki, completely dressed this time, still had her blush when she came back and sat down next to him. He handed her a bowl of stew and a piece of bread and they quietly began dinner. Neither knew what to say, especially with the recent incident and he knew teasing her again in a short time period would be a little bit too much. He breathed out a sigh as he watched her face lit up as she ate his stew before eating another spoonful of the warm stew even as different thoughts swirl around his head. 

‘What is going on here?’ He wondered, the feeling that had been his constant companion ever since that night 4 years ago had disappeared. For once his heart did not feel like it was frozen or being crushed, for once his heart felt... almost warm, for once he felt at peace. Then a sudden thought struck him, ‘When was the last time he ate with another person? Actually, when was the last time he was this close to another person outside of class or buying food? Why is it that I get the urge to know more about her… to have fun? Why am I not feeling annoyed? Did she cast a spell on me or something?’ he turned to Mizuki, who seems intent on shoving the entire bowl inside her mouth then quickly came to the conclusion, ‘nope, not possible, so what had changed?’

He broke out of his pondering thoughts when he felt something nudging his arm. He looked up from his bowl to see Mizuki nudging his arm with her now empty bowl. He opened his mouth to if she wanted more when a soft growl came from her stomach, he blinked and raised his eyebrows. Mizuki’s face took a brighter hue of red and quickly buried her face in her tails.

“Seconds I guess?”

At her slight nod he took the bowl from her stretched hand and poured another bowl of stew, watching in slight fascination as the second bowl disappeared just as fast as the first bowl did… and decided to just hand her the ladle. He smiled as he watched Mizuki enjoying the food that he cooked, he remembered the times when his mother and father grinning at him when he was enjoying the food they cooked and wondered if this was what they had felt back them. As quickly as that thought came, he could feel the coldness creep back in and before Mizuki could notice, fixed a smile on his face and decided to focus on his meal.

After all the stew drained from the pot and all the bread eaten, he collected the bowls and was cleaning them in a nearby stream when she spoke up.

“Just so you know, I am not a pervert and this doesn’t happen… usually”

Usually as in getting caught or…, he opened his mouth to comment then closing it shut before he could say anything, it is not his place to judge what other people do for a hobby after all.

“Why do I get the feeling you are thinking something rude?” She glared at him.

Yokaze simply turned gave her a slight smile and walked back to sit by the fire, not minding the glare directed his way, the only thing that glare did was make her look cuter after all. He paused for a second before promptly shoving those thoughts out of his mind. ‘Cute?’ he scoffed inside his own mind, ‘What the heck am I talking about? Ah that’s it I must be sick or having a hallucination’

The silence continued for a while, with Mizuki ineffectively glaring at Yokaze and him mentally arguing with himself over the possibility of Mizuki being cute or him being sick before remembering that the stew he planned to have for breakfast as well is already gone and was mentally running through the list of ingredients he still had when Mizuki finally remembered.

“Right the bear! D-” she shouted turning to grip him on the shoulders. He held up a hand right to her face making her stop as he winced at the sudden shout.

“I’ll answer your questions so please don’t shout and no I did not kill it, just its head is bigger than me, you know? Besides bears that big have a stupidly high defense against both physical and magical attacks, definitely not something I want to fight against until I gained my 3rd tail. You somehow managed to pass through the wards surrounding my home which protected you from being found but even then it was a close one.” 

“Did you see anyone around where you found me?” she continued as he gingerly removed her hands from his shoulders.

“No from what I could tell, the only Kitsune scent in that area was yours and mine, and the only blood scent I smelled was yours. What happened anyways?” he said as he used a stick to poke at the fire, sending sparks flying into the sky.

“It was around midday I think when I was trying a few things in the woods when my father found me and was shouting at me for coming to the woods without supervision. Suddenly we were attacked by the bear, I froze as I watched it loom over me swinging its paw when I got shoved back by my father. He was yelling for me to run when he got slammed into a tree before the bear turned to chase me. I panicked and ran off in a random direction and the next thing I know I woke up here” she quietly replied, slightly shaking as she recalled the experience

“I see,” he sighed, “well there’s not much we could do right now, your father has 5 tails right?” he recalled from times he saw her father picking her up. At her nod, he continued, “Then I wouldn’t worry too much, at his level the strike would have knocked the wind out of him for a while but nothing too serious,” he heard her breath a sigh of relief before feeling her slump down on him. He let out his own sigh, before carrying her unconscious form and tucked her in his sleeping bag. He continued, “take a good rest, tomorrow I’ll take you to look for your father, failing that I’ll bring you back to town” He moved to lay out a spare one before glancing back at her, 

“Be glad that you still have a chance to meet again, to say sorry… not everyone is that lucky after all”

He turned his eyes once more to the river of stars over head praying for a dreamless sleep.