Beatrix met Bartholomew and Blaine at the entrance of the camp. He held his head high and puffed out his fluffy blue chest. 

“Okay. We are going to walk for a long time, do not annoy me or you will get left behind,” Blaine said sternly, looking at Bartholomew who was smiling like an idiot. 

“How far is it?” Beatrix asked.

“About one full moon away, so we better start going,” 

Beatrix’s heart was pounding and he couldn’t stop his legs from making him jump up and down, up and down. Bartholomew saw this and began nipping at his tail every time he jumped. 

“Hey!” he shouted, “Stop that!”

“No!” 

Beatrix growled at him and then began running away, fast. Bartholomew let out a loud laugh and chased after him. Beatrix remembered the first time he and Bartholomew were chasing each other in the forest. He was behind Bartholomew and could barely catch up, but now it was the opposite. He ran with the speed of a pegasus, his paws only touching the ground for a millisecond, while Bartholomew had become more stalky and buff, he had more weight to carry therefore he was slower. 

Beatrix zoomed past Blaine with a wide smile on his mouth. Bartholomew trotted ahead, panting. 

“Beatrix! Wait up!” Blaine called. Beatrix turned his head and saw that they were very far away, looking like little deer.  He stood still and waited for them, but his legs still wanted to run.

“If you run all day you're not going to be able to get up in the morning,” Blaine said as he walked to him. 

“I bet I could run all day!” Beatrix exclaimed, “I probably could run through the night too, if I took breaks,” 

“I can’t believe you,” Bartholomew sighed, exhausted. Beatrix smiled, he was finally good at something. 

“We just need to walk, a steady pace,” Blaine said. They continued walking through the  forest. 

Beatrix took his time to look at his surroundings while they walked. He saw Giant Toads that were the size of his face, he saw Blazards, they looked like snakes with arms and legs, but they also glowed bright white on their backs and tails. He continued along with Bartholomew and Blaine, who were not interested in whatever Beatrix was pointing out. 

“Guys look!” Beatrix squealed, “What is this thing?” 

Bartholomew rolled his eyes and went back to see what he was talking about. 

“That’s lunch,” Bartholomew said blankly as he stomped his foot on the creature and put it in his mouth. 

“Everything is lunch to you!” Beatrix cried, “What is it actually?”

“It was just a Jumping Unirat, “ he said through crunches.

“I barely even got to look at it before you ate it,” he said sadly. 

“There are tons of them. I promise the next one we see I won't eat,” Bartholomew crossed his heart then placed his hand on Beatrix’s chest. Beatrix smiled.

They continued onward for quite a while. Beatrix would point out things and Bartholomew would either answer his questions, or just mess around with the thing. 

Beatrix found a white snawfus antler but Bartholomew grabbed it in his mouth and ran away with it.

“Bartholomew! You’re such a rat face!” Beatrix yelled. Bartholomew was far ahead, about to pass Blaine.

He turned his head to Beatrix, “Catch me if you can, little man!” 

BOOSH!

OOF!

ARG!

OOPS!

“What in Jigoku possessed you to run at me with that!” Blaine snarled. Bartholomew stabbed Blaine in the behind with the antler and it snapped and he went flying onto Blaine as the both fell down. 

“That’s what you get!” Beatrix smiled. 

“You two are done!” Blaine yelled, “No more running around!” 

Beatrix felt heavy all of a sudden, his eyes started to water and he felt really bad, “I’m sorry,” he squeaked. 

Blaine sighed, “It’s not your fault, it's his,” 

“Okay,” was all Beatrix said. 

They walked in awkward silence, Beatrix stifling tears. Memories of all the mistakes he had made before flooded his mind. Everyone yelling at him for doing something wrong, it scared him. 

Soon the sun was high and it was bright and warm. Beatrix felt better, but now was very tired and wanted to lie down. He dragged his paws each step and yawned continuously. 

“Blaine, we’ve been walking for…forever, can we stop yet?” Bartholomew complained. 

“It’s hardly been forever!” Blaine growled, “We won’t stop until it’s dark,”

Bartholomew groaned, “Just a little break,” 

“No,” 

They walked behind Blaine, their heads low to the ground and their legs taking baby steps. Soon they were far behind Blaine and had no energy to keep up. 

“Come on!” Blaine yelled, “What happened to all your stamina?” 

“I killed it!” Bartholomew gasped. Beatrix giggled 

Blaine stopped where he was and waited for them to catch up. 

“I don’t think I can keep going!” Bartholomew cried, “Carry me,” he said to Blaine and he raised his wrist to his forehead and fell backwards. 

“You’re such a drama queen,” Blaine rolled his eyes and continued walking. 

“C’mon Bartholomew,” Beatrix said as he tugged on his hand, “Get up!”

“Fine…” he rolled over and groaned as he got to his feet. 

“How are we supposed to do this every day for a full moon?” he sighed. Beatrix shrugged. 

They walked silently behind Blaine until the sun began to set behind them. 

The air became very cool and the trees began to “woosh” and tilt in the breeze. Beatrix began to shiver, but Bartholomew was still warm in his thick coat and fluffy mane. 

“Stop!” Blaine shout-whispered. They stopped and looked at each other. “There’s our dinner,” Blaine began to creep through the bush in front of them, and then he disappeared behind it. 

“Where’d he go?” Beatrix whispered.

“I don’t know, he found something,” Bartholomew responded. 

They sat down finally resting their aching legs. 

“Blaine is so moody today,” Bartholomew said. 

“Why?” 

“I don’t know…I guess he doesn’t like traveling,”

Suddenly, Blaine burst through the bushes behind them with a chimeric weasel squirming in his mouth. Its orange fox-fur weasel face was contorted in scared and angry folds, and its brown snake tail was trying to curl around Blaine's muzzle. 

Blaine put it down and stomped its guts out with his hind hoof. The chimeric weasels' orange squirrel wings seizured as it began to bleed out and squeal in its death.

“Nice!” Bartholomew trotted over to the dead weasel, but was stopped by Blaine’s claws and low growl. “Okay dude, chill…” He said as he backed away.

“Beatrix, you’ve seen your skulk leader breathe fire, right?” Blaine asked as he sat down behind his kill. Beatrix nodded. “And you know that other Kasai kitsune’s your age can breathe fire too, right?" Beatrix nodded again, but a bit of sadness controlled his face. A little whine came out of his throat. “I haven’t seen you breathe fire yet though. Why?” 

Beatrix stared at the ground looking away from both Blaine and Bartholomew. It took him a moment to respond, “I just can’t,” 

“Yes you can!” Bartholomew chimed and bumped his shoulder on Beatrix’s.

“I really can’t!” Beatrix exclaimed, “I’ve already tried,”

“Come on kid, don’t make this hard,” Blaine sighed, “At least try for now, you will get it soon. I promise,” 

Beatrix grumbled, not definitely, but anxiously. Bartholomew and his leader were watching every step he made, if he failed, they would see it. 

He walked up to the kill and stared down at it, refusing to look at anyone. Then he breathed in deep and let out a puff of breath in the chilled air. It was a wheezy breath, like a flutist running out of air. 

“See,” Beatrix backed up and stared at the ground, fiddling with his paws in the dirt. 

“Has anyone ever taught you how to breathe fire?” Blaine asked. Beatrix shook his head, still looking at his feet. “Look at me Beatrix," Blaine said gently. Beatrix raised his eyes slowly and shakily kept eye contact with him. “I can teach you how, but you have to be brave, and trust us,” 

“Yeah, Beaty!” Bartholomew called as he shoved him gently with his hand, “You just have to trust me!” His smile was golden butterflies dancing on pearly white teeth, one snaggle tooth poked out from the right side of his lower jaw. 

Blaine sighed, “No one is going to trust you with anything, Bartholomew,” Bartholomew gasped aloud and then tightly closed his eyes, obviously knowing it was sarcasm. “I meant you have to trust Me, the Tengoku, and yourself,” He said seriously.

Beatrix looked at Blaine with a slowly happily changing face, “Okay…I think I can do that,” He smiled.

“It doesn’t hurt if Bartholomew is your sidekick though,” Blaine joked.

“I will have you know I am a main character in EVERYONE’S story,” Bartholomew burst out. 

“No, you are the annoying side character that’s only purpose is comedic,” Blaine stated matter-of-factly. Bartholomew just puffed out a breath and sat down.

“Lts continue walking, soon we’ll be in the Winterlands. We have to find a safe place to stay for the night before the snow comes.” Blaine explained.

“We just sat down!” Bartholomew wailed.

“Oh well!” Blaine barked. 

Beatrix felt bad to laugh, but he secretly found Bartholomew’s little hysterics very funny.

They continued walking behind Blaine, who still had the weasel in his mouth, “Just in case Bartholomew goes crazy” was his explanation. 

There was a different smell in Beatrix’s mouth, the cold air made his senses more sensitive. The cold had a distinct taste in the back of his mouth. The pine trees became pine and cedar, the smell was wild and enchanting. Along the edge of the trail, there were light blue fuzzy leaves growing taller than him. They smelled different than most plants, not very earthy, it smelled like the sour fruit leaves from his home in the jungle. He remembered the bitter taste of the leaves back home, and became sick for his mother. He tugged on a leaf with his teeth and it fell off, then he began to chew it up. He quickly spat it out, it tasted way worse than how he thought it would. 

Blaine and Bartholomew both stopped and looked back at Beatrix desperately trying to forget the taste by licking his fur. 

“Oh no!” Bartholomew screamed, “You can’t get loofy now!”

“What! What is this!” Beatrix squealed with wide worried eyes.

“Oh shut up for once, Bartholomew!” Blaine snapped. “It’s just Windleweed, it makes you loofy, but just one bite won't do anything.” 

“What does loofy mean?” Beatrix asked with his head tilted. 

“It is when you eat this plant and you get a strange sleepy feeling, you start to hallucinate and you have an out of body experience,” Blaine explained.

“Oh, so I shouldn’t eat this?” 

“Only at certain ceremonies you can eat it,” 

“Oh, okay,” Beatrix walked forward, away from the spit pile of Windleweed.

Soon the sun started to set, and it was time to find a shelter for the night. Beatrix could see his breath in the shivering air and was pretending to be a dragon. Bartholomew saw him playing and started to play with him. They both played dragons, even though Bartholomew, being a catoblepas, was already part dragon. They slashed at each other playfully as Blaine was on the lookout for any sort of cave or burrow to spend the cold night in. 

“Boys, be quiet for one minute, please!” 

“Sorry!” Beatrix yelped. 

“I think this old bear cave will do,” Blaine said from the bottom of a dug-out cave in the ground near the path.

Beatrix ran down into the cave, “Safe!” he cried. 

“Okay, I basically win anyways, I got your tail,” Bartholomew bragged with his head high and his eyes closed.

“Yeah right!” Beatrix protested, “Tails don’t count!” 

“Of course they do!”

“How would you kill a dragon with its tail?” 

Bartholomew paused, “I’d strangle the dragon with it,”

“Hah, I’d like to see that!” Blaine chirped. Bartholomew side-eyed him. 

There were dry sticks in the cave laying about everywhere, also leaves and tree-beard moss. Blaine gathered it all and piled it in the middle of the cave. 

“Beatrix, come here,” Blaine called. 

“Coming!” 

Beatrix sat in front of the pile opposite of Blaine. “I want you to light this fire,” He said coolly. 

“Okay,” Beatrix sighed. 

“If you go into it thinking you can’t, then it won’t happen,” He said sternly. Beatrix looked up at him with sad but hopeful eyes. Then he took a deep breath, and just like before, it was all air. 

“Look kid, you're scared of something, we all can feel it,” Blaine began, “But you just need to turn all your fear, and sadness, and all of your emotions into fire. You need to bundle up all of your emotions and turn them into a flame,”

“What does that even mean?” Bartholomew said with a raised eyebrow. 

“It means that all the anger I have right now, all the annoyance from you, I will gather in my chest, and then as I breathe out I will see the flames burning you to a crisp,”

Beatrix giggled. 

“Anyways, Beatrix just take all of your biggest emotions and see them turn into fire in front of you as you breathe out onto the wood,” 

Beatrix closed his eyes, he felt…guilty. Guilty because there is no reason for him to have any negative emotions. He knew he had anger, and rage, and sorrow, and all kinds of emotions, but he felt guilty for having all of them. He didn’t deserve anger, he didn’t deserve to be sad, he had so much. He had everything he needed. He even had the Tengokus watching over him. He had no right to feel anything other than happy, cherished, joyful, and at the very least, just fine. 

He tried to wangle up any emotions he could find, but he could see them, he couldn’t really find them. At last he let out less of a fiery breath and more of a moist wheezey cry. 

“It’s okay kid, it’ll come to you when you need it,” Blaine's words were gentle like a pat on the back. Beatrix realized all of his muscles were hard and cold like icebergs. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. 

“We’ll sleep here, let's get some rest. It’s going to get really cold so we’ll have to pile up,” Blaine said. Beatrix and Bartholomew were tuckered out and immediately followed orders. Beatrix lay sandwiched between the two of them, the warmest hug he’d ever felt.