not rly a pairing pairing but why not have some daddy and daddy's girl time -- Sun Ce and Sun Shi ; Hunting
The first time she wants to go hunting with Ce, he's already leading his white horse away from the stables with his bow and quiver secure, and he's prepared to mount when she comes running out as fast as her little feet will take her.
"Papa!" she cries, and he gives pause, not at all used to her sounding so distressed. The second her arms come out, he drops to catch her and he sweeps her up into his arms with minimal effort. He waits until she puts her arms around his neck before quickly burying one of his hands into her dark brown hair before his hand is firmly against the back of her head.
"Take me with you!" she says after she buries her face into his shoulder and sniffles.
Ce remembers her mother warning him that she was going to follow him wherever he went as soon as she could walk, and as soon as she could run to keep up with him. He remembers looking at her with such adoration, and he remembers being fascinated with the way she looked at him like she knew he was and she had only been present for just a couple of hours. He remembers, as he pulls away just a little to look at her sad face now, that she was in part the reason he wanted every single one of his hunts to go well.
"Ah, c'mon, don't make that face!" he tells her, "You gotta stay here and keep your mother company!"
"I wanna go with you!" she protests, and even as he laughs and messes up the hair he's sure her mother spent time brushing, he's thinking about how dangerous it is for her, even now. He's hunting animals, but she's too much like him and he can't guarantee that they'll come back and she'll be without any cuts or scratches. He can see her running toward the target, excited to catch it, but only ending up startling it and getting herself hurt.
And yet...Ce finds himself unable to tell her no again as he sighs and carefully puts her up onto the horse before he follows suit. Her mother is going to kill him upon his return, but the elation she expresses as they begin to gallop away and into the forest makes him believe it was worth it, because he can't stand seeing her cry. The elation never wanes, even as he tells her to be quiet so they don't startle the deer; even when he's poised to fire his arrow he can hear her feet against the dirt behind him as she presses her hands against the tree. She never skips away from where he tells her to stay, and she waits until he's either hit or missed his target to run up to him or encircle him.
"Again! Again!" she chirps and finds himself laughing because he's sure when he was young he might've done the same when he went hunting with his father when he was present. They return home before dusk and he's realized that this is one of the best hunts he's ever been on.
It's dusk again years later, and she's much older now; Hunting's been traded in for etiquette, dancing, and courting. Because Ce is trying to come to terms with the fact that his daughter isn't the naive and innocent little one he could sweep up into his arms and carry, he leaves her behind to hunt on his own. He misses hearing her happiness at him hitting his targets, and he misses her sloppy but still meaningful hugs when he fails to hit what he wants to catch.
"You left me behind, Father!" she tells him, and he can see the way her jaw is clenched, the white knuckled grip on the bow that threatens to break it, the way she digs her shoes into the hard ground and kicks up dust once, and the way her face is scrunched up. Even though he's scratching the back of his head and letting out some nervous laughter, he's remembering each day he was home and went hunting.
Ce's taken her with him on those trips, and now, as he tries to think of something reasonable to say to his angry daughter, he still remembers her, even if she couldn't fire an arrow with any kind of precision, as a mirror image of himself. He remembers her very clearly, imitating his posture and his focus.
Ce allows his shoulders to slump into defeat, "Hey, look, I'm sorry. I thought you wouldn't wanna go kill animals with your father anymore! You've got many more important things to manage now that you're older--"
She pokes him in the chest with her finger, "I don't care about those! I'll always pick hunting with my Father! So take me with you next time!" she tells him.
The next time Ce is leading his horse from the stables, it's never long until he hears the hooves of his daughter's horse alongside his.
