His mother had said the last place he’d seen his sister was in the forest and he’d understood that it was up to him to find her because their mother was getting old and when they’d parted ways, he’d known that it was likely the last time he’d ever see her. 
 
But he’d spent a considerable amount of time in the forest and had not encountered anyone who seemed to be the perfect combination of their parents—deep red and plain brown, no one with antlers that shifted at will. No one with their mother’s soft eyes and he had tired of the darkness.
 
(He has no way of knowing that the sister looks nothing like their mother remembers her. No way of knowing that the sister had succumbed to fire once and been reborn from the ashes something entirely different. No way of knowing that he is looking for the wrong girl altogether.)
 
He ventures down to the river because the forest sends tremors down the length of his spine that make him weak at the knees. Because sometimes he hears the howl of wolves and does not understand why the sound makes his heart twinge something terrible. (His father met his end this way once. But he has not met his father.)
 
He ventures down to the river because he has not looked here yet. And he is young and he is tired and thirsty and he is beginning to believe he will never find the sister and he will be forced to break the promise he made their mother.
 
He dips his head to drink, the cold water hitting his gut like a thousand blades, and grimaces. He lifts his weary head and grits his teeth, casting his gaze left and then right. The sister is not here either, but he is not alone.