Trouble down to an art

Things were different now, and not the good kind of different. It had been nearly a month since her brother had left. She was surviving without him, but only surviving. She was not happy. She was terrified. She had never been alone like this before, and she didn’t know what she should be doing. Was she supposed to stay put and wait for him? Or did he want her to move on, pretend that he had never existed?

Didn’t he know how impossible that was? Solveiga let out a trembling sigh as she walked aimlessly in the same direction, her eyes trained on the ground, the same thing she had been doing for days. All she had ever known in her life was the guidance of her big brother. He had always decided where they would go next, what they would hunt, when they would stop traveling and find a place to sleep. As strange as it sounded, without him Solveiga felt completely unable to do those things for herself. Even those most basic things. She never wanted to make the wrong choice. What if she went to the wrong place, ate the wrong thing, met the wrong people? Her brother had always spoken for her. She didn’t know how to deal with strangers. She was completely, and entirely, hopeless.

So she just kept walking, in search of water or a quick bite to eat, if she could catch it. She had no long term goal in mind, only to survive and keep moving. He would come back. She repeated that over and over in her mind like a prayer. He would come back. He would come back. He loved her. He wouldn’t leave her like this.

Suddenly the poor, small creature lifted her head. There was an unfamiliar scent in the air, one that frightened her and made her curious at the same time. She found its source on the ground, tracks that were very fresh but seemed to lead in the other direction. Solveiga let out another shaky sigh and continued toward the water she could hear gurgling not far away. But when she arrived at the little pool, she found herself mistaken. The scent of the stranger was not leading in the other direction after all. The stranger was here with her.