Jade Fern Grove along the path we lost our way

There was an absence in Easthollow which worried the boy: he hadn’t seen @Keen in over a week, and her scent had begun to grow stale.

If this had been Arlette, he might have chalked her absence up to exploring. He often found the trail of his paler sister leading out of the territory - but Keen was not like Arlette; she was not like other wolves. Even the frailest breeze seemed to rattle her, so much that he often wondered if she would ever find the footing to leave Easthollow at all. He hoped he was wrong, but to strike out without word or warning now was not like her, and  he couldn’t help but worry that something must be wrong.

After all, his father, too, had disappeared, and maybe that is what spurred him so quickly now. Merrit would let the same happen to Keen.

He tracked the faint trace of her lingering trail to the shadows of the grove on the other side of the meadow, where thick branches bled into the darkness of the night. “Keen!” his voice stole through the silence, clinging to the air in a wisp of foggy breath. She had been here, he was sure, but was she here anymore? “Keen!” he tried to discern shadow from shadow, “It’s your brother, Merrit! Where are you?”

After resting up a bit, Nikai was ready to explore the territories surrounding Easthollow a bit. He'd get to his own pack territory later, to see if everything was still in one place, but he would love to see the surroundings a bit. He'd stuck to Easthollow or explored really far mostly when he lived here before, but now he wanted to get to know the territories surrounding it better too.

As he was exploring the grove nearby that night he suddenly heard a voice calling out a familiar name -- Keen. Nikai's heart skipped a beat as he thought of Keoni for it had been her nickname, only to remember what Valette had said the day they had joined... Keen was one of her daughters from last year's litter, named after Keoni. Though a little disappointed it wasn't his sister risen from death, Nikai decided to check it out anyway. After all, it was likely one of her siblings or another pack mate that was calling for her.

The answer presented itself as Nikai closed in on the calling -- Merrit, her brother. At first only his speckles and green eyes would be visible to Merrit as he approached and chuffed to announce his presence as he came to a halt on his three legs. Hello? It's not Keen here, but your brother Nikai. Nikai didn't know if Valette would've told them about him, but he presumed they at least knew his name, if not from before then from after he had joined. Hopefully he wouldn't startle Merrit too much out here in the darkness.

cameo!

Somewhere along the way, she'd fallen ill. She's had sniffles before, here and there throughout her short life — but nothing like this. Her entire body aches with illness, from her stinging nose and throat to her aching joints. Keen is in a miserable condition... and still very lost.
It's hard not to feel hopeless, ignorant as she is to just how close she is to home; hysterical, even. What drives her forward now is the kind of panic that just can't be shaken, an urgent dread. She needs to get home. She's not ready to die — and that's what will happen, isn't it? The idea won't leave her mind, warping her thoughts and bleeding the rationality from her. So when she hears something that sounds like her brother, she doesn't quite believe it's him at first. She doesn't believe she could be that lucky — but hope draws her to a halt anyway, bringing her ears to a perk as she sluggishly tries to focus on the sounds around her. She can't smell a thing through her stuffy nose, but she would recognize Merrit's voice anywhere. She listens closely, hoping to catch it again — but the next thing she hears is the voice of a stranger. She flinches, terrified and suddenly certain she'd misheard the first time, and bolts the opposite direction before she even has a chance to think it through.

Sorry for the wait!

Merrit squints into the forest, but is met with nothing but inky darkness. The moon does little to help him see, but his eyes are strong enough to separate the shadows from the night, and his ears are keen enough to discern the noises that surround him. There is motion all around - subtle, and an annoyance; the slight stirring of leaves, moved by creatures or the wind, a familiar hum. Yet there is something unusual in the distant woods...

... his ears pitch forward, but he turns around instead, distracted by a closer movement, and his heart skips in his chest. "Keen?" his breath slips as a cloud of fog in the cold night air, hopeful, in its own quiet and unobtrusive way - but the moonlight reveals a stranger. The emerald gaze that meets him is amicable and warm, but completely foreign to him.

Disappointment fills the boy, and he feels frustration sink against his heart, yet he holds himself as formal as ever, firm in his posture and stoic.

"Mother told us about you," is all he says at first. He is curious to probe further, but his thoughts remain fixed on his missing sister. Nikai - brother though he may be - is of secondary importance to Keen. "I'm looking for my sister. Her fur is brown, and she stands tall, and delicate." His had always been different - fragile, almost as if the wind could blow the very fabric of her away. "Her eyes are blue." Sharp, intelligent. "Have you seen her?"

Merrit seemed to hide whatever disappointment he held for Nikai's lack of Keen-ness well. Nikai smiled softly as he looked at his brother and listened to what he said. Nikai hadn't yet met Keen though he knew of her, because Valette had explained that Keen was named after Keoni. The description he gave didn't sound like Keoni, but he supposed that odds would've been slim for a pup to have looked like his late sister, anyway. Maybe it was better that way.

He shook his head when Merrit finished describing her with a frown on his face. No, I haven't. He looked around as if hoping to lay eyes on her and added, Did she get lost? He wondered if she had been gone for some time, that Merrit was looking for her now, or if there was any other reason that he was out looking for her.

Nikai hadn't seen her. Another disappointment. He felt his mouth turn with the slightest flinch of a frown, though even this was hardly visible against the perpetual look of aloofness that stole his face. If neither he nor Nikai had seen Keen, then perhaps this trail ran cold. Yet she had been here at one point - and he could yet find her, if he could decipher the twisting path of what traces of her scent remained.

Nikai's query only tested Merrit's already thinned patience, and showed, so clearly, his otherness among them. If Nikai had known Keen, he would have known her absence could only mean one thing, and Merrit withheld a sigh. "Keen isn't one to simply wander," he said, matter-of-fact, and turned away from his brother, though his words carried on, "She left without speaking her intent to anyone, and now her scent grows stale. She is lost." And the words tasted bitter on his tongue. If he hadn't been so absorbed by his own troubles, perhaps things would have been different. He would have noticed Keen absence sooner, and she would have never gone astray.

Maybe it was because Keen was named after Keenie that Nikai assumed she might just wander -- Keoni'd loved doing so. But Merrit quickly informed Nikai about the fact that Keen never wandered, which caused Nikai's hopefulness to sink and a frown to show on his face, replacing the smile that he'd previously carried. He contemplated asking if there were any places she liked visiting but Merrit had already said that she didn't wander usually, especially not without telling anyone.

Has anything been bothering her? Do you think she... I don't mean to sound disrespectful, but do you think she might've left on her own accord..? Nikai had heard whispers left and right about how their father's disappearance had bothered the children so maybe she had simply left to seek other places. It wasn't entirely unheard of, although Nikai himself preferred to always hear from anyone who decided to leave. I'll help you search, he decided, though he let Merrit lead -- Nikai had no idea where even to start, as he didn't know much about Keen yet. She was one of the wolves he wanted to get to know.