Noctisardor Bypass teach me to be a better man than I am now

He hadn't seen Ophelia in many days. Her scent dried up at the Bypass like cracked riverbeds in the summertime, and though Everett thought to pursue her, he had simply stared into that space of land where her trail had led the first day he'd noticed her missing, and had gone no further than that.

Were they to go after her? She had not been well. Should he find her? Tybault would if he did not. Had she meant what she had said to him? That she loved him? Her whisper and warmth pressed gently into his heart.

Had he ever heard those words before?

Everett traced the walls of the bypass to where Ophelia's scent line faded like the rest of her and his belly twisted. What if she died out there? He had never seen her face so gaunt, her ribs so prominent, her mind, so unstable, so unwell. And now, Tybault's scent mixed with the remnants of their sister. Leading outward, away, away.

He took a step to follow.