Whitefish River all the sunlight's good for us

there had been a pack here, once. no longer. their scent markings were dwindling, the signs of their presence fading with time. perhaps a pile of dung here, an abandoned cache there. cam didn't know where they went, but he knew the swollen, half-frozen river was a treasure trove—and now he could explore it fully.

one of the faster moving bends was not iced over quite yet, and fish were here, swimming against the current and seeking solace in tumbled rock formations, where the water calmed. he sat crouched by the bank, watching them for a long while. eyes moving, following their every nuance. they were bigger and fatter than the fish in the forest pond.

rather than trying to scoop one out with a skinny foreleg, he instead shoved his head underwater and was suddenly overwhelmed by the chill that engulfed him. cam snapped his teeth but to no avail; they found no purchase, no meat.

he flung his head back and let loose a frustrated, explosive exhale, shivering profusely. shaking himself, he curled tighter and glared at his would-be quarry, water dripping from his chin. why couldn't he just catch one? what was wrong with him that he was still so rotten at this?

Things at home were feeling more and more unusual, driving Nieve to escape in the form of wandering. She continued to keep a weather eye out for her missing siblings as she went, but by now she'd more or less concluded that they weren't coming back. It would be a miracle if Marisol was even alive after all this time, and Clem and Reyes... they could fend for themselves, surely, but maybe all the bad had pushed them away for good.

These days, she wasn't sure there'd be a home for them to come back to.

She didn't get very far today before stumbling across another soul out in the snow. From afar, she didn't recognize him for the boy who'd been travelling with Rosalyn. In fact, she didn't recognize him even when she got closer, bemusedly watching his spectacular failure to catch a fish. His head arced back out of the water and he shivered, prompting a wry smile to curl her lips. You need to wait for them to think you're not there, she called, jogging toward her black-furred companion.

the voice that came drew him out of his self-imposed rage, and he stared at the golden form that had emerged, blinking profusely. only to find himself embarrassed, crawling into a shell, as he realized. . . ahhh. the girl from the cliffs, whom he had abandoned. he felt bad, still. he shouldn't have fled as he had.

i am, cam argued, at a loss for other words. what am i doing wrong? i'm trying. he gave these words fervently, trying to state his case. whether nieve understood or not, he didn't know.

but it was nieve. she knew the ocean, its happiness and its ire. why shouldn't she know the fishes, too? water life should come naturally to the girl; his ears perked, waiting for her response, even as his face remained sullen and dripping.

If she was telling the truth, Nieve knew about as much about fishing as Cam did, but no need to tell him that. As far as he knew, she was a master. She wrinkled her nose in a chortle when he talked back and shook her head, but for a moment didn't say anything. Fishing seemed easy enough to her. Fish were incredibly stupid animals, so how hard could catching one really be?

She opened her mouth to bluff about it when she caught sight of his eyes and her voice caught in her throat. Stunning green. Staggeringly beautiful, impossibly tragic, extraordinary green. Her mouth went dry when she realized who the boy was and remembered how he had straight up fled from her and her mother. It was more important than ever to pretend she knew it all.

Well, she said, faltering a little as she tore her gaze away from his, y'gotta find somewhere more shallow, first off. So you can see the fish better and they'll be closer to the surface. It made sense to her. Whether it was actually useful advice remained to be seen.

as concentrated as he was on the fishing, cam didn't notice her realization. he was under the impression that she hadn't recognized him yet, which was good. better that then having to come to terms with his sudden meltdown and subsequent disappearance.

instead, he hung onto her words. shallow, right, he mumbled half to himself, stepping back as his eyes raked over the water. he found a spot that looked appropriate and began to meander that way, glancing over his shoulder to see if nieve would follow.

all right. . .now what? cam asked, once he was perched on the edge of the stream. she was right—the fish were easier to see here. what other tricks did she have up her sleeve?

Now, said Nieve as she trotted along behind Cam, more composed now that she couldn't see those gorgeous eyes. You gotta stand in the water and then stay really still 'til they're close to you. When they get close and seem calm, you strike. If it was spawning season, then catching a fish would be easy. There were so many salmon packed into the rivers at that time of year that you could practically open your mouth and wait for one to drift in. In winter, however, fishing was not only a difficult task, but a terribly cold one.

At least, she assumed it was. Everything she advised was based on common sense rather than experience. For all she knew, this was all very, very wrong advice. She might be a water loving wolf, but she had no real passion for hunting and hadn't seen firsthand how tricky fishing could be.