To the White Wolf | Fenrys (ToG)

Part 3: Connall's Journey

(Connall's POV)

I sat down in the snow, feeling an odd kind of exhaustion. It wasn't my body that cried out for rest but my mind. For some reason though, I knew I was close. I stood up and trekked through the snow on all fours. My wolf form was more adaptable to the cold.

I stopped. I wasn't sure where I was, it didn't seem like Adarlan or even Terrasen. What is she dreaming of?

My head whipped around as I heard the familiar laughter of my sister. It was the laugh she made when she did something wicked she thought was funny and could get away with.

With a flash of light, I was running back in my fae form. "Wylla!" Her name ripped out of my throat. But her laughter only grew further for me. I ran uphill through snow that turned muddy and when I hit the peak, I came to a sudden stop.

Wylla.

She wore thick hooded furs as she pressed herself against a tree with a wide smile lighting up her small glowing face. She kept her back to the tree and cradled snow against her chest like an injured bird. But looking more closely, I realized it wasn't the snow under her feet that made her taller nor the shadows of her furry hood that made her look older. She was older. She wasn't my little six year old sister anymore, she was a young lady. Maybe sixteen?

"Wylla!" I called out but my voice sounded as though I was underwater. I took a step towards her and ended up slipping in the cold mud.

When I sat up, I saw a young male running towards her with wings on his back. I tried to climb to my feet but I slipped again as though something was keeping me down, keeping me from running towards my little sister. "Wylla!" I tried to cry again but my voice didn't sound right.

She was only about ten feet in front of me and yet she didn't notice me as that male crashed a large ball of snow on top of her head. She cried out with laughter and then they were kissing as they embraced.

Oh.

My voice was more even when I spoke this time, "Wylla?"

Her and the strange young male pulled away. "Did you hear that?" Wylla's voice even sounded different, rougher.

Yes, Wylla! Hear me! The ice pulled me back down once again as I rose and screamed, "Wylla! Wylla! Where are you!"

Her head turned towards me, but she looked through me like I was a ghost. "I thought I heard someone call my name."

"It's Connall! We're dreaming!" But this dream I had entered was of her making. When she shook her head in confusion, snow fell from the sky faster than before, the mud solidified around my limbs and I sank. She doesn't want me here, I knew. That's why her dream was rejecting me. "Tell me you're safe! Please! Mom misses you!" She took a step closer but the snow began to pile onto my back. "Dad misses you!" I miss you.

She looked at the ground.

The snow stopped all around us, simply floating in the air. Her male friend was no longer to be seen and the trees turned black. The whole world looked to be in black and white, the only color was my sister staring at the ground with her rosy cheeks and shining blue eyes. She didn't look up as she walked past my half frozen body. I could no longer talk and feared I would be stuck like this without a way to wake up. It felt real.

Her footsteps came to a stop behind me. Her voice was sad and reminded me of our mothers, "I don't know how to go home. Stop looking for me."

And then I woke up.

"Connall." My father's face was the first thing I saw. He looked terrified as he sat on the edge of my bed with a wet rag.

I was dripping with sweat and couldn't slow down my breathing. My heart was going to burst in my chest, I could feel it bounding under my skin as I placed my hand over it. "I-Dad- I," couldn't form a sentence or thought.

For two years Wylla had been missing.

Two years we had been looking.

And tonight was the first time I had seen her.

"You're burning up with a fever," my father placed the rag back on my forehead. "You've been asleep for four days."

I reached for the glass of water on my nightstand and finished it in one gulp, already thirsty for another glass. Reading my face, my father took it and filled it up in my bathroom. When he returned, I noticed how tired and worn he looked. His facial hair was rugged, his hair long enough to pull into a bun with curls falling out, and his eyes were darkly ringed. "I thought you weren't going to wake up."

I cleared my throat after drinking the water, "I saw her, dad. She's not here."

He looked up at me with wide eyes. His mouth fell open, not sure what to say, he stood to his feet ready to go get her.

"No, dad, I mean she's not here."

I wasn't sure how to say it but I knew something was strange about her dream. It took four days to get to her unconsciousness when I could easily infiltrate someone's dreams across the sea in a thirty minute nap.

"Where is she," he gritted out. Not a question. A demand.

I opened my mouth but I didn't know. My small victory evaporated. I saw her though. I saw that she was happy. But knowing how dreams work, I knew that telling my parents would make them feel blessed she was alive but crazed that we still didn't know where she was.

Uncle Dorian was the first to give up the search. I knew he believed she was dead.

And though my father didn't admit it, he gave up hope within the first year.

Even I had given up hope. It hurt spending my life looking for my ghost of a sister. Sometimes I just thought that she blew away like dust with the wind. I lost hope because we would play together in our dreams when she was here with us. It was fun sharing dreams and playing with the creatures we made up in our heads. We would even walk together into someone else's dreams and spy. I knew how to get to her dreams no matter where she was, it was as simple as lighting a match.

But night after night, I still couldn't find her dreams.

Until one night I dreamed of a shooting star. I reached up and touched the tale, allowing it to pull me along like a leashed dog dragging its owner. I didn't let go as my body seemed to burn. I knew I was going somewhere important. After a long time, I saw lands of snow, lands of fire, lands of mountains. And when the star turned to dust in my hands, I fell from the sky and onto a pillow of snow on a mountain top. I slid down it and had been traveling in my wolf form when I heard Wylla.

"She's alive." Was all I said before stubbornly wiggling back under my covers. I was going back to sleep. I needed to find her again.

My father let out a breath of relief. A smile I hadn't seen in a very long time took over his face and he blinked away wetness in his eyes. "My little girl is alive," his voice was a whisper.

That's when it sank in. Wylla's alive. "I have to tell mom," I ripped the blankets off of me. I surprised my father with a quick hug I rarely gave and ran as fast as my fae legs could carry me. I had a feeling where my mother was, she had spent her late evenings there for the past couple weeks after her routine of searching. My mother hadn't given up hope yet. She had been all around the world and each time she came home she said the same thing, "I feel closer to finding her."

I changed into a wolf as soon as I got out of the busy part of Rifthold and ran to the docks. That's where she went. I saw her sitting at the end of a dock with her head resting against a pole. She turned around as she heard my trot and I changed back when she stood, "Connall, you're-"

I crushed her in a hug, towering over her and kissed her head. I couldn't remember the last time I was this happy. My sister was alive. My smile was genuine when I pulled away and looked into my mother's hopeful eyes and told her of seeing Wylla's dreams.

Her smile was contagious as she pulled me back into her arms and I believed her this time as she said, "we're closer to finding her."