Cappella hadn’t seen her wolf for days. In all the years they’d known each other, this had never happened. She thought he might be hiding, playing some sort of new game. She looked everywhere. At first, it felt exhilarating, but those feelings soon gave way to confusion and then anxiety.

Had she done something that made him angry? She couldn’t think of what it might be, and any misunderstandings they’d had in the past—a stepped-on paw, a nipped finger—they’d resolved in seconds with gentle head butts and steady gazes.

Pipe in hand, because she was too upset to play, she returned to the tree where her mother waited.

“What’s wrong, Pella?” her mother asked. “It’s not like you to look so sad.”

“The wolf is gone.”

The look that crossed her mother’s face told Cappella she was right to worry.

“You’ve tried calling him?”

“Of course.”

“And you’ve looked everywhere?”

“Yes. I’m afraid something terrible has happened.”

Her mother held out her arms, and Cappella moved closer for a hug, even though she was getting too old for such things.

“What about the cottage?” her mother asked. “Did you look there?”

“Why would I look there? He’s a wolf. He lives outside.”

“All the same,” her mother said, “I think you should check. Would you like to go together?”

Cappella nodded and followed her mother outside their great tree. The day was a fine one. Sunlight shot through the canopy and sparkled on the snow still left on the ground. The bright light made for extra shadows, and behind each one, Cappella thought she saw her wolf. But it was never him. It was a rock. Or the frond of a wind-brushed branch.

They reached the cottage. Her mother knelt as though she was looking for something on the threshold. Then she stood and peered through the windows.

As she did, Cappella noticed two pairs of depressions in the ash-gray snow. “Look, Mother. Footsteps.”

Her mother exhaled. It was a long sound, the kind she made when she had a lot to say and didn’t know where to begin. “Headed toward the kingdom, it looks like.”

“But why?” Didn’t they know it was dangerous there? She looked at the footsteps again. “Why did they not return?”

“We need to go home, Cappella. There’s something I must tell you.”

They sat on soft cushions in the center of the tree, where a little fire crackled merrily in a ring of polished stones beneath the grate they used for cooking. Her mother heated water. It wasn’t very often that they had serious conversations, and Cappella could tell that her mother was moving slowly and deliberately so she could gather her thoughts. Cappella couldn’t stand the tension, and the way the music of the forest was always a little louder inside the tree made everything worse.

“Do you think he’s dead?”

Her mother poured hot water into two cups. “I don’t know.” Then she reached into a clay jar and removed two dried flower blossoms, which she dropped into the water.

Cappella counted on her mother to know everything. That she wasn’t certain, that she couldn’t offer reassurance, made it hard for Cappella to breathe. She wrapped her hands around her mug. “Why did we go to the cottage to look for him? Do you think they hunted him?” She’d seen a golden-haired hunter in the woods, and her mother insisted Cappella remain in the tree whenever he was on the prowl.

“Oh, no,” her mother said. “That wasn’t what I was thinking at all. Do you remember the morning, not too long ago, when I left before sunrise?”

Cappella nodded.

“The day before that,” her mother said, “there was a death. Two, actually.”

Cappella held her breath, fearing what would come next.

“The woodsman and his wife passed away, as all living things do.”

Cappella breathed out. Not her wolf. She felt terrible for those people, but she didn’t know them, so her sorrow felt more like a shadow than something real. The dried flower in her tea, its petals unwound, spun slowly in her cup.

“They passed away, but their children lived.”

Their children. Cappella had seen them on occasion, a brother with gray eyes and a sister with the longest, most beautiful hair she’d ever seen, the color of winter sun. She’d never spoken with them because her mother had told her not to. She’d always been curious about them, though, especially the boy. He was just her age and his face was so kind. She felt sad for them. If she’d lost her mother, she’d be alone in the world.

“I went to the cottage with a gift of gold coins for the children.”

“How did you come by gold coins?”

Her mother sipped her tea and took her time in answering. “I made them.”

That didn’t strike Cappella as that surprising at first. After all, she and her mother made their own clothes.

But as she thought about it, questions emerged. “Is it difficult to make a coin? And where do you find the gold?”

“I summon it from the soil.”

“Like a potato?”

“Yes, but like one I did not plant.”

“Did you make my pipe as well?”

“I did,” her mother said. “When you were just a very tiny thing, humming along with the music of the woods. And you learned to play it so quickly, as if it had been meant to be.”

“Did you make me that way?”

Her mother’s expression changed, and Cappella wished she hadn’t asked, even as it had been in jest.

“Of course not,” her mother said. “You know where children come from.”

Cappella did. She wanted to ask why she had no father. Had he died? Had he left? She sometimes felt angry not to know, but she always quelled that feeling. Her mother was all she had. She couldn’t afford anger.

“I don’t see what any of this has to do with my wolf,” she said.

“I know, my darling,” her mother said. “I was thinking out loud. But this is what I truly believe … that your wolf is all right. He just might not live here anymore.”

Cappella was speechless. Why would he leave? And without saying goodbye?

“Is that what wolves do sometimes?”

“It’s what many creatures do,” her mother said. “Leave home. Make their way in the world.”

Cappella had finished her tea, but she held on to the cup so her hands wouldn’t be empty. “I would have liked to say goodbye,” she said.

“I know,” her mother replied.

“I’ll never leave you,” Cappella said.

Her mother set her teacup down, stood, and brushed soil off her clothes. “I’m going for a walk. Join me?”

Cappella shook her head. She was confused about so many things, and she felt worse than she had before. Something important had been unsaid, some secret her mother wasn’t telling her.

After her mother left, Cappella put her pipe to her mouth and listened to the woods. When she found an opening in their song, she joined in. And she hoped that, wherever he was, her wolf could hear her play, and that he felt less lonely for it.

Her song, as always, was for him.