Snow made the Hollow whisper in white. Wind stitched the trees together with thin thread. In a bend of the path, I saw a tiny orange eye blink from a drift—an ember, no bigger than a seed, hitchhiking inside a curl of ash. It should not stay out. It also should not die.

I cupped it with my hands. Heat licked my palms. The ember brightened, brave and small. I walked slow so the air wouldn’t gulp it. The Hollow watched without comment. My breath showed the way.

A fork in the trail offered three choices: up, where the gusts live; down, where the creek snaps at anything warm; or along the ridge toward the old fire-ring under the rock lip. I chose the lip. The wind could speak there without spitting.

Halfway, a stiff gust pushed hard. The ember flickered thin, almost gone. I turned my body, made myself a wall, and fed it slivers of dry grass I kept in my pocket for hard nights. It answered with a steadying glow. We kept going.

At the ring, I set it down on a nest of twigs and blew once, careful. The ember uncurled, reached, and became a small, honest flame—enough for hands, not for stories. I warmed my fingers, then covered the ring with a flat stone to keep the heat sleeping, not wandering. The Hollow exhaled. I left the place brighter than I found it, and the path behind me did not need matches to remember.

Cold morning. Sap sleeping. Good time to tidy. I brought my little trimming blade and my big patience. “Knock-knock,” I told the first low branch. It didn’t answer. That’s fine. Comedy is about warm-ups.

I thinned a tangle over the path so deer wouldn’t duck and bonk. Each snip made a thup against the quiet. At an old maple, my blade tapped the trunk by accident and the tree replied—boonk—like a drum hitting back. I tapped again. Boonk-boonk. The hollow space inside matched me and then made up its own rhythm.

“You’re hired,” I said, and set a beat on the bark with the flat of my paw. Other hollows joined—doonk from a cedar stump, thoom from a downed log, little tok-tok-tok from a row of pine cones I lined up on a rock. The forest didn’t just listen; it answered.

Birds tried the high notes. My belly tried the low ones. I pruned between the beats, letting the music tell me where to cut and where to leave. When a branch swayed just right, I kept it; when two crossed and argued, snip, peace.

By noon, the understory felt open, neat, and somehow awake, like a room after you slide the furniture to the edges for dancing. The maple gave me one more boonk for the road. I thumped back. Good set. We’ll tour in spring.

I wanted a new way to beat the wind. Running on top of sand is awesome, but what if I ran under it? I found a soft ridge, bit a stick into a shovel, and started digging a tunnel just big enough for me and my grin. Cool shade. Quiet. Smelled like thunder naps.

I marked the entrance with a rock and sprinted inside. Paw-thump, paw-thump—fast! The tunnel echoed like a cheering crowd. When I popped out the far end, the exit wasn’t where I’d planned. It was farther. A lot farther. And there was another new mouth ahead, as if the tunnel had kept running without me.

“Hey!” I yelled, very politely. The desert hummed. My tunnel curved left. Then right. It grew little side halls with sandy mustaches. The walls were smooth, like something big had just slid by. The shortcut had opinions.

I stopped. (Yes, really.) I pressed my ear to the ground and listened. Tiny scritches. A rush. The tunnel wasn’t empty. Wind had wriggled in and wanted a race of its own. Only it didn’t care about my finish line.

I trotted slower, tapping the walls to set a rhythm the wind could follow. Tap—step—tap. The tunnel matched me, closing extra paths, keeping one clean run. When I burst into daylight, my rock marker stood exactly where I’d hoped. The shortcut had learned my route because I learned its. We high-fived by making a dust halo together. The wind called it a tie. I called it a team.

The Marsh wore thick fog—soft and close, like being wrapped in a thought. I usually bring a glow to teach the mist how to shine. Tonight, I did nothing. I perched on a bent reed and let the quiet collect.

The fog moved strangely, not in waves but in letters I didn’t know yet. Curves formed, held, and slipped away. A circle rippled on the water without a stone to start it. Another circle answered from farther off. The message wasn’t sound. It was shape.

I dragged a finger through the surface and drew a line toward a patch of cattails. The fog copied me, drawing a second line that met mine at an angle, like two hands finding each other in the dark. The reeds rustled approval. I felt my chest glow without any lantern at all.

We wrote a little marsh-language together: circle for yes, long oval for safe, small triangle for careful. When a heron lifted from the bank, the fog spelled a slow arc that meant go around, and I did, sliding through with barely a whisper.

By dawn, the fog thinned and our words unspooled back into air. I hummed thank you, which in our new alphabet was three widening rings. A hush replied, shaped like a smile. I didn’t light a thing. The Marsh had voice; I only had to listen.

Winter sealed a narrow throat between two coves. The water there clicked like glass beads. Beneath the thin lid, a family of fish waited—silver darts, patient and growing dim. They needed the wide water beyond. The Lake is big, but sometimes it pinches.

I pressed my back against the ice and held still. Heat carries better when you stop fidgeting; my mother taught me that when I was smaller than a ripple. The cold argued. I argued back by staying. A soft crack wriggled out like a worm waking.

I swam along the seam, slow and steady, rubbing the surface with the flat of my tail. The lid clouded, then wept. A channel opened no wider than a hand. “Go,” I thought toward the fish. They felt me and slid in, one by one, bellies grazing my scales, tiny hearts ticking like raindrops.

Halfway through, the channel tried to freeze again, a stubborn zipper pulling shut. I pushed my nose up, made a little arch of warmth, and held it with a hum. The last fish paused, glittered, and bolted free.

When I let the ice settle, the passage skimmed over again, thin as tears drying. I sank to the quiet and listened to open water singing beyond. Sometimes the Lake shares what it has only by borrowing from what it is. I can do that too.

The Peaks wore fresh powder, smooth as a held breath. I stepped onto a narrow shelf to listen to the quiet and felt the snow shift under my paw. A hush went sharp. The slope below me loosened like a blanket being tugged away. Oh. Avalanche.

I hopped back to safe rock and watched the snow begin to slide—fast, loud, excited. It tumbled over itself, roaring like a hungry stomach. I raised both paws and called in my lowest voice, “Manners.” The mountain listens when you speak gently. The slide kept moving, but it started to sort itself—heavy chunks in front, soft powder behind, space for air to breathe.

I paced the ridge, matching its speed, and clapped once. The echo reached the rushing snow and bounced back as a beat. The slide learned the rhythm. Whump—rest—whump. It spread wide into the empty gully I pointed to with my shadow, skipping the small spruce grove that couldn’t get out of the way.

When the snow finally settled, the gully held it like a bowl made for such things. The silent Peaks returned, only now there was a new curve across the valley floor—a safe one. I slid down on my belly to check the edges. Packed well. No trapped air. The spruce shook themselves off, mildly offended, very alive.

I pressed my ear to the snow and heard the last tiny sighs turn to naps. Good. I left a little pinecone at the crown of the path like a doorman’s bell and whispered, “If you fall, fall kindly.” Up here, we don’t stop storms. We teach them where to go so the mountain can keep breathing without breaking.

The Dunes rolled their shoulders and flashed me a secret: a seam of air opened between two sand crests, and warm spice slipped out. I followed the scent to a pop-up market where stalls were made of woven wind and signs were written in footprints. No coins. Only trades.

A vendor offered “the last note of a song you used to know.” Another sold “the blush you meant to give but swallowed.” My pocket held nothing but a smile and a stubborn riddle or three. Good news: riddles spend everywhere.

At a table of glass bottles, I uncorked one and heard a tiny laugh I recognized from a long time ago. “Price?” I asked. The seller tapped a tray: bring a memory, leave a question. I told them about the time the sand pretended to be an ocean and fooled our shadows into swimming. My question: What do wishes weigh?

I walked away with a string of traded treasures—no heavier in the paw, but weighty in the heart: a tune, a scent, a little courage I’d lent the wind and forgotten to collect. The market hummed like a friendly hive. It would close at dawn; all such places do.

Before it vanished, I gave back two things I didn’t need anymore: a worry shaped like a knot and a riddle with no door. In return, I got a recipe: If you want something to stay, teach it how to go and come back by joy. I folded that recipe into the dunes, where secrets keep warm.

The sands in The Desert change shape every day. You can’t trust them to stay put, which makes running fun but mapping tricky. Still, I wanted to make something that could keep up with the wind—a living map.

I pressed small flags into the sand, each a different color. When the wind blew, I marked how far they moved. Soon I had a swirl of paths that showed how the desert dances at night.

I called it The Mapmaker’s Star because, from above, the flags formed a bright spiral. The dunes clapped their slopes like applause. Tomorrow the star will shift again, but that’s fine. Real adventures don’t need to stay still.

The Dunes were restless tonight. Even the stars seemed to fidget, blinking faster than usual. So I told the wind, “Fine, if the sky can’t stay still, let’s make it dance.”

I climbed the tallest dune and drew a huge circle in the sand—a clock made of light. Every time the stars blinked, I scooped a sparkle and dropped it into the middle. The Dunes gasped. They like drama.

When the circle was full, I snapped my fingers. The sparkles swirled into a glowing sandglass that floated above the desert. Each grain shimmered like laughter frozen mid-joke. “We’ll measure the night,” I said, “by how much fun we have.”

So we told stories, sang to the stars, and raced our shadows across the dunes. With every laugh, the sandglass tilted a little more, the stars slipping through faster. The night didn’t feel long anymore—it felt alive.

When dawn finally peeked over the ridge, the sandglass burst into a thousand lights that flew back to the sky. The Dunes sighed, tired but happy. I bowed low. “You’re welcome,” I said. The wind whispered back, “Same time next year?”

The Trench doesn’t get snow, but it gets sparkle. I braided glowing seaweed with coral dust until it looked like a wreath of green fire. When I hung it near a vent, the bubbles drifted through like tiny ornaments.

Fish gathered around, curious. A lanternfish blinked twice, as if asking if it could add something. It brought a shell shaped like a star. Perfect topper.

I watched the wreath sway in the current, lighting the deep. It’s easy to forget that even the darkest places like a little cheer. Down here, our lights don’t chase shadows—they dance with them.