The river in Edrith was always loud in spring.
Snow from the northern ridges melted too fast, swelling the current until it roared against stone and root alike. The villagers warned their children every year.
Stay away from the banks. Don't play near the bend. The river doesn't forgive.
Kael Viremont knew that.
He also knew his little sister didn't listen.
"Elira!" he shouted, breath misting in the cold dusk air. "Come back!"
Elira stood at the muddy bank, shoes half sunk in wet soil, holding a crooked stick like it was a sword.
"I'm fighting it!" she yelled back at him. "I'll defeat the river!"
Kael tried not to smile. She was eight. Thin as a reed. Wild hair tied poorly behind her head. "You can't defeat a river."
"Then I'll scare it!"
Thunder rolled faintly in the distance.
The sky had turned a bruised purple. Too dark, too fast.
Kael's chest tightened.
"We should go," he said. "Storm's coming."
"One more minute!"
There were a hundred things he could've done differently.
He could've dragged her home earlier. He could've refused to bring her at all. He could've stood closer.
Instead, he was five steps away.
Five.
Elira hopped onto a flat rock near the edge.
The rock shifted.
It happened quietly.
No dramatic crack. No warning.
Just a small, sickening tilt.
"Elira—"
The ground beneath her gave way.
Mud slid.
Her body lurched sideways.
The river swallowed the sound of her scream.
Kael moved.
He didn't think. He didn't breathe.
He threw himself forward and caught her wrist just as the current tried to take her. Her fingers dug into his skin.
"Kael!" she sobbed.
"I've got you."
The river pulled.
It was stronger than it looked.
Her body slammed against the rocks, water surging over her legs. The current twisted her sideways.
Kael braced his boots against the unstable bank. The mud began to slide under him too.
He felt it.
The slow, unstoppable shift.
"Elira, look at me!" She did.
Her eyes were wide. Terrified.
"Don't let go," she whispered. "I won't."
The bank cracked.
His knee sank into water. The current pulled harder. His grip slipped an inch. Then—
Something strange happened. Not visible.
Not magical.
Just a sensation.
A pressure.
Like the world paused to decide something. Kael felt it press against his spine.
Against his ribs.
A weight.
A choice.
The current surged violently. His arm jerked.
Her wrist slid from his grasp. For a split second—
He could've sworn—
The river's pull shifted direction. Not away from him.
Toward him.
The current yanked.
But not at her.
At him.
His body lurched forward unnaturally. Elira's fingers slipped free.
He hit the water instead.
The river consumed him.
Cold.
Violent.
Merciless.
He didn't see where she went.
He only knew the water was everywhere.
In his lungs. In his ears. In his mind.
He fought upward.
Hands clawing blindly.
The world was white noise and choking panic. Something struck his ribs.
Pain burst across his side.
He gasped—
Water filled his mouth.
Then—
Hands grabbed him.
Voices shouting.
Rough fingers dragging him onto shore.
He coughed violently, vomiting river water into the mud. "Where's my sister—"
No one answered.
He forced his eyes open.
Villagers stood along the bank.
Some wading downstream.
Some staring at him.
He rolled onto his stomach, trying to stand.
His legs wouldn't hold. "Elira!" he screamed. No answer.
The river roared.
---
They found her at dawn.
Three bends down.
Caught between roots.
Too still.
Kael didn't cry.
He didn't move.
He just stared.
Someone wrapped him in a blanket. Someone else pulled Elira away.
He didn't remember who.
The sky was gray that morning.
Too quiet.
The river had calmed.
As if nothing had happened.
---
The village said it was an accident.
They said spring floods were unpredictable.
They said children were careless. They said the gods were cruel. Kael said nothing.
But he remembered something. That moment.
That weight.
That shift.
He replayed it every night.
The river had pulled her.
Yes.
But at the last second—
It had felt like it changed.
Like the force redirected.
Like something chose.
And it had chosen him. Except—
He survived.
She didn't.
That part didn't make sense.
If something had chosen him— Why was she gone?
---
Weeks passed.
The village returned to routine.
Fields needed tending.
Roofs needed mending.
Life moved on in the way life always does.
Kael did not.
He stopped going near the river.
He stopped laughing.
He stopped sleeping properly.
At night, he heard water in his ears.
Felt phantom current dragging at his limbs.
But something else began happening too.
Small things.
Wrong things.
A cart wheel came loose while rolling downhill toward an elderly man. Kael saw it first.
He ran.
Pushed the man aside.
The cart smashed into him instead.
Cracked his shoulder.
The old man walked away unhurt.
Coincidence.
A lantern fell from a tavern hook.
Would have shattered across a woman's infant. Kael stepped forward to catch it.
The hook snapped early.
The metal struck his temple.
Blood.
The baby remained untouched.
Unlucky.
A horse kicked wildly in the market square. Should have broken a boy's ribs.
Instead, its leg twisted mid-motion—
And caught Kael across the thigh.
Pain.
Bruises.
The boy stood safe.
Unfortunate.
Each time—
There was that same feeling.
A split-second pressure.
Like invisible scales balancing.
Like something rearranging harm.
Not preventing it.
Redirecting it.
Toward him.
At first, he thought it was guilt.
That he deserved it.
That the river had taken Elira because he wasn't strong enough.
So this—
This was repayment.
But repayment for what?
He was the one who failed.
He was the one who survived.
---
One evening, standing alone near the training yard, Captain Rorik approached him. "You're not healing properly."
"I'm fine."
"You've said that every time you're bleeding."
Kael looked at the ground.
Rorik studied him quietly. "You can't keep stepping into danger."
Kael almost laughed.
"I'm not stepping into it."
"Then why does it always find you?"
Kael didn't answer.
Because he didn't know.
Or maybe he did.
Later that night, unable to sleep, Kael found himself walking toward the river. He didn't realize where he was going until he heard it again.
The rushing.
The endless, uncaring rush.
He stood at the bank.
Staring into dark water.
"Why her?" he whispered.
The river gave no reply.
But the air grew heavy.
Just slightly.
Like that night.
Like that moment.
His chest tightened.
And suddenly—
A memory hit him differently.
When the bank had collapsed—
When her wrist had slipped—
He had felt the current pulling him harder than her.
As if something had decided:
Only one.
And it had tried to take him.
But someone on shore had grabbed him. Saved him.
Interrupted it.
What if-
The river wasn't the only thing choosing?
What if something else had been adjusting the outcome?
What if harm had been meant for him
And she had been in the way?
His breath trembled.
"No," he whispered.
But the thought wouldn't leave.
If something could shift fate
Then maybe
Maybe it had failed that night.
Or maybe-
It had succeeded.
The weight in the air pressed faintly against his shoulders again. Subtle.
Almost approving.
Kael stepped closer to the edge.
The mud didn't give way.
The current didn't surge.
It just flowed.
Waiting.
He didn't know the rules.
He didn't know the cost.
But deep inside-
He felt something terrifying.
If pain had to land somewhere... If the world demanded balance... It would keep choosing him.
And next time-
He wouldn't let anyone interrupt it. The river roared louder.
As if in agreement.