Alari rides low over Wing's back, legs gripping tightly and blond hair flying in the wind. She's exhausted, and worried, but she refuses to stop until she finds Navin and his unit of soldiers, wherever they are. She has only stopped once in the past six hours, and only to give her horse a rest.
Alari snorts and wonders if Kylan is looking for her yet.
She wonders if he'll ever forgive her.
Because she abandoned him, leaving without a word, spoken or scrawled in a hasty note, when he's injured and when their parents are—
Well, she doesn't know where their parents are. But she's going to find out, and that's why her little brother with his sparkle-innocent eyes can stay safe in the castle.
She hopes. There is no way that he will actually stay in the castle—there's something they both learned from their hero-parents, and that's determination. Their family does not give up, ever.
Ever.
When she spots the single rider on the horizon, hope sparks deep in her chest like a candle in the dark. The horse moves very slowly, and the rider sways in the saddle, slumped over like they can't sit up.
Alari slows Wing to a trot, and then a walk as they approach the other horse. She sees the royal guard's uniform first, and then the Hylian Crest on his tunic, and then the familiar set to his shoulders…
"Navin!" Alari gasps, the name tearing its way from her throat on its own. The rider's head raises as she practically leaps out of the saddle and hits the ground running until she reaches his horse's side.
That's when she sees the blood, staining his horse's white coat, trickling down his left side, mixing with sweat and salt tears of pain, and she sees the arrow buried deep within his shoulder.
He makes some kind of groaning sound that has her name in it, and topples off of his horse's back.