Scarlet was a little girl from a small village nestled between the tall, green trees of a forest. Every day, she walked down the woods, and somehow she never got bored of them. She always felt drawn by the forest. Everything made sense there, for there was always something new to discover, whether it was the different routes, the variety of animals and birds, or even the way raindrops fell onto each leaf and then down to the ground.

One autumn day, just as the sun rose in the sky, she said goodbye to her parents and ran to the woods. The day before, heavy rain with strong winds had swept through the forest. She was used to seeing fallen trees on the muddy ground. She climbed over them easily, for it wasn’t the first time she had witnessed the aftermath of nature's madness.

This day, two things caught her attention. The first was a soft whistle of a bird. The whistle was so faint that she held her breath, listening carefully as she followed it. Just beside a fallen old trunk,...