The wind is stronger here, carrying the scent of heather and the unmistakable promise of incoming rain.
“We’ve got a problem,” Cameron says while scanning the horizon. “Three sheep escaped the flock this morning. We need to find them.”
“And I assume this is my mission now?”
“Let’s say it’d be a good way to test your observation skills,” Connor replies with the infuriating half-smile I’m rapidly beginning to hate. “Doctors are supposed to be observant, right?”
I diagnose symptoms.
I do not track missing sheep across fifty acres of heather.
Apparently my professional skill set has expanded dramatically.
I study the landscape.
Nothing.
Just endless purple heather, wind rippling through the grass like waves across an ocean, and increasingly threatening skies overhead.
“I don’t see anything.”
“Look for tracks,” Cameron instructs, crouching near the ground. “Sheep leave marks in wet soil. And they eat vegetation differently—they tear it instead of cutting cleanly.”
I crouch beside him, studying the ground with the same intensity I usually reserve for chest X-rays.
Sure enough, now that he points it out, I notice hoofprints pressed into the damp earth—small oval marks tapering slightly at the front, heading west.
I follow them carefully, trying to ignore my aching knees and the fact that my soaked arm has started shivering again.
Ragnar follows beside me, occasionally sniffing the ground.
Is he helping me?
Or mocking me?
With this sheep, it’s impossible to tell.
After twenty exhausting minutes that feel more like twenty years, I hear bleating somewhere ahead.
I move around a rocky outcrop and finally spot them.
Three sheep grazing peacefully beside a collapsed fence, looking entirely satisfied with their little morning adventure.
“Found them!”
The twins arrive behind me, and for the first time all morning, I see something dangerously close to approval in their expressions.
“Not bad.”
“Good eye.”
They herd the sheep together with the effortless efficiency of people who’ve done this their entire lives.
Then Ragnar surprises me completely.
He positions himself behind the runaway sheep and calmly guides them toward the trail back home with the authority of an experienced sheepdog.
Officially, this sheep possesses more professional competence than I do.
