“I’ll find one, one day,” she peeped, tracing the routes between the stems as she always did, her tail whipping back and forth for balance. “Ma says she found one, when she was younger.”

“There are too many clover heads to check,” I call after her, but she’s gone, a streak of green-gold in the dappled light. Every morning was the same since our mother told that story; we’d embark on our usual morning hunt for food but we’d be led astray by my eager sister, a hatchling only months old, who was convinced she would find a four-leaf clover, just as our mother once did.

Drinking the dew from the middle of the rare clover is said to bring good luck. Mother claims she won her biggest shrew race on the day she drank from the four-leaf she found. But we’ve lived in this patch all our lives and never seen more than three leaves. Even our father said that he’d never seen one, and he’s flown overhead hundreds of times.

Still, Sis is so intent. Maybe she will find one, if she looks hard enough.