Rita led the winged wolves over to the middle of the clearing: a bare spot in the cave that only the warm sunlight shone through.

The heat felt good under Dawn's paws, slightly calming her. Raven rested her head against Dawn's foreleg.

Alpha Blizzard stepped into the sun, giving Dawn a chance to get a better look at his physical features.

Under his mismatched eyes were small bags, as if he hadn't slept in days. His disheveled gray-and-white pelt added on to the prediction of sleep deprivation. His tired eyes groggily moved across the group of winged wolves.

Dawn heard Riptide gulp nervously.

After a moment, more Cripps began to crowd around them. Avalanche, Andes, and the foxlike Cripp from the group was among them. The white Quadruplet looked around for Rita, but she was nowhere to be seen.

"Avium," Alpha Blizzard boomed in a deep voice. "Welcome to the Pack of the Shimmering Snow. I expect that my Scouts brought you here?"

The winged wolves collectively nodded.

"Ah, yes," he replied. "Of course they did." His muzzle remained in a consistent frown. "Now, Avalanche. Would you mind telling me the reason for the winged ones' presence?"

Avalanche stepped forward. "Gladly, Alpha," he said, turning toward Blizzard and bowing his head in respect. When he raised his head again, he began his side of the story.

"We had set out before sunrise. I was with Rita, Andes, Rocky, Atlas, and Elias. Tired as we were, we had decided last night to leave early, since it's harder to find prey in the brutal winter months. We had reached the outer territory just as the sun was coming up," Avalanche told Alpha Blizzard. "Our Scout group had eventually stumbled upon the pups and their mother, and..." Avalanche's voice trailed off as he noticed the Alpha's face, which was full of sadness.

"Alpha Blizzard? Is everything alright?" a young, female Cripp asked. Her black pelt shimmered like the night sky, and her golden eyes looked like two shining stars. Three pups were at her paws, trying their best to sneak peeks at the winged wolves. One had fox-colored fur with golden eyes, one had a black pelt with leaf-green eyes, and the third one looked like a mixture of the two, possessing black patches on his ginger body, with the addition of golden eyes from his mother.

Dawn looked back up at Alpha Blizzard, whose gaze now met the ground. He didn't say a word.

The she-Cripp left her pups to the care of the wolf next to her, and padded over to the Alpha wolf. Tears of sadness were filling his eyes.

She nuzzled him, trying her best to comfort him. "There, there, father... I miss her, too..." she softly cooed.

"That must be the Alpha's daughter..." Dawn thought.

"I'm sorry, Sierra..." Blizzard whimpered. "I'm trying my best to keep my composure... But I can't stop thinking about her..."

The foxlike Cripp from before had now stepped into the situation as well. He padded to the mourning wolves. "Sierra... I'll take it from here. Why don't you take Alpha back to his den?"

She nodded. "Okay... Thanks, Atlas." The black she-Cripp nodded and led herself and Blizzard back to the Alpha den. They walked through the cascade of white flowers and disappeared.

Atlas turned to face the winged wolves, his foxlike tail swishing behind him. "As you can tell, Alpha is too... distracted... at the moment to focus on matters such as these. In a quarter-moon, we'll ask Alpha about this again. Until then, these Avium will be staying with the Omega Prisoners."

Avalanche let out an irritated growl, swearing softly under his breath. He turned away and stalked toward the direction of his den. The other Cripps slowly left the meeting to go about their day until only Atlas remained with the winged wolves.

"Follow me, Avium," he ordered before making a left turn toward one of the den entrances. After a moment, Atlas led them inside the opening, which turned out to be another tunnel, this time much smaller than the one that led them to the Pack's camp. Dawn bumped her head on the hard-packed soil and rock more than a couple times, each one getting a little more dirt in her snow-white fur. Finally, the tunnel widened again to reveal a thin ray of sunlight pouring into a much smaller cavern.

Besides the little amount of light, it was very dim and hard to see what was in there. Dawn could just make out two large tangles of tree branches, each one containing a figure eyeing them intensively.

She nearly jumped out of her pelt when she heard a female voice chirp, "So, Blizz sent ya down here?" However, Dawn recognized the voice.

It belonged to Rita.

"Er... Not exactly..." Atlas replied. He then proceeded to tell Rita of how Alpha Blizzard broke down during their trial, and they were to stay in the prison for a quarter-moon until the trial could be continued. Rita nodded in return.

"Don't worry, Atty! I'll keep all eyes and ears on them!" she said with a wink of her sky-blue eyes.

Atlas turned and went back into the tunnel, leaving the winged wolves with Rita and the prisoners.

"Okay, guys," Rita stated, acting excited to be in charge. "Males go in the right cell, she-wolves into the left cell."

Dawn was about to protest. After all, there were only three guys compared to the six girls, but she didn't want to cause any more trouble. She'd had enough for one day.

Rita skillfully pulled back a large root to let the males inside their cell. As the three went inside, Dawn was able to catch a glimpse of their new cellmate. His dull gray fur was matted and filthy and his equally gray eyes were full of drowsiness. You could easily see his ribs (even in that dark cavern).

Dawn gulped when she looked further down his body. The majority of his right hind leg was missing. Where the rest of his leg should've been was a grotesque mess of faded red-pink scars. She wanted to look more, but Rita had closed the tree-root cell.

The brown Cripp then went on to open up the females' cell. Pulling on another root, Rita motioned with her tail for the she-wolves to go inside.

Dawn let Star, Jinx, and Nova go before her before Raven and herself padded in.

It was even darker in the cell. A few small bones were scattered here and there. Dawn just hoped they were from past meals. A shady figure in the corner was staring at the wall, its dark brown fur almost camouflaging itself with the dirt and roots.

After Summer stumbled in, Rita slammed the root behind her, nearly getting her delicate butterfly wings. The Flutter wolf growled irritatingly.

Dawn just continued to stare at the creepy wolf on the other side of the dark cell. She slowly inched closer, Raven hiding right behind her.

Then, without warning, the wolf's head turned around, revealing shiny iceberg-colored eyes. It let out a threatening growl as Dawn backed away.

The other winged wolves had done the same until they were all pinned against the tree-root wall. It stalked closer and closer until the wolf and Dawn were literally muzzle-to-muzzle.

The white she-wolf couldn't move, paralyzed with fear.

In desperation, Dawn thought, "What have I gotten myself, my friends, and my family into?"