This day was coming, even if he hadn't seen it; a crackling thundercloud over the horizon that only needed the slightest of winds to push it over the pack.

She was his firstborn, his only other children were still young pups, to have graced the earth so recently that they weren't even Scouts.

Regret laced his mind, a silken ribbon of the action of telling him of his future. A kindness and a sin.

He was old, thin and weak. Undiluted luck is what made him survive the battle. Pure, purified, putrid luck.

He could have died; the prophecy would die with him and his young daughter would have been named Alpha of the Waning Winds Pack.

His sweet mate comforted him, whispering that fate and destiny had this planned since Snow was born. Her tail brushed his muzzle, sweeping off the dirt and worry, a brush of snow-light fur.

Snow would have to leave alone. Even if fate and destiny stood against him, he could not let a prophecy muttered in a moment of pure emotion ruin his pack's way of life.

That night he howled a gathering, and announced Snow's declaim to being the lead Hunter and the next Alpha, banishing her to the will of the moon, the only light in the darkness.

That night his daughter left, knowing that there was nothing her father could do.

Warg spoke a new prophecy, to help him forget the old. The lunar goddess had no part in this one, but his daughter was no longer chained in titles, he needed protection from the free wolf.

The Alpha shall brave the cold snowy winter, his jaws shall be wet with reindeer blood and his claws dappled with the flesh of his enemies.