Blacktail Deer Plateau As we go on, we remember all the times we had together

Other wolves came to say their hellos and goodbyes to Junior, and Saena began to melt away into the background as best she could. Truth be told, she wasn't very good at goodbyes, certainly not the ones that were sincere and not flavoured with anger and betrayal. She couldn't feel these things for Junior, for one reason or another, even if she'd tried. As Lasher introduced his children and Junior addressed Dante, she took slow steps backward as though to combat the tight feeling creeping into her throat.

Junior didn't let her flee the inevitable, though; the dark Thief River Beta drew up alongside her. The tightness in Saena's throat turned into a lump at her sister's touch, and she said nothing as Junior gave her final farewells to all, even the Plateau's most recent litter. She could barely even summon the willpower to say, "happy birthday!" before a sob cracked her voice and she had to turn away, hide her face so none could see how upset she really was that Junior was leaving so soon.

She didn't blame her sister, of course—Swordfish was waiting for her—but it was still hard to watch her walk away, so Saena coped with it as she had coped with many things in her life: she looked the other way and didn't look back.