Silvertip Mountain I'm as real as you are

The night was warm the slowly cooling, the air still damp and heavy around him. Grayday panted happily as he reached his desired destination: the Glass Caves.

For a while, he simply sat and gazed around him, heart filled with a sort of emptiness he didn't know how to explain. The more he focused on the emptiness, trying to puzzle it out, the more it grew, until it became a feeling he could only describe as sorrow. And it was a sorrow he couldn't explain. Yes, he missed his family - but he'd dealt with that. Yes, he'd failed the little she-wolf - but what could he have done? He'd tried his best to help her, and she'd gone astray. He had a new family now, and yet...

There was still something missing. Maybe it would come with time, as he got to know his new packmates. Maybe, he would only find it when the dreams he'd set off with were realized.

He tipped back his head and gave a low, mournful howl. There was just nothing for it.

"Cat and Calf, please take this burden from my heart," he prayed, staring over the horizon, where the last pools of color were bleeding from the sky. "I've been a good wolf - I serve as well as I am able. Can I just be content, now?"

He had the uncomfortable feeling that he already knew the answer to that question.