Whitebark Stream My whole life I felt like a burden; I think too much and I hate it.

It was rare that Dawn ventured from the whelping burrow, and she never did so for long. The sterling Alphess had slipped away earlier to quench her thirst and stretch her stiffened limbs, leaving Artyom to hover protectively over their young brood.

He talked to them often in his mother ttongue, despite knowing that they could not yet understand him. He recalled how his parents had reared their second litter, his younger sisters, by communicating regularly in both so that they grew up fluently bi-lingual. They'd brought him up in the same way, Artyom supposed, and he wished for his own children to learn too.

On hearing the sound if approaching paws, the pale leader quieted. He pricked an ear and listened quietly, nose working toward the hollow's entrance for any suggestion of who might be close by, and let himself relax at the sound of a familiar voice. "Minnow," he called to his niece softly, "come and meet your new little cousins."