Whitebark Stream and it’s getting so hard tryna to cope

Tags for reference  :)

To rear his own brood was an absolute joy and he hated to part from them for any length if time, but Artyom's duty did not lie only with them. As sole leader of Whitebark since Dawn had stepped down to turn focus on the upbringing if their children, he felt the strain of it. To act as Alpha entirely on his own was not something his parents had prepared him for and, with the disappearance of pack-mates meaning less hunters to feed their collective young, he was beginning to entertain the idea of promoting another to aid him.

But who?

Minnow would've been his heart's choice. She was young, yes, but she was his niece through Dawn - but could she handle the pressure? Had her mind been more stable, perhaps, but the notion had vanished completely when she had. Artyom had looked for her, naturally, but it was difficult to source a young she-wolf who didn't want to be found.

Still, his heart ached for the pale yearling and he couldn't shake the sinking feeling that he'd failed her. It was the way of yearlings, he supposed, to disperse from a place unsuited to them - he only wished she could've reached out to him first so that he might wish her well.

Having delivered a meal to @Kaori and checking that all was well with her little family, Artyom dropped by to see @Kavik and Grezig. He wagged his tail in the adults' direction as he arrived, though it was the tiny explorer who caught his attention. The dark boy was a handful, at times an escape artist, but he was just as wonderful as all of Whitebark's other cubs. "Who's this?" Artyom asked as he drew nearer, keen to express interest in the child's newest discovery.