Larksong Grotto nagrulik-atuun

When Kigipigak deigned to return home to the Watch he found himself moving slowly over the snow, hesitant to cross the fields and climb the mountain. He was not sure who would be there; without Stjornuati to lead those that gathered Kigipigak worried they would disperse—and he could not blame them for that. Winter was a harsh time for any wolf without a well defended and properly stocked village. Many lived short lives in the far-flung northlands, taken by the sheer cold or the slow ache of starvation. Kigipigak had been arrogant enough to believe himself immune to all of that because of the Stormskyli brothers—and they were gone, now. Following the wind as it called to them.

Kigipigak crossed a frozen river as the flurries became thick and then sought shelter in the maze-like tangle; there he was lost for a solid four or five hours. Each time he thought he'd found his entry path to double back on it would lead him somewhere new—the snow having piled so quickly that the chasm his body left behind quickly filled, leaving him in a white expanse.

By the evening he had crossed an icy meadow and sought out the shelter of a grotto. The mouth of the cave looked bleak and smelled worse; some other creature having used the same logic to hide out while the winds shrieked outside, except whatever-it-was had died and begun to stagnate along a far wall. The putrid smell was pervasive; Kigipigak did not think he could linger there for longer than a night because of it.

He took to pacing within the grotto.