By the next morning

Autumn had noticed her father leave, and shortly after, Gentle Night left the den as well. The girl shrugged, smiling to herself as she stretched out her long legs, enjoying the time alone in the den to keep snoozing. However, after a while when no one returned, including mother, she began to wonder where everyone was. Had she missed out on something? Rolling to her paws, she got up and gave herself a shake, trying to wake herself up so she could go trailing after the scent of her family. The slate-coated, striped young female left the den, her nose twitching as she scented the cold air. It wasn't long until she caught scent of her sibling, and her father as well, and so she followed the trail. Her tail was wagging back and forth as she followed the scent trail confidently, and what she found was nothing close to what she expected.

The scene she stumbled upon was a bloody mess, and as her eyes darted across it, she wasn't sure what to do. All she could do was catch her breath, her throat tightening as panic began to set in, hers ears pressing against the back of her neck, her eyes watering. Her once wagging tail had curved between her legs, and her neck twisted this way and that as she looked to every wolf around. The adults were shouting, everyone seemed frantic, and her parents lay ominously still on the ground. And the blood. There was so much blood. Too much. Instinctively, Autumn knew what that meant, but she didn't want to believe it.

Amongst the chaos, she spotted her sibling, and without hearing a word of anyone else, she went to Night's side, pressing herself into them. The sensitive girl squeezed her eyes shut as she pressed her head against their shoulder, wanting to block it all out, her breath catching in her chest as she tried to force reality away from her mind. But it wouldn't work; the stench of blood was over-powering, and the sound of everyone's voices overwhelming, and the absence of her mother and father's voices and liveliness all too apparent. Her heart sunk, and she needed Quelt and Bright Moon more than ever, yet somehow she knew she would never feel their warm touch again.