Believing her mother had been hard. Would she really stay around? Was she really there? She'd left before, ran, and had never came back to check. Avani was the only one who came back. A lot of others had seen the carnage, but Avani was truly the only one who really saw it. Who got to comfort her littlest sister who slowly died in her paws while she could do nothing to help.

In the end, she was the one who left her mother, drifting away, uncertain, unable to stick around. It was hard, and she was coping. The whole reason she left that adoptive family of hers was to try and find the living members of her birth family. Now that she had, she had, in a way, ran away.

Now she wandered back, wondering if she'd find her mother again. She thought she might have scented the familiar woman, but she wasn't 100% certain - perhaps only being there could tell.

She would probably never entirely get over the fact that her life had done a complete turn around. From a peaceful, quiet existence in a pack she truly loved, to having everything slip between her paws leaving her with an absolute mess. Even though things were now going somewhat well with Zephyr, it was a fragile sort of happiness they shared which felt as if it could shatter at any moment if they did not tread carefully. So much tension, so many questions, and no answers. Huffing loudly she let her eyes slip closed and acknowledged that stewing in her own inner turmoil was going to get her nowhere fast. After all, she did this all the time and nothing had come of it other than Cae finding herself increasingly frustrated. Maybe it was time to have some difficult talks with Zephyr - she had to grow up and act like an adult at some point, right?

Ever since their meeting Avani had been in the back of her mind. For once someone other than herself had run off. She really couldn't blame the girl, after all, she'd had to grow up remembering a family she lost with no way of knowing her parents were still alive. Well, okay, so Caelum hadn't really gotten to the whole "your dad is alive too by the way and me and him aren't really together anymore but we kind of are but it's weird and complicated" stuff. Getting through that bit was gunna be interesting. Uncomfortable, awkward, upsetting, basically everything except for easy. Hell, the only thing they'd really talked about was the obvious. Cae couldn't even let herself be surprised, after having run into Inverno and Zephyr she didn't have i in her to be shocked that someone else made it out okay despite the carnage. Shuddering, she pressed her way through the deep green vegetation that clung to life in the chill of winter. This winter was going to be a hard one indeed, she'd seen some rather ominous looking clouds in the distance.

She never really never expected the strange things and unexpected encounters that cropped up in her life, though at this point Caelum was beginning to think she should. She came to a halt, seeing the pale form with scattered dark markings and knowing before she'd even fully focused on the form of the girl that it was her daughter. "Avani," she whispered. What could she say?