Book 1. The long dark nights. RE-EDITING

25. Meet the pack, your family. EDITED

Melody looked at Riker. Could this be the same Riker? The Riker her mother told her about? If so, she would probably be safe here. But after what happened to her so called family, she didn't know what to think.

"Where are you from?" Melody asked him.

Riker looked puzzled. He hesitated to answer, but did answer. "North of here. Why do you ask?"

"Did you know Amy from the rogues pack there?" She asked.

"Maybe. Why?"

Melody ran to him. She leaned on his leg.

"She's dead." She said starting to cry.

"You were supposed to be there!" She cried. "You were her brother!"

Artos looked at Maria.

"You could have stopped mum from being killed!" Melody said.

"Melody. I didn't know. I thought she was leaving when I was. She said she was going to leave when the time was right." Riker said.

Melody looked up at him, then dropped to the ground. Her eyes were cloudy with tears. All she wanted now was to be by her mother again.

Artos walked over to Hinto. "Did you know?" He whispered to him.

"No." Hinto replied.

Maria walked over to Melody. "Hey."

Riker looked at Maria. "No. This is something I have to do."

Maria backed away from them.

"Melody. We need to talk bout what happened." Riker said.

Melody looked up at Riker. She got up and followed him to a spot out of the way from everyone else.

Maria looked at Hinto. "Is that her real Uncle?"

"It's always possible." Hinto said.

"You mean you don't know if it is?" Maria looked a little confused.

"I mean that I had no idea that Riker was her uncle." Hinto said.

"That means she might want to stay here?" Artos asked.

"If she trusts him, she might want to stay here. I'm hoping that she would at the least trust Rinty." Hinto said.

Artos was looking around. He didn't see Rinty anywhere. Maybe he was out hunting.

"Where is Rinty?" Artos asked.

"He went out on patrol this morning. He hasn't been back for a little while." Someone spoke from behind him.

Artos turned around. He saw the wolf who spoke. She looked a lot like his mother. Artos stepped back a step. Who was this?

"You must be Artos." She said. "I am Mishka. I'm your aunt."

Artos thought a minute. 'Aunt? Does this mean I might have more family alive?'

"Aunt?" Was all he managed to say.

"Yes. Your mothers sister." Mishka said.

Artos looked at Maria. She was acting not to be aware of this conversation. He looked back at Mishka. She sat there watching Artos. All this about wolves finding long lost families is strange. Two different wolves in one day. Coincidence? I think not.

"So. Um. There must be a lot of my family here, huh?" Artos asked.

"I'm afraid not. I've moved into this pack recently. Most of my family members stayed away from packs. Some were for good reasons. Some were for bad reasons. And some were for no reason at all. Most that were in packs left them." Mishka said.