Author's Note: With this chapter, I'll pass 2 million words posted, and Usurpation of the Darkness will have accounted for slightly more than a quarter of those words. That's… a lot. And crazier still, I've not told even a third of the stories I've already started to write yet. Seems like I'll be here a while yet… and I wouldn't have it any other way.

Anyway, semi-meaningless milestones aside, have a momentous chapter!

"It's amazing how easy it is to lose our way when the sun isn't out," Lily said, glancing up at the snow-covered canopy. "Especially since we can't see it that much even when it is out."

"I don't feel like we've been going the wrong way recently," Beryl grumbled, though the thinning treeline in front of them meant they had lost their way at some point. "But I guess we'll see. Think I can risk a quick flight above the clouds to check?"

Lily stepped forward and yelped as she sank into a chest-deep depression in the snow, one hidden beneath the featureless blanket of white. She hurriedly backed out of the icy dip, shaking herself to remove as much of the snow as possible-

Beryl came to her and pressed his side against her chest. "This just isn't your morning," he snorted. "Keep warm."

"Pamper me like this and I'll walk into more snowdrifts on purpose," Lily purred, snuggling into the crook of his neck and enjoying the dry warmth radiating off of him like the heat of a rock in the sun at the height of the hot-season, but deeper and less superficial.

"Pampering?" Beryl rumbled innocently. "This is a purely logical, calculated move to make us as efficient as possible. There's absolutely nothing to it aside from that."

"Oh, really?" Lily snickered. "You'd do the same for Diora?"

"She could freeze," Beryl declared. Lily knew he wasn't at all surprised that she had brought up Diora; when it came to jokes about someone neither of them liked, Diora was the only safe option, so she came up often enough.

"As I thought," Lily purred, licking his back where she could reach. "But we could be more efficient by finding out just how badly off-course we are." Clever jokes were well and good, and she wasn't rushing to move as fast as possible, but at some point before the sun went down they did need to figure out why the shore was in front of them instead of a long walk to their left.

"We have all day for that," Beryl muttered. "But here… this should work better than standing still." He stepped to the side, pulling her with him, then again.

Lily laughed as they slowly shuffled around the deceptively flat patch of snow she had fallen into, one tiny step at a time. At this rate, it would take them the rest of the day to get to the shore she could even now hear in the distance.

Not that a day's delay would make much of a difference; it was hard to keep track of the season by moon-cycles when the sky was constantly overcast, but she was reasonably certain they had spent more than a moon-cycle on the move since escaping the fiery trap that marked Grimmel's last attempt to capture them.

A moon-cycle of walking, talking, hunting, eating, mating, sleeping together, and little else. The days blurred together in her memory, and she couldn't have picked out any particular one as unique. They were all good, great even, but nothing had happened since they had lost Grimmel. Slowly making one's way through an endless, monotonous forest was not a good way to find new and exciting things.

So it was just as well, she mused, breathing in Beryl's scent, that she had brought the exciting, interesting thing with her on this journey.

"Race you to the treeline," she said, abruptly pulling away from him and breaking into a run. He almost toppled over, and she got a good ten-step head start before he recovered. Said head start lasted all of a dozen heartbeats and then he was past her, but she didn't mind, that was the plan. She immediately spit out a blast of flames and ran through it when it detonated in front of her.

Thus camouflaged, she darted to the side and slowed to a walk, creeping through the snowy forest.

"Lily?" Beryl called out. "Where did you go?" It sounded like he had stopped running, and she caught a glimpse of glossy black amidst the trees.

Lily's plan was to sneak around and try to pounce on him without him knowing she was there; her camouflage would make that harder than it should be, given she was much more obvious than the average light wing, but it was still better than nothing. Her natural coloration might have blended in well with the ground, but the trees were not so favorably colored.

She could see him now, black pacing around aimlessly in the white and brown of the forest. He seemed to have given up their race, maybe worried about something actually happening to her. She felt a pang of guilt for making him worry, and resolved to get her little trick over with before he could become too alarmed. He was close, and a blur approaching out of the corner of one's eye was hard to notice…

"Got you!" Beryl barked, spinning around to face her with an unbearably smug look.

Lily groaned, disappointed. "What gave me away?" she demanded as she rejoined him, and they continued toward the shore.

"You're warm now," Beryl rumbled appreciatively, rubbing up against her as they walked. "I hate to tell you this, but a big blurry patch of air is pretty easy to see in the daytime. At night, it's pretty good, but when there's enough light out…"

"Not so effective," Lily sighed. "Well, it could be worse. You could be able to see with sound."

"I'm going to learn that the moment I get a chance," Beryl grumbled. "You should too. If everyone else has an advantage seeing you-"

"Then I should have a better advantage," Lily hummed, cutting him off. "That would be good." If she had the time to learn something that took moon-cycles of aimless roaring. If Beryl knew it, she could have learned from him, but finding someone who could teach meant finding the pack, which meant all of her free time would disappear faster than a No-scaled-not-prey after having his paw blown up.

That was in the future though, the distant future at the rate they were travelling. She didn't have to think about it, and she had grown used to living in the moment. More used to it than she would have guessed, going into this endless journey. And she definitely had one dark wing in particular to thank for that.

"You know," she hummed, "sand holds heat pretty well. Spread our flames a little bit, build up a snow break for the wind…"

"More motivation to reach the shore," Beryl purred. "If a little risky, given we'd be out in the open."

"We'll do it near the shoreline, in the dunes," Lily elaborated, undeterred. "There aren't any Deathgrippers flying over the land anymore, and we'll see ships coming long before they see us."

"If there even are any ships out there," Beryl agreed. "I would like to think you blasting Grimmel's paw off showed him the error of his ways, and that he subsequently turned around and left entirely."

"It wouldn't have killed him," Lily retorted, reluctantly giving her own, less optimistic input. "And he has lost us, but that doesn't mean he has given up." There was an obvious shoreline to follow if one was looking for her pack, especially when the No-scaled-not-prey forces were more efficient at travelling over water, and she and Beryl were going parallel to that very shore. There might not be many ships in the area, but it seemed unlikely that there would be none.

Of course, that was all conjecture; she was totally ignorant when it came to what had happened after that last, fiery escape. Such was the downside of travelling anonymously. It was hard to keep track of someone while also trying to avoid being tracked in turn.

"At least we'll get a sense of whether he's around," Beryl hummed. "I still don't get how we managed to turn so hard, though. There's the shore, right in front of us, while it should be a day's walk to our left." He flicked his tail out to their left for no apparent reason. "And we leave those snow arrows to make sure we know which way we're supposed to be going, even when it's cloudy. This morning's arrow was there…"

Lily had been the one to come up with the idea, and the one to draw the previous night's arrow, so she knew he was asking her whether she might have put it in the wrong direction. "I made it right when we decided we'd be stopping there," she recalled. "It wasn't like I was distracted. A little hungry," that was normal, prey was sporadic, though consistent enough that they could live off of it, "but not distracted. I'm sure I put it in the right direction."

"Then maybe the shore curves," Beryl proposed. "It can't go straight forever. If it curves inward, then we have kept the right direction."

"And that would make this the first impassable obstacle to someone without flight," Lily recalled, her heart speeding up as she realized what this could mean. She had told her people to stop and gather at the first such place. If this was one, if they were not just seeing some other break in the trees...

The sight of the restless waves stretching out in front of them put paid to that notion, at least. Lily stopped just short of the snow-covered shoreline, lingering behind a few scrawny, wind-bent trees. The waves were choppy, and the horizons clear… save for one ominous blot out in the distance, though that was not necessarily a No-scaled-not-prey ship. It was too far to tell.

"Windy," Beryl observed.

"No it's not," Lily said. She didn't feel any wind.

"Up high," he clarified. "The clouds are shifting. We might get a view of the sun soon."

Which would tell them whether they had gone off-course, or found the designated stopping point. "I see."

"You will see, if we stick around here," Beryl snorted. "What I don't see is a waiting pack of light wings. We might as well look for them while we wait for the sun." He didn't suggest flying above the clouds to get an immediate answer, and for good reason; just because they didn't see any enemies didn't mean there were none around, and a black dragon flying up in the sky would be visible for a long way.

"Searching would be efficient," she agreed, mentally watching her plans for a warm hideout in the sand blow away like dust in the wind. An uneasy pit had opened in her stomach, one that bothered her more when she thought about actually finding the pack. She wanted to, she really did, but the responsibility would come crashing down on her again the moment she laid eyes on one of her people. She knew it would; she had only put it aside because there was nothing she could do for them.

"Split up, or go one way?" Beryl asked. "The shore goes two ways, and I don't know where the others would have settled down to wait."

"One way." She didn't like the idea of splitting up now, and if the sun came out to reveal this was all a false alarm, there would be no backtracking to meet up again. She turned to the left, reasoning that they might see the shore was curving if they went that way, and Beryl followed.

He also, she noticed as they walked, followed a few steps behind. Usually, it was either her behind or them walking close, side by side. Him walking behind her let her take the lead, both physically and metaphorically if they came across her people… And ensured they wouldn't stumble across the pack while doing something revealing, like the little jokes and excessive contact they had enjoyed only a few moments ago.

All of that, the easy closeness she enjoyed with Beryl, would need to be shoved back to where it had been before their journey. She tried not to think about that. The gnawing nervousness that permeated her mind was a worthy distraction, if not a good one.

Every tree she skirted around might be hiding one of her light wings, a forward scout looking for her. Every distant noise could be someone noticing her before she saw them, preparing to call out and greet her. To welcome her and burden her with the safety of scores of her fledglings, all in the same moment. She couldn't wait and didn't want it to happen at the same time.

It was with that confused, anticipatory state of mind that she noticed a flash of red lumbering through the forest, red and black and large, a Deathgripper.

Her tail smacked Beryl in the face, her silently flailing to get his attention, and she shrank back behind a duo of closely-rooted trees. Beryl crouched behind her.

"Wait… it might walk by…" he rumbled quietly.

Lily was in no mood to fight a Deathgripper, so she heeded his advice, peering between the two trees but otherwise remaining out of sight. She wouldn't easily be noticed thanks to her camouflage, but that didn't stop her heart from pounding.

The Deathgripper continued through the forest, seemingly unaware of them. It was grunting as it walked, a repetitive, somewhat melodic noise Lily didn't understand the point of, and it was alone, lacking even a rider.

"Wait…" Beryl hummed. "I know that tune." He waited expectantly.

It took Lily a moment, stressed and focused on the Deathgripper, to understand what he was saying. "Ember?" she hissed incredulously.

"Very likely," Beryl murmured. "But maybe I'm wrong. You get his attention, so if it's not him, he won't bring Grimmel's forces down on us."

She nodded and slipped out from behind the trees, mentally plotting her escape route if calling out resulted in an obviously hostile Deathgripper charging her. "Ember!" she barked.

The Deathgripper stopped, looked around, and burst into blue flames. For once, that unnatural sight made her feel nothing but relief, the wider implications of it being him aside. By the time Ember had revealed his normal dark wing form, Beryl was already halfway to him. The two collided so hard Lily winced, imagining what an impact like that would do to her back.

"You made it!" Ember barked happily as they tumbled over each other. "I knew you would, but it's still good to see you here!"

"Everyone else?" Beryl asked, pulling away to look his Sire in the eye, suddenly apprehensive. Lily knew the feeling; she held her breath, waiting for the answer.

"Pretty much everyone," Ember hedged. "Our family made it fine, all but one of the light wing groups hasn't shown up, and some stragglers came in a few days ago. I think only half a dozen light wings are still missing from that group, but you'll have to ask Mist for an exact number. Her group is the one that got scattered."

Lily let out a long, loud sigh. "I'll do that," she said. "Are you out here looking for those stragglers?"

"Got it in one," Ember confirmed. "And you two, of course."

"And us," Beryl happily repeated. "You were definitely looking for me, specifically. That thing you were humming…"

"I figured you'd recognize your own creation," Ember rumbled. "It's been a while since I heard it last, but I think I got it mostly right."

"Mostly," Beryl agreed.

Lily had no idea what they were talking about, but she didn't want to ask. She had to go back to being friendly with Beryl, nothing more, and butting in to ask about something that sounded deeply personal seemed a little too friendly. Or maybe she was overcorrecting, but that was better than getting Ember suspicious right away.

"Come on," Ember purred, "I can't take you over the water until it's dark, for safety, but there's a little patch of dry ground the sentries keep open nearby, we can wait for nightfall there."

"What's over the water?" Lily asked. She assumed the rest of her pack, that was the only logical answer… though she had specifically told everyone to wait on the accessible side of the first obstacle. Whoever arranged these patrols must have thought they served the same purpose, but still.

"There's an island, a much safer place than here," Ember explained as they walked. "Has Beryl told you about the ice nest we encountered a while back?"

Lily looked to Beryl, who shook his head. "It hasn't come up," she said neutrally.

"We were only there twice," Beryl said somewhat defensively. "I didn't get around to telling her my life story, we weren't that bored." His dismissive tone might have annoyed her, had he not cast her an apologetic glance that made it clear he was exaggerating to keep their cover. She nodded thankfully.

"Well, the most important thing about that nest is its alpha," Ember said solemnly. "This island has a similar guardian."

"Massive and icy?" Beryl asked.

"I don't know, I haven't seen her," Ember replied. "Haven't spoken to her much, either. She doesn't like me."

"Her loss," Beryl snorted. "Or is she scared of going into your mind and not being able to find her way back out?" The words sounded like a joke to Lily, but Beryl said them far too seriously for that to be the case, and sure enough Ember nodded seriously.

"Exactly that," he rumbled. "But she's strong enough to keep Grimmel's forces away from her island."

"Not just the Deathgrippers? Humans too?" Beryl looked over at Lily. "No-scaled-not-prey heads are a lot thicker, so usually this sort of thing doesn't work on them."

"What sort of thing?" Lily demanded. She was pretty sure she was getting the gist of what they were talking about just by listening, but way too much was being left unsaid.

"It varies… a lot, actually." Beryl growled thoughtfully. "Forcing people to do things they don't want to, taking over their bodies, searching through memories, trapping people in memories while their bodies do whatever the one controlling wants…" He trailed off, giving her a worried look.

"This one seems entirely concerned with keeping No-scaled-not-prey away," Ember added helpfully. "She's of the paws-off variety."

"I like that variety," Beryl murmured. "Better than the other kind, at least."

"I don't think I like the sound of any of this," Lily huffed, feeling overwhelmed. Ember was bad enough; she felt she mostly understood him now, not that knowing what he could do made him much less dangerous. This was a whole new realm of dangers she didn't fully understand, one her pack had apparently flown right into.

"It's not as bad as it seems," Ember assured her. "It's only thanks to her that there's a safe place for your pack to wait. Deathgrippers and No-scaled-not-prey are all over this shore some days. They know something is up with this area, and they're not going away."

"You have that on good authority?" Beryl asked.

"I've been doing some sneaking," Ember confirmed. "But they know this body now, or at least that something's off with any Deathgripper missing a rider, so I can't just pop in and get the latest news."

"Let me get this straight," Lily requested, trying to sort everything out in her head. "There's an island nearby with a guardian who keeps No-scaled-not-prey from even noticing it."

"Yes," Ember said.

"My pack has gone there for safety." That she understood, though it relied on the one doing the protecting being as benevolent as she seemed. Not something Lily felt comfortable assuming for herself, but she could understand her fledglings believing it. "And they send back scouts to make sure they don't miss anyone coming in on paw."

"Today, that's me and Mist," Ember supplied. "Yes."

"Okay…" One part of all of that failed to make sense. "But why does that random island have a guardian in the first place?"

"Good question," Ember rumbled. "Truth is, I don't know. Like I said, she hasn't spoken much with me. Holly or Aven would know if anyone does, though. They talk to her often enough."

A brown patch of ground became visible through the trees, small and muddy around the edges. "We're here," Ember announced.

"Nice place," Beryl said dryly. "Very… not snowy."

"Lily?" A bit of snow crunched, and a blurred form leaped out into the dirt patch. "You are here!"

"Safe and sound," Lily confirmed, moving to meet Mist halfway. The camouflaged light wing knocked into her carelessly, sending a sharp surge of pain through her back, but she ignored it in favor of embracing Mist.

"I am so glad…" Mist abruptly backed up, and Lily got the impression she was cringing, though it was impossible to be sure. Her voice certainly supported that, though, quivering as she spoke. "I failed."

"How about we go fishing?" Ember murmured to Beryl in a transparent attempt to provide privacy. Beryl muttered an agreement, and the two were gone in a moment.

"How?" Lily asked carefully, unwilling to commit to anything before she knew what, exactly, Mist was talking about. Ember had mentioned that Mist's group was scattered and some hadn't returned, but that could mean any one of a number of things, ranging from Mist heroically trying to defend her group, to Mist giving her people away to secure her own safety. Neither of those was likely, but either was possible.

"We were flying camouflaged eleven days ago, over the water," Mist said slowly. "None of us were visible. Two Deathgrippers bearing No-scaled-not-prey came up behind us, looking as if they would pass over. I gave the order to hold our course, and when someone's camouflage ran out early, they saw… There was a fight and everyone fled in different directions, and I could not find half of them again!" By the time she finished speaking she was all but barking the words out. "We had to keep going, we could not stay and search any longer, but that means I left some of them behind-"

"Which is exactly what I would have had you do," Lily said, trying to ignore her own guilt, and stared Mist down with stern eyes, daring her to object. "I put you in charge to make hard choices. Are you sorry for doing what I asked?"

"I… No?" Mist growled uncertainly. "You did not even ask how long we looked, or if the Deathgrippers were coming back, or anything! How can you know I made the right choice?"

"Because I know you would not have decided to leave someone behind if you thought it was safe to keep looking, and I trusted your judgment when I put you in charge," Lily said firmly. "If you made that choice, then you made it for good reasons. You can tell me about those reasons later." And she would ask later, when Mist didn't sound so terribly distraught. Right now, she just wanted to make sure Mist wasn't taking on any of the guilt.

Because all of the guilt for this, all of the responsibility, was Lily's to bear, and nobody else's. She had sent everyone out, coordinated and arranged the departure. She had made the choice, and whatever came of it was her failure, not Mist's. So long as Mist had acted as she thought best, then she had nothing to be sorry for.

"Who did you lose?" Lily asked solemnly.

"Six light wings," Mist said quietly. "Six have yet to return, all mine. Two of them were fledglings." She whined those last few words, and Lily felt like whining with her.

"And who did you save?" Lily asked, pushing her pain away. Ember had not spoken of light wing captives, which shed a grim light on the possible fates of those still missing, but she couldn't be sure, and now was not the time to think about that. Not when she couldn't yet do anything about it.

"I… One fledgling, two pairs of parents, and an unmated female," Mist stuttered out. "It was all chaos for a while, and they were the ones I found without giving our positions away…"

"You didn't fail," Lily concluded, thumping her tail on the ground for emphasis. "You lost people, but you didn't fail. Failure would be not making it this far with anyone."

"Nobody else lost anyone," Mist growled, suddenly defiant. "Holly did not. Pina did not. Rain did not. I did."

"I don't know about what they did, just what you did," Lily growled right back at her. "And I say you did as best as could be expected. Are you going to argue with me about it?"

"I want to," Mist said stubbornly. "But… no."

"Good." Lily nodded to herself.

"You are… different," Mist hummed to herself.

"How so?" Lily asked, more bothered by that simple statement than she showed. It struck especially close to home now, when she knew she was hiding something, and still feeling strange about stepping back into her place as alpha after so long away.

"I expected you to be mad," Mist admitted.

"Well, I'm not," she huffed. Worried for those who had been left behind, heartsick over the idea of any of her people being hurt or killed, guilty about all of the above being her doing at the heart of it, but not mad. Maybe she should have been mad, but she wasn't.

"I can see that…" The blur that was Mist moved over, and Lily got the impression she was being stared out. "How was your walk?"

Lily took the not-so-subtle request for a change of subject without comment; she was more than happy to talk about something less depressing. "Long," she said. "Dangerous."

"But you got away okay, since you are here," Mist objected. "What happened?"

"It started with Ember getting noticed," Lily recalled, lying down on the bare dirt as she spoke. If they were going to be here until nightfall, she would have plenty of time to tell the story, so she didn't feel like rushing it. Especially as it helped keep her mind off of other things…

She still didn't feel quite right about being alpha again.

O-O-O-O-O

"Ready for a flight?" Ember asked.

"Definitely," Lily hummed, hiding her anticipation with a seemingly casual flick of her tail. In the craziness of returning to her pack, possibly dealing with a mind-altering dragon, and everything else, the simple fact that she would be flying, or at least riding someone else who was flying, seemed small in comparison.

It didn't seem so small now, watching Ember change into a Deathgripper and knowing that the cold-season winds would soon be under her wings, or close to it.

"How are we flying this?" Mist asked, looking out at the empty ocean. "The normal formation, or should I go ahead and tell everyone Lily is back? And is Beryl going ahead, or keeping pace with you?"

"I'm sticking with the group, just in case," Beryl said.

"And I don't want anyone flying ahead to announce me, so you are too," Lily told Mist. That said, she clambered up onto Ember's back, her paws finding holds in between the many spiny protrusions, big and small. She was thankful for the thick scales and annoyance, in a way, because it felt much less like she was sprawling across someone's bare back this way. She had lain on Beryl's back once or twice, and this was nowhere near as intimate or comfortable.

Ember looked back, presumably mute in his present form, and she gave him a nod of confirmation. She was as ready as she would ever be-

He leaped, and she barked as an invisible paw pushed her down against his back, the force surprising her immediately. His whole body shook, and she clung to him, feeling much less secure in her grip than she had a moment ago.

The boundless sky, partially cloudy with stars shining through the gaps, beckoned to her, and she gasped quietly at the light feeling in her stomach, the unexpected vertigo of shooting up toward the moon after so long firmly on the ground.

She gave in to the urge to spread her wings at least a little and held them out, testing the wind. It pulled at her, painfully tugging at her back and pulling, pulling for her wings to come all the way out and straighten despite that being impossible for her…

It was a terribly bittersweet feeling, and she folded them in entirely before it could overwhelm her. However nostalgic it felt to be in the air, her paws were firmly holding her weight, and always would.

Ember didn't level out, not like she had expected; it felt like he was always climbing as he flew, flapping hard to keep in the air.

Off to one side, Beryl flew leisurely, easily keeping up with them. "Deathgripper with passenger is pretty slow, huh?" he called out when he saw her looking.

"Seems like it!" she replied, forcing her voice into an upbeat purr. She was supposed to be enjoying this. She was enjoying it, for what it was. Only the lack of anything more kept her from sitting back and-

There was an island looming close in front of Ember, hilly and sporting a forest in the middle. Beryl had sprung forward impossibly fast, and wasn't looking in her direction anymore. Her mouth was dry, and a headache had sprung to life in an instant, throbbing between her ears and behind her eyes. The clouds had broken open, covering less than half the sky, and the moon shone down on her. She was sprawled on Ember's back, not standing as she had been, and she couldn't remember moving.

Her breathing quickened as she realized that she couldn't remember the clouds moving, or flying long enough to go from not seeing an island to almost being there, or anything else, and she quickly connected that confusion to where they were going and what they would be encountering-

'That was fast,' a voice that came from nowhere and everywhere at once said calmly. 'You are quick to notice when things are not as they should be.'

"That was hard to miss," Lily snarled, looking around wildly. She was almost certain this was the guardian Ember had spoken of, but if some trickster thought to deceive her by camouflaging, flying above, and talking at just the right time, she wasn't going to fall for it so easily.

'Come to the boiling pool once you have collected yourself,' the decidedly feminine voice hummed calmly. 'You are alpha, and there are things that must be discussed.'

"You can start talking here and now," Lily growled irritably. She didn't like being summoned like someone's subordinate, and she liked somehow losing track of time even less. She still couldn't remember the time between Beryl's quip and now, but she was sure something had happened. There was no point in making her forget a totally boring, eventless flight, so she had been made to forget something more than that.

There was no response from the voice, and for a moment she wondered whether she had hallucinated it. Ember and Beryl had brought back the fish, so she was pretty sure she hadn't eaten anything suspicious, but maybe there was something in the snow she had melted for water…

Beryl shuddered midair, his eyes widening. "Something just happened," he said slowly. "I don't know what, but something."

"Can you remember flying out this far?" Lily asked urgently. "Because I cannot, and a voice told me to go to a boiling pool."

"I didn't get any messages from voices in my head," Beryl growled, "but I can't remember the flight, either. What happened?"

"Holly says the guardian checks newcomers' minds," Mist offered from somewhere nearby. "I thought you two were just bored and not saying anything."

Ember tossed his head, likely agreeing with Mist.

"I'm not bored," Lily growled. "I feel violated." Her mind was her own, and even she didn't like going into some parts of it. Nobody else had any right to pry there.

"What does she check our minds for?" Beryl asked curiously. He didn't sound all that upset, but Lily saw how he was holding his tail more carefully now, even as he flew.

"Holly did not say," Mist admitted. "You can ask her. We are almost there."

Lily distracted herself from her impotent anger by looking down at the island Ember was taking her over, balancing herself against the steady rhythm of his wings.

The island below was small, maybe twice the size of the valley in total. It didn't look that much different from the forest they had left behind, except for the massive bald patch lacking greenery in the center. Instead of trees, there was… nothing.

She stared in wonder as they passed over the huge opening in the ground, her tail going limp in amazement. A hole the size of a small mountain was dug into the center of the island, gouged out of dirt and rock and so deep she felt dizzy, despite already being in the air. The depths were illuminated by faint lights, blue and green and orange, all of which seemed to emanate from odd rocks jutting out into the depths. Steam rose from the very bottom, reflecting and carrying the multi-colored light.

Lily didn't need faint memories of Pyre talking about glowing crystals to tell her what this had to be; if she had been asked to imagine an entrance to an underground realm fit for flying creatures, she would have imagined something very much like this in size and grandeur. It could be nothing else.

"That's an impressive pit," Beryl said lightly. "Is everyone sleeping at the bottom?"

"There is a boiling pool down there, so no," Mist answered. "The pack is by the far edge, see where we are going?"

Lily tore her eyes away from the colorful pit of mystery and looked at the much more mundane forest edge around it. Sure enough, light wing forms flitted through the trees right in front of her. The forest ended abruptly, tree and grass giving way to sheer drops, and her first thought was that someone had better have posted guards to make sure hatchlings didn't bumble off and fall to their deaths-

A mingled series of roars rose from the edge of the pit, and Ember was dropping to land there, and a dozen light wings crowded around, their voices mixing into an unintelligible babble that sounded like gibberish, but felt like home.

"Let her down, at least!" someone cried out, and a space was cleared. Lily leaped off Ember - who, now that she thought about it, looked like a Deathgripper but wasn't being attacked by the pack - and almost landed on Pina, of all people.

The closest thing she had to a Dam nuzzled her quickly, her eyes wide and bright with happiness. "You found us!" she cried out.

"I did!" Lily barked, straining to be heard above the crowd. "You all made it!"

"Are you hurt?" Honey demanded, shoving her way through the crowd, her shrill voice cutting above the rest to make itself heard. "Copper!"

"I'm perfectly fine!" Lily assured her. She looked around for Beryl, thinking that he could aid her in roaring loud enough to silence the crowd, but he was already gone along with Ember.

"I'm fine!" she roared again, channeling her momentary dismay into a shriek loud enough to quell the ruckus for a heartbeat. "Everyone quiet down!"

In the silence that followed, she laughed lightly. "I got used to it being quiet out there," she said. "Give me a little while to readjust… and some space, too."

Those who were least personally interested in greeting her shrank back, pressing against trees or leaving entirely, and Lily was left with the people who most wanted to see her. Chief among those was a familiar female who looked far more at peace than she had the last time Lily saw her.

"Crystal," Lily greeted. "How are you feeling?"

"Much better than when we parted," Crystal hummed. Thunder and Lightning were nowhere to be seen, but Lily had no doubts as to who had helped her best friend get over her grief. "We were all worried for you."

"I was worried for all of you," Lily responded. She saw other familiar faces, Dew and Rain and Clay, and Holly-

Holly, who was approaching, sliding through the natural gaps formed in the crowd as light wings moved. Something about the look on her face had Lily bracing for an argument and wishing she knew where Beryl was.

"Alpha!" Holly greeted formally. "It is good to see you."

"And you," Lily responded. "I'm glad you made it here, in fulfillment of the duties I entrusted to you." Her instinct for maneuvering said that she needed to remind everyone that she had given Holly authority, so she did so. She didn't know what she had just flown into, or she didn't know for sure, so following her instincts was the best she could do.

"It has been difficult, improvising with so many depending on me," Holly said.

"On you?" Lily asked, still doing her utmost to sound friendly, if formal.

"There was need for one of us to step up, to come here and bargain with this place's guardian," Holly explained. "She required someone to speak for the group. I was chosen."

"And I'm sure you did well with your limited experience," Lily said kindly, hiding her suspicion. They were being watched by what was probably the majority of the pack, and she had to come out of this looking like the one in the right, no matter what happened. No matter how out of practice she was at making herself look good in front of everyone. "I'll want you to give me a thorough explanation of all that's gone on, so I know what I'm working with."

"You will have that," Holly hummed, bowing her head. Some of the tension clutching at Lily's chest eased; Holly had put one paw firmly into the perception that she would be giving her stolen authority back, and she would not find it easy to withdraw.

For it was stolen authority that they were struggling over, albeit with kind words and pretense instead of teeth and claws. Holly was hard to read, so Lily didn't know what her true motivations were yet, but regardless, it was clear she was not happy to give up the authority she had gathered and solidified under herself in Lily's absence.

"My thanks," Lily hummed politely.

"Welcome back, Lily," Holly said just as politely, purring innocently.

"Alpha," Lily corrected.

"Welcome back, alpha," Holly said, correcting herself without the slightest hint of reluctance. "But I thought you wanted us to call you Lily?"

"It seems this island's guardian prefers formality, so alpha seems more fitting," Lily countered with a friendly shrug of her wing shoulders. "Just so that it is clear."

"Very wise," Holly hummed. "Would you like that explanation now, or tomorrow morning?"

"Later tonight," Lily requested, fully aware that she was inconveniencing Holly. After that subtle attempt to usurp authority, Holly had it coming.

O-O-O-O-O

"And this is where the fledglings play," Liona said, leading Lily past a jumble of flat rocks that looked as if they had been dragged up from the massive pit. The marks on the trees around them implied they had been dragged, anyway. "We wanted to make them feel at home, and this way they do not try to go play in the hole."

"Very smart," Lily hummed. There were no fledglings around now, of course; most of the pack had gone back to sleep, and this seemed to be a place purely for fledgling play time. The rocks were small and worthless for anything else, so she understood why. "Who came up with the idea to bring the rocks here?"

"Dew, and Holly helped her work out the details," Liona purred. "There is another waste pit over in the forest to your left, and if you will follow me, we are almost back to the main sleeping area."

Lily trailed along behind Liona, thinking about what she had been shown. Not the fledglings' play area, though it rankled to hear that Holly had been the authority involved in helping make it.

Her pack was spread out around the hole, sleeping, eating, and socializing in the sparser forest near the edge. There were a few dozen small caves in the hills near one end of the pit, where Liona was taking her now, but the entire rim of the pit bustled with activity. The island, she was told, wasn't quite as cold near the pit, since hot air came up from it at all times, and apparently flying over it was a popular pastime.

On the other paw, there was little to no privacy. Lily hadn't been told that, of course, but Liona had mentioned mated pairs working out a rotation to sneak down into the pit, and subsequently being told off by the guardian herself - through Holly - which implied there was nowhere better to go.

That was a problem on two levels, both for her as alpha and for herself as an individual hoping to meet up with Beryl on the sly. Both promised to be headaches to solve, in their own ways.

There was also the matter of water. Snow was plentiful, so it wasn't a problem with supply at the moment, but the island itself had no natural sources of fresh water meaning all water had to come from snow. That was likely to cause logistical problems as the closest, cleanest snow was exhausted between storms.

Holly probably had a paw on that too, though. She had her paws in everything, and when her name didn't come up it was Aven or Cara taking charge. Necessary, maybe, but Lily fully intended to begin redistributing the duties of all three sisters. They had overstepped, and she didn't like it.

"And here we are, back at the sleeping caves!" Liona proclaimed, leading Lily past a bunch of open holes in crumbly rock that made her feel claustrophobic just looking at them. Light wings were packed inside, lying on top of each other with their noses pointed to the entrance. "They are cozy, but warm. We think they get heat from the boiling pool down at the bottom of the pit, through cracks in the ground."

"Breathing that air doesn't cause ill effects, does it?" Lily asked worriedly. Pyre had told her about something like that, once, and she knew he had been here at one time in his life, so he might have been speaking from experience gained at this very place.

"No, someone checked," Liona said. "If you want to sleep here, I think Pina's cave has some space open, or you could sleep in the same cave as me and Cedar and a couple of others."

"Or?" Lily said, sensing there was another option.

"Well, you could go find the dark wings and their big snow cave," Liona said. "But I thought you might want to get away from Beryl?"

"Why would I want that?" Lily asked.

"Because you were travelling with him for a moon-cycle?" Liona said innocently. "But if you are not tired of him, maybe his family will let you in. I think the caves are better, personally."

"I'll probably go sleep with Pina," Lily said. It wasn't really even a choice; sleeping with Beryl's family was out of the question, and she felt a lot more comfortable sharing with Pina than Liona and Cedar.

"Sounds good…" Liona let out a long yawn. "I think I hear Cedar calling my name," she mumbled, turning toward one of the distant caves. "See you tomorrow, Lily."

"See you then," Lily purred, turning her tail on the sleeping caves. She had one more thing to do before she intended to sleep, and it was a big one.

The pit itself was huge, and the sides were sheer almost the whole way around, but there were a few walkable slopes that led down into the depths. Holly was waiting for her at the top of one such slope, her eyelids sliding down and flicking up every so often. She wasn't alone; Beryl was there too, looking much less tired. He'd slept through the afternoon, of course.

"Sorry I took so long," Lily said as she approached, meaning the apology wholeheartedly for Beryl, and somewhat less so for Holly.

"It cannot get much later," Holly mumbled. "Do you want to speak to her tonight?"

"No, I'm saving that for when I'm rested," Lily said honestly. She also fully intended to speak to the guardian without Holly being present; if she had her way, this would be the last thing Holly did with even a tangential connection to the guardian. "Give me the rundown."

"The guardian protects this place from No-scaled-not-prey and any who would betray its secrecy," Holly began. "She lets lone travellers through, or redirects them around, but big groups are different. She has trouble keeping large groups away all at once."

"No-scaled-not-prey, or our kind?" Beryl asked a heartbeat before Lily could.

"Sorry, I am tired," Holly apologized. "She has no trouble with any number of us, it is large numbers of No-scaled-not-prey who give her difficulty. Once a few of us flew out from the shore and into her range, she knew what was going on, and requested our leader. Only three of our groups were around then, and I was picked to go talk to her."

Lily nodded, urging her to continue. She would, of course, be double and triple-checking this story, but Holly would know that, and thus wouldn't lie about something so easily checked.

"She recognized me as acting leader of the pack, and after I promised not to speak of this place to outsiders, and agreed to let her look through the pack's memories, she let us come to the island." Holly shrugged her wings. "The No-scaled-not-prey were everywhere those days, and I asked everyone first."

"As you should," Lily rumbled neutrally. "But why did she want your memories?"

"To make sure we were not planning anything more than we said," Holly huffed. "Which we were not. So she let us come here, and keeps the No-scaled-not-prey away. More than that, she would not tell me. She was waiting for you."

"Or for the pack to decide I wasn't coming," Lily growled, unwilling to leave it at that. "So they could make you alpha."

"We hoped you would come, but the guardian was less than sure," Holly said sincerely. Or, Lily thought she was sincere; she couldn't be sure. Holly was surprisingly hard to interpret, more now than before. "That was a possibility."

"Which is fair, it's not like the pack can sit here forever," Beryl said. "You don't know what she wants the alpha for?"

"No, I do not," Holly rumbled. "That is pretty much it."

"You can go," Lily said, waving her tail dismissively. "Thank you for your help."

Holly wasted no time leaping into the air and flying for the sleeping caves; judging by her lopsided flapping, she really was tired.

"I was talking to my family," Beryl said as they watched Holly fly away. "They say she did a good job leading in your stead."

"It's not how well she did, it's how she gathered power to herself and then didn't want to give it up," Lily said quietly. "That's not something I can ignore."

"She probably didn't mean any harm by it," Beryl said.

"No," Lily agreed, not really meaning it, "but I want to keep an eye on her, just in case."

"Maybe you could ask the guardian," Beryl suggested. "Get a report from the person who dug through her mind."

Lily let out a surprised laugh and turned to face him. "That's a good idea. Thanks."

"You going to talk to her now?" Beryl asked, nodding down at the path. "I can't say I like the look of that slope, it might be dangerous to walk down in the dark."

"I could make it, but I think I'm going to have to wait until morning," Lily admitted. "A night's sleep might help me guess what she wants to talk to me about."

"Right. Good plan." Beryl tapped his tailfins against the stone under his paws. "So…"

"So," Lily said, looking around. They were as close to alone as they were going to get for the foreseeable future, which was to say not very. They wouldn't be overheard, but they were standing in the open, in plain sight of any number of spying eyes. At least that was enough to talk about it. "Us?"

"I remember you saying you want to just go back to before," Beryl murmured, looking at her with wide, hopeful eyes. "But that doesn't feel right."

"I'd rather not," Lily admitted. "When you have some time to yourself, try and find us a good meeting place."

"Sounds like a plan," he said. "But… why do we need to be a secret, again?"

"Because the pack isn't ready for anything like that, especially when I'm doing it with a male outsider," Lily huffed.

"As opposed to a female insider?" Beryl rumbled curiously.

"I mean both of those things make it more difficult," Lily snorted. "When things aren't all unstable and changing under our paws, maybe I can work something out."

"You can," Beryl said confidently. "You're really good at that sort of thing."

"Until then…" She tilted her head. "Secret place?"

"Secret meetings," Beryl hummed, shuffling his paws. "I'll start looking as soon as I can."

"Look fast," she hummed. Then she forced herself to turn and walk away, to act as if she was just ending a normal conversation with a friend. Not like she was resisting the urge to lick him, or just lead him into the forest and start the search for a secret place right now.

It was going to be hard to balance all of this, harder than she had thought, but she couldn't bear the idea of dropping Beryl for everything else, so she was just going to have to deal with it. With hiding her affection for him, and keeping Holly in her place, and leading the pack, and whatever the guardian of this place needed her for.