Lidiya silently nodded, still in disbelief that something like this was happening.

Yet again, they were running away from their respective packs, yet again. Lidiya honestly somewhat couldn't believe they were doing this. Like, she had expected them to be following - but not that closely.

Not wasting any energy like she had earlier, she nodded. To be fair, she didn't really know much about thi place anymore - they were getting further and further away from where she was used to going. But she'd try anyway.

Leading th way to goodness knows where, far out of their comfort zone, she ran away from the sounds of battle slowly fading behind them. Away from her old pack again. Away from everyone, to try find something new.

---

Deverick, now out of his confinement den, looked in slight bewilderment at the ragged party that limped back to the site.

The sun was almost down, and Dev knew two full days had passed since Lidiya had - left. Abandoned him. For... he didn't know if he should believe the rumors or not. Was she really lured away by a male? Dev, knowing his older sister well, doubted it, but - anything was possible.

He just didn't know.

Right now, though, he watched the expedition party that had gone out to chase - and hunt, and possibly even kill her older sister - limp back.

That, out of all things, was most certainly not what he had been expecting to see when they came back. He had expected them to be triumphant - for how could they not be? There was no way the two of them could have ousted six enforcers.

But here they were. Limping, injured - actually, possibly more than injured. Wounded. In more than one case, more than just a little bit. Dev could notice the dragging hind limb one had, or the gashes along their belly that was still bleeding on another.

How the heck did that happen?

Word spread quickly, however.

"Tomorrow. Tomorrow, Alpha is hosting a meeting to explain everything. To do something."

Dev didn't have a good feeling about that.

Lidiya was greatful for Kodak not doing what he really had been doing that morning. Really, he was.

But the way he had treated him throughout the day - detached, like there was a stone wall between them - as much as she wanted Kodak to keep his distance within the next week... she didn't want that wall.

"Kodak?" Instead of going into the little place that Kodak had pre-assigned for her - despite he had found it - she wandered over to where Kodak was lying down.

Lying down on her front, not really close to him, but near enough that she could still smell barely his scent - this was the first time she'd been able to properly talk to him since the morning. Since... since they had both learnt who exactly she was.

In fact, it was the first time since that morning she'd been able to look at him properly. And he looked... detached. Unfeeling. Not what she had thought Kodak was from the past two days they had spent together.

"... I think you want to know what Alph- Cooper was talking about earlier." She'd wanted to explain what she knew, she really did. She just hadn't had the opportunity until now.

Plus, she really shouldn't be calling him "alpha". He wasn't her alpha anymore.

Any more than he was her father. Which... just wasn't a thing.

"I... I didn't know he was my father. That was the same breaking news that it was to you as it was to me." She exhaled a breath quietly. "My mother never told me who my sire was. Who she'd - mated with." When she was in heat, much like how she was now. "I didn't know it was... Cooper. He never treated me like one, barely even acknowledged my existence." If she could have chosen anyone in the pack to be her sire - and believe it when she said she did think about it quite a lot - one of the very last wolves she would have picked would have been Cooper.

"I still don't know what to make of it either." She looked downwards, unsure of what to say.