If there was an ounce of emotional energy left in Serach's body, he didn't know where it was hiding. Over the past year, he had come to terms with those absences in his life that had left the biggest holes, but that familiar crushing feeling of abandonment had come rushing back in a heartbeat as more and more Bend wolves took flight. They were experiencing the coldest, longest nights of the year, but a match had been lit in the very center of the Bend and set his dreams for what he expected his future to look like on fire. Standing on a rise covered with snow, Serach could not help but feel like he was standing on those ashes.

He and @Aponi had lit the match themselves, with their foolish dreams for a future. @Sahalie had pointed out that the pack had reacted just as violently when Drestig had proposed uprooting them all, but somehow Serach had been blinded to the fact that this upset in leadership would have similar effects. They were not the same thing, in his mind, and yet the number of paw prints leading out of the Bend had proven him wrong. The evidence was plain to see in the fresh snow, and no amount of rationalizing was going to change that fact.

While he cared deeply for all of the wolves who had decided to build their hopes elsewhere, there was one wolf in particular who Serach would not let go without some kind of a fight. Although as he raised his head and called for his uncle, the younger man could not be certain if he would be fighting to get Triell to stay put or to release all of the rage and pain he was feeling. Unsure if the older man was even still there to answer him, he remained quiet and determined to wait as long as it took to know for sure.

Seconds ticked by, turning into long, quiet minutes. The only response to his howl was the wind itself, a painful reminder that the Bend was drastically empty. A part of him had desperately hoped for a response, but as the minutes became hours, he was faced with the realization that no response would be forthcoming. He had long since begun to pace, desperate to rid his body of some of the tension that had racked it relentlessly since he and Aponi had first called for Spieden. The deep circle in the snow showed his path, but it was unbroken save for a single set of tracks - his own arrival to the rise. Snarl on his lips, he lunged forward. His teeth snapped against each other with a violent metallic in the space where he so desperately wish Triell's scruff had filled. His foreleg lifted, he lashed out to push his invisible enemy down and away into the cold snow, but it was only his own imagination that rolled over and admitted defeat.

He didn't know how long he battled his invisible demons on the snowcovered hill, whirling and snarling as he lunged and dodged an opponent that was drawing further and further beyond reach with each passing moment. It was only when he had overheated and had to stop to catch his breath that he looked at the trampled snow all around him with some kind of rational mind. It was the closest he would ever come to justice for the grave violations committed against him that day by the wolf he had considered both father, uncle, and friend for so long. But in the end there was no denying the truth - in the chaos of the rank challenge, Triell Tainn had fled Oak Tree Bend without a word, taking his mate, youngest children, and Leotie with him. "YOU'RE A GODDAM COWARD!!!!!" Serach roared at the sky and the trampled snow. But there was no relief in saying it aloud, not when the only thing listening was evidence of his own pain. It had not made him feel any better when he had yelled it at @Drestig either. That had been a whole lifetime ago, it felt like, but the bite of knowing he had been abandoned once more was a cruel as ever. Ultimately, the end result had been the same too. He could yell and snarl as loud and as much as he wanted, but they were never coming back.

And perhaps that is for the better, he thought as he turned over his shoulder and began to run towards the trees, suddenly desperate to run from the scene of the fight that had taken place within his heart that day.