It was an insightful question. One that no one had ever asked her. "We have an oral history," she said. "I can write the words phonetically, but if we ever had an alphabet, it's long lost. Probably under the same waters that swallowed up our island, a thousand years ago."

Ariadne never thought much about Alastrian history. Not that far back, anyway. It was a bit like a dream. One you'd just woken up from, one that was drifting away like smoke from a candle.

"My father hoped I would become the pack storyteller, when I grew up," she mused. "The keeper of all of our memories."