Summary

In Chapter Eighteen, Nik found his father at a ceremony celebrating the whelping of another litter of puppies and told him about what happened at the Gathering Site. When he mentioned that the Earth Walker who died called him "Galen," Sol recognized the name, and told Nik that Galen was his friend who he had killed after he had sired a half Earth-Walker half Companion.

In Chapter Nineteen, Sol told Nik that he and an elder of the tribe, Cyril, had discovered Galen stealing from the Mother Plant. When they confronted him about it in secret, so as not to start a scandal, Galen refused to explain himself. Sol felt he had no choice but to execute Galen, and he lived with the regret for the rest of his life. Nik and Sol agreed that the strange girl in the clearing who started...