Birdsong filled the woodland, and Nate, without truly realizing he was doing it, whistled back to them a song of his own. A mod-podge melody, it meandered through his subconscious as he trailed the edge of a clearwater creek.

His time might be better spent hunting... but this morning, he preoccupied himself looking for shiny stones. Colorful or unusually shaped ones, or things that glittered. He'd once had quite a collection in his life before. Becoming a wolf didn't mean surrendering all his old hobbies, surely.

If he was intending to stay here, among the flowered woodlands and butterfly swarms, he felt now it might be possible to amass little treasures again.

The diversion gave him time to think, too, about what it would mean if the others stayed here, with him. Or if they didn't. Having realized he didn't want to run away, anymore, he now had to contend with the possibility of losing companions to things beyond his control.

No easy answers, anymore, if there ever were any. Nate paused with a mouthful of rocks at a shallow crossing, and watched morning smoke float over the ripples.

Cecil appeared like a vision through the watersmoke, and Nate's ears pricked hopefully before he remembered he'd done harm, and tilted to their sides instead. They were distant, these days, and more than Nate would have wanted. Just as he'd found the courage to stay, Cecil drew back. And Nate's navel-gazing regarding the acceptance of loss or its potential, he had to admit, bled most red from the space between them now.

He was surprised the water at his feet hadn't been stained by it.

Still, forced his tail into a friendly wag. He wished he could pretend not to know why it was happening. Just like he'd pretended pink smoke had been the only reason for what happened in the ruins. And pretended he could hide the worst parts of himself from companions who could, literally, smell your damn fear.

But the powers that were had denied him death twice in the effort to teach him something — maybe that it was time to stop pretending.

GHm— Nate started through a mouthful of rocks.

Well, that was perfectly incomprehensible.

He looked down, not eager to drop them all back into the water. Grimaced (which looked foolish, with a mouth full of rocks). Then backed up onto the grassy bank and Pthewy!, spat them out. Tongue pulled over tugged lips and white teeth as he contended with the aftertaste of stone and spring melt.

Nate gestured vaguely to his find, though Cecil certainly could not see them from behind the grass and down the way. Rocks. He said proudly, as if that explained it.

It felt a bit like pretending, still. Going through the motions. But Nate supposed several things could be true at once and it wasn't lying to decide which feelings, or impulses, to act on. So he let his tail keep wagging. Told himself this time he was the greenbroke horse, spooked by some shadow a thing and just needed coaxing through it to see himself to the other side.

Cecil might leave. But so far, Cecil had stayed. And now, Cecil was here.

Asking about rocks which... Nate didn't think he had any particularly good explanation for. I used to uh, keep 'em? In a little pouch, with some old coins from Pa and beads my Eduda gave me. And marbles. I figured... might be nice to have some shiny rocks, again.

Folk were building lodges. Digging dens. Nate supposed at some point maybe he ought to do the same, and it would be nice to have things to decorate with.