Jade Fern Grove won't stop the pain, but she'll smell like fabreez

Though his offer hadn't been taken, he'd considered going to retrieve some more bark anyways. The tree wasn't to be trusted until he found out why it wasn't like the one in Blackfeather, but, even still, the notion of stripping some more bark away from it seemed doable. He knew her limb to be aching still, the occasional wince that flickered across her face confirming as much. In the recesses of his mind, he felt at least an ounce of guilt, but never had it been made to surface. The feeling was kept far from his conscious mind, disallowing him the opportunity to truly experience it, as well as display it. There existed only the denial that he'd had anything to do with her injury, for the admittance of anything else were words that his tongue seemed incapable of forming properly.

Yet, in spite of his inability, he'd not been quick to deny any contribution when the idea of an apology was brought up. Xan had looked away, his mouth remaining shut whilst he seemed to work over his options within his head. It wasn't his fault, he'd convinced himself of that much, but the thought that he might apologize hadn't made him feel uneasy. It'd neither irritated him nor caused for the boy to lash out, there'd just been silence and a diverting of his focus. Once he'd been able to look in her direction again, he'd muttered a quick, "I'm sorry." The word was foreign on his tongue, tasting peculiar and leaving him without a clear idea of how he should feel. Thus, he'd looked away again, keeping his eyes upon something in the distance so that he might not feel the urge to look back towards her. His plan hadn't worked, however, as there'd come a second in which he'd noticed his head turning back her way against his will, the curiosity of how she might react having been too strong to resist.

"Do you forgive me?" was his question for her, having been unable to prevent himself from asking. Alexander didn't want to believe that he'd contributed to her injury in any way at all, but, alas, the realization had slowly started to creep up on him.