Redhawk Caldera I will fight you for eternity.

His ears pricked up at the fact it wasn't just one pack having problems with another, but three.  That was a conflict where it did seem like it would be easy to find the "right" side to be on... You piss off that many people you probably actually did something wrong unless the three were virtually a hivemind.  Individuals were ornery, so that seemed unlikely.  That is, if it was all truth.  She could very well have flipped the tables and her pack could be the tyrants and troublemakers, with the "prisoners" being ones freed from whatever slavery they were putting them under.  Emotional appeals with a grain of truth made the best lies.  He'd need to find confirmation from someone else before he in a sense offered his sword to the cause.

But then there was his predicament.  He didn't have a horse in that race, he was a ronin, or a knight without a lord -- pick any of the obvious metaphors, they all applied. That's kind of my point, he said, with that same irritation as previous.  When Quixote continued, he was lightly poking fun at himself, which was probably his most emotive state this side of a full sarcastic tirade, Look, I don't get along with idiots very well, so I kind of would prefer to find out in advance what ones to avoid in the first place.  Hard to do so when all the people you've come across have no clue about the locals.  He left out the part about having just come from his little intelligence-gathering trip close to the borders, instead nodding his head towards her. And your pack. Is it the leader of that escapade?  He wasn't planning on asking to join up, yet at least, but it was only after he let the question hang in the air a moment that he realized it, in retrospect, could sound a bit suspicious if she really did think he was a spy or something. There was an involuntary twitch as he corrected his err, as if he'd mentally smacked himself upside the head, I'm used to conflict.  I just want to know how much trouble comes with each pack that might be an option.