Permafrost Hollows when springtime came, red robin built a nest,

it is. wintersbane affirms. he's never seen anything quite like it before — the closest, he recalls, is the wisps in wispmother grotto. but they are a marvel that are best left in his past; a memory. there were plenty of new marvels to discover in the present and in the future, which is where he divides his time largely between now. he's learned the value in remembering but also in moving on. his ears cup forth atop his head, steps slow as not to slip on the damp and dewy rocks, as he listens to her explanation. a small pang shoots through his heart. her story reminds him of his own, but not half as bad. she isn't as young as he'd been when he'd wandered too far from teaghlaigh and she'd been fortunate enough to have been found by derg instead of an unsavory stranger that intended to leave her for dead.

there is a kinship towards her forging itself beneath his breast. he sympathizes and is glad that her story was not as bad as his; regardless it makes him wonder if she aches to see her family again. if she will stay with them or if they are a temporary stop to finding her way back home. i got lost too when i was young, he tells her, to communicate that he understands. wintersbane does not tell her that when he did find his family it was his mother's grave and that his ( ex ) sister and him fought every time they came in contact with each other, the last fight of which wintersbane had wanted to kill her. he doesn't tell her that getting lost forged survival instincts out of the hottest flames and unyielding iron. it changed you.

maybe she'd be different than him. she had hope. more so to the point, she had the vartija. we will help return you home to your family, if that's what you want. but keen was old enough to make her own decision. the pair talked for a bit as he continued to lead her out of the hollow's tunnels and back to the safety of the surface.