Whitefish River I am sometimes more doubt than man

That distraction came in the form of a certain brown-furred healer. Although she was a stranger to him, Dragomir always felt at ease with Speedy around. She reminded him of his mother but without some of the baggage that sometimes came between him and his well-meaning dam. Speedy was warm and caring like Aurë, smelled of herbs and soil like Aurë, but lacked his poor mother's more melancholy tendencies, which helped to ease Dragomir's mind when she was around. She was easy to talk to despite them not knowing one another well, which was more than Dragomir could say for most wolves upon first meeting them.

Speedy came with more plants today and a warm greeting that made him feel a little like rolling his eyes in embarrassment—he wasn't a sweetie, hello!—but he couldn't bring himself to jest that way. Not even his family had coaxed much humour from him lately. Isilmë was the only one who could come close and even she struggled to bring a smile to his face. Hello, he greeted, polite but lacking any sort of vigour. A little better. I don't feel like I'm not really here today. There was a spider ... But then the fresh aroma of her plants tickled his pink nostrils and he asked, wriggling his nose gently, what's that?