Firefly Glen the grand optimist

Ignorant to the arrival of another, Rian stood defiant against the icy grip of fear wrestling with his pounding heart. Any wolf could see the threat of her healthy frame; her pearlescent teeth. But while he, too, boasted of a fruitful summer, he would never aim to inflict harm upon the svelte Queen—not even in self-defense. His teeth had known blood, this was true, but Hydra's would be poison to his tongue. 

The frustration expressed by her aimless snap prickled at instincts that pulled him to an immediate halt, and the long fur of his ruff shuddered from the abrupt cessation of motion. He squared his shoulders, and lifted his head a fraction to regard her ardently as she contiuned her departure with heavy, albeit militant steps. His stomach twisted painfully. Had he truly caused such irrevocable damage to such a cherished soul? It could not be so! 

He would not allow himself to entertain the perilous thought a second further.

Hydra stalled a moment—a mere breath—and his ears pricked despite himself. In spite of himself, for he was no longer the timid, meek-hearted boy of his youth, but a man who earned as many scars for the experiences he lived in the years apart from her. Not that he had the words to convey it at present; his eyes, rife with interest, flashed across her own when she cast a gaze sidelong toward him. The breath in his lungs streamed through his nose and while he did show diffidence to the agitated clip of her teeth with an appeasing flick of his bottlebrush tail, Rian remained stubbornly fixed to the spot. 

"Tell me," he all but breathed—the words delicately shaped on a tenuous breath, "tell me to go, and I will."