Hushed Willows as spring opens (touching, skillfully, mysteriously) her first rose

She sensed his disapproval, and he sensed her anxiety over it. Part of him felt bad for causing her any negative emotion, but he wasn't going to pretend for her, just as he wouldn't ask her to pretend for him. He was not in the habit of asking others to change, or to be things that they weren't, and he expected the same consideration from others.

"I know," he told her, his voice still a little gruff. He did not feel like being sweet with her, but she'd taken his fleabitten forleg in her own dainty paw, and he could not help but soften. "I admire you for it, and I ain't gonna say nothin' against it. I don't want you t'feel as you cain't tell me these things, but darlin', it's always gonna get my back up."

He did not necesarily believe that she could handle herself, having seen no evidence of such. She still seemed awfully young to him, and younger still now that he'd heard of this most recent adventure — and like Nine Lives, she was cocksure and exhilarated by her conquering of this task she had set for herself, no matter how dangerous or unneccesary it had been. No matter the risks, no matter Kin's delicate heart.

Unlike Nine Lives, however, she was in no way tied to him. He had no standing to ask her to be more careful, so he did not. He merely pushed his nose against her cheek and tried to get the moving once more. "C'mon, little troublemaker. We got places t'be." He nodded in the direction they'd been going and added, for good measure: "Tell me 'bout this mountain. I thought you was born here in the woods?"