Noctisardor Bypass Its entrance gate is rusted shut,

Luckily for him and Arbiter both, Dagfinn expected very little from these wolves, at present. He hoped to find a home and a temporary family, but such things could not be had out of thin air. First, he was a stranger on their doorstep — a beggar after proverbial scraps.

His body language was deferential toward the soot-and-snow stranger as she approached, at first actively with a flickering tail and lolling tongue, and then more passively when she seemed keen on cutting straight to conversation.

"Dagfinn," he replied, sensing he'd caught the woman on a short fuse. (He did not yet guess that she was always on a short fuse.) "Pleased to meet you," he added, because it was polite to do so, and because he assumed she was sometimes a lovely person, and probably just didn't have niceties to spare for strangers on this day in particular.

"Legion wouldn't happen to be in need of a bard or a dancer?" he asked her. And then, once again sensing that being quick and to the point would be more appreciated here, quickly added: "Or a warrior. I am all three in one dashing, vagabond package."

But he did not look dashing, right then. He looked rather tired, and there was a fever-brightness to his eyes that was not entirely joy, not entirely pain. He looked, rather, like he could use a good, long cry and a good, long nap. He was sure that Arbiter would understand this, if he were to explain it to her, but for the moment he did his best to keep that buttoned up, and hoped ever so that Arbiter would forgive him for being a little less charming and ribald and musical than usual.