Swiftcurrent Creek you never thought we'd go to war, after all the things we saw

The delicate ruby before him offered some insight to her concerns—and while he listened and considered, he didn’t feel truly at ease with offering any insight to the minds of a teenage girl… It wasn’t as if he himself was lined up for parent of the year anytime soon. “I’ll see what I can do,” he agreed—not entirely sharing Arlette’s confidence in him nor her hope.

When the conversation drifted to the garden, he found his focus shifting on what little self-preservation he might have had left—to simply be numb to the implications of what the garden had represented in so many hopeful ways for the creel.

“I want whatever is best for the pack,” he noted to her, a paw lifting to scratch at the side of his face. “If it has useful medicinal herbs then… let’s keep it? I don’t know much about them. I just planted and did what I was told with it.”