Sunset Valley ma'am... some other sunset

After the brief scare, Dutch made an effort to gaze at the woman head-on, as he would with any other wolf. The way she held herself stirred guilt in his heart, but there was nothing he could do to take back his initial reaction.

A thin smile curved his mouth at her question.

"Only for a moment," he admitted.

They assessed one another, neither seeming to have much to say. She smelled of cold places and isolation, as he was sure she might have said of him only a few weeks prior. But his visit to Round Valley had been fairly recent, and he knew he smelled faintly of his distant cousins, and the few siblings that still remained with them.

"Clearly you are a braver wolf than I," he said. A weak attempt at humor.