Phantom Hollow It's been a little cold and not outside

Okay.  He'd been planning on saying she could stop by whenever it was they parted ways, but apparently she was way more eager to leave her past behind than he thought.  Maybe that was because he'd always gone back because of his sister, even if he didn't want to, and only broke that habit when she was gone too.  I could.  I could definitely use the help.  If you want.  Honestly he was probably still finding it weird when someone actually wanted to help him out of something other than guilt or obligation.  And he did look grateful, even got a wag or two of his tail despite the doom and gloom.

I don't know why, but out of everyone who's stayed, even for just a little while.. I don't know if any of them would really like.. Do any real defending of stuff.  It's just been me.  Well, ok.  There were a couple who he wouldn't have asked to fight in the first place, like Cam (who he still imagined as a little pup instead of how big he must be now), and Cèilidh because she was nice to him so it made more sense to him to protect her.  Assuming she stuck around, he hadn't run across her in the past few days at least but he was kinda broody sometimes.  Okeanos?  If he came back, Mal just guessed he wouldn't fight unless someone was gonna die or something.  And I'm probably better at bluffing than fighting at this point. Understatement of the year, kid.  For all his threats he'd made through his life, he'd bitten another wolf exactly one time to prove a point.  But he was also unscathed, so he had to be doing something right in his decision-making