Silvertip Mountain thestral

There appeared out of the darkness a moving shadow. Astara finally came into full view with a set of exposed fangs and Dragomir shrunk further in on himself, pulling every limb and appendage as close to his core as he possibly could and flattening himself to the wet floor. The water was soaking into his back and he was immensely uncomfortable, but in his head he kept telling himself that if he just made himself as small as possible and moved as little as he could, he would be okay. You're okay you'll be okay it's okay it's okay—

Meanwhile, everything that Merrick did only furthered Dragomir's illusion that this was Sanguinus. Only his mother's deceitful protector would ask him to call for her, he assumed. It's not true it's not true it's not true it's not true, he kept saying inside his head even as his muscles trembled and his eyes leaked hot tears at the notion that maybe it was true, maybe she didn't want him to come home. Sanguinus would know, wouldn't he? He was snapped out of his thoughts by Sanguinus' sudden shout and he cried out, pressing his muzzle down into the fur of his breast.

He managed to produce only a weak little howl for Aurëwen that was quickly choked off by uncontrolled sobbing; the echoes would barely leave the cave mouth, not easily heard by anyone that wasn't in close vicinity to the cave.