I found him sitting on a bench in a grotto, surrounded by ferns growing off of trees and with little birds pecking at seeds scattered near his clawed feet. I spent a minute examining him, looking at his hunched shoulders and bowed head, the way his tails coiled around his own legs, and the tension in his arms and thighs.

His eyes darted towards me for a second, his face tense and unhappy. Dain looked... ashamed. And afraid.

With a sigh, I walked over and sat down on the bench next to him, the colorful songbirds scattering at my approach. When Dain cringed away from me, I wrapped one arm around his waist and leaned my head against his shoulder.

"Leah," he said, his voice shaking and his body stiff. He sounded like he was about to cry.

"Alluin told me what you're doing." I exhaled again, a heavy breath that wanted to be a sigh. I felt so tired. "I didn't want you to go without getting to say goodbye."

We sat there in silence for a while, Dain trembling with his hands gripping his knees, and me soft and leaning against him. At last he said, his voice cracking, "Am I doing the right thing?"

"I don't know the exact answer to that," I said quietly. "But it's the right direction. I'm..." I took a breath. "I'm proud of you."

"You are?" he asked, desperation in his voice as he turned to look at me.

I picked my head off his shoulder and looked into those familiar wolf eyes. "Of course I am." I put both my hands on his face, searching his tormented expression. "You did something awful, I think because you were terrified and that terror turned into a need to cut down the thing that had caused you so much pain. That doesn't make it okay, and an explanation isn't an excuse, but it at least gives me a way to align it with the man I've seen so much of."

With a sad smile, I touched two of my fingers to his trembling mouth, and felt him press a gossamer kiss against them. "But now you're doing something that I know is terrifying and difficult for you, to try and undo the damage and save lives. You're making yourself a better man, and I'm proud of you for it."

"I might not come back," Dain said against my fingers. He took my hands and lowered them to his chest. "If it truly was King Omahice who tried to have us killed, a likely reason is that he wanted to remove Stag Court's most dangerous defender before attacking."