After the horror show that the Circle Tower had turned out to be, Zevran wasn't surprised at the way everyone had slept like the dead the day after. Only Kyrn had seemed eager to leave the relative safety of the Lake's interior to sleep under the stars instead. With her urging for a swift return to Castle Redcliffe, their new comrade Wynne in tow and the stricken boy mage to consider, they had made a half day's progress back along the King's Highway before they were forced to make camp or watch one of them collapse on the hard stone causeway.

Zevran found himself awake in the quiet half-light just before dawn, as he often did, listening intently for the sound of creaking floorboards or errant breathing. There were neither, though Alistair did snore in sporadic, ear-grinding bouts, and Leliana had a curious propensity to recite poetry in her sleep (though most of it was incomprehensible).

While the night had been an ongoing symphony of bircalls, frog choruses and an uncountable number of insects, the first sign of morning light had softened them all until there was little to break the silence but the faintest of breezes stirring the air. Unease finally pulled him from the warmth of his blankets. He dressed quickly and circled the camp, surprised as he always was that there was no guard on his tent, no nightly watch, despite the diligent Mabari being too far away to save them from an ambush, or a turncoat like himself. Kyrn's was the only tent unoccupied. The flaps were up, and her bedroll already neatly rolled and tied tight.

"Well, she isn't fleeing this dreadful lot without her bedding," Zevran thought.

Following her wasn't difficult. She had shown him many tricks in the past two weeks, little telltale signs of life moving through the forests, or the direction game were traveling by the depth of the prints alone. From the look of the crushed foliage leading to the west of them, it seemed she wasn't interested in hiding her trail at all.

With a few minutes brisk walk, he spotted her, crouched low over a fallen log, staring intently at something he couldn't yet see. As his feet cackled through a clump of dried ferns, her hand snapped up to point at him, pinching her index and thumb together without breaking her gaze.

"I can smell you there, Zevran," Kyrn stated calmly.

The brevity and even tone startled him enough to chuckle, "My, that is unkind of you-"

"You're standing upwind of us," Kyrn explained.

"Us?" Zevran paused, finally taking in his surroundings fully. The breeze had picked up since he'd awoken, crackling through the undergrowth and dying fall leaves like a fire popping over green wood. Just barely above that natural whisper, he finally heard the growl. Something was very near them both, snarling out a warning.

He circled around behind her warily, painfully aware of all the noisy floral refuse that littered the ground between them. As he looked over her shoulder, he found himself staring into the ravenous gaze of a wretched half-starved wolf. It's coat was dotted with mud and dried sap, and damp from sweat or rushing through dew-laden undergrowth, he couldn't tell.

As their eyes met, it tipped its head up and snarled anew, snapping it's jaws in agitation. "Look away, Zevran," came Kyrn's calm, quietly commanding tone again. Despite his pride, he found himself glancing to her, watching her backside rise and fall as she took pains to keep her breaths even despite their dangerous proximity. She wasn't wearing her usual armor, either: just her odd Dalish small-clothes, and a satchel strung over one shoulder. Her bow and arrows had been laid aside behind the log she was perched over.

The same hand that had pointed grasped his hand gently, tugging to coax him to crouch down behind her. The wolf's gaze snapped to her and back to him again, renewing its threatened pitch. Zevran could feel a cold sweat beading up on his neck as he watched the creature. It was smaller and leaner than it's peers that had continuously tried to ambush them on the road, but it had a fierce determination in its posture that was unlike the rabid wolves that were slowly falling to the Blight all around them.

Kyrn grasped up a flimsy switch from the forest floor with her right hand, still grasping Zevran's hand in her left. She tapped it's shoulder lightly, drawing it's agitation back. Their eyes were locked, almost unblinking as she dropped the switch, and slowly reached for the satchel at her hip.

"Durg," Kyrn called out flatly, pulling up a recently killed rabbit from the satchel. It rushed forward a step, saliva beginning to drip from its fangs. "Fen durg am." Kryn growled out, and the creature pawed the ground, but ceased growling, and backed away again.

She tossed the rabbit, and the wolf caught it in it's teeth before it could even touch the ground. It tore into the small meal hungrily, shredding the fur and snapping up the muscle in guttural, growling bites. Zevran had killed men and woman throughout his career and never before felt the squeamish weight fall through his stomach that he did right now watching one wild creature tear another apart.

Kyrn's fingers slid away from his, and she inched forward with a cupped hand towards the wolf's head. It paused mid-bite to snarl at her with hairs and viscera still stuck in it's teeth, until she cupped her hand sideways and circled her reach downwards, until her hand lay palm-up on the ground, just a foot away from rabbit that was now no more than bones and bloody sinews.

After it had cracked as much marrow as it could from the larger bones, it studied Kyrn silently with eyes no longer savagely hungry. It leaned forward with a nervous hesitance, licked her hand delicately, and then bolted into the underbrush at a rapid speed.

All Zevran's muscles relaxed at once, releasing a breath he did not even notice he had been holding, tight with a primal fear he had rarely experienced. "What was that?" Zevran finally choked out.

Kyrn shook her head, blinking her eyes rapidly as if trying to shake off a dream. "Vir Adahlen… the way of the wood. I," Kyrn closed her eyes and inhaled deeply, "it's something I've gotten better at, since I was little. I could tell he was out here. He's been circling us for almost a week now, since I left the Mabari at Redcliffe…. a wolf that patient, I knew I had to either deal with him, or befriend him."

"So," Zevran drawled out, "You chose to befriend him? A Wolf?"

With slow, languid motions Kyrn finally stood up from her crouch, wincing from muscles sore from stillness and tightly coiled intent. A quick shiver ran through her, like a dog shaking off water, before she exhaled and replied, "I got lucky. He accepted the arrangement."

"Besides," She continued as Zevran looked at the leftover bits of bloody fur and shattered bones that were all that remained of their standoff that morning. "He isn't the first lone wolf I've taken in."