His mind has so quickly jump to the incorrect conclusions that he was taken aback by her reaction to his presence. The false assumptions he'd made were only further impressed upon his mind as she stood to attention, her petite bodice rising in a defensive manner at his sudden approach to the borders. Atlas' mind was thrown into cataclysmic disarray, unable to comprehend what a battle with Tobias could have done to warp her mind from one passion to another; did the black male truly possess such powers? And then, suddenly, the aggression went out of her and her form withered. He strained forward even as she came to stand just out of reach, just within the confines of the Asteraian plains and the sickening scent markers of Tobias and his wench. When he spoke her name it was muddled with the confused assumptions he had allowed his mind to make, and her reaction to the very tone of his voice made his brows pull up slightly towards his forehead. Never before had he seen her in such a state, not even when she was on the brink of death that night they'd first met. He'd come to know her as a wolf with an endless amount of fight within her heart, a passion scalded into her very skin. Now her tail tucked and her expression seemed anxious.

Before she even spoke he realized his mistake, for this was not a wolf in service of her pack, this was a wolf caged. Her movements along the borders were not those of duty, but rather the manic pacing of an animal confined within a trap she could not escape. He could not help the way his features fell as her words lashed out at him, biting into him from the miniscule distance that separated them. So little interaction between them had led to further discord, misunderstandings abound. It was her declaration that she did not need him to carry on with his mission that struck the deepest, but Atlas would not be forced back so easily. After all they had been through, her passion had sparked a fire within him and he believed entirely that there was a reason they had been brought together that night. He hadn't saved her only to let her perish here beneath the rule of the one who had taken her so close to death's door, and the one who had long stood as a danger to his family.

His brows furrowed as he regained himself even as she glared across the borders at him, as if he were someone to be dismissed and sent away because he had arrived too late for his presence to be consequential. Well, his fire would not be snuffed out of her life so easily. Atlas understood now, the misgivings he'd had only moments before extinguished as he came to realize that Fiammetta was a prisoner here. The gears turned in his mind as he looked past her, eyes surveying the open expanses of the plains and seeing no other wolf in sight. Pale yellow eyes returned to her face then, sudden intensity flashing in them as his instincts kicked into overdrive much the same as they had the night he'd first saved her life. "I am here to help you. No warden watches over you now, mm...run and I will have your back...as I did not before." It is an apology of sorts, for remorse etches just behind the serious intent of his gaze as it locks upon her face. He thinks no less of her for suffering defeat at the hands of Tobias. How could he possibly, after seeing all she had fought through to this day? She had survived, and that was all that mattered. She had survived, and together they would live to see another day and gain their retribution.