Shem, for once, hadn't been feeling particularly guilty. In fact, he had been strangely okay with having been outside Taviora far more than usual; he tried not to attribute it to meeting her, Tikal, but really, it likely had been. She had, after all, given him something else to think about other than his usual spirals. In any case, being away from Taviora had been interesting in itself. It was the first time in a long time that he had spent time outside the pack during spring and he had taken to enjoying what he could before summer came through to lay waste to it all. Spring had been slow to really emerge though and he couldn't help but wonder if it had been faster to bloom closer to Tik-no, no, closer to...Glorall, where his brother was of course. It was a nice lie to tell himself so that he didn't get annoyed that a lot of his time really was spent thinking about how he should probably do better next time he saw her.

The journey there meant traveling through the crags and grotto, a task slightly less enjoyable than, say, biting into a rock. At least, in Shem's eyes and at that point - he was frustrated at always having to change his path thanks to trapped water or because a tree had died in winter and decided to fall across one of the few paths that lead through the lower crags. By the time he emerged from the crags and into the lower region of the grotto - the home stretch! - he had found himself wet up to his knees with dregs of mud covering his undersides. Hell, a spot of mud had even managed to get on his face and despite all the pawing in the world, it remained steadfast in its resolve to make him look like a stray.

Why he had even chosen to go through the grotto, he couldn't say. But he begrudgingly did so nonetheless, a trail of heavy sighs left behind him - that was, before he spotted some movement in the distance. From what he could tell, some wolf had managed to meet a fate similar to him - and by that, he meant he could really smell it. Leaves accumulated in the fall, froze over in the winter and come spring...well, it was a pungent reminder of the seasons. Earthy and musty. He had to go by the wolf anyway but he sped up, hoping to pass through quickly. As he got closer, he sneezed but cut himself off when he realized just who had managed to find themselves covered in leaf-mush. Of course it was her.

He paused, completely fixated on watching her as she huffed about. He followed her eyes up to the ridge, a brow raised. What? Did she think she was stuck in here? He uncrinkled his nose, did his best to look his usual passive and cool before he cleared his throat. "Looks like you need some help again, huh?" He half-grinned, a snaggled smirk of amusement. It really did feel very cool being the kind of wolf to step in at the right moment to give help, he had to admit.