The mottled wolf hesitated, unsure if she should share anything more with this wolf. Her throat closed a bit, and she cleared it before speaking, "I wish I had. More than anything." She had a feeling that she would regret leaving in the middle of the night, even if the alternative was that she probably never would have left if she had spoken to her father about it.

From the way the white boy had asked, Cas assumed that he would be very critical of her answer, so she decided to speak up again. "I know that makes me seem like a terrible person, and maybe I am. But before you judge me, understand that you don't know the circumstances behind what I did. You can't." She had raised her head a bit, challenging him, in a way. She couldn't help but be defensive about her decision to get out of the cage and leave her father behind.

He'd wanted to stay. His mate had wanted to stay. Cas had not. She couldn't have died in that dirty, stinking, disgusting pen, knowing that she'd done nothing with her life at all by the end of it. Sure, it might have been selfish. Sure, it might have been stupid. But it was her decision, and she couldn't change it. now. Not now that she had found the Lore and understood that she couldn't go back anymore. She didn't want to. But she wished she'd said goodbye.

Something about the way this boy was speaking to her was really and truly pissing Cas off. The fact that her leg was throbbing and aching from her stumble helped nothing, and before she knew it, her fur was fluffing out along her spine and her hackles were raised.

"Who the hell asked you?" she demanded, feeling that damn lump rise up in her throat again, frustration and anger and sorrow building into one outburst. "You know nothing - nothing - about me, so don't act like you do. You haven't lived your life in a damn cage. You can't possibly know what I-" she cut herself off, biting her tongue. The white wolf had done nothing to warrant her tantrum, and she sighed deeply through her nose to remedy her temper.

The russet-and-gray female turned her back toward him and limped up the bank, away from the water. "Sorry. I get really pissy when I'm not feeling my best," she explained, flattening her ears in shame. "You don't deserve to be yelled at. You're entitled to your opinion." He certainly was, and Cas didn't care to be judged. She really didn't. She chalked her most recent outburst up to the pain radiating from her poor leg; she should probably get off of it soon.

Yes, Cas had a temper, but it was one that flared in short bursts and was usually overcome by her desire to keep the company of whomever she was with. It took a moment, but she did come to remember that the wolves around here probably had never and would never know what a cage was. That was a beautiful, wonderful thing that it wasn't something they would ever need to be concerned over. Cas was grateful on their behalf.

She could tell the white male was still angry. She didn't know exactly what she'd done to ruffle his fur, but oh boy had she ruffled it. Leaving her father behind had been the first selfish thing she had done in her life - and yes, it had been selfish. She would readily admit to that. But she had no idea why on earth this boy seemed so concerned with what she'd done in her personal life.

Not that it really mattered. Wasn't like she'd ever see him again, anyway.

Probably.

She put her weight down on her left foreleg to test it and inhaled a shaky breath through her teeth when pain shot up like lightning, from her paw to her shoulder. Her eyes burned, but she chased away the feeling of tears. There was no reason to cry about a little pain. She was tougher than that... but that didn't change the fact that it still hurt.

Badly.

She angled her ears backward, turning to face her volatile companion with a small smile when he dropped the anger and inquired about her leg. "I didn't sprain it," she told him truthfully, unable to mask the slight wobble at the end of her sentence that betrayed her pain on a physical and emotional level. "It's just... useless." That time, however, her voice was filled with venom directed inward, at her own body that didn't even know how to live right.

She hated it.

Oh, no. That wouldn't end well - the whole thing with whomever this 'Nonna' character was. She was fairly certain that going with the white wolf would mean that she'd be meeting with his pack, and that was not a good idea at all. She shifted her weight from paw to paw, excluding the injured one, and glanced up at the boy who no longer seemed hostile toward her. She sighed through her nose and shook her head.

"There's not anything your Nonna can do to help me," she told him truthfully - if the humans hadn't been able to fix her, then a wolf certainly would have no idea. Humans had these machines and medicines and strange rooms with metal tables on them to look at the patients. Wolves didn't have any of that. She wagged her tail, and, in an attempt to be cheerful in the face of disaster, said, "I drew the short straw in life. Some people just get the bad end of the deal, and I guess I'm one of them."

She stretched, wincing a bit as she finally put some more weight on her aching leg. But she was determined to push past it; to prove to this boy that she was not some weak girl who needed help and protecting. No, she could take care of herself... relatively speaking.