"It is fairly impressive. Most of us around here are genuinely trying to rebuild something." She hadn't really thought of it from an outsider's perspective, not for a long time. They had a lot to be proud of, even if they did have a lot to be worried about as well. Shadow sighed. "It's not all sunshine and roses though. We're only relatively civilized. In the winter everyone has to focus on their own survival and no one stirs up much trouble. Now that everything has thawed out, tempers will probably heat up a bit too."
They were lucky here, but there was always the lingering threat, especially in the city, that things could heat up again at any moment. It was hard to explain, especially to people who hadn't seen what it was like before. "It's usually limited to isolated incidents, but even though the Lions need our food, we know they'd much rather have our land and the farm for themselves. It bothers them, too, that Wolf and the rest of the tribe have stood up for people without tribes. They'd much rather use them for... entertainment." Her voice took on an edge as she talked about it. She hadn't really meant to talk about anything so sensitive or to get at all emotional about it, but she couldn't help herself. "They set up cage matches, young and desperate drifters fighting each other for meager supplies for their entertainment. Last fall they burned a man alive and Wolf was the only one who said a thing about it. They seem to attack wanderers indiscriminately. At the beginning of the winter they nearly killed a pair of drifters they'd falsely accused of stealing from them. The two came to us for help. It took more than a dozen stitches to close up the woman's knife wound. And we've been hiding them ever since, although everyone knows about it by now."
Shadow took a deep breath, using that to restore her usual calm demeanor. "So it's not quite as peaceful as it seems. We do pretty well though, and I have faith that we can do even better. It'll just take all the good people, the considerate souls, standing up and working together." She looked out at still gray and drizzling sky, lost in thought for just a moment. "It looks like the rain is starting to let up."