It is the gathering of wolves that draw her, not the rabbits. By the time the dark shewolf passes by the gathering, the scent of prey is entirely drowned out by the more than two dozen wolves in the small meadow. Initially she thinks it is a hunt, a hunt by the largest pack she has ever seen. Yet as she watches them from the relative safety of a distant ridge, she notices that some stay off to the side, and a few seem to be introducing themselves. Not a pack, she tells herself, just wolves drawn by good hunting. It’s probably not good anymore, what with the many wolves have killed or driven off the remaining hares, but the red tailed wolf is still curious, and she moves, somewhat hesitantly, down the hill toward the conglomeration.

There is one wolf, a male with a dark coat like hers, that stands alone at the edge of the clearing. She doesn’t know him anymore than she knows the others, but she gravitates toward him, thinking she recognizes the same piqued, yet tempered curiosity that she feels about the wolves. She approaches him with a quiet yip of greeting, but keeps a comfortable distance between them. For all she know he is an alpha of a pack, and she’s just a vagabond drawn in my the hunt. Foxtail is not a particularly dominant wolf, but she is no coward, and she’d rather keep her distance than avoid the shame of submission.

“I’m Foxtail,” she tells the wolf, whose name is Cillian, though she doesn’t know that yet. The black hair of her rough coat catches the bright sunlight, reflecting off the russet hairs that give the slender wolf a reddish halo in the light. “Who’re you?”