go…somewhere.”

“But you can’t!” Dusty burst out, “You can’t even walk!…and the pups-”

Kira sighed heavily. “You know, if it hadn’t been for you I would’ve froze in that cave two days ago. Now I’m not so sure I’m happy about you saving my life.” She kicked at the snow with her good front leg. “Get back to Nome, Dusty. I’ll try and follow, but if I don’t make it, what’s the difference?” Kira shrugged. “Me and these pups don’t have much to go back to.”

“Kira-” Dusty started to plead.

“Dusty!” Kira barked, “I can’t run anymore, so what’s left for me? I don’t want to turn into a house dog! And my pups will be ashamed of who their father is, as ashamed as I am! Listen, I’m just tired of being stuck in the same place. We need to move!”

A low growl emitted from behind the cave, echoing darkly. Dusty froze, and watched fearfully as Kira looked around and bared her teeth.

“Enough with the noise, and just get out here and show yourself,” she demanded.

A brown wolf slid from the shadows. His scent was the same as the lone wolf that Dusty had seen kill the deer. Without realizing it, Dusty began to tremble. Kira didn’t seem so brave anymore, either, now that she was face to face with a wolf.

The wolf stared at the two petrified dogs, and with all the power and majesty of the wild predator…snorted. “Well, this is unusual. Are you two lost or something? Because this isn’t a town.”

“So we’ve noticed,” Kira snapped, but in a quieter tone than normal. She was still frightened but trying hard not to show it.

“What are you doing on my territory?” the wolf snarled. He looked surprised when Kira growled back, then angry. “Look, I’m not here to fight. I just want to know what two tame dogs are doing out in the wilderness.”

“That’s none of your business, is it?” Kira said.

Dusty was growing impatient, and he suddenly heard himself say, “We’re part of Nome’s mail team. We fell out of our harness while we were climbing the cliff, and now we’re stuck here.”

The wolf looked at Kira. He didn’t seem to hear a word Dusty said. “Is he your mate or something?”

Kira’s face burned pink under her fur. “No!” she exclaimed.

The wolf shook his head. “Well, let me just say that this is my territory, Brenner’s territory, and I don’t like you being on it.” He crouched down low, a wicked grin playing across his face. “Are you sure you can make it out here? Because there are animals that would gladly hunt you, and kill you. Lynx…and bears…” Brenner’s legs grew tense, and his grin widened until his expression resembled the devil’s himself. “…and wolves like me.”

Dusty could take a hint. He bolted, racing as fast as he could, yelling, “Run, Kira!” The fact struck him in the face: Kira couldn’t run.

Gritting his teeth against any bad words trying to get past, he spun around and raced back, almost colliding with Kira as she limped through the snow. Brenner was circling her, laughing.

“C’mon!” Dusty cried, throwing himself to Kira’s side, substituting as her missing leg. She leaned against him, a determined look on her face as the two picked up the pace.

“Well, isn’t this sweet?” Brenner said in a bored voice.

Dusty winced as sharp teeth snapped at his ankle. He could smell his own blood, but he had to keep going.

Dusty and Kira ran jerkily over the tundra. Dusty could only see blurs as they whipped past, but the smell of Brenner never left as the wolf followed them, nipping and jostling and laughing at his prey’s weakness. Dusty closed his eyes as Brenner’s mocking chuckles rang through his head, and he wished he could close his ears, too.

Suddenly the ground vanished from beneath his feet. Dusty’s eyes snapped open in terror as he and Kira tumbled off the edge of a precipice into a dark chasm below. His stomach flew to his throat, and Dusty wondered if he was going to be sick in mid-flight. With nothing but cold air surrounding him, he felt nothing but fear, and turned his head away the earth.

Thud.

Dusty scrambled up and barely noticed the cold snow running over his throbbing legs, numbing them. It hadn’t been so far to fall. But he had become separated from Kira while in flight.

“Kira!” His weak cry chipped at the icy air. He prayed for an answer. Together they were the only hope for each other’s survival.

“Dusty!” came the faltered reply.

Rejuvenated, Dusty raced towards the voice with hope singing through him. She was out there! She could hear him! Now they only had to find each other. “Kira!” he shouted.

Silence.

“Dusty!”

Dusty stopped perplexed. Her voice hadn’t gotten any closer or farther away. She was probably looking for him, too.

“Kira, don’t move!” He got no reply.

Dusty turned around in several directions, searching, then charged off on an impulse, his heart lobbing hard against his chest. “Kira, DON’T MOVE! Stay where you are! I’ll…I’ll find you!” he cried, panting heavily as he yelled. He raced around in ever-wider circles in his desperate quest, and for a few seconds at a time he thought himself blind with the perpetual whiteness of the snow. Finally he stopped, breathing laboriously, and listened.

“Dusty…” It was a soft whisper on the wind, a wisp of Kira’s voice.

He tore up the wet earth as he sped on once more, pure snow mixed and ruined with the mud flung up from beneath. Dusty galloped across the tundra, but eventually he knew he had failed. He had lost Kira again.

A strong gust blew through his fur, pummeling him with snow. He faced into the wind and yelled in anguish, his anger and blame rising to consume his heart in flames.

The wild breeze whipped away his cry, and the fire in his eye flickered out. Dusty visibly drooped as all energy went out of him. Stumbling forward, his nose touched a prickly branch of a pine tree. He shook his head and brushed past it, and collapsed in a broken heap in a small den in the hillside behind the pine.

Dusty curled up in a shuddering ball, his limbs jerking and twitching with pain and cold. The wind howled like a pack of wolves outside, which made Dusty’s thoughts turn to Brenner, then Kira, and black fire unfurled and flamed inside his heart. He loved Kira. He admitted that to himself now. She was the most beautiful creature on Earth, inside and out, but now she was lost to him.

And would she have had him, anyway? After what Lucas had done to her, Dusty didn’t know if Kira could trust another male to get close to her again. At the thought of Lucas the erupting fire flared, and Dusty found the rebel inside boiling to the surface. He enjoyed his enraged thoughts, let them wash over him as he had never done before. It felt beyond good to fuel his anger, to curse Lucas and all of his own shattered emotions, and let himself free his rage.

Kira’s determined face bubbled to the surface of Dusty’s mind. His soul slowly tore apart as he remembered, but then he hastily tried to mend it back together with hate. He loved Kira, but since when had love done anything for him? Had it stopped his cowardice? Had it helped his family? Had it gotten rid of Lucas? Had it saved Kira? No. And now Kira was gone.

Dusty felt a resolution burn and brand itself onto his soul: he would never love again. Love was worthless. It did nothing except bring him pain. Instead, he would stay here and forget his past, and loved ones, and become the one thing that he was sure only required anger and the blood lust of the wolf: Dusty would become wild.

Nearly two months later, a bedraggled canine limped across the barren tundra, seeking help. Her fur was thick with mud and snow, and her belly almost brushed the ground in its stretched, swollen state. She was soon to have her pups, and with her many injuries, especially her broken front leg, she would need someone to watch over her and her children as she gave birth.

Hobbling past an old evergreen tree, she spotted a den cleverly concealed behind its branches. The entrance to the small cave was littered with shining white bones and tidbits of rotting meat. Bloody pawprints marked the clean snow in front. She sniffed to identify the inhabitant, but the smell of blood and aging meat covered any trace of a scent.

Bravely, she lifted her head and cried, “Help! Please help me! You’re the only one left in this valley that hasn’t refused me.”

“Why would you need help from someone like me?” a smooth voice called from within.

She shook her head at the thought that she’d heard the voice before, and said, “Please. I’m about to have pups, and I’m hurt. I need someone to see that the birth goes well and that I don’t hurt myself or my pups during it.”

“Go away,” the voice murmured absently.

That struck Kira hard. The heartlessness of the stranger cut her to the core, and she found herself yelling, “Look, I have been all over this valley, and no one has agreed to help me! You are my last chance! I don’t care if you don’t like it, I’ll just-”

“GO AWAY!” Dusty hurled himself out of the cave and pinned the female to the ground. He glared angrily down into her face, but froze, his mouth open.

The girl dog’s blue-green eyes flashed up at him, slowly turning green with rage. He looked down at her fur. Beneath all the muck and grime, he