among the greatest

Bazi had crossed The Tangle before sunrise. Along the way, she shed the garb her responsibility-laden everyday and dressed in the furs of her fictional self: Wilder.

The back-story had changed a few times since her run-in with Scarlett. She felt guilty pretending her children were dead, and rearranged details until she was a wandering mother seeking revenge for her murdered mate, leaving the children with a trusted aunt in the south. The wolves she sought now were the same ones that had murdered Danica, lending a little more credence to her story. Bazi only had to think of her friend's mutilated corpse to feel as Wilder must feel, in whatever universe she really existed.

She stalked through the vast coastal forest, following a faint trail that she pretended to recognize even though Rhett's scent was utterly unknown to her. So preoccupied was Bazi with her game that she paid little attention to where she was putting her feet. Long ago, before the land was protected, a poacher had set up a trap in anticipation of just such a wolf.

The fall knocked the wind out of her. When Bazi came to, she was looking at the world from the bottom of a hitherto disguised pit, surrounded by the debris that had covered it. It did not take her long enough to work out what had happened, and within moments she was overcome by blinding panic. "HELP!" the trapped wolf howled, rearing up to scratch at the earthen walls of her prison. "HEEE-EEELP!"