The Heartwood Take the oxygen straight out of my own chest.

Wounds: Chest gouge, probably some tears to his legs.

There was no reason for them to be fighting in the first place except for Revui's need to dominate, but beyond that, he needed to let off some steam and it hadn't felt possible within the woods controlled by his once-captors; it was wrong of him to set himself against the first body he come across, or at least the first who looked like a challenge, but mad was the right phrase for it. He was hungry, angry, unable to process all that he'd been through, and was trained in combat. Overall it was a bad combination which the pale wolf was being forced to deal with.

Combat was what he knew. It was all he knew. Hydra had tried to do more for him when he lived on the mountain—make him slow down and think—but he had been running off of the fumes of his anger for so long that everything else fell away from him. Until now, as his pain and his blood shocked his system in to some kind of awareness. He felt his teeth slice and the flesh give; he moved automatically, as he had been trained, and was countered swiftly by the teeth of his opponent. Back and forth they went until the pale wolf reached for his elbow and something clicked for him.

He wanted to plunge face-first after his quarry but seeing that split-second of teeth aiming for his forelimb made his brain vomit images of Black Hat grappling at him; the breaking of bone, the overwhelming pain, then waking in the pit—

With a roar Revui focused on that one movement from Rosencrantz and did his best to get out of range, backing down as best he could, except that the other man's momentum had him moving so fast that Revui felt crowded, and he lost his balance, and then he was tripping on his own feet; he hit the icy dirt a few seconds later and with a snarl began to snap his teeth at the air, kick with his paws. He wouldn't be broken again—he wouldn't be a captive again—!