A Child's Dream

Chapter 6 Lone Wolf

She\'d made it. To the boarder anyway. But it was nothing that she\'d expected. Before her stood the one thing she never thought she\'d see along a Canadian boarder. A twenty-foot high, concrete wall. Canada had sealed their boarder, literally. She stood on the top of a hill overlooking the structure, at points, about a quarter mile apart, there were towers like those used in prison yards. In them she was sure there once had been guards, where now, the windows remain broken, and giant sheets of cobwebs sway in the wind. The towers had not been used in some time she was sure, and in many sections of the wall she could see, were falling apart near the top, and large cracks were evident through the wall. But it still stood high. \"What do you think, Max?\" The horse snorted and bobbed his head. Such an obstacle was no problem. The real problem, was what lie on the other side?

She looked up and down the wall, from her perch, she could see the tops of dozens of trees, too thick and too close to the wall for them to clear in a single leap over. But she noticed that one of the towers still had its platform around it, not far to the right of where she stood. If it were still stable, she could jump Max onto it, then travel along the wall, till they found a clearing, then jump off. It wasn\'t like the horse hadn\'t walked along a narrow ledge before. At least this time they wouldn\'t be dodging enemies.

She directed Max\'s attention to the tower, and told him what she wanted him to do, once he indicated he understood, she started riding towards their jump point, getting a good distance from the wall to build up speed to carry them up to the wall. Finally the tower in front of them, she charged her horse towards it. The leap was perfect, the landing was textbook, the footing was good, the stability was terrible. As soon as their ht wht was on the platform, it started to sway and be. Se. She tried to make it back to the wall, but the platform had already started to fall away. Quickly she turned Max around as best she could, to find there was a small, a very small, clearing just below. \"JUMP MAX!\" Following her pull of the reins, he jumped in that direction, running further as his hooves touched the ground. Finally safe a few feet into the trees, the structure of the platform falling into the tiny clearing, completely filling it, and making it unusable to the animals, if there were in tin the area. \"Good boy Max. That was close. Any damage?\" Max shook his head. \"Good. Let\'s go. I\'d like to see if there\'s a road or a town around somewhere. I want to see where we are on a map.\" She rode off into the trees, scaring off a small animal that looked a lot like a small dear. So there was wildlife. She hoped they\'d forgive her for the loss of their clearing. There didn\'t look like a lot of foraging areas around.

She rode on, not realizing that other eyes watched her. One was a wolf. Small and agile, gray and white coat strikingly shiny against the sun\'s rays. It watched her go with its silver eyes, it\'s meal for the day gone, frightened by this intruder from over the wall. That wasn\'t right, and slowly, cautiously, he followed, ignoring his hunger for now.

Another kind of eye watched her also. This one small and black, shiny when the sun hit it, but smooth as glass. For it was glass. The glass of a camera lens. Not as dead as the rest of the wall\'s towers appeared to be.

It was early, or was it late. He couldn\'t tell. Didn\'t care really. All he knew was he was stuck at the same post once more. Requests to be transferred to another unit, ignored. His C.O. hated him. Good, he didn\'t like him very much either. Again, like every other day for the passed seven years, he propped his feet on the counter, leaning back in the tilt swivel chair, careful no to disturb the track it would slide in. Around him were dozens of monitors. Some worked, others didn\'t, some of the non-working ones were even broken, never haven been replaced. But what would you replace them with? There wasn\'t anything left. The place was falling apart. Just like that stupid wall he was ordered to watch.

He was one outpost in a string of many. He was responsible for 400 observation points, but only 153 worked. Fat lot of good that will do. The images were all the same though. Noting. Just wall, dirt, and tree tops. \"Your assignment is simple, yet extremely important to the security of this country,\" he remembered his C.O. telling him. He hadn\'t done as well as he would have liked in his classes. But it wasn\'t totally his fault. His family needed him. And they came first. Then, when he graduated, finally, he was 37th in the class, of 42. Well at lease he wasn\'t a total looser. \"This is your post. Lt. Makweeze. This is Lt. Godett.\"

\"Lt.\"

\"Lt.\" They exchanged.

\"You\'ll be taking over from him. You have just one task. Make sure no one comes over that wall.\" He followed his C.O.\'s gesture to the line of monitors. \"Each monitoring station has been equipped with a motion sensitive tracking system. If it moves near that wall, we\'ll know about it. The monitor will start to flash read, and once you push the button under the monitor, the main screen here will display that camera. Understand?\"

\"Sir, Yes Sir.\" He replied eagerly. He couldn\'t believe how gullible he was. His job was the worst. He\'d never see action, everywhere he went people would avoid him, his was the lowest paying job there was, and not only that. His butt fell asleep every time he sat down. In the beginning, he would diligently watch every monitor, watching for any signs of the disease-ridden people from the southern lands trying to cross over. Any illness that was airborne was cured, no problem. Or the people with the disease that was incurable was killed. Their air scrubbers were the best in the world. Never on any day, did the air stand still. There was always a breeze. The air was sucked up, super heated to be sterilized, then sent back through a cooling system. The condensation off that system was collected and poured directly into the city\'s water supply. And the air was pumped back out, totally clean. At least, that\'s what they were told.

In the beginning, there were 352 of the monitors working. Over time, and lack of maintenance as his department had it\'s funding slowly chopped to barely enough to pay him and his C.O., the monitors had died, fizzled out, or just exploded from a short. He hated this job. Because in all those seven years, not once, not once had anyone even ventured near the wall.

Until today...

He was half asleep when it happened. His feet propped up firmly on the counter. The surface of it decorated with numerous coffee cup stains, and food spills that stained before he got around to cleaning them up. There were papers everywhere, mostly of just him writing \'I\'m bored\' over and over again, just for something to do. He even wrote it in every language he learned in classes, just to keep them fresh in his mind. Under some of these papers were magazines, old antique ones of naked women, performing acts that no self-respecting wench would even think of doing. And there wasn\'t a lot that they wouldn\'t do. For a man of his income, it was the only means of sexual stimulation he got. Well not the only means, but no one needed to know about that.

He was gazing up at the ceiling through slotted eyes, his mind alive with images of women, both busty and slim, performing erotic dances before him. As one was about to kiss him he was sure, an alarm sounded, and a red light flashed overhead. \"What the fuck! AH!!\" he cursed, falling backwards out of the chair. He crawled back over the counter and looked to the flashing monitor. \"Red?\" He thought there was something wrong, so he started hitting the top of the unit. It didn\'t stop. \"Oh SHIT!!\" He hit the button under the monitor and brought the image to the main screen. \"SHIT!!\" On the screen, as plain as day, was someone ridding a strange horse, directly at the wall. Then the horse jumped, landed on the surrounding platform, and as it gave way, the horse jumped once more, landing on the ground, and running off into the bushes, the rider safely on its back. \"The C.O. I gotta call the C.O.!!\" Quickly he located the phone, berried under the dirty magazines. It started ringing, as it was supposed to, as soon as he picked it up.

\"Commander Wilks.\" Came the gruff reply.

\"Sir. Lt. Godett here. Um, I\'m not sure how to really go about this but - \"

\"Just spit it out boy! I\'m in the middle of something!\"

\"Ah. Ok. Someone just came over the wall.\"

\"WHAT!!! OWE! Watch it bitch!\"

\"Sir?\"

\"Never mind. I\'ll be right there!\"

\"Yes sir!\" The most action he\'d seen in seven years, and he was going to be the center of attention for the whole facility. People would look at him differently now. Yes sir, they certainly would. Then he saw the state the counter was in. \"Shit! I gotta clean this dump up! QUICK!\"

In ten minutes, his C.O. was standing at his side, the counter before him clear and devoid of any offensive material. Though many of the stains in the surface wouldn\'t come out, but he didn\'t seem to mind that. The controls were sluggish, as Godett replayed the recording of the intruder\'s leap over the wall. Though the evidence was all right there. \"Where was this taken?\" the man asked.

\"Observation post NB214 sir. The camera was believed to have stopped working. Then it just came on line.\"

\"Good. And intrintruder is heading which way?\"

\"That\'s the problem sir. The camera couldn\'t follow after the collapse of the platform. I think something overhead was jamming it. Keeping it from turning up. But from what I gather, from the image, and the direction the rider is going, I\'d say east, and inland.\" \"Ok. And if you\'re wrong?\"

\"Than I\'ll stop putting those request for transfers on your desk, covering up the condom wrappers you leave lying around after fucking your secretary sir. Not that I know it\'s her for sure, but there is definitely something going on.\"

\"You been taking lessons from General Ripston again?\"

\"Sir. It\'s this man\'s military. You want to get ahead, bribe the C.O. That\'s the code. And if anyone found out you\'d been discharging without permission, I\'m sure your wife will demand a sperm count ASAP.\"

\"Alright. What do you want?\"

\"Two things. One, a transfer out of this dump. Two, I want on the mission. I want to go after this guy.\"

\"I think that can be arranged. They\'ll want you along anyway. To verify that the kill is the man you saw leap over the wall. For reasons I care not to discuss, I\'m not able to go on this mission.\"

\"You\'re wife is ovulating isn\'t she?\"

\"Like a bitch in heat. She\'s gona drain me dry.\"

\"Not if the secretary does that first.\"

\"Shut your mouth.\"

She\'d been ridding straight for two days now. She was tired, hungry, and bored of the same thing. Trees, trees, and more trees. It was like wading through the forest in the southern lands of the far shore. Though the trees were not as wide across as the those had been, still it was a thriving forest. Birds, deer, and even a tell tail skunk, though she didn\'t see it she could smell it\'s presence. The area looked much different than across the boarder. It looked younger, less desolate. Maybe Canada didn\'t get hit as hard as the rest of the continent seemed to. The war did seem to be directed at the Americans anyway, at least from what she remembered. But still, things had gone from bad to steadily worse back then. She hoped that if death came, it would take her quick. Instead, she ended up surviving all of it, only to live out another kind of death. The death of her heart.

She\'d managed to kill a rabbit for supper. It was a good size, nearly as big as a large tomcat. She\'d skinned it, rolled the skin in the salt brick she\'d always carried, taught to her by D, and was busy burying the rest of the innards in the ground, when she heard a low growl. She turned slowly to see a silver and gray wolf standing between some trees, not too far away. The arrow she\'d used, had severed the rabbit\'s spine, so when she skinned it, the thing fell in half quite nicely, more or less. She took the larger half, the chest of the animal with front legs still attached, and tossed it to the wolf. The wolf looked confused for a moment, then carefully stepped forward, took the carcass and left. Kale turned back to her dinner, and readied the remains on a stick to cook. There was no way she\'d be able to eat the whole rabbit, and there wasn\'t anyway to keep it from going bad, but the larger sized animal was the only game she\'d located. Why not share it. A small peace offering to the wolf, that she knew had been stalking her for at least a day, frightening off whatever game she happened to find. Maybe she\'d inadvertently done the same to him some time earlier, maybe by sharing her only kill would appease him somehow. Wolves were funny creatures. Well maybe not funny, complicated was more the word for it. A lone wolf, was something not to tangle with.

\"Hi Aceline.\" She turned to see her brother Peter, no scar evident on his cheek so she knew it was him, herding in about a dozen live horses to the pen near the cyberizing plant. All the snow was gone now, the ground was slick and muddy, puddles abound everywhere. She\'d finished all her distasteful chores at home, and was free to do as she wished. The school house had been damaged from the snow fall, so classes were canceled while it was repaired. Mr. Colaros\' daughters weren\'t in the best of playing moods right now, not that she blamed them, or that they\'d play with her anyway, they were so much older. She wandered around for a while, and soon found herself in front of the cyberizing plant. It was mid afternoon, and she\'d found her brother\'s lunch bag still with his locker. She asked where he was. One of the men told her he was coming in with some horses, and that she could find him in the gathering pen shortly. So she took his lunch bag and went there, propping herself up on the fence rails, sort of hanging between a couple of them. Her arms over one to hold her up, while sitting on a lower rail. \"What are you u?\" ?\"

\"Nothing,\" she sighed. \"I found your lunch inside.\" She handed him the bag.

\"You know you\'re not supposed to go in there.\"

\"I know, but I didn\'t go far. Only to the lockers.\"

\"Then some one chased you out?\"

\"No. I left on my own.\" She climbed to the top rail as he leaned against the fence to eat, watching the horses mull around in the yard. \"I don\'t know why I can\'t go in,\" she complained, accepting a part of his sandwich he handed her. \"I know you kill the horses in there, then take them apart and make them into cybers.\"

\"Yes, but it\'s not somethihat hat a little girl should see when she\'s so young. You need to grow up first. Leave the horrors of death and mutilation of these horses to us for now. Ok?\"

\"Ok.\"

\"Eat up.\" Just then there was an explosion inside the plant, a great burst of flame shot out the upper vents, angled down to the paddock. The horses scattered, squealing and running everywhere. Several knocked down Peter, and Aceline fell off the fence to the outside. As she rose to find Peter, trying to crawl out of the paddock, she was horrified when one of the horses kicked, and sent the boy several feet away.

\"PETER!!!!\" He didn\'t move. \"HELP!!!!!! SOMEONE PLEASE!!!!!!! HELP MY BROTHER!!!!!\" Several of the men from inside the plant came out to inspect the damage, and had seen the pair fall the first time, but weren\'t able to get to them. One of the men grabbed Aceline and set her into the back of a wagon that was nearby, keeping her from trying to get back to her brother, which she was trying to do. \"PETER!!!\"

\"Someone herd those horses out! NOW!\" the foreman shouted, as he waved his hat madly to move the horses back from the boy. \"Someone get the wagon! Hurry!\"

Aceline sat there crying, watching helplessly as the men worked. The horses ran free passed her, and the men gathered a couple of nearby cybers stripping their saddles and hitching them to the wagon the girl had been placed in. Another man shouted for someone to send for the doctor, as they carried Peter from the paddock and lay him down next to Aceline. A man held her back as others steadied the boy on the journey back to her home, quickly tying a bandage around his head. There was so much blood. She couldn\'t take her eyes off it. She could almost feel him slipping away. \"PETER!!! FIGHT!!!\" she shouted. \"PLEASE PETER!!!\" The man holding her rocked her in his arms. This was nothing a child should have to see, let alone the youngest sister.

They arrived back at her home, and quickly the men carried Peter inside. Aceline, still in shock, remained in the wagon, crying, not sure what to do. \'I want my mommy,\' she thought. But it wasn\'t her real mother she pictured in hend. nd.

\"Do you think they\'re still around?\" asked the sym, as D stood before the wall that separated the great landmass in two.

\"I know they are. Can you hear it?\" Carefully he listened, as the sound of turning gears, and altering shutters narrowed on him. The towers had eyes. You may not have been able to see them, but they were there. Tiny cameras sending their signal back to where ever the military was based now. Someone watching the monitors he was sure, with just a call, he\'d release several troops to hunt down the trespassers, and kill them.

\"I hear them. But still, this is where she crossed.\"

\"The tracks are nearly gone.\"

\"There\'s been no rain, so she can\'t be more than a few days ahead of us. We can\'t give up now.\"

\"Who said anything about giving up? The towers may still have eyes, but even they can\'t see in the dark.\"

\"You sure about that?\"

\"I watched that tower last night,\" he said pointing to the one before him, where the sound of the camera came from. \"There was no green light from the lens, so they can\'t be equipped with night vision. We\'ll cross tonight.\"

\"I love it when you\'re sneaky.\"

\"Quiet.\"

Later that night, a dark shadow leapt to the wall, it ran along the top for a good three miles, before finding a clearing and leaping down the other side. It wasn\'t what he\'d wanted. He was miles from her tracks now. He\'d have to guess where she\'d go, if he had any hope of catching up to her.

She sat quietly on the ground. Peter never woke up from the accident. He slept for eleven days, before he took his last breath. Aceline hid beneath his bed every night, hiding from her mother who sat at his side. She\'d sit holding his hand during the day, while one of her sisters or brothers sat with him. Montel would come in from time to time, but couldn\'t stay as much as he would like. Without Peter at the plant they were short handed, and the order for the horses had to be filled, without exception. The night before his passing, Mr. Colaros came by to see him. He didn\'t say much, she didn\'t remember if he did say anything at all. That night, she crept out from under the bed, as he gasped for air. She tried to sooth him, but it was no use. Quietly, Peter ceased to exist.

She felt very strange. She knew all along he was dying, but didn\'t want to believe it. Her mother woke to her crying, and cried herself. It was shortly before dawn when she looked at Aceline, a strange new hatred in her eyes. \"This is your fault,\" she hissed, then left to fetch her husband.

\'How is it my fault?\' she asked herself. \'Peter died. How am I to blame? Mommy, I wish you were here.\' How had she found herself wishing for a different mother? True her birth mother was no angel to her, but she had no right to think of the strange woman, who\'d passed her way, as her mother. For all she knew she hated the idea of being a mother. In this moment however, she found great comfort in the image in her mind, as the woman\'s loving arms surrounded her, holding her close in her moment of grief. Then there was the man. That strange pale man. He was always there too, and now, in her mind she wished for them both. The perfect couple, the perfect pair. Her parents. But it wasn\'t real. It never would be.

She had very few places to go now. Her room was no more. Her sister Linda had taken it over, kicking her out of the attic. Her family helping her to repair the windows and insulate the walls. This was turning into the perfect room. Over looking everything. She thought that she would be able to return to her old room, but her mother had converted it into a nursery for the new baby, telling her she had to sleep in the barn. Linda had found the chest with Aceline\'s treasures. She tore the cloth doll apart, furious that the little girl kept it, and used the birthday candle to set fire to the dress, and burned it before her eyes. Aceline didn\'t care anymore, she\'d already lost her greatest treasure. Nothing they could do would hurt her more.

Slowly she left the house, looking to the dreadful place she\'d be forced to live in. She knew she wouldn\'t be safe there. She dared a trip to Mr. Colaros, but found him sullen himself over his wife\'s passing, she felt it best not to disturb him. She wandered around for a while, passing the cyber plant, the horses once more gathered in the holding pen. The cause of the explosion was found to be a blocked fuel line, that once it freed itself, the influx of fuel was more than the system could handle, thus it exploded. No one else was hurt inside, and the fire suppression system worked as it should, but they never thought of what may happen outside. She couldn\'t stay here. The image of the accident replaying in her mind. The dark legs of the horse flying out, striking her brother\'s head. The doctor said the boy was lucky to have survived at all, but didn\'t expect a full recovery. Quickly she ran from this place, she couldn\'t bear to look at the horrid beasts any longer.

Eventually she found herself in the local cemetery, standing in front of a stone. \'PETER LARWENCE STRIDE. 16. 16. Killed in horse accident\'. That\'s what his stone read. The headstones here were a lot like that. The person\'s name, their age, how they died written across the face. Many graves were just marked with a large cross, the person\'s name and age across the front of it. Carefully she sat down next to her brother\'s stone, her cheek to its cold surface. She was alone now. So totally alone.

It was well after dark when she returned finally to her house. She didn\'t need any lights to find her way. She could see perfectly well in the pitch blackness as though it were dusk or early dawn. Just how she could she didn\'t know, but she was grateful. The house was dark, all had gone to bed. She went to the barn to find that Montel had been at it again. All the hay bails were over turned and tossed around. He\'d been looking for her. She didn\'t care, he\'d never find her. Slowly she made her way to the back of the barn, pulling away some of the floorboards of the tack room. She took the old feed scoop once more and kept digging. She\'d made quite a nice hole. She\'d dig the dirt out of the ground, into one of the buckets, then spread it around in the garden. She\'d sneak back into the house and get something to eat at the same time, so she wasn\'t starving. All she needed was a place of her own. A room she could hide in, and she\'d make it herself. The hole wasn\'t big enough yet. But it was getting there. She\'d use old boards to hold the sides intact once it was deep enough. She felt strangely at home there, in the earth. Maybe her destiny was to die. Just dig her own grave and die. Oh well, she\'d be safe with her brother then. No one would ever be able to hurt her again.

She left the shop, her purchase made. Carefully she folded the map down so that the small portion of the east coast was showing. New Brunswick had changed a bit. There was a wall built off the point of land near where Bathurst used to be, connecting to the small point of Quebec that ran along the opposite shore of the bay. It had been drained and built up, making great fields for crops. The Island \'Ile D\'Anticosti\', if she remembered right, had been joined the same way to the shore of Quebec it was closest to. But there was no sign of where Prince Edward Island used to be. Not even a sand bar. Walls had been built around many of the slender portions, or bays around Nova Scotia, and had been sealed off the same way. Walls built, water drained, earth moved in, and fields grown. How thick had they made those walls? They must be monstrous to hold back the raging sea. Nova Scotia didn\'t look the same any more. Then again, the name wasn\'t even that any longer. New Shores, that\'s what it was called. Both New Brunswick and Nova Scotia were one now. New Shores was their name. \'Things change,\' she thought, \'things change.\'

She tucked the map into her saddlebag, pulling her cloak off her saddle. She\'d had the opportunity to see the money people used here. Trying not to seem like a hovering robber. It was nothing like the coins she carried. The language writing that people used, was much the same as the rest of the world, so there was no problem there. But the money would be. She\'d found a shop where things were both bought and sold, she located her daggers, small and shiny, and sold them. She still had her larger blades, she didn\'t want to part with them, and it was only a couple out of the six that D had bought for her. D. Why was she continually thinking about him? He\'d never forgive her. She shook her head, clearing her mind of such thoughts, focusing on what she had to do. She got $75 for her daggers, and had bought a map for only $2. Not a bad deal. She tied her horse outside a rowdy bar, the only place in this little town that offered any food for purchase already prepared, and made her way inside. Similar to other bars, there were tables with men at them playing cards, women standing near them, their purpose obvious by their state of near undress. But the one thing that wasn\'t like the other bars, where the occasional man, dressed in tight leather pants, with a white shirt that hung open off their shoulders. One made his way to her, smiling and bowed slightly. \"The lady arrives alone,\" he said. She only looked at him, then turned away and sat at a back table. He followed, and sat across from her, his legs resting apart, emphasizing his endowed groin. \"The lady likes?\" he asked, referring to himself.

\"Get lost letch,\" came a man\'s voice. She turned to see a tall black haired man with brown skin standing just behind her. \"She doesn\'t want you.\"

The man stood nose to nose to the man. \"And I suppose you\'re her type, hum?\"

\"I think she\'d prefer me, over you.\" He pulled the man\'s arm up, pulling the sleeve down, revealing a large burn mark. A brand. \"You\'re diseased. You should be dead!\" The man pulled away, as others in the bar looked at him. Quickly he ran out of the bar, several following him. She heard gunshots, and a thud on the ground. The man was dead. The black haired man raised his arms, displaying the unscathed flesh. Satisfied that no one challenged him, he turned to the woman at the table. \"He would not have made a good bedmate.\"

\"I wasn\'t looking for one.\"

\"Good. Neither am I. May I sit?\" She waved to the seat, and he took it. A woman of the bar came over to him and he pushed her away. \"We want a server, NOT A WENCH!\" he shouted, slowly the barman came over, a pencil and pad of paper in hand.

\"What\'ll it be?\"

\"What\'s the usual?\" she asked.

\"Spuds, meat, your choice of veg.\"

\"The meat?\"

\"Beef, if you want something else, it\'ll be extr


\"That\'s fine. The usuall, and something green for veg.\"

\"Fine. You?\"

\"The same, but carrots. I\'ve had enough of green things.\"

\"Good. Same bill?\"

\"No,\" they both calmly answered, and the man returned to the bar. \"No drink?\" he asked.

\"No. I\'m fine.\"

\"Good. I\'m Logan. You would be?\"

\"Wanting to be left alone.\"

\"Ok. My thanks to you then, for sharing your table.\" The two sat quietly through out the meal. Then left. He thanked her again for allowing him to share her table, and quietly went on his way.

She rode out of the town, that evening, not wanting to let people see her search on the map for her position. Enough people eyed her as she bought it, she didn\'t want any more attention. She found a thicket in the woods to spend the night, and was reading the map by firelight. The town she was in was called Dunmow. Why, she wasn\'t sure, or cared. But it was near the old city of Saint John, her Grandmother\'s old town. She found herself wondering what may be left, and decided to head there come morning. She\'d only been asleep a short time, when Max nudged her. She woke instantly and saw what was wrong. Dark clouds were moving in over the moon, and thunder threatened in the distance. She\'d need to get moving, to stay ahead of the storm. As she readied to mount, she heard a snap of metal, and the yipping cries of a dog. \'Traps. Wonderful,\' she thought. She couldn\'t leave the animal like that. The pain of a trap. She followed the sound, shining the torch she rekindled from the fire, to find not a dog, but a wolf. Perhaps the same wolf from earlier, fighting against a trap its front leg was caught in. At once it saw her, and growled. Slowly she approached, and draped her cloak over the animal\'s head so that it couldn\'t see. \"Don\'t bite me,\" she said, cautiously reaching for the trap. \"Hold still, I\'ll get you out.\" She foune pre pressure release lever, and pressed it. The trap sprung open and the wolf charged from the trap, and away from her, her cloak left behind. \"You\'re welcome.\" She called, springing the trap again to make it safe for other animals to pass. She turned away, confident he wouldn\'t come after her once he saw her leaving. He could put some weight on his foot, she could see, and the bone didn\'t appear to be broken. The rest was up to him. Again she turned to her horse and med ued up, rain was coming, she could tell. She wanted to be far from here when it did.