Heart of the Wolf

Chapter 1 - The Meeting

He immediately turned his attention to her leg. It looked infected and he knew it must be hurting her, judging from her earlier actions. When he tried to touch it to examine it, she let out a yip and pulled it away. She was a pet, that reaction cemented his theory. If she was wild, that would have been an attack instead of pulling away.

There was a ranger's cabin not far from here, he thought as he eyed her. He could get to it and clean out the wound. He knew he was going to have a serious talk with some irresponsible campers after he did. This was a national park with wild animals. It was not somewhere you let your pet run wild, not even a wolf dog.

He radioed in that he was heading there and bend down to pick her up. She wasn't going to be able to walk on that leg, not with how infected it was, he reasoned. He just hoped that there was no permanent damage and that the wolf dog wouldn't die on him.

There was a moment of panic when he picked her up, but she adjusted and seemed to tolerate it. She probably knew he was trying to help he tried to tell himself, eyeing their surroundings for evidence of the other wolf pack. They would likely have no interest in him, but her, hurt near their pack-lands was not a good idea. The longer he walked, the more she relaxed and he, in turn began to relax as well.

When they reached the cabin, he set her down on the bed and went back in the main room to gather what he needed to clean the wounds. He grabbed the first aid kit and some water and then headed back to the wolfdog, satisfied that the things he gathered would be enough for now.

When he walked into the room though, he instantly froze, and the water slipped from his grasp to hit the floor with a loud and definite noise. A woman laid were the wolf had seconds before and if that wasn't a big enough shock, he felt his body come alive to the sight of the naked woman.

Her hair was the same color as the wolf's fur had been and she had to be around his age. He knew it wasn't polite to stare, but he couldn't seem to stop himself. She was one of the most beautiful women he had ever seen. Her skin almost shone with vitality and her muscles were strong and defined. If shew as truly the wolf, he knew they were muscles earned from hunting and running. He knew the sound had to of woken her when she shifted and he immediately tried to look away, again failing.

The sound of something hard meeting another hard surface had woken her. She started to open her eyes, then slammed them shut. Foreign colors assaulted her vision, and she sighed in frustration. She had broken her promise to herself. Injured and hurt, her wolf had turned to and trusted her human half. The human part of her knew the injury needed treatment and had betrayed the wolf. Running straight to the humans in a situation she likely thought was the only solution.

Images of the pack fight flashed through her mind, and she remembered the rival's teeth in her leg. Injured and bleeding, she had run from her pack's territory. This man, this human had found her, and she hadn't had the strength to fight him. Even now, she could feel the heat and pain of the infection in her leg.

She took a deep breath, hoping that would help her determine where she was, but she barely smelled anything. Oh yea, human noses sucked. The thought filled her head moments later and she suppressed a sigh at the reminder. She had relied on her wolf noise far more then she had realized, and human's scents were poor when compared to a wolfs.

She opened her eyes again, this time carefully as she let them slowly adjust. They adjusted slow, but when they did, she looked around to see that she was in a cabin. It had the familiar sense of security she felt when she visited the packs den during whelping season. Was this a home? Was it like the one from so long ago?

Her eyes traveled around the room until they fell on the human who had carried her. He had dark brown hair and eyes. He wore the outfit she often saw the park rangers wearing and remembering that he was hardly out of breath when carrying her, she knew he had to be quite active within the park. The outfit had to mean that he had to be an employee of the park. That would explain what he was doing in no man's land after the packs fight.