Chapter 1
A LONE WOLF
Snow blew and icey spikes seemed to rain down the waterfall. Ice raced down to the path behind the waterfall, his silvery white fur flattened by the wind. This was the biggest blizzard he could remember, and the windiest! Unlike other wolves, he relieshed the ice and snow winter came with. Others hide from it. He couldn't remember his real name, but he liked the name Ice. Wolves lived in packs, but Ice went it alone. He couldnt get used to the order of all the different ranks, so he had left. He blinked the snow out of his eyes as he entered the tunnels behind the falls. He was a legend among packs, and feared. There were rumors about him in the packs, though few were true. It was rumored that he was the only wolf who had learned to climb trees; this was true. Some thought that he was really a spirit from the stars; this was not true, but he did look a bit like a ghost on a full moon night with deep snow. Many beleived he was abandoned; this is true. Some, very few but still some, thought he was a demon even though his fur is a close to white silvery; this was definitly not true. Nearly all wolves beleived that he had darkness in his soul, and was disgiused by white fur; this was not true either. The tunnels were quiet despite the blizzard, knowone dared to venture into the darkness of his home world. Ice headed to a narrow crack in the rock hidden by a large boulder. Slipping behind it he agily slid down the winding maze and entered a cavern the size of a small tree. Ice leaped onto a ledge in the cave and was soon asleep.
Chapter 2
MERGING DREAMS
Stone padded into her den and shook her fur. That blizzard was rageing! Not even anceint old Moss could remember a storm like this, and Moss was about as old as a wolf could get! That she still walked was a wonder. She clambered into her nest of moss and ferns, she wouldn't be needed today. It was to windy for the hunters. When she fell asleep the wind howled in her dreams. She was standing on a stone ledge, in a dark, cold place she didnt recognize. A silvery wolf with icey blue eyes was looking at her intently. Then the wolf leaped off the ledge and into the shadows.
Meanwhile, Ice was haveing the very same dream, it just had more in it. He stood on the ledge, looking at a pine-colered wolf with a tint of gray in her fur. He leaped off the ledge, flying down the tunnels to another, smaller cavern. Standing there was a wolf, a wolf standing in flames! His eyes blazed with light, and his fur glowed in red flame. "The mark..." The wolf whispered. "who-who are you?" Ice whispered. the wolf gave no answer, only kept whispering "the mark..." He raised a front paw, and flipped it over. Ice gasped, there was a mark on his paw, but not any mark. It showed a picture of red and the white-blue of ice swirling together, endlessly spiraling together. That mark, it was on HIS paw! All of a sudden, the wolf was engulfed in flames, and disappeared in a swirl of smoke. Startled, Ice woke and found himself in the quiet of the ledge. "Just... just a dream... so real..." he breathed.
Chapter 3
STORMING WINDS
Ice padded down the tunnel to the cavern where he saw the dream wolf. Tentavly he looked around the corner into the cavern; nothing. he padded forward; still nothing. "Hello?" he called. Even still, nothing. "Please answer me! who are you? What are the lines on my paw?" He threw the questions at a wall of silence. Maybe it was just a dream, maybe the wolves didn't exist. No, he thought. That dream was to real, his pads still hurt from the heat of the fire, not being used to heat in his cold stone world. But why so real? What did it mean? questions flew around his head waiting for answers. Shaking his head, he looped back up the tunnel to the entrance. the wind still howled, and a wall of white still blew, but it was quieter behind the falls. and with the falls in the way, he had less risk of being snowed in. he stepped out onto the ice-slick path. he didnt slip becuase he was used to ice, and knew every way to avoid slipping. He spread his paws out and balanced his weight on each paw evenly and continued. The wind hit him like a boulder as soon as he came out from the falls. Nothing was visible through the flying flakes and he pushed through drifts as high as his cheek. the weather was harsh, no normal wolf could stand this and live without injurys, but he wasn't a normal wolf. He climbed up a boulder that hadnt iced yet and sat well above the snow. He closed his eyes and breathed deep. few would even be out in the weather, but he loved the howling winds and blinding flakes with all his heart. It reminded him of home.
Down
"Stone, Stone!" Stone shook her head awake, Twig, the lead hunter was prodding her awake. "Huh? good timing, I was having the weirdest dream!" she shook her head again. "what is it?" She asked. "the wind died a bit, and the hunters are going out, the pack needs meat." "coming" Stone padded out of the den, the blizzard raged as fiercly as ever. The other hunters were huddled in the wind, sheltering under the hanging rock; a rock that stuck up like a rock crop, but was bent in the middle to form a kind of arch that didn't touch the ground at one end. twig looked around to see that everyone was there. "Lets go!" She howled above the wind, and the patrol raced out of camp. they trod through the snow, sniffing for any prey to take back. stone didn't think they had much hope of finding anything. Suddenly she was falling into a dark empty space, down, down, down, into an anceint stone world. "STONE!!" She heard Storm, a male hunter behind her, howl. She hit the floor, and everything turned black.
Broken Isolation
Visions... dreams... things of the future... the past... the present? Stone was running through a dark, stone maze. Up, down, left, right, she could never find the way out. she howled for help, the howls echoed back to her, echoes from the past, and soon, the future. Now she was teaking through deep snow, trying to see her way. the highest boulders in the world stretched in front of her. Towering to the sky. Stone blinked her eys open, wind blew yet the air around her was still. It was freezing, yet strangly warm. Was she alive? Was she dead? She tried to get up, but flopped back down. Where was she? where were the hunters? A huge pain suddenly swamped her, and she clenched her jaws so not to alert any creatures down here that she was there. Would she live? how would she get home? Would she get home? she craned her neck and saw that her foreleg was broken, it was bent at an odd angle. Still confused, she tried to remember how she got down. she had ben following the hunting patrol... yes. She thought. I stepped in a snow bank, and there must have ben loose earth. it caved in, and hear I am. Tired and stunned, she fell back asleep.
Ice shook his head. home was in the past, and now he had a new one. "STONE!!" A howl sounded. Ice jerked his head in the direction it came. Wolves. Pack wolves. Strange wolves. thekind he avoided. He leaped off the rock and raced for the tunnels. the wind battered his flank as he ran onward. He slowed at the falls and went behind and inside. But something... something didn't feel right. he felt as if his isolation had ben broken. Like a beaver dam giving way so that the river flows past. He shook his head. Who would venture down here? Ice leaped up onto the ledge and crircled, laying down he sat there for hours. Sleep would not come. Something just wasn't right. getting up, he leaped down to explore the tunnels, the ancient stone maze that had ben his home for years.
