her jaws. And shaking the poor thing, she let it fall on its side. That should have been enough, but in the next moment ... an amazing thing! For the jaws of the fox yawned open and it snapped at Singer's face, and what with the spray of flying mud, and the snarling, snapping, and threshing of their heads where their jaws seemed locked, it appeared to Radu watching from the bank that something passed between them, from fox to wolf. Or it could have been that Singer had ripped out the fox's tongue to swallow it whole! Whichever, that signalled the end of it; the fox sprayed red from his mouth, sank down into the mud and gave up the ghost.
But it was not the end of it for Singer. Leaping to firm ground, she sprang this way and that, coughed and choked, and bounded in the air, until finally she collapsed. Unconscious, she lay with her sides heaving, then grew still, and only the faintest of heartbeats to let her master know she yet lived.
Dismayed, Radu sat with Singer a while, there by the rim of the swamp, with her head in his lap and her tongue lolling, until it appeared she wouldn't die. Then, draping her over his shoulders, he carried her out of that place, and in an hour or so she struggled to be put down. Shortly after that, to Radu's great relief, she seemed as good as new. She seemed that way, at least ...
They explored for an afternoon and an evening - that was all, but more than enough in that place - before Radu headed south and a little east, to skirt the barrier mountains into Sunside. He knew it to be a route which must take him into Zirescu territory sooner or later, but by then he would have climbed back up into the mountain heights and so put temptation behind him. So he thought.
And when the ominous twilight failed and the long night fell at last, because the region was strange to Radu and possibly dangerous with hitherto unknown hazards, and the swamps alive with mosquitoes and other flying things, he found a cave in an outcrop at the foot of the mountains and built a fire in the entrance to keep injurious insects and other creatures at bay; behind which he and the now strangely withdrawn she-wolf sheltered and prepared for sleep ... ... When down from the heights echoed a distant howling in praise of a blotchy yellow moon tumbling through the murky sky. And though Singer's nose lifted and her eyes lit with recognition, still she made no reply to the songs of the grey brothers on the mountain flanks. And even when Radu sang a low tune to himself (as he was wont to do in strange places), Singer held back from joining in; not even a growl escaped her, or a yawn of her long-jawed, soft-leather mouth. So that all in al Radu considered it weird, but perhaps a mood was on her, which in a place like this he could understand well enough ...
During the night on those several occasions when Radu woke up to toss branches on the fire, stretch his legs or relieve himself, he discovered Singer awake, silent, staring out past the slow-burning fire into the night, or whining low in her throat, or shaking her head from some unknown irritation and pawing at the earth where she stood in the entrance of the cave.
Far more worrying, on the last such occasion, she was on her belly close by, forepaws outstretched in Radu's direction, peering at him intently through her feral - or sick? - yellow triangular eyes. Following which he felt it prudent to remain awake, and sat by the fire until the twilight before the dawn, then moved on with all speed towards the risen but as yet hidden sun somewhere on the far flank of the crumbling mountains. And it has to be said that Radu was glad the night was over ...
As the Sunside/Starside nights are long, the days are longer still. But the territory was unknown to Radu, the rotting rock of the lower mountains was treacherous (so that he must go with care and patience), and there always seemed to be a new, higher ridge behind whichever false plateau he had just negotiated.
For he had made up his mind that instead of skirting the mountains, he would cut diagonally across their lower ramparts and so