But Leo would not be deterred. He leapt into the air and met it head on, sinking his fangs into the hornhog’s throat, catching it off guard and driving it to the ground, despite its size.

Kyra watched in shock, so proud of Leo’s courage, but was amazed to see that, for the first time, her wolf’s razor sharp fangs were unable to puncture a creature’s hide, as thick as it was. The hornhog merely rolled on its back and threw Leo, who went flying onto his back. The hornhog then charged for the prone wolf.

Kyra, horrified, saw that it was about to kill Leo, and that she would not reach him in time.

“NO!” Kyra shrieked.

Her reflexes kicked in. Without thinking, she grabbed her bow, placed an arrow, raised it, and took aim.

Her heart slammed as she watched the arrow sail through the air, praying that it hit its mark, with barely time to take aim.

The arrow hit the hornhog in its eye, a powerful shot that would have felled any other beast.

But not this one. The hornhog shrieked in agony and, furious, turned away from Leo and set its sights, instead, on her. It reached up with its paw and merely snapped the arrow in two, then snarled at her, death in its eyes. At least Leo’s life had been spared.

It charged and Kyra had no time to reload another arrow; it was too close, and too fast, and she knew that in but a moment it would tear her apart.

There came a vicious snarl, even more vicious than that of the hornhog, and Kyra suddenly felt Andor lunge beneath her. Andor snarled, lowered its horns, and charged with a ferocity unlike any Kyra had ever seen. As it bucked, it was all Kyra could do just to hang on.

A moment later there came a tremendous impact as the two creatures met, like the world shaking beneath her. Andor’s horns gored the hornhog in the side, and the hornhog shrieked in true despair. Kyra was shocked to witness Andor lift the immense creature high in the air, impaled on its horns, overhead, as if displaying a trophy of his kill.

Andor threw it, and it flew through the wood and landed with a thud, lifeless.

Whistling at Leo to follow, Kyra kicked Andor, and the group of them turned and took off at a gallop, running back through the wood, Kyra trying to get as much distance as she could from the rest of the pack, knowing this was a battle she did not want to fight—and a battle they all could not win. She hoped and prayed that the hornhogs were gorged, and that with one of their own dead, maybe they would think twice about pursuing any further.