Moonlight and Silver

Cynthia halted her sprint just short of source of the desperate sounds that had drawn her so deep without a thought for her own safety.

Just ahead a break in the canopy from a fallen tree as big around as Alberto's wagon was filled with moonlight shining down upon a woman leaning against the same log. Her long dark hair alternating deep blacks and blues while doing nothing to preserve any sense of modesty around the almost water etched channels defining each muscle.

As Cynthia looked it was hard for her to decide what could make someone who looked like…that, scream like her very soul was being ripped out. The answer came as the woman reached for her leg, drawing Cynthia's attention from the Woman's nudity to the source of her plights.

A bear trap of a size that she had only seen once long ago when several villages had joined funds to hire a hunter to take out a dire bear who was taking out the disruption to its winter slumber on any live stock or farmer it came across on a path towards the villages.

The Woman gritted her teeth and grabbed hold of the trap as blood welled around where metal sunk into flesh, and screamed as she tried to pry the device open. She made tremendous progress, but right before she could either get her leg out of the way or lock the device back into a neutral position the smell of burning flesh reached Cynthia and the woman jerked her hands away.

The trap snapped shut again, its teeth burying deeper into the woman's leg from the force and smoke curled from her palms into the moonlight.

"FUUUUUUCK!" the woman snarled almost inhumanly, a frustrated fist slammed into the tree truck sending splinters of wood flying as far as Cynthia's feet.

Cynthia grimaced and started walking towards the woman. With the shock of a naked person wearing off, her mind grasped at old fertility rituals the village used to preform in its heyday that involved naked dances and runs through the woods. This mental justification of the woman's state transmuted the last of of the lingering shock into out rage at the man, for only they could be so thoughtless, who had placed a bear trap in the path of a rite.

A slight breeze filtered through the trees and the woman froze with nothing but a twitching nose to show she was a living creature. Unconsciously Cynthia shifted from storming up to a fellow human to approaching a skittish cow.

Once Cynthia was where she could be seen the woman snarled, unperturbed Cynthia reached a gentle hand out for the woman to smell.

'Why am I treating this woman like a beast?' Cynthia wondered to herself 'Am I that intimidated by her physique?'

The woman sniffed for a moment then softly growled "This better not be a trick girl. You don't have the smell of a poacher on you but I would not put it past one to hire someone unconnected to their foul blood trade to get around my suspicions."

Calmly Cynthia replied "I am no hunter nor poacher, me and my companion were just passing by when I heard your pain. Now what can I do to help get you out of this? I am clearly not your equal in strength but with the right lev-"

The woman interrupted fiercely "Just give me your shirt and that will be all the aid I need."

Cynthia's brains stutters to a halt, this woman wants her shirt? Her shirt? Cynthia had never considered herself ugly but had never thought someone would demand she strip down on the spot. Wait was this the trap all along? Was this woman bait to get her in a comprised situation then carry her off as a slave. Though the idea of being subservient to this woman stirred a heat comparable to what was roused when Alberto let a glance linger a smidgen to long.

"SNAP OUT OF IT YOU HORMONAL PUPPY!" the woman literally barked, then in a pain sharpened tone "I can fuck you to your hearts content, AFTER we get the bleeding stopped! NOW off with that shirt!"

With a blush half from the embarrassment of forgetting the severity of the situation and half from the woman's offer, Cynthia doffed her top.

Instead of tearing it into strips for a tourniquet the woman wrapped her hands carefully in the shirt before counting down "Three, two, ONE!" and once again pitting her muscles against the mechanism of the trap, with her leg in the teeth of the device she could not get it more than half way open but Cynthia had recovered enough presence of mind to reach down and pull the injured leg from the trap.

Cynthia picking up the shirt as it fell to the ground she was reaching for the injured leg that now bleed freely with the teeth of the trap removed, but stopped in shock once more.

Freed from the trap Cynthia's shirt had fallen from the woman's hands…Because they were no longer hands!

In the woman's place whimpered a dire wolf, the wound from in the leg mending itself before Cynthia's eyes. She looked closer at the trap, seeing for the first time the silver lining the edge of every surface.

She had heard stories of beast kin who's human forms were tied to various natural occurrence, but she had never dreamed they had been more than stories to teach children bushcraft.

The practical bent of her mind reasserted itself, the woman dog was starting to fall asleep from the strain of the ordeal and if someone was keen enough to set a silvered trap it was a safe bet they would be making rounds to collect soon.

Snapping off several branches from the fallen tree to make stretcher. With not a little effort Cynthia gets her new charge aboard and off to the wagon.

'I wonder how Alberto manged to miss all this noise?' Cynthia muses to herself, 'It sure would be useful if he showed up about now.'