Zane gave a yelp when Byrce easily turned the tables, instead pouncing on him. He turned his head and body at the werewolf’s nip to return it with trying to bite at the thick fur near the large wolf’s neck, but his attention, too, turned to Thea when she moved. Taking advantage of Byrce’s pause in action, Zane wriggled away from the other wolf. When Byrce nudged his cheek against his, he tried to lick the other wolf’s snout, then pranced back to Thea as their mutual friend went to the river’s edge.
	“I did say [i]walk[/i], not swim, downriver, right?” Thea asked lightly before her friend looked back at them, Thea cocking her head curiously in response. When he gave his non-verbal request, she smiled at him, her attention already on him.
	Thea stepped closer and around the boulder she had sat on, bending her body to get a better look as he lifted a paw and placed it on the water. When a cloud of mist burst into existence and rolled over the water, she stepped back, surprised, and hit the boulder, making her fall to a sitting position on it. When the mist dissipated, leaving a thick layer of ice over the river rushing below it, Thea gawked and Zane gave a yelp and backed away, his ears pulling flat against his head.
	I thick layer of ice now glittered in the sunlight a good distance over the flowing river, reflecting the fiery leaves of the shedding trees nearest it.
	Zane glanced to Thea, caution in his dark, questioning gaze as he moved to stand more in front of her protectively.
	She paid Zane little attention, besides giving him an absent reassuring pat. When Byrce looked to them again, she could not help but mimic his grin as she returned to her feet.
	“You… have magic!” she exclaimed excitedly, her expression widening and twinkling in her eyes as Byrce walked across the ice.
	She stepped to the ice’s edge as Byrce ran back to them, then stopped in front of her. She gladly let him tap her hand with his nose.
	“That’s… absolutely [i]amazing,[/i] Byrce!” She moved to quickly pet the fur on the side of his neck, then giddily stepped out onto the ice at the shallower part of the river.
	Zane whimpered in a warning against it, pawing indecisively at the edge of the ice as Thea lifted her skirts just enough to see her boots on the frozen water as she stepped out further onto the icy river. She turned back to Byrce, slipping slightly.
	“Byrce Vukasin,” she began in a grand voice, thrusting one hand out to the side, “prince of the wolves, and master of ice!” She draped her arm over her midsection, and gave Byrce a mix between a deep bow and a curtsy.