[Fordim Hedgethistle]

Stout whinnied in terror as the great she-wolf loped toward them, her tongue hanging out between yellowed teeth, her eyes ablaze with a terrible hunger. Fordogrim just had time to realise that neither Harold nor Kalimac would be able to help him when the wolf was beneath Stout, slashing at his faithful pony’s flanks. Stout screamed with pain as one paw raked its way through the flesh of his belly, and rearing, he spun about. Fordogrim gripped the saddle with his free hand and tried to hit the wolf with the only weapon he had – his cane – but the knotted wood only cut through the air as he flailed about uselessly. Again, the wolf lunged at the pony and Stout turned about, Fordogrim thought to run away, but his old friend’s heart was apparently made of sterner stuff. As the wolf made for them, Stout lashed out with a hind leg, neatly catching the monster on the side of her shaggy head.

The wolf staggered back and fell against a tree, yelping and spitting in anger. But she soon righted herself, and lowered her belly to the ground. Now, the thrill of the hunt was gone from her eyes, and there was only a blind hatred. She glared at Stout and Fordogrim with the look of a beast intent upon destruction and rapine. Fordogrim knew that all thoughts of food were now gone from her mind; all she wanted was to kill, and to feel the blood of her prey course over her teeth. She took her time in this attack, circling around the slower moving pony, whose own movements were beginning to slow down from the pain of his wound. The wolf soon got behind them both and immediately sprang. Fordogrim turned in his saddle and lashed out with his cane. “Get away you mongrel!” he cried, sure that it was the last thing he would ever say.

Whether the hobbit or the wolf was more surprised by what happened next would be hard to say, for despite the dark and the sudden murderous speed of the beast, and the staggering gait of the pony, and Fordogrim’s failing eyesight, his cane somehow found the top of the wolf’s head. With a sound like that of a stone falling onto pavements, the wolf’s head was driven downward by the knotted wood of the cane. At that very moment, Stout had kicked out his legs in one last desperate attempt to leap forward and save his master, and as the wolf’s head went down it met the pony's hooves on the way up. There was another sound, this time, like a small door slamming shut as the wolf’s lower jaw was driven upward into her skull. She let out a howl of the purest agony as her sharp teeth cut through her tongue, and she fell to the earth splitting blood and trying to see through the welter of stars that swam before her vision.

Fordogrim wasted no time to gloat over his lucky victory. Looking about he saw Harold and Kalimac mounted upon the Whitfoot’s thoroughbred, facing the other two wolves. Spurring Stout toward them he pulled up at their side, brandishing his cane above his head and letting fly with what he hoped sounded like a fearsome cry of defiance. “Me and my Stout have handled one of these monsters! Let’s deal with these last two curs and send them back to the mother as whelped them!”