I Dance with Wolves, But I Dream of Dancing with You," The Legendary Giant Warrior Confessed

In the misty highlands of northern Oregon, where ancient forests whisper secrets to those brave enough to listen, Marcus Kane had earned a reputation that followed him like his own shadow. They called him the Wolf Walker, the man who moved through the wilderness with a pack of gray wolves as his only companions. What the townspeople below never understood was that Marcus hadn't chosen this life of solitude among the predators.

It had chosen him, claimed him, and held him prisoner for seven long years. The morning alarm never stood a chance against Marcus Kane's internal clock. His eyes opened at five fifteen, exactly three minutes before the ancient wind-up clock on his nightstand would shatter the silence of his cabin. The wooden structure sat nestled in a clearing twelve miles from the nearest road, accessible only by hiking trails that most people considered too dangerous to attempt alone. Marcus stretched his six-foot-eight frame, muscles protesting the confines of the narrow bed he had built himself from Douglas fir logs.

His hands, scarred from years of outdoor survival and construction work, found the edge of the wool blanket his sister had sent him three Christmases ago. Back when she still hoped he might return to civilization, back when she believed the tragedy that had driven him into the mountains was something time could heal. The floorboards of his cabin knew exactly where to groan and where to remain silent as he moved through the pre-dawn darkness. Every piece of furniture had its designated place, its specific function, its careful distance from everything else.

The wood-burning stove sat precisely four feet from the kitchen counter he had fashioned from reclaimed barn wood. His hiking boots waited by the heavy oak door, laces adjusted to the perfect tension for quick departure but secure enough to handle twelve-hour days in treacherous terrain. His coffee supplies occupied a metal cabinet mounted eight inches above the counter, protected from the mice and chipmunks that occasionally found their way inside despite his best efforts at wildlife-proofing.

Next to the cabinet, a stack of unopened mail had accumulated over the past six months, letters from family members who still believed regular communication might eventually convince him to rejoin society. Outside, the Oregon sky stretched endless and gray, heavy with the promise of rain that would turn the forest trails into muddy channels and make his daily rounds more challenging than usual.

The thermometer mounted on his porch read forty-two degrees, cold enough to require layers but warm enough for the kind of physical activity that would occupy most of his daylight hours. Marcus poured his coffee strong and black, then stepped onto the wraparound porch that provided a clear view of the surrounding forest in all directions. The two-hundred-acre parcel of land had belonged to his grandfather, a logger who had purchased it in nineteen sixty-eight when timber rights still meant something to independent operators.

Back then, it had been called Pine Haven, a name that suggested peaceful retirement and family gatherings around the massive stone fireplace his grandfather had built by hand. Now Marcus simply called it the sanctuary, a place where wounded wildlife could recover without human interference and where he could maintain the delicate relationships he had developed with the local wolf population. The gray wolves had returned to this region only recently, part of a natural migration that had brought them down from the Canadian wilderness in search of territory that could support their complex social structures. Marcus had encountered his first wolf during the second winter after the accident that had changed everything.