The man stood there in silence, waiting for an answer that was taking an awful amount of time to come. As he waited, he observed the little wolf he'd chased down. Wolves weren't normally small.
They manifested at an age where they were nearly fully grown so finding one that was this small was next to impossible. Then again, it wasn't unheard of for a child to experience an early first shift.
Still, that didn't explain what just happened. Five minutes had already passed since the two had stopped running, yet the man was still panting.
The small wolf, on the other hand, had more signs of fear than exhaustion. The fall that allowed the larger wolf to catch up was more than enough reason to…
'That fall…' the man only now noticed something wrong with this small wolf. It had fallen, from far more than simple exhaustion. After paying more attention, he noticed a glaring set of ribs… and when he paid attention to the wolf's breathing patterns, his eyes went wide.