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KATIE SAW THEIR huge woolly heads coming over the rise, heard the loud, guttural noises they made as they charged across the open grazing plains. Three massive bison were nearing, dark brown in color, a gigantic bull and a pair of cows; four, really, including the smaller reddish calf tagging along. Katie noted their shaggy bulk as they ran, the short sharp horns.

They all stopped abruptly in their tracks, stood unmoving, ghosts in the tallgrass, staring blankly, then one of them broke away from the rest—the giant bull whose rear half was a dirty white, Kate could see now, sable brown fur covering its head and mottling back over its humped shoulders. It came rumbling like a train across the rolling meadow land, leaving the others behind.

“Miracle,” Katie breathed, her eyes dreamy-wide, her heart soaring.

He was headed straight for them, she realized with some alarm. Right for the boundary fencing and the individuals this side of it. Katie stepped away from the group, who wer