I remember reading an old Russian story about a wedding party with the bride, groom, and fathers of both coming home after the wedding in a rural location.

It was wintertime at night and they were traveling by horse drawn sleigh back to the city. As they started traveling through the woods, a pack of wolves began pursuing the sleigh. Seeing that the pack was about to overtake them, the father of the groom jumped off the sleigh sacrficing himself in the hopes of saving the others. Some of the pack stopped to kill and feed on him while the rest of the pack kept after the sleigh. The father of the bride jumped off the sleigh in hopes of saving his daughter and new son-in-law, and part of the pack killed him and started feeding on him while two of the wolves continued after the sleigh. The sleigh was heavy, and the horses were tired, and the two remaining wolves were gaining on the bride and groom. The groom tired from the chase, despondent over the loss of his father, and realizing there was only one way to throw off the wolves summoned his last bit of strength and threw his bride off the sleigh and continued on his way to the city.

The morales:

None of us know for sure what we are truly capable of until a situation arises.

Our heritage does not guarantee our actions.

And damn few of us are as good as our fathers.

By the way, in the Russian of those days, if his own relatives had not killed the groom to put him out of the families shame and misery, the relatives of the bride would have.

Bountyhunter