Circe's Gifts

Chapter 24

When they decided to rest again, Pet feared that Dylan would protest and start trouble. He looked ready to fight anyone and anything. Tiernan sat on a log by Dylan, oh so deceptively silent. Pet hadn't realized how easily the human manipulated them just by his silence. Dylan glanced at Tiernan and closed his mouth before he said anything.

Kalliope paced, even when they were supposed to be resting. Pet thought about suggesting she stop. He wasn't that stupid. Instead, he sat at Dylan's feet and played with the end of his braid, much like he used to grab at his tail and run his hands over it when he was especially nervous.

Dylan was in a mood and Kalliope anxious --

"If you're not going to rest, why the hell did you think the rest of us should sit here?" Dylan demanded. He pushed away from the log and stood. "Let's get going. We're wasting time!"

"You were stumbling on your feet, Dylan!" she answered with a snarl. Wrong thing to say of course. The cat hated to be told he was weak. "We would have been carrying you --"

"Which is no big deal, all in all," Pet offered. He forced a grin. "Relax. Dylan wasn't the only one who needed a break. I'm glad to sit down and have a chance to think again."

"And what have you thought?" Tiernan dared ask before either Dylan or Kalliope could start in again.

"We frightened that human," Pet replied. Then he grinned. "Or more properly, Kalliope frightened him. I saw him cast that spell, the one to turn you back into your true form --"

"Yes," Kalliope said. She stopped pacing. Dylan sat down, looking more intrigued than angry. It didn't take much to catch the cat's attention. "He thought he was turning me from wolf to human. He didn't know that wolf was my true form. And that frightened him."

"Why?" Tiernan asked. "The man had magic. Lots of magic. What would it matter to him if it was human changed to hawk or wolf changed into a human?"

"I don't think like a wolf anymore," Kalliope said and frowned, though she didn't look upset. "Even when I'm in wolf form it's not the same as it used to be. I suspect that you remain mostly human when you are a hawk. I know that you keep your ability to reason."

"True. So what does that mean about you three? What will it be like --"

"When we go back to being animals?" Dylan asked, his voice soft.

Pet could see that Tiernan hadn't fully considered that future. None of them had. They'd not been given a choice, though to be fair his mouse-brain could not have comprehended that particular question of choice before he became human anyway.

"I think we need to worry about the more immediate future," Kalliope suggested. She even sounded a little subdued, as though she tried hard not to find another reason to argue. "We'll be to the capital soon. I suspect this next part isn't going to be easy. There's no way we can just walk up to the King and tell him about this, right?"

"Right," Tiernan said. "I'll need to get to someone -- someone who might actually believe who I am. I've been gone for a long time."

"You've no way to prove who you are? Did no one see you in all those years?"

"Yes -- early on, but they may not be at court." He stared out at the trees. "I don't know if even my father would recognize me now."

"Wolves always know their young," Kalliope said.

"We aren't so gifted."

Diplomat, Pet thought with a smile he hid with a bowed head. The kid knew all the right things to say, and even Kalliope couldn't find fault with the answer.