Grace of a Wolf-Chapter 82: Grace: Strawberries (III)

"Here." I hand Owen his phone once he returns, and the absence of the device makes my fingers curl into fists. It’s like handing over my safety.

He accepts it with a nod, tucking it into his pocket. Bun wiggles in Owen’s arms, leaning toward me with grabby hands. Her eyes—wide and dark—fix on mine with intensity.

"Guh!" she demands, and I reach out without thinking.

Owen transfers her into my arms without comment. The weight of her settles against my chest, warm and solid.

I freeze.

The bunny ears I’d gently dried minutes ago have vanished. In their place are triangular, twitching appendages covered in fine black fur.

Cat ears. Definitely cat ears.

I blink hard, certain I’m hallucinating. My fingers tentatively reach up to touch one. It twitches beneath my touch—warm, soft, and undeniably real. Not a headband or costume piece, but flesh and bone and fur growing directly from her scalp.

A dizzy sensation washes over me. This isn’t possible.

"What the—" I cut myself off, glancing at the other children.

None of them seem remotely concerned. Sara and Jer are finished cleaning. Ron sits cross-legged on a woven mat, flipping through a dog-eared book with some cartoons on the cover.

Jer skips over, reaching up to stroke Bun’s new ears with familiarity.

"Are you a cat now?" he asks with a grin, unfazed by this new development.

Bun responds with a high-pitched "Meow!" which sounds uncannily authentic. Her eyes narrow in satisfaction as Jer scratches behind her ears.

My arms tighten around her instinctively. "But she was—"

"Ooh, be a duck next!" Sara interrupts, hovering at my elbow. "Ducky Bun is the best!"

Before I can process what’s happening, the cat ears melt away. Not falling off, not retracting—they simply disappear, sinking into her head. Bun’s entire face shifts next, her nose and upper lip extending outward, hardening and flattening into an unmistakable yellow duck bill.

"Quack!" she announces proudly, her voice muffled by her new anatomy.

My knees nearly buckle, but I hold myself upright by sheer force of will and the vague panic I might drop the baby. "What’s... how...?"

Cold sweat breaks out across my forehead. I’ve lived with wolf shifters for years, seen what transformation looks like.

But they can only transform into wolves. Not random other animals.

A shifter can only be one thing.

This? It’s impossible.

"Stop messing with her," Ron calls out, not looking up from his book. He sounds bored. Maybe mildly irritated. "You know she gets stuck sometimes when she shifts too fast."

My mouth opens and closes several times before words finally emerge. "What kind of shifter is she?"

Ron looks up with a blink, slamming his book closed. "Didn’t we already tell you? We’re all special."

"But..." I can’t wrap my head around this. There’s special, and then there’s impossible. "Shifters can only transform into one animal. That’s how it works."

The kid shrugs, unimpressed by my crisis. "Says who? The rules people tell you are just the rules they know."

Owen pats Bun’s head. "Turn back," he says, and I wonder how he doesn’t scare her with the way he speaks. He sounds like he’s going to murder us all if she doesn’t do as he says.

But the toddler just quacks at him. She’s now sporting not only the orange duck bill, but whiskers. She looks at me and quacks again, seeming delighted as her eyes crinkle up into happy little crescents.

"That’s not..." My voice trails off. "That’s not possible."

Sara plops down beside me, her small legs folded beneath her. Bun dives toward her head-first, sliding out of my arms with alarming ease, and my heart plummets, already envisioning her head splitting open when she hits the ground.

But the older girl catches her like this is a daily occurrence. Maybe it is.

Bun wiggles in Sara’s lap, making her duck noises with glee as she flaps her arms.

Sara blows raspberries onto Bun’s neck, dissolving the little girl into a peal of honking laughter.

Jer stands in front of me, arms across his chest and legs spread wide as he announces, "I can be five different animals."

The brown-haired girl groans, rolling her eyes dramatically. "A mouse and a rat are basically the same thing. And a guinea pig isn’t much better."

"They’re different," he insists, glowering at her naysaying.

"Barely."

"I can still shift into more animals than you!"

"Please. At least mine are different."

He sneers, with all the arrogance of a seven-year-old. Or however old he is. "Yeah, so different you can’t even fly when you shift into a bird."

"Enough," Owen says, and Sara sticks her tongue out at Jer when he turns his back.

Bun moves with surprising insight and agility, suddenly rolling off Sara’s lap and bolting toward my legs.

Jer suddenly launches himself at Sara with all the ferocity of a tiny predator. Tiny round ears pop out of his head.

They tumble across the floor, a tangle of child-sized limbs and high-pitched shouts.

"I’m gonna bite your ear off!" Sara shrieks.

Jer bellows. "Yeah? Then I’ll make you bald!"

I stand frozen as Bun clings to my leg. My mind races through potential responses. Should I intervene? Let them work it out? The line between responsible adult and confused hostage is very, very fuzzy.

Back at the pack, I was never responsible for breaking up fights between kids. Even young, they’re strong.

Before I can decide, Owen wades into the chaos like a superhero of questionable origin. One moment they’re a tangled mess on the ground; the next, two kids have been hauled off the floor by the backs of their shirts, kicking and punching wildly as they dangle a foot off the ground.

It’s... comical, really.

"I said, enough," the reticent man states, as impassively terrifying as ever.

"He started it!" Sara yells, her freckled face flushed with outrage.

Jer’s indignation matches hers. "She stuck her tongue out at me!"

Owen regards them with stony silence, but neither of them break. They keep up the glowers and occasional kicks in each others’ direction.

Tension builds until he finally speaks, his voice low and matter-of-fact: "I was going to order pizza." ƒreewebɳovel.com

The mild statement has an immediate—and astonishing—effect. Both children freeze mid-flail, their expressions shifting from fury to shock to calculation in the span of seconds.

Sara clears her throat, smoothing her expression into something resembling contrition. "On the other hand, maybe I was a little mean to Jer."

"Yeah," Jer agrees, nodding solemnly.

Sara shoots him a venomous look. He catches it and hastily adds, "But I should have been the bigger man and let it go." Like he isn’t younger than her.

Sara rolls her eyes.

But she doesn’t argue.

The well-meaning (?) kidnapper lowers them to the ground with surprising gentleness. The moment their feet touch the floor, they throw their arms around each other’s shoulders, plastering identical grins across their faces—the fakest expressions of friendship I’ve ever witnessed.

Ever.

"See? We made up," they chirp in perfect unison.

Jer leans toward the man, his whisper loud enough to qualify as a shout, "Can we still eat pizza?"

Owen grunts. "Behave first," he commands.

"Got it," they chorus.

Ron sighs.

My heart rate quickens as I watch him move toward what must be the exit. This is it—my first glimpse at a potential escape route. Bun tugs at my leg and I pick her up absently, my eyes glued to Owen as I angle myself for a better view of what he’s doing.

He approaches what appears to be just another section of cave wall, tapping an unremarkable-looking rock formation.

The floor shakes, and a section of wall slides away. Like magic. Harry Potter style.

No daylight comes through the door—it’s dark out. But there’s a faint breeze, carrying fresh air.

I breathe in deep.

Bun reaches up, grabbing at my hair right above my scalp as she scrambles to stand in my arms. Her chubby foot scrabbles at my chest and throat as she climbs my face, and I grip her torso with as much strength as I dare, terrified of her falling.

Ron, the absolute angel, comes over and plucks her off my face. These kids handle her with confidence, like she’s as dangerous as a sack of potatoes. Me? I feel like I’m handling glass.

Wiggly, slobbery glass.

He hands her back to me, settled into a more normal position. Despite the duck bill hiding most of her expression, I get the distinct sense Bun is grumpy.

"Don’t let her do that," Ron advises, patting her head. "She won’t stop if she thinks she can get away with it."