Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 121389 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121389 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Young as they were, none of the children had spotted the shift happening on the far edge of the yard, but the two leopard cubs’ heads snapped up the instant she stepped out of the shadows. They yelled out, “Dad! Mom!” without hesitation, giving up their surreptitious play in the face of danger.
Natal and Razi turned toward her, and for a moment she thought they’d forgotten her. It wouldn’t have surprised her. They were so young. But even as the back door slammed open and lights flooded the yard, both children ran toward her with yips of excitement, their bodies shifting midrun in a shower of sparks so that when their small bodies hit her own, they were in the forms of ocelot cubs.
TAMSYN grabbed Nathan’s arm and though he was a DarkRiver sentinel, aggressive protectiveness built into him, he didn’t shrug her off. “Boys.”
The twins ran back at their father’s single command, positioning themselves beside their parents. Tamsyn had known they wouldn’t run into the house, not when their friends were still out here. She was fairly certain Jules was going to grow up to be a dominant who’d head into soldier work, Rome a healer, both of them with protective streaks a mile wide.
Meanwhile, their adored pet, Ferocious, perched on top of the climbing frame, hissing at the intruder.
The intruder didn’t care, wasn’t watching. She was … crying.
Tamsyn’s eyes burned; she hadn’t known a big cat could cry like that. But this cat did as it nuzzled and licked the fur of the two children who were cuddling against her as if they’d found their mother. “I don’t think we have anything to worry about,” she murmured quietly to her mate.
But Nathan wasn’t looking at the poignant reunion taking place in the searing brightness of their backyard. His eyes were aimed at the darkness, their color leopard green. This time when he moved, she let him go. Skirting around the adult ocelot and the two cubs, he made for the edge of the yard.
Well aware he could handle himself, Tamsyn turned to ensure that her boys were behaving. As she did so, she caught sight of the rope created out of sheets being pulled back inside the house.
Roman, who’d stayed behind to distract her, while his partner in crime went to hide the evidence of their escape, said, “I thought you said their mama was in heaven?” And though he was doing it to distract her, she could tell the question was real. Slipping a small hand into hers, he looked over at his friends as they climbed all over the adult ocelot.
“Yes, their parents are in heaven,” she murmured. “But this is obviously someone they love.” Her scent was familiar, of the thin healer who’d refused to give DarkRiver her name.
The back door opened behind her, an older female voice saying, “Tamsyn, I heard—” Words cut off on a startled burst of air that turned into a cry of piercing joy. Even as Tamsyn was turning to greet the healer of some eight decades of age who’d gone to bed at the same time as the children, saying her old bones needed time to relax, Yariela shifted in a fragmentation of light.
The shift took as long as it took. Age didn’t change the speed of it. But the ocelot that came out of it moved slower and it had white in its coat. Such a symptom of age was rare in felines, but changelings tended to show it more often. Tamsyn had found the odd thread of silver in her mate’s pelt when she looked close, an echo of the silver threads that had appeared in the dark of his hair. Her Nathan was aging like a fine wine: the man just got better-looking.
But though this older ocelot moved more slowly, she did so with clear intent, and was soon standing face-to-face with the intruder, while the two children bounced up and down next to them.
Then the younger adult ocelot was bowing her head and the older one was rubbing the side of its own head against hers, before she went down onto the ground, her body a curve of welcome into which the intruder curled their own body, and the children curled their bodies in turn inside her curve.
Tamsyn didn’t realize she was crying until Roman looked up and said, “Mama? What’s wrong?” His own eyes were big and full of emotion, her sweet boy with a healer’s heart.
Crouching down just as a whirlwind emerged from the house to snuggle under her other arm, she said, “I’m happy.”
Roman patted away her tears with one small hand. “Happy tears,” he said, parroting something she’d said to her boys more than once. He kissed her on one cheek, while Julian echoed the move in perfect synchrony on the other side.