Trapped

<Even when you’re grody.>

That’s … very generous of you.

Oberon’s nose lifted in the air again, but not for the display of any attitude. His nostrils flared. <Atticus, I smell the dead. Lots of them. Coming this way.>

I frowned at my hound. Vampires?

<Unless we missed the zombie apocalypse, I’d say so.>

All directions?

<No, from this side of the mountains.>

So they would be French vampires. Perhaps the vampires from the Iberian Peninsula wouldn’t be far behind. After my conversation with Theophilus, I could well imagine that he’d given the command worldwide to hunt us—I certainly hadn’t ceased to train my apprentice, so I must assume that his promised pogrom had begun and the world’s vampires were sniffing us out.

It probably wouldn’t be all that difficult to find me, provided I stayed in one place; my ancient blood smelled different from that of modern humans, and if they’d been told by their mysterious Fae connection that I was binding Granuaile to the earth, they’d know to search the wild places in Europe.

I had no desire to remain and take on an unknown number of vampires, so I shifted to Tír na nÓg and found a relieved Granuaile waiting for us. She did a couple of pogo jumps in the dark. “I did it!”

“Indeed. And now let’s go to Tanzania. Lead the way again.”

We spent some time finding an appropriate place to shift. We chose some acacia woodlands in Lake Manyara National Park, and then we went ahead as before, with Granuaile going first.

<Are you going to tell her about the vampires?> Oberon asked once she’d shifted.

Soon. I need to think about it a little bit. She has enough to worry about at the moment.

When we reached Tanzania, which was humid and warm and full of animals eating one another, we both had our night vision on. Granuaile was giddy.

“Can I shape-shift now?”

“Wait a moment. Bind with Oberon first.”

“Oh! Yeah. Duh! I’m sorry, Oberon, I’m just so excited.”

<She’s dancing like she has to go to the bathroom.>

“He understands,” I told her. “Okay. So look at the connection between Oberon and me in the magical spectrum. You need to bind yourself to him in the same way so that you can hear his thoughts and vice versa.”

“Will you be able to hear my thoughts too?”

“No. The only person I know capable of human telepathy is the Morrigan, and she doesn’t accomplish it through traditional bindings.”

“What if we’re both in animal form?” Granuaile asked. “Do we use Oberon as a go-between to speak to each other?”

“I suppose we could.”

<If you want to drive me insane.>

“But we should probably try to keep that to a minimum,” I added.

Granuaile nodded. “Poor dog would probably go nuts.”

<She’s a bit more sensitive than you, Atticus.>

Hey!

<Give me two months to work on her and I bet she’ll get me a French poodle.>

Do not take advantage of her generous nature!

<Are you serious? You might as well ask me to stop being a hound.>

Granuaile gave a tiny gasp and her eyes widened. “I heard that! Or the end of it. Why would you want him to stop being a hound?”

<Hello, Clever Girl.>

“Hi, Oberon! It’s so nice to finally hear your voice! Is ‘Clever Girl’ your name for me?”

“He’s been calling you that ever since that business with the skinwalkers. Watch out. He’s buttering you up for something.”

“Is that so?” Her eyebrows asked a question of my hound.

<Ignore the surly Druid. I have no shadowy agenda. I am motivated by food.>

“And tonight you’re hungry for really tiny antelopes.”

<That’s right! But I’ll settle for whatever we can catch.>

“Okay. I’ve never hunted before, so you’ll need to give me some tips and forgive me if I screw up, all right?”

<Tonight I will cut you infinite slack.>

“Good. Because my predator form is a giant black cat.”

<You’re a cat person?> Oberon whipped his head around to me. <Atticus, you never said anything about that!>

“It wasn’t my choice, Oberon!” Granuaile said. “Gaia chose my predator form. If it had been my choice, I would have been a wolfhound like you and Atticus.”

That’s true, buddy, I said privately. She didn’t have any say in her animal forms. Besides, what does it matter? She’s Granuaile no matter what shape she’s in.

<Well, that’s a fair point,> Oberon admitted.

“What is?” Granuaile asked.

<He said you’d still be Clever Girl no matter what your shape is.>

“Oh. That’s true. Atticus, maybe we should speak aloud to Oberon whenever we can so we don’t have to always ask him for clarification when he answers?”

“Yep. Good idea. I’m used to keeping a lid on it, so it will take me some time to break the habit.”

<Let’s hunt.>

Granuaile and I disrobed and placed our clothes near the tethered tree. We asked the earth to part and conceal our weapons for us.

“One more thing before you shift,” I said. “I have to fix your necklace.”

“Oh.” Granuaile raised her hand to the cold iron amulet dangling at her throat. “Good call. I would have garroted myself.”

“Would you mind terribly if I did this for you? Fix it so that it changes sizes with your shape? I could teach you how, but it would take a while.”

“No, go ahead,” she said.

“You’ll have to shift to every form to do it properly, and I know you’ve been dying to anyway.” I moved around her and unfastened her necklace, noting as I did so how much slack and extra chain there was. Then I stepped away with it in my hand. “So let’s take it from the top. Horse first. Go.”

Granuaile spoke the words that would bind her spirit to the form of the horse indelibly tattooed on her arm. She shifted to a beautiful copper-colored chestnut, sometimes called sorrel, with her mane slightly lighter than her coat. Her nostrils flared and she sneezed. I told her what she looked like as I adjusted the necklace around her neck and memorized the size and position. She whinnied and stamped on the ground with her hooves, one leg at a time, no doubt marveling that she had four of them. I crafted the first part of the binding that would allow the necklace to shrink back to human size when she shifted.

“Okay, shift back to human. I know you want to run, but this isn’t the best place to do it. There are leopards in the trees here and other hungry things.”

Granuaile snorted and shifted back to human form. “Atticus, that was amazing! Four legs! Hooves! Incredible!”

“I know. Check your necklace.”

She looked down and saw that the necklace was fastened around her neck exactly as it had been before.

“You rock.”

<Don’t swell his head. It’s already the size of a zeppelin.>

I unfastened the necklace again. “Okay, kitty form.”