“Restless night,” he said, glancing at them. “You need new sheets, or can you get another night out of these?”
“They’re fine.” I hugged an exuberant Keen. How much does it cost to bring a wulfleng to maturity? “I can buy you new ones.”
“No biggie. I get them at the thrift store.” He rubbed his hands together. “Okay, change into your running gear.”
While I got dressed, he stripped. I had a hard time looking away from the vicious scars tracing his body. When I declared myself ready, he had me place my hands on his shoulders and then his skull while he shifted. Seeing the change was very different from feeling it. It made me aware on a visceral level.
After he’d changed, we ran. Chris had me keep pace from various placements around him so I could observe how the wulfan moved up close. He spoke in his bestial form, although only in stilted sentences. The words were pronounced oddly, with the “u” sound prevalent and replacing many vowels, but I understood him well enough. We stopped several times so he could show me the full range of movement of his limbs. He also demonstrated a few other things his wulf body could do. The first time he leaped into the trees, I slid to a stop to stare, and Keen barked, bewildered. The forest in this region was a mix of deciduous and evergreen, but none of them were huge. This meant that the trunks kicked and bent under his onslaught, but I soon detected a pattern to his movement. When he jumped, the trunk or branch swayed away from him, and at the farthest aspect of the swing, he sprang to the next branch. Like an enormous black squirrel, he traveled as fast or faster in the air than he did on the ground. I made note of his technique: claws to grip, hind legs to push off trunks, and arms that rotated to swing from one to another.
My furry friend and I barely kept pace on the path below as he swung through the trees. We panted by the time he dropped twenty feet to the ground. His feet only touched down before he leaped again, pushing off his strong hind legs to send him thirty, then forty feet along the trail with a single bound. I couldn’t keep up with him, even at full sprint, and I suspected he could go faster if he wanted to. Even Keen flagged after half a mile.
Our training area became boggy, and when we reached a small pond, he paused, and shifted back to human. “The wulf form doesn’t swim well,” he explained. “We can’t paddle like a dog or stroke like a human. The front half of our body is much heavier than the hindquarters, and we have almost zero body fat to help us float. So we sink, head first. If you’re in the water, you’re better off as human.”
“Can you do a partial shift to help you swim?” I asked, visualizing how it might be possible by slimming the front half, cutting back on the heavy neck and shoulder musculature.
Chris’s brows lowered, throwing his eyes into shadow and giving me a formidable glimpse of the predator within. “Even for experienced wulfan, partial shifts are dangerous. Very few can do them at all. They can go horribly wrong if you’re inexperienced.”
Like me. I made a note: no partial shifts. Except wasn’t that what I had already done?
When I voiced that concern, Chris shook his head. “That’s the wulf attempting to take control—that’s different, and normal. Mistakes at the extremities are seldom lethal, only uncomfortable. Deliberate attempts to morph things at the core are very dangerous.”
Right. No core changes. If I wanted broader shoulders, I’d have to earn them.
When we returned to the barn, a panting Keen flung herself on the concrete floor, and I stood with my entire form trembling. Ignoring my exhaustion, Chris put me through another upper body workout. This must be what boot camp is like. Ugh. Yet my arms didn’t give out, and I saw what Chris was on about. Unlike my human body, the wulf kept accommodating the changes. I could swear I already swung from the bars with greater strength and accuracy.
Lunch had never tasted so good. Josh fixed a meal fit for several humans, and I wolfed—pardon the term—most of it down. By the time I sat back, I wanted nothing more than to nap. But Chris had other plans.
So, I found myself sitting cross-legged on the heated cage floor, listening as Chris first described how to meditate, and then guided me into a reflective state. Being sleepy helped me clear my mind, but when he started on the guided visualization, I woke up in a hurry. Chris set out to poke the bear, and he did a good job of it.
He started with pleasant memories based on my photos and drawings, but then he moved to the dark side. My eyes were always the precursor of the wulf within. When they changed, the hands were soon to follow. Chris would switch back to good memories, helping me regain control.
After an hour of such yo-yoing, I discovered that my teeth were the next on the list, and man, did they hurt when the big fangs dropped from my upper gums. These teeth were huge. Not something that should be able to hide. How long have they frigging been there?
Chris kept at it until I poured sweat and every bone in my body ached. Finally, he fell silent, staring over my head into the depths of the barn.
“You have a pattern, you know,” he said, his voice low.
“Yeah,” my breath came in gasps as I fought the waves of pain. “Animals, women, children. Victims.”
“But not yourself.” He looked right at me, and the shadows were back in his eyes. “You had a childhood that would scar most, yet other than the separation anxiety, you don’t react to personal stuff.
