Grace of a Wolf by Lenaleia

Chapter 85: Grace: Wild Child

I reach for the fluttering brown sparrow darting through the room, but my fingers close on empty air as Bun zips toward the ceiling.

"Damn. You were so close," Ron says.

"Yeah, damn," Jer echoes.

Sara sighs. "You’re not supposed to use bad words."

Meanwhile, I’m waving my hands frantically as I shout, "Bun, please come down!"

The tiny bird chirps manically, wings beating frantically in hunger-induced chaos. She’s been shifting nonstop for twenty minutes—from bunny to kitten to fish (a terrifying thirty seconds of flopping), and now this. My heart hammers against my ribs even as I wonder how a toddler who can barely walk a straight line has already figured out flying.

"She’s losing it," Ron says beside me, craning his neck upward. "The pizza’s taking too long."

Jer nods grimly. "Sugar crash. Plus she’s still growing."

He sounds so wise, but I don’t think her growth has anything to do with her current state of mania.

I watch helplessly as the little brown bird dives toward a particularly threatening-looking piece of wall. "Can’t you guys do something?"

Sara crosses her arms, shaking her head. "She’s too fast. Last time she went bird, Owen had to use a net."

"And Sara can’t figure out how to fly, so she’s useless," Jer adds.

"Shut up, Jer!"

The sparrow swoops directly over our heads, chirping what sounds suspiciously like swear words. Except she’s a toddler, and I’m pretty sure she only knows about fifteen actual words.

Ron sighs, sounding so resigned, you’d think he was asked to work overtime. "I’ll get her."

His transformation happens in a blink—one second he’s a gangly preteen boy with messy hair and eyes too old for his face, the next he’s a young gorilla, his fur glossy black.

My jaw drops.

Sara says with a shrug. "Ron can turn into anything. Well,

wall with surprising grace, powerful hands finding invisible holds in the rock. Sparrow Bun flutters in panicked circles as he approaches,

I call out uselessly, my hands

ledge, her beak open as she trembles. Do birds pant? Because it looks like she’s

tiny bird. She pecks at his fingers, but he doesn’t flinch, just cradles her close to his chest

carefully extending his palm toward me. The sparrow glares at me out of the

a bright red apple in her hand. "Look, Bird Bun! Food! Want the yummy apple? A is for

barely has time to set her

it into Bun’s tiny palms. "Here, eat this before you transform into a freaking pterodactyl!"

with momentary satisfaction—before her face scrunches up in disgust. She hurls the apple to the ground

every surface, amplified by the cave’s acoustics into something almost supernatural.

against my chest. Her back arches in my arms like something possessed, her spine bending at angles which can’t be natural. Her tiny hands fist in my hair, yanking hard enough to

it!" I struggle to contain her flailing limbs as she twists, doing her baby damnedest to pull my hair out of my head. "The

hands to her mouth and eyes wide with horror. "Oh my Goddess, Bun, stop! The Lycan King’s gonna eat

my arms like a banshee baby.

my forearm, and I bite back a

the ceiling. "We’re doomed. Ron, can you turn into a horse? We need to

pizza—" Jer

mode. He and Bun are both dressed,

hisses, like

his eyes. "Don’t be so dramatic,

insists, backing further away from me

the moment when Jer jumps in, rounding on Ron. "Dude, don’t you pay any attention? The King wiped out an entire pack just

in the escalating, inaccurate facts being thrown about, but every time I open my mouth, another kid’s

hundred wolves because one of them looked

Bun’s continued screaming. "Caine didn’t—I mean, he did kill some of my pack, but

me with varying degrees

Ron. "See? Told