Chapter 161

We were two days from the lion village when we heard the cry.

High and piercing, cutting through the afternoon air like a blade. I looked up, shielding my eyes against the sun, and saw them. Five shapes diving from the clouds, wings tucked, falling like stones before spreading at the last moment and swooping low over our group.

"Hawks," Aureon said, his hand going to his weapon before recognition dawned. "Wait. I know that cry."

The largest hawk shifted in mid-air, becoming a woman with copper hair and golden eyes, landing with the grace of someone who had done this a thousand times. Behind her, four smaller hawks became boys, tumbling through the air with less grace but equal enthusiasm. And last, smallest but no less fierce, came a little girl with feathers in her hair and a screech that could shatter glass.

"Alara," I breathed, breaking into a run.

"Krys!" she shrieked, meeting me halfway, scooping me into her arms and spinning me around with a strength that belied her slender frame. "You’re back! You’re actually back!"

She set me down, her hands on my shoulders, her golden eyes scanning my face with the intensity of a predator assessing prey. "You look terrible. Tired. What happened? Who do I need to kill?"

"Nobody," I laughed, though the laugh caught in my throat. "Everyone who needed killing is already dead. It’s a long story."

"I have time." She turned to her children, clapping her hands. "Boys! Girl! Come meet the woman who saved your mother’s life."

The hawk children approached, and I stared. They were beautiful. Unbelievably so. Four boys with copper hair and golden eyes, ranging from perhaps four or five, all handsome and proud and preening under my attention. And the girl...

"She’s perfect," I whispered.

Alara beamed, her chest swelling with maternal pride. "Isn’t she? Her name is Kestrel. She’s five months. And she’s mine. My girl." She said it with the reverence of someone discussing a miracle. "You know how rare girls are among the beast world. Five children, and only one girl. I really do count myself lucky."

The little girl stepped forward, her chin lifted, her golden eyes sharp and assessing. She looked me up and down with the frank appraisal only a child could manage. "You’re pretty," she declared. "For a ground-dweller."

"Kestrel!" Alara gasped.

"It’s fine," I laughed, charmed. "She’s right. I am pretty for a ground-dweller. And you’re pretty for someone who fell out of a tree."

Kestrel’s eyes widened, then she laughed, a sound like bells. "I like her," she announced to her mother. "Can we keep her?"

"She has her own family," Alara said, gesturing to where my mates and children had gathered. "But we can visit. We can play."

And play they did.

The hawk children took to the air immediately, showing off their skills, diving and swooping and performing aerial acrobatics that made my heart stop. Kestrel, despite being the youngest and only girl, was the most daring, executing a barrel roll that made her brothers gasp with envy.

"Show-offs," Atlas muttered, but he was smiling.

"They’re amazing," Chase breathed, his eyes wide with wonder.

Alara watched my leopard cubs with a softness I hadn’t expected. Once, she had hated Rina, their mother. Had wanted to kill them once. But that was before. Before I had saved her life. Before the cubs had become mine.

"They’re good children," she said quietly, watching Tavren, Kaizen, and Zarek chase each other through the grass, their spotted fur gleaming. "Rina’s children. Your children now. My savior’s children." She looked at me, her expression serious. "I don’t hate them anymore. I don’t hate her memory. You saved me, Krys. You gave me a second chance at life, at love, at motherhood. I can’t hate anything connected to you."

I squeezed her hand. "Thank you."

"Besides," she added, her voice lighter, "they’re land beast. No competition at all."

I laughed, and she laughed, and the sound carried on the wind.

We caught up as the children played. Alara told me about life with Krane, about their nest in the cliffs, about the challenges of raising five children who could all fly before they could properly walk. Krane himself arrived later, shifting from his hawk form to bow to me with the awkwardness of a man who was still learning how to be social.

"They shift at five months," Alara told me, watching her children teach mine how to spot prey from the air.

I looked at my leopard cubs, at Tavren, Kaizen, and Zarek, who were staring up at the flying children with expressions of pure longing. They were five months old now. Next month, they would shift for the first time. Next month, they would feel their bones break and reform, their bodies torn apart and rebuilt.

I dreaded it. The pain they would feel. The fear. The confusion.

"They’ll be fine," Alara said, reading my expression. "All children are stronger than we think. They survive the shift. They survive everything. It’s the mothers who suffer more, watching."

"That’s the truth," I muttered.

We parted as the sun began to set, with promises to visit, to bring the children together, to let them learn from each other; earth and sky, spotted and feathered, bound by friendship and gratitude.

"Come to the cliffs!" Alara called as she shifted, her wings spreading wide. "We’ll teach your cubs to fall gracefully!"

"They’re cats!" I shouted back. "They always land on their feet!"

She laughed, the sound carrying on the wind, and then she was gone, her family rising into the sky, becoming silhouettes against the setting sun.

---

We made camp that night in a valley between two hills, the grass soft and the stars bright. The children were exhausted from playing, from running, from the excitement of new friends, but they refused to sleep. They wanted stories.

I sat by the fire, my mates around me, the children piled in laps and curled against sides, their eyes heavy but determined to stay awake.

"Tell us a story, Mama," Levy requested, her head in my lap, her fingers tangled in my hair.

"Little Red Riding Hood," I said, the memory coming to me suddenly, sweet and sad and far away.

I told them. About the girl in the red cloak, the basket of treats, the wolf in the grandmother’s bed. I told them about the woodsman with his axe, the rescue, the happy ending.

The questions started immediately.

"Why did she wear a red hood?" Levy asked.

"To be visible in the forest," I explained. "So hunters wouldn’t mistake her for a deer."

"Why was the grandmother alone?" Atlas wanted to know.

"She lived there."

"Why didn’t she move in with her family?"

"Because... because she liked her independence?"

"Why did the wolf want to eat her?"

"Because he was hungry and bad."

"Why didn’t he just eat a deer?"

"Because... because the story needed a villain?"

"Why did he dress up as the grandmother?"

"To trick Little Red Riding Hood."

"Why didn’t she recognize him immediately? Was she stupid?"

"She was... trusting. She didn’t expect deception."

"That’s stupid," Chase declared.

"Why didn’t the wolf just eat Little Red Riding Hood in the forest? Why go through all the trouble with the bed and the dressing up?" Niku asked

"Because... because then there wouldn’t be a story?"

"That’s a terrible reason to risk getting caught," Aureon observed, his expression serious. "If I were that wolf, I would have just eaten her in the forest. Efficient. Practical. No witnesses."

"That’s horrible!" I gasped.

"I’m just saying," he defended. "It’s poor predator strategy."

"How did the wolf fit the grandmother in his stomach?" Ravin asked, his head tilted. "Whole? In pieces? Did he chew?"

"I... I don’t know. The story doesn’t say."

"Was she still alive in there?" Leon asked, his eyes wide with horrified fascination. "Could she breathe? Was there air?"

"I don’t think the story is meant to be anatomically accurate," I said weakly.

"Was the grandmother digested?" Caelion asked, genuinely curious. "When the woodsman cut her out, was she... was she partially digested?"

"Stop!" I laughed, holding up my hands. "It’s a fairy tale! It’s not real! It’s meant to teach children not to talk to strangers!"

"Well it’s terrifying," Veylan muttered. "A wolf that can swallow a whole person? Dress up in their clothes? That’s nightmare fuel."

"And the grandmother was just... waiting in there?" Ravin continued, apparently unable to let it go. "Was she in a stomach acid bath? For hours? How did she survive?"

"Magic," I said desperately. "It’s magic. The story has magic."

"Your world has strange magic," Soryn observed. "Wolves with expandable stomachs. Grandmothers who survive digestion. Little girls who can’t recognize their own grandmothers."

"It’s not meant to be realistic!"

"Clearly," Aureon said, his lips twitching. "Or the wolf would have eaten her in the forest."

I threw a pillow at him. He caught it, laughing, and suddenly everyone was laughing, the sound filling the night, chasing away the shadows of the trees.

"Tell us another," Levy begged, though her eyes were drooping, her voice slurring with exhaustion. "One that makes more sense."

"None of them make sense," I warned. "They’re all ridiculous."

"Good," she said, snuggling closer. "I like ridiculous."

I smiled, looking around at my family, at my mates who were acting like children, at my children who were struggling to keep their eyes open, at the fire and the stars and the night.

"Once upon a time," I began, "there was a sleeping princess..."

And I told them stories until the fire died and the stars faded, and sleep finally claimed us all, tangled together in a pile of fur and limbs and soft breathing, dreaming of grandmothers and wolves and magic that didn’t need to make sense to be true.