Roar of Magic (2 page)

They entered a large room that had wide carpets and some cushions in the corner. Lee closed the doors and latched them together with a series of latches that would require manual dexterity.

“So, how do we start?”

Lee grinned. “I put the baby down, and then, we get changed. We will start with breathing and go into visualization before we try a shift.”

“I am still not sure that this is actually a thing.”

Lee held up her hand and changed it into a wide paw.

Anessa’s heart started pounding, and there was a pressure inside her.

“Good start. Let’s get changed so you have something to go home in.”

She was escorted behind the screen tucked into the corner, and she shucked her clothing. There had to be something to this, or it was the largest delusion she had ever seen.

The wrap around her breasts was tucked so that if she changed shape, it would pull free and not constrict the shift. The soft wrap she was wearing would do the same.

Lee smiled and settled on a cushion. “As you get more familiar with your other form, you will become a little less attached to being clothed all the time.”

“I will become a nudist?”

Lee grinned, “No, but you will be willing to sit in a room with other naked strangers and sexual interest will not be an issue. In a peculiar skewing of nature, shifter men tend to be more attracted to your human form when it is clothed. A naked shifter is one ready to attack. It is a different societal norm.”

“So, this?” Anessa gestured to her minimal clothing.

“Satisfies your human-raised sensibilities and lets your beast know it can come out and play.”

“I was more free range than raised, but it is very comfortable.” She ran her hands down the cotton on her thighs.

“Excellent.”

Amelia squealed happily when the adults sat on the floor facing each other. She clambered around the room with the determination of someone who had just learned to propel themselves.

“Our first thing to concentrate on is your breathing. You have to inhabit your body fully in able to shift. So, breathe in and out and focus on feeling your heartbeat in every inch of your body. Even your fingertips have a pulse. You need to feel it.” Lee sat with her hands in her lap and closed her eyes.

Anessa followed her example.

They breathed quietly in unison with only the sound of the cackling baby in the background. Anessa found it strange that she didn’t even realise she kept herself in a tiny core of her body. The more she turned her attention inward, the more she became aware of her hard shell around her emotions and senses. It was nearly a tactile thing.

She felt the cracking of her senses and opened herself to actually inhabit her own limbs. She tracked her pulse and focused until she felt it in her fingers and toes.

When she was full of herself, she felt something else. Something stretched and flexed in her mind.

“Do you feel her?” Lee’s voice was a whisper of sound.

“I feel something.”

“What is she doing?”

“She is stretching.” To Anessa’s surprise, she felt her own hands opening and closing on her thighs.

“Let her run around in your thoughts. Just let her become familiar with you. Whatever she wants, listen to it. You don’t have to act on it, but you need to listen.”

Anessa nodded. “Right.”

The lioness was curious. She had never been invited to explore, so now, she was making up for it.

Anessa watched from within while the large cat explored her emotions, her reactions and even her sexual responses. Anessa didn’t even realise she
had
any sexual responses.

“How does she feel?”

Anessa smiled slightly, her eyes still closed. “She is exploring, but there isn’t much left to look at.”

“When she is done, open yourself to her. Let her take over your body. She will know what to do.”

“I still can’t believe that there were two of us in here all my life and I never noticed.”

“I grew up knowing, and it was still a fight for me. Now, during the first shift, you might be uncomfortable. Let the pain wash over you and keep going. At first, it will be like stretching, and then, it will feel more intense. It is natural, and you will get used to it.”

Knowing that pain was coming wasn’t encouraging, but the lioness soothed her. Everything would be fine.

A strange sucking noise got Anessa’s attention. She opened one eye and noted that Amelia was having lunch.

“Does it bother you?”

“No. If she is hungry, she needs to eat.”

Anessa continued her focus on her body, but her body began to tell her that it was hungry. It was that basic need that set things in motion.

She shook her head, but the shaking became more violent and her hands took on a golden, blurry cast.

Anessa watched her limbs get longer, and she felt the snap of the fabric that covered her. Her tendons stretched and the pain was definitely coming.

Her scream turned into a yowl, and a roar echoed through the room.

The baby stopped suckling and cried.

Her mother soothed her, and when she was settled in the pillows, Lee got to her feet.

Anessa was having a problem standing. Four feet was strange. She wanted to put all her weight on her back legs, and her lioness was getting irritated.

“Listen to her and let her be in control of the body while you ride along. I will join you.”

Lee shifted easily into an impressive lioness who nuzzled her daughter before walking over to Anessa and helping her to her feet.

Being on all fours was odd, but soon, Anessa was able to pace the length of the room without having her tail pulling her off balance.

Lee waited for her, sitting like a sphinx. Anessa stood in the centre of the room, and little Amelia crawled to her at speed. The little one pulled at her whiskers and put her fingers in Anessa’s jaws. She moved her head away and picked the baby up by the back of her onesie, carrying her to her mother. Amelia shrieked and giggled.

The baby thought it was an amazing game. She crawled a fair distance from her mother and then turned and waited for Anessa.

Sighing, her lioness went and retrieved the bald cub and brought her back to her mother.

They played the game until the baby leaned against her mother to sleep.

Anessa sat and mimicked Lee’s pose. It was comfortable and relaxing. With the baby’s small breaths making an even cadence, Anessa shifted back into a naked human.

Lee followed suit, and she was completely right, the nudity was no longer something Anessa was concerned with.

“So, how did that feel for your first time?” Lee smiled and gathered Amelia up, heading to the corner where a diaper bag was waiting.

“I am actually a lion. It is weird.”

Lee changed the diaper, and Amelia clutched her toes and laughed. Her mother lifted her in her arms. “Come and visit Aunty Anessa.”

“Will she be a lion one day?” Anessa took the child expertly and tucked her on one hip.

“That or a tiger. Her father and I have command of both forms but that is due to some very specific spellcasting administered at the Crossroads.”

Anessa was bobbing gently up and down as Amelia leaned against her for naptime. “What is the Crossroads?”

Lee smiled and gathered her clothing. “The Crossroads is a place where shifters who can’t find a match go to meet others in the same situation.”

“What stops them from finding a match?”

“Lack of population of the opposite sex, lack of social connections or family tradition. Some are just unmatchable. Their energies and beasts just refuse to find someone local.”

“How do lions usually find a match?” She said it low because the baby was passed out in her arms.

Lee finished getting dressed and held out her hands. Anessa handed the little one over to her momma.

“Their pride usually arranges a sort of barn dance that lets members of other prides come and hunt for a mate. My family was a bit different in that regard, and so, I got my ass to the Crossroads as fast as I could. I met Jim and lived at the Crossroads for a while until this little one came along. It isn’t really the place for babies.”

Anessa got her clothes and got dressed. It felt weird to hide her body now that she could feel every cell, but it was what she needed to do if she was going to leave this room.

“Ystine will have some food for us. You look like you could use it.” Lee grinned, grabbed the diaper bag and unlatched the room.

Her instructor took her through the house and out onto the open veranda that overlooked a carefully manicured garden butting onto a large forest. Ystine was sitting at a table set for three, and she smiled brightly when they appeared.

“Everything went well, I assume?”

“It did. She’s a natural. A few more sessions and we will have her sprinting through the forest at full speed.” Lee smiled and handed Amelia over to the older woman.

Amelia settled in happily and played with the silvered blonde hair that cascaded over Ystine’s shoulder.

Ystine smiled and offered them the other two seats. “So, Anessa, how did you enjoy your other form?”

Anessa flexed her hands. “It was different. She was very glad to get out, though she did want to hunt.”

Lee reached for the platters and filled a small plate with sandwiches, setting it in front of Anessa. “Here. Eat. I was going to feed you as a lion, but your instincts are not quite aligned yet. You did well with Amelia. She had a lot of fun with you.”

“She was very determined to make me play.” Anessa picked up a sandwich and tried to stop herself from biting her own fingers. She was ravenous.

Lee chuckled. “She gets that from her father. He was in charge of the bar at the Crossroads, and once he realised what I was, he was determined that I play with him.”

Ystine chortled and pried her hair out of Amelia’s pudgy hand. “It is a solid match, Lee.”

Lee grinned. “I know that better than most. Amelia is happy to be exposed to both our communities, so it has worked out.”

“Lions and tigers. That sounds...sensible?” Anessa didn’t know what to say.

Lee snickered. “It is something that the Crossroads enforces. The families and communities have to accept the blended families.”

“How is it enforced?”

Lee wrinkled her nose. “All clans, guilds, prides, herds and families involved agree to enforce the connection. If your family gives you any attitude, you can simply go to the Shifter’s Guild, and they will send in reinforcements to remind your people of their obligation.”

Anessa blinked. “There is an actual guild?”

“Guild, Council, it depends on what you need.”

Ystine shifted Amelia in her arms. “And now the fey are involved.”

Anessa jolted and hoped they didn’t notice. “They are?”

Lee smiled and filled a plate for herself. “They are. From what the council members have said, the fey have weighed their loss of population with their loss of life, and they engaged in a strange manoeuver that got them permission to offer a few of their folk to the shifters at the Crossroads. It has been going quite well.”

Anessa asked, “What about the contact shock?”

Lee raised her brows and smiled. “You have felt it?”

“Yes, over a year ago. It was not something that would be conducive to more intimate contact.”

Lee nodded. “You would be right there. The mages have come up with a spell that can balance the two magics. James and I were part of an older version of the ceremony. Balancing shifters is easy, balancing shifters and fey is a specialization. As far as I know, the only person trained to manage it is currently at the Crossroads.”

Anessa nodded. “Right. Now, you mentioned additional sessions?”

Lee grinned, and they discussed the next few days and whether Anessa would be able to make it to the house again in order to master her feline form.

She agreed to make the necessary arrangements. She wanted to know what she was capable of.

Evan was only too happy to give her time off. He didn’t ask her what she was, he just told her to enjoy herself.

When she talked with the zoo, her heart sank. They had volunteers and students lined up to work with the big cats, and they could not hold her spot. She tried to negotiate some time with them, but they told her that if she didn’t turn up on the following day, she was off the roster.

She hung up and rubbed at her forehead, looking around her tiny apartment. The companies she worked with had handed her their weeks’ worth of receipts, and she had processed them in the software and forwarded it to update their systems.

Being removed from the volunteer roster hurt. For six years, she had spent every single day with the beasts, and they had come when she fed them. It was a bit of a betrayal to be cast off.

She sighed and went to bed, setting her alarm for first thing in the morning. It was a long bus ride followed by a long cab ride to the Prime Alpha’s home. Six hours of travel per day were going to make her create a new schedule. Hopefully, her training would complete sooner rather than later.

Lee sat across from her, and they breathed calmly in unison. They were in a cabana near the pool with fabric blowing gently on three sides. Today, Anessa decided to skip the clothing entirely.

They relaxed, and Anessa felt her lioness creep forward to inhabit her. The shift was slow and wasn’t as painful as the day before. Today, it was simply like the burn of muscles the day after a hard workout. She felt the heat running through her limbs, and the fur sprang out, her fingers shortened, claws appeared and the soles of her hands thickened. It all took under a minute.

She got up and left the cabana at Lee’s side. Lee led her toward the woods. The burst of speed caught Anessa by surprise, but her beast knew what to do. For the first time in her life, her lioness ran in the real world and not just her imagination.

They wove in and out of the trees until a scent caught Anessa’s attention. She growled and followed the scent, looking for the key to identify it. It smelled like food.

Eventually, she saw the source of the smell. A steak was hanging seven feet above the forest floor.