Chương 65: Chapter 63: Daughter-Shaped

Rachael wasn't exactly a baby, and I felt like she was small for her age. Admittedly I wasn't any kind of judge at all about this sort of thing, but I still barely noticed her weight as I carried the small, warm, grunting little form of the small werewolf towards the river. She grunted, puppylike, and squirmed a little, but her Wolf had firmly established, my wolf assured me, that I was the one in charge between the two of us. It was a little strange, but... it did make things easier.

Walking on just two limbs with my massive figure, especially carrying something, was a bit awkward though, and I did eventually set the girl down. Sootpaw squirmed on the ground like as squished bug a moment before flipping onto her belly and pushing her way up to her paws. She didn't look nearly as awkward as she had before when she was moving in this shape, but she still clearly felt odd about it. Even so, her tail waggled hopefully as she looked at me with uncertainty in her eyes.

Maybe I could convince her to come with me on her own instead of making her do anything?

"LETS GET YOU CLEANED UP" I said, and again it struck me how... well, not loud, it wasn't loud at all if sound was the criteria, not generally, but... unsubtle? Our current language was very unsubtle. I'd attributed being able to speak it to being a Riftwalker, since I could speak... whatever Gelidia and the others were speaking, but maybe it was more of a werewolf thing? Seemed to make some kind of sense anyhow.

Sootpaw tilted her head to the side, and her ears flicked a little, but she bobbed her head in a nod to me that only had human meanings, and said, in canine"OKAY!" and... took off like a bottle rocket! I blinked after her, but she returned, a blur of dark fur and panting, lolling tongue! I found my tail wagging - she'd said her body felt very good, and I could relate! I saw no reason not to join in on the fun, and bounded after her into the woods towards the river!

She was as swift and graceful as the wind, and like any puppy ever she was a dynamo of energy, bounding ahead of me with a wagging tail and bright eyes! I poured a little more effort in an attempt to keep up, and she only got more excited as, united for the first time, girl and wolf played together! Without really talking about it, we made it into a game that any kid could understand - tag.

I caught up to her the first time and barged into the squeaking hybrid, making her jump a full three feet into the air in surprise, and then... it was my turn to run away! Sootpaw bounded after me and it became pretty clear that while I was strong, and that I could keep up with her with some extra effort, she was much faster than me by default, and she caught me way quicker than I caught up to her, vibe checked me with a full body pounce that rang my bells, whined a'SORRY!'

and, once she was sure I wasn't hurt at all, took off. I of course gave chase and it took me longer to catch her this time but I did, and pushed her over at the most awkward point in her gait, making her flop into a bush with a squeak! When she picked her way out of it, unharmed, her tail was wagging and the chase game became more like a wrestling match. There was no malice involved, no intent to harm.

We'd simply barge into each other and playfully bite and grab and push each other over, and while the kid was pretty fast... I was a lot stronger than she was, and quite a bit bigger. She had snappy little jaws, and her Wolf seemed to think with them, to love biting and holding and tugging, never hard enough to taste blood but hard enough to pinch! After the third time she was put on her back, she was tuckered out, and didn't have the energy to get up again.

I got up and inspected her, checked her over with momma wolf eyes, and then... used her as a stinky cushion. She made a squeaking, grunty, uncomfortable little noise, but otherwise just panted and tried to recover. My Wolf, inside me, chuckled in her wheezy, chuffing schooby doo kind of way in amusement, her tail waggling a bit.

"YOU WILL EAT BETTER" I said"I WILL MAKE SURE OF THAT. YOUR ENDURANCE WILL GROW AS YOU GET HEALTHIER." Sootpaw's tail thumpathumped the ground and she made another soft, puppylike grunting noise as she squirmed beneath me and pushed me off. I let her, and she got up on wobbly legs, clearly struggling to get her breath back for about four times as long as it took me.

"THAT WAS FUN" she said"I NEVER THOUGHT IT WOULD BE LIKE THIS!" I lolled my tongue out in a doggie grin and licked her snout a couple times, again revealing to me how dirty she was. No way no how was I going to succumb to my instincts and just start licking her clean.

"WE CAN LIVE IN PEACE LIKE THIS" I said"THESE WOODS HAVE A LOT OF GAME WE CAN HUNT TOO. THAT WAS MOSTLY FOOD I FOUND HERE." I said. Sooty tilted her head and... World she was so cute! Her big gold eyes blinked at me as she took in my statement at a 45 degree angle. OURS"ONLY MOSTLY?" She asked, and I nodded at her, adjusting my position a little atop her form. Why was I sitting on her? Wolf told me it was to establish dominance to her wolf, and because it was funny. I got up.

Sooty, having caught her breath from our run and roughhousing, again rolled onto her belly and got up, shaking off in a very doglike way.

"ONLY MOSTLY. I FOUND RICE AND SALT IN THE TOWN, AND THE BAKER GAVE ME SOME YEAST AND SOME HOOCH." I explained. She flcikaflicked her ears and blinked her big golden eyes at me.

"... HE GAVE YOU?" She asked, and I nodded again.

"YES. HE IS STABILIZED TOO. HE IS A GHOST. THE TOWN IS FULL OF STABILIZED MONSTER-FOLK, LIKE YOU AND I." I explained and her jaw dropped a bit as her head tilted and eyes went wide, both wolven and human confusion played large on her face. Sootpaw tried to come up with something to say to that, but all she managed was to open and shut her mouth a few times like a gasping fish. Finally, I reached out pet her snoot once, and firmly shut her mouth between index and forefinger.

She squirmed out of that - really she was quite adorable - and nipped at my fingers playfully. I stretched then, a very doglike motion in the way I lowered my front and kneaded the cool grass, then shook off vigorously. She did the same, mimicking my motion with a happy grunt-grunty noise, and I led her towards the river again. Rachael was quiet for several minutes as we traveled, didn't make a peep before she spoke up at last, saying something like"Mreeeeh merrarrarerrr" and huffing in annoyance.

I looked at her, blinking, waggling my tail, and she said, in Wolf,"THE TOWN IS LAMBSTOCK?"

"YES."

"AND THEY WELCOME YOU THERE?"

"YES. I AM THE DUCHESS'S CONSORT." I explained and she missed a step to flop with a squeak into a bush again. I kept loping along in my semi-bipedal gait, tongue loling out as I made a doggie grin and chuckled. Sooty caught up to me and chuffed, so I looked back at her.

"CONSORT? WHAT IS SHE?" she asked, and I smiled again.

"A GHOST. SHE IS ALSO A WIND SAGE." I explained. I realized then we weren't exactly speaking the same language a dog like Spelt spoke. It was just as unsubtle, but it had considerably larger a vocabulary. Was this some kind of Werewolf version? We, Sooty and I, both knew it instinctively, so... whatever that was, there it was.

"A GHOST... AND A WOMAN?" she asked"ARENT YOU A WOMAN?" A farm girl. She'd probably never even heard of that kind of thing before.

"I AM. MY SCENT IS FEMININE, ISNT IT?" I said, and she barged into me! I could have been more helpful, but teasing the kid was a bit of harmless fun. Besides, she was bitey and spicy, my Sootpaw! She was hardly helpless.

"YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN!" She said, exasperated.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN?" I asked, tail wagging. She HUFFED and got in front of me. I stopped walking.

"HOW DO YOU... WHAT DOES... HOW? YOU ARE BOTH WOMEN? UNLESS DUCHESS MEANS SOMETHING DRASTICALLY DIFFERENT THAN I EVER HEARD OF IN LAMBSTOCK!" I chuckled again"SHE IS A WOMAN, YES. SO AM I." I said, then sat. Sooty sat too, and blinked at me.

"YOU SEE, BOYS CAN FALL IN LOVE WITH BOYS, AND GIRLS CAN FALL IN LOVE WITH GIRLS. THAT ISNT THE USUAL COURSE OF THINGS, BUT IT HAPPENS." I explained. I felt something stirring inside my inner self, and Gelidia entered my... what, my wolfspace? The place where Wolf and I were? I tried to ignore the way Wolf body checked her in greeting and focus on the explanation to the kid. She deserved to understand. The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

"AS FOR HER BEING A GHOST, DID YOU WONDER WHY MY TITLE WAS TWICE-CURSED?" I said, and held up my Wolf Pendant. She sniffed and blinked at it, then at me. Then at the coin. And then Gelidia reached out of it and... booped the cutie on the nose with a cheery"Boop!" Sootpaw, skittish thing that she was, reacted pretty predictably and tried to jump into the air in surprise, bolt, and dodge all at once and just flopped over to wiggle on her back like a turtle.

Gelidia slid into real space easily, and I pulled the shade into a hug from behind. She was as real to me, when manifested, as anything else and Soot could clearly see her! The kid stared wide eyed as Gelidia, who was a very intelligent woman and understood the assignment, manifested fully, her skin flushing with color as she rested against me. She embraced my head and peppered kisses to my brow even as she filled me with magic, enchanted me to speak. With my own voice, in my own language, I spoke.

"I met her in the town when I first got here... and she asked me to take her Wishing Coin in the well so I could help her retake the town from her father in the Dungeon the Keep turned into." I explained, in a very nearly human voice. Sootpaw's jaw dropped open as Gelidia's hand linked fingers with mine and she settled into my lap, tiny as you please. Really, right now, she was just a bit smaller than Sootpaw was.

"HOW ARE YOU DOING THAT?" she asked in Wolf, and I responded with my own voice.

"She can help me speak. She's a Wind Sage." I said. Gelidia nodded at that, and smiled.

"Hello Sootpaw. Your name is Rachael? That is a lovely name. I am Her Grace Gelidia of the house of Windbinder, Duchess of Lambstock. But you can call me Gelidia, honey. It's lovely to meet you at last." my beloved said. Sootpaw shut her gaping mouth with a click, and seemed to take that in, thinking about the situation and how it changed things carefully before nodding.

"CAN SHE...?" she asked, and pawed at her muzzle a little, and Gelidia seemed to get it. She took her hand gently from mine and rose a bit to kneel in front of the girl instead of staying in my lap. She offered her lovely, pale hands out to the girl, nodding.

"Come here, sweetheart, I won't hurt you" Gelidia murmured softly, well-used to lycanthropic hearing. No compulsion washed out, no magic afoot, just... a gentle, quiet offer. Soot hesitated. Ghosts, I remembered, were dangerous beings as well and... well, this had been a strange day for the kid! Even so, she got up and... as any dog might, sniffed Gelida's hands before nuzzling between them. Gelidia melted like any girl might, fawning over the cute, too-thin wolf girl I'd...

adopted, not going so far as to make baby noises at her but certainly running her hands through the girl's greasy fur, apparently oblivious to how filthy she was. Then, Sootpaw gasped a little, and said"Oh!" in her own voice, or at least something very close to it!

"Oh that feels... l-like I dunked my head in cool water!" she admitted, her tongue glowing green like a thermonuclear mint in her mouth. Gelidia lowered her hands and... very subtly, wiped them on her dress a bit. Sooty didn't notice, she was too busy marveling at the miracle of Gelidia's subtle working of power.

"M-my name is... w-well you already said it. It's... n-nice to meet you, your G-- I mean, Gelidia." Sooty said like a little lady.

"I um... I'm a werewolf."

"I noticed!" Gelidia giggled and despite everything gave the girl a kiss on the snoot. Sootpaw had no idea how to react to that.

"You're so thin... poor thing, you've been living all alone for so long, haven't you?" Gelidia said, honest compassion in her voice and in her face. Sooty blinked at her a bit and didn't seem to know how to react. But I saw something in her expression, something that made me happy to see: hope.

"Well. If you want you could stick with us? We'll give you a safe place to live and to sleep, hot food, a soft bed, and... you don't need to worry anymore about what you are. Not in Lambstock. We're making it a home for people like us" Gelidia said. Like us... I liked the sound of that. Sootpaw let the silence stretch a few moments. Without discussing anything so far, Gelidia... seemed amenable to the idea. I reached out to her in my mind and brushed her presence inside me.

She didn't look back, but her mental self smiled at me. If she wants it... I don't want to leave her alone. I want to adopt her. OURS! OUR PUP Wolf said, subtle as a brick to the side of the head. Gelidia blinked at us both. Then smiled warmly.

"Of course!" she said into my mind. No hesitation.

"She is a child! If she wants it, if she's willing, I am quite glad to take her in. I will love her as if she were my own flesh and blood. Noblesse oblige, as the World Wills." Sooty seemed to make up her mind.

"Okay" she said in a tiny, nervous, hopeful little voice. She'd been... burned once before, I knew. But this time would be different. We'd make it different. Things would be better. Gelidia and I took the kid's paws, one in mine, one in hers, and she let us. She looked between us, and tears were shrink-wrapping her eyes, but she didn't actually cry. She just held on tight, daring to let herself hope. I tugged the kid forward and the two of us, Gelidia and I, embraced Sootpaw tight.

Things would be different, indeed. Together, the three of us went to the river. Gelidia of course didn't enter the water with me, but I stepped into the sand on the bank first, and slipped a bit into the water. Sootpaw hesitated at the bank, taking her hand from mine to let out a whiiiine. I blinked back at her, and she fidgeted a little before testingly stepping into the water a bit.

Whatever hesitation was in her, whatever made her cringe a little as she tested it, faded bit by bit as she got to her waist, then dove in at last. I joined her, and the wash of soot and grime from her fur and body was quite visible, turning the water near her gray! My god, how long had it been since this kid bathed?

"I couldn't get in water really! It hurt!" she explained, unasked but clearly aware of how strange her hesitation had been.

"If I did, it would wash my mana away!" Well that explained her filthiness I supposed! I blinked at her, incredulous. Gelidia blinked too, and tilted her head a little!

"Why is that, honey? Were you a Fire Sage?" she asked.

"That's a thing?" I asked, incredulous. My mana was just fine in the water.

"Fire sages" Gelidia explained"Can get power from Fire and sources of heat, and those skills can sometimes do that."

"That's what was it was, yes. I wasn't a fire sage, but Beast of Cinders was a fire-aligned core. Now I... well, I guess my Lycanthrope and Peasant cores are now a little bit, I got some... weird synergies when I... did that stabilization thing and subsumed it." she said, clearly invigorated by the cool river's waters.

"Beast of Cinders... I don't think I've ever heard of that one." Gelidia admitted.

"How did you get it, if I may ask?" Sootpaw froze up a little. For a moment I was worried for her, but she spoke in a small voice.

"I... survived a fire, a... a bad one. It's... an animal core for um... animals who survive forest fires and things." she said softly.

"... it wasn't fire exactly though. It was... well, cinders, ash, and char." she said. Gelidia, unprompted, explained.

"Fire is a generic, blanket term. Really, there are many aspects we... kind of lump together into fire. Ash for example borders fire and air, cinder borders fire and earth, as does Char." she explained "There are actually hundreds of aspects of each, some physical, some metaphysical, but most do not have names or are so subtly different as to be indistinguishable" Gelidia said, and turned to Soot "A dedicated hybrid class, hm? It must have been a Rare core." Sooty nodded.

She was treading water, so she must have known how to swim before, I figured.

"I... I guess so. It... did cinder magic and... it was very physical. It let me um... refill my mana by being near fire, and... well, it made me resistant to it as well. Guess that's done with." she said. I swam to her - I could still just about touch bottom - and scooped her in against me to pet her ears and head, running my hands through her thick coat, swirled with white and brown and black, to reveal her true colors. Sootpaw wasn't nearly as dark colored as she'd seemed, now that she was getting clean.

Really, she was closer to a German shepherd or Malinois in coloration and general shape, if you ignored where her fur was swirled with white as if she'd had milk swirled into her coat. I wasn't much different - Sootpaw looked at the white patch of fur in the center of my chest curiously, tilting her head so one waterlogged ear could half-flop over - GUH CUTE! Sootpaw didn't ask though. I could actually see her reach the decision not to.

When we left the water, I felt more naked than I should have with a thick coat of golden fur and it slicked tight to my form. Sootpaw looked like a drowned rat! She was... god, it was heartbreaking to see - she really did look like she was a fuzzy skeleton or some kind of forgotten thing dredging herself up out of a bog. She just looked miserable to me. I shook off vigorously, FWUPPAFWUPPAFWUPPA and Sootpaw took that in before... also shaking off!

Gelidia, clever girl that she was, stood well off to the side to avoid the floppas of two walfs.

"I'm hungry again - can we... what do we do about that?" she asked, and I grinned, tongue lolling out a bit!

"Why, we hunt of course!" I said, and Gelidia chuckled. WE HUNT! Wolf said, clearly ecstatic! I chuckled"We... hunt? Oh!" Sootpaw said, distracted, and her eyes flashed to wolf eyes for a moment before she shivered.

"I... oh. That's what you meant... um, before, about how your wolf could talk to you." She said distantly, in a tiny voice I wasn't sure I could have heard if I were human. I licked her nose.

"Spoke to you did she?" I said in equally soft tones, and she nodded.

"Kind of." she breathed.

"She gets stronger as you do, more vocal. At least, mine has." I said softly. With that, we set off to hunt for our dinner that evening!