“A gift, you say?” he says with a look of utter bewilderment at the parcel I place onto his desk. Then his face breaks into a child-like smile, and he plucks it up, greedily tearing into the paper.
My back grows slick with sweat as I wait for some reaction, some indication that the curse has taken hold. Without saying a word, he hums and hands over the parcel to his secretary while I hover there, unsure whether to retreat. But once again, I can’t seem to make my legs work.
Then there’s the sound of muted footsteps hurrying toward us along the ugly carpet, and a woman dressed in the king’s livery knocks on the study door before giving a little curtsy.
“Your Majesty, there’s a group gathered at the palace gates. Beast-borne folk in the courtyard.”
My gut twists, and I feel the sweat pooling at the small of my back. Luckily, no one has questioned why I’m still hanging around or why I look like a clammy wreck.
“Indeed?” The king gets to his feet and makes his way to the door at a leisurely pace.
“Where are the guards?” the secretary asks sharply.
“Well, the, er, people outside seem to be racing each other. So the guards are mostly... uh, placing bets on the winner.”
I follow behind as they make their way along the hallway outside, palms sweaty and heart pounding as I wait to hear the king’s reaction.
Is this the moment he roars for their arrests and locks them all up for trespassing?
Instead, though, he laughs.
It’s a small chuckle at first, one that breaks into a full guffaw once he reaches a balcony looking out onto the courtyard.
The entire crew seems to have shifted into their animal forms, and they’re causing mayhem. Some are racing each other while others are engaged in what looks to be a ginormous game of tig. I peer out from behind the window, my eyes narrowing in on my brother who has lost his hood at some point. He has both tentacles out on display and is waving them around like he’s conducting the accompanying music.
“I guess, as a test of whether it worked, this is as good as any,” Torin says in a low tone.
My shoulders are so stiff with tension that my head is beginning to hurt as I wait for the king’s verdict.
“Is this a festival day we weren’t aware of?” he asks.
“I don’t think so, sir. I’ll confirm with our beast-borne representatives,” his secretary replies.
The king hums. “This reminds me, Smith, I’ve been meaning to amend the beast-borne labour laws.”
I blink as an incredulous laugh threatens to erupt out of me.
It worked.
It really worked.
I slink backward a few steps, then turn on my heel and hurry back along the corridor.
“What did you do?” Torin asks as he strides along beside me. “That wasn’t just you getting the king to forget about what he did to us, was it?”
“I changed things,” I tell him. “Made him forget all of his rotten thoughts in the hope it’ll make things better. If it worked how I intended, he’ll have forgotten everything about the labs. As well as every negative thought he’s ever held about beast-borne folk or anyone he saw as less than.”
There may be a whole lot of empty space left in his brain now that I’ve chopped out all the toxic rot.
“So rather than cutting off the snake’s head,” Torin muses as we step outside and pause there as I let the breeze waft over me,cooling my body and drying my sweat. “You’ve turned the snake into a puppy dog?”
“Something like that,” I reply. “Now, let’s just hope that it sticks.”
“Very restrained of you,” he says, causing me to let out a dark laugh.
“Well, you don’t want to know what else happens to him on the night of the full moon.” I shoot a grin in his general direction.
And then we head out toward the chaos of the courtyard. My eyes scan past the dozens of shifters in their animal forms, gamboling about and letting out joyful cries. Over the top of all of them, I spot a curly head of hair and a proud, grinning face. My chest lights up with relief and joy, and somehow, I just know I’m feeling Reva’s emotions reflected back at me.
