us again, bit his shoulder in warning, although he didn't move.
"Mistress, look how fine you look."
Something soft brushed my shoulder. My shoulders flexed, but the touch wasn't unpleasant. A slow steady rub between my shoulder blades, as if I were a kitten.
A two-legger, one of mine, crouched at my side, ignoring the stench of Camellia as he bowed his head and nuzzled against mine, just behind my ears. Familiar and animal and sweet. Another hand reached bravely for my snarling jaw, fingers scratching into fur as I continued to growl.
"You always have been, and always will be, the finest creature I've ever laid eyes on."
There was another kind of magic, but this wasn't mine. It was gentle, like a blanket, but it sank into me, softening my snarls, soothing my muscles.
"Not like this," Owen whispered in my ear, making me twitch with the tickle of his breath.
"You—you… It can't be," Camellia gasped, staring at me. "It can't."
I roared and lunged, and she screamed and cowered, eyes slamming shut. I laughed, chuffing and pulled back again, watching her tremble weakly.
All the while, Owen petted me. Calm, fearless, patient. My head turned, butting into his shoulder, and he hummed happily, working that strange sweet magic of his to calm me. I was calm. As tempting as it was to bite Camellia—she'd earned it—the tiger in me knew she would taste horrible. And the woman—I, Bryony—knew that I couldn't use the excuse of being a tiger to kill my sister. I was trying to prove that the two-natured weren't dangerous, and such an act would undo everything.
Guilt, a purely human emotion, sank uneasily into me, and with it, the tiger stepped back.
I rose, with Owen's help, naked and calm before my sister.
"Are you insane?" Camellia gasped, staring up at me with plain horror on her face, body crumpled on the floor before me.
"Luckily for you, I am not," I answered.
"Come, Mistress," Owen murmured, edging away.
Cress stood a man again, his eyes blazing on mine, but it was a mix of anger and love and relief.
"Be careful, sister," I said as Cress took his jacket off and slipped it over my shoulders.
"Of what?" Camellia squawked.
I smiled in answer and backed away.
22
Bryony
“My…goodness."
I yawned, and the woman, my mother, gasped at the sight of my enormous toothy jaw.
"Now she's just showing off," Cosmo murmured, smirking at me.
My tail thumped against the floor, and my artist grinned and turned back to the grand model of me on his table. It was rough still, but already elegant, powerful. Just as I was.
"Beautiful," my mother murmured.
"You can pet her," Owen urged.
My mother glanced between us, excitement filling her face, but there was a little flavor of fear on the air too. Cosmo huffed as I pushed up from the floor and padded over to my mother, who stiffened. She'd kept safely away from me since I'd transformed for her, and while she seemed her usual delighted by anything self, the nerves in the air were a clear hint to something else.
I resisted the urge to let out a rumble of annoyance even as she stumbled back two steps. There'd been no keeping my new second-nature a secret. Not after I'd gone barreling through the castle on a spree. Or a hunt. Even now that the tiger and I were more unified, I could still recall the flavor of Camellia's terror, sharp and dense and bitter, scratching at me to track her down and snap at her just to hear her scream again. Maybe that was a little bit my own wish.
I sat down in front of my mother, close enough to rub myself against her but waiting for her to grow more comfortable first. Her heart was loud and fast in her chest, eyes wide and fixed to watching. Owen reached out, and I tilted my head to catch his scratching fingers behind my ear, a huff of pleasure escaping. My mother laughed, one trembling hand reaching out slowly. She smelled of men and of magic and the animal in me found something unpleasant in the flavors, but I was trying to prove to her how gentle, how myself I really I was, so I leaned into her touch, lapping my tongue over a spot on the back of her wrist and marking my scent there.
"Oh my." She sank down to her knees in a quick rush that prickled my senses, warned of an attack, but I held those instincts back, blinking at my mother as her face hovered