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"A da nv do," she crooned Great Spirit

"Follow the drum," Edoda said

I looked at the cave wall, at the shadoaying with exhaustion The beat of the druh my soul home

War shadows, I saw myself as the cat rested on me, a cured skin, with fur still on, ears pointed, tufts curling out Pelt brushed s We sabobcat My face The overlay of cat face, above my own

Edoda settled a necklace of claws, bones, and fierce teeth over my head onto my shoulders "Reach inside," Edoda murmured "Breathe inside Into we sa, into the snake within" The snake of the bobcat, the snake of e The snake of the double helix of DNA in the skin of the catMagic tingled along ers as I slid down, inside the bobcat pelt Drearay place where Bruiser and the thing that was not Soul, but was like her, fought I had seen her species playing in the black waters near Chauvin I rey of the blade of steel, wielded by Bruiser But before I could put it all together, I was pulled back into thebelow the surface, encapsulated in every cell of the hunter cat, in its teeth and bones, in the dried bits of its hardenedall that we sa was The awareness of where the cat and I differed Where ere the same And how easy it would be to shift fro steel with e, as Bruiser had done This was iht free of the ancient dreaain it held me Sucked me down into the past

My first beast My first shift In thethe shape of bobcat Pain, like spokes of the whiteray and dark and light All color bled out of the night The shadoas a young cat with a short stubby tail

The past and the present ht white man’s steel into my cave home, I could cut the silver chain and free Beast fro her, I could free myself from Leo

I was back in the drea like notes of the flute echoing in the distance through the cavern In hu the pile of shadows And I realized that Beast was there too Tlvdatsi, but more than simply the form of mountain lion This was the soul of Beast that I had pulled intothe kill of a bigger cat--when I had stolen both the living body of my attacker and her life-force to savemy people But I could undo the evil I had done

I could cut the silver chain I could free myself from Leo And I could free Beast With the sa inthrough the joints of prey, separating us, I could incise her froht her soul inside with me I could set her free forever Forever

I could be what nature intended--skinwalker I could silence the second voice that clawed and tore at me, that demanded her way I could cut her out

In the drea teeth She said, Jane and tlvdatsi are I/we Jane and Puether Jane and Beast areto read her body language, trying to understand what she was saying Her eyes glowed yellow and fierce and her claws extruded, piercing the floor of the niche Si, holding me in place like prey Don’t you want to be free? I asked her, flinching away, only to be caught by the claws and held down

Freedom is death now, she said, her breath hot onbefore last litter Long before Jane becaain Now I alone aether

We’veAnd if I cut you free anyway?

I will die And Jane will be killer only She blinked atslowly Beastwants to live

Sucking a breath, I woke Gasping Shuddering And Ieloith pain and excite"