What Now? Ch. 02

Emmanuel ran in, barking. He bowed his front end down, tail in the air and wagging furiously. Lyssa looked at her son, smiled, and shifted to wolf, sliding from her clothes.

Emmanuel bounced, first one way, then the other. Lyssa adopted the play stance and he yipped and took off.

Emmanuel bounded down the stairs with his mother following. Though her son was a strong young wolf pup, she could still easily overtake him. They ran around the den, past sparring males, and into the woods.

Soft, spring grasses, flowers, sun.

As Lyssa followed the silver-tipped tail around the lake, she yipped and leapt forward as he was bowled over.

Her fright was quickly dissipated as a small blondish pup rolled with her son. Ah, Lyria. Joanna must be over for a visit. As the two pups tumbled and chased, she watched them play, briefly, then headed for the den.

Lyssa found Joanna with her mother, as would be expected. They embraced briefly, and Lyssa told her friend she'd be in the exercise room.

She was doing triceps extensions when Joanna came in, "Hey, Lys."

Lyssa put the weight down. "Hey, Jo. How're you? How's Nathan?"

"So glad to be back to work and I'm glad he's happy."

"Goin' back to school?"

"Yeah, probably in the fall. How's Em?"

They headed to the kitchen for coffee and a piece of cake. "Busy. Trying to keep everybody safe. Organizing. Security cameras. Training sessions, males and females."

"Little Em?"

Lyssa took a drink as they sat in the dining hall. "We keep trying to get him to understand humans can be dangerous and that he's got to watch out for them. I'm worried somebody'll grab him. His answer: Me bite."

Joanna chuckled. "Too independent for his own good."

Lyssa sighed and nodded. Jo put a hand on her arm. "How about you?"

"Lawyers. Legislation. Training. Council meetings. Hey, did you hear some police agencies want to have us work with them to solve crimes?"

"Sounds good. Is it?"

"As long as we work out the contract right, we should be OK. I don't know who's gonna like it much, though. Cities. Lots of humans. Smells. Noise."

"You might be surprised."

"And Stephanie's pregnant, can you believe it?"

"It's so sad..." They talked amiably for a period, with occasional interruptions for greetings from others. After a while, two pups tottered into the room, crawled into their mother's laps, became pink little children, and fell asleep.

"She looks like you," Lyssa said.

Joanna looked up from stroking her little one's skin with a radiant smile. "Daddy's little girl. And he's definitely Em's son."

"Oh, yeah." Lyssa smiled down at her little boy, ruffled his hair.

"So, he still can't send?"

Lyssa shook her head. [It's really starting to scare me. He's so independent.]

Joanna opened his mouth, then closed it. She looked down at Lyria and thought of how she'd feel if something happened to her and she couldn't call for help.