One morning, as Lily got up, she heard a strange hissing conversation coming from outside her door. She had woken up after Gux, finding a berry and a flower sitting on her dresser, waiting for her, and she stretched as she got out of bed. It had been a month since Zaax had entered her life, and while she never would’ve guessed any of this would’ve happened when she found Gux out in those woods… now she was surprised she’d ever imagined life without him.
She walked into the living room to find Zaax speaking with Berry. He wasn’t strong enough in magic to be woken up by Zaax, so it had to have been Gux that did it, meaning her husband hadn’t left that long ago. Berry was speaking in gnoll, while Zaax had this strange, almost slithery tone to his voice. She could understand Berry, but Zaax… She leaned against one of the knots in the wood of her natural hut. “So, what are you two talking about?”
Berry looked about to jump from his pot as he turned to look at Lily. “Oh! You’re up early! Zaax and I were working on language lessons, isn’t that right?”
Zaax nodded. “Speak… good.” Lily was actually quite proud of that, smiling warmly and her heart giddy with excitement. She came over, hugging him tight. He smiled. “Thanks, mom.”
She looked him in the eyes, seeing those golden orbs with little red flecks in them, and her mouth twisted a little. She looked at Berry. “So, what was it that he was just saying as I came out?” Zaax looked confused, and Lily knew he wasn’t that far in his language work, so she wasn’t surprised.
Berry rustled sheepishly in his pot. “I mean… I promised not to talk about it. Or in it, but Zaax wanted to share…”
She looked at Berry with an intensity. “Talk about what? And promised to who?”
Berry shook his leaves. “It was to Gux, obviously, but I won’t break about what. If he wants to tell you, you can ask him.” Berry remained rooted in his position, and while Lily wanted to question him further, she knew how wooden his responses could get, so she decided to leave it.
She looked at Zaax, swapping into gnoll. “Zaax, what you and Berry talk about?”
Zaax grinned, that almost crazed, but adorable grin that only gnolls could do with their wide mouths. “All sorts of things! I learned about the birds and bees and plants and pollination and how what you and dad were doing last night was the same as what the tribe did out in the public, but how it’s a private, intimate thing that you don’t want to share!” He beamed proudly, while Lily was blushing quite red, not realizing she’d been so loud.
She got up, dispelling the magic on Berry. “Okay, that’s enough talking to your plant friend for one day,” she said quickly, and Zaax looked sad and confused.
“But mom… I want talk Berry!” Zaax stomped his foot, a little tremor forming in the wood around her, and she actually looked at him quite proudly before she realized how mad he was.
“Sweetie, you need to get ready for class with the others. It’s your first day, remember?” She didn’t want to continue her line of questioning, and the magic pulse from Zaax had actually been impressive. She was sure she had a good druid here, but he continued to grumble.
“I don’t want to talk with the kids,” he growled in gnoll. “I want to play with you and Berry! Why do I need to go to some boring old school?”
Lily gave him a matronly look. “Because it’s good for you. It’ll help you learn and grow, my little bud. You need the soothing waters of knowledge to soak into your roots so that as you grow big and tall you can blossom into a beautiful person.”
He harumphed, crossing his paws and sitting on the ground. “Me no go.” “Zaax…” “No go.” “Zaax.” “No go!”
Lily was going to lean down in front of him, but decided a different approach was in order, blooming a flower under him that brought him up to eye level and putting him off balance so he was more open to talking. “Zaax, you need to go to class. If you don’t like it, I can teach you at home, but you need to have more friends than a potted bush and your parents!”
Zaax grumbled some more, turning his back to her. “I also friends animals.” Which was true, while he wasn’t very good with most magic, he had a surprising ability to talk to animals directly, even without magic, and more than once she’d had to stop him from playing too hard and running off with a pack of wolves. She knew a lot of druids who were good with animals, but… She was thinking Zaax might have been that special learner she’d thought Gux was at first.
But that didn’t change his need to learn. “Zaax, please. If you go to class, I’ll make sure your animal friends come to play with you after, okay?” She knew she shouldn’t be rewarding bad behavior, but she just liked seeing him playing and laughing too much to say no.
Even that, however, didn’t get to him. He hopped off of the flower he was on, going to the corner. “I no want go… Kids laugh. Not good laugh… Mean laugh.” Laughing was one of the few non-violent ways gnolls showed appreciation or friendship, Lily had learned from Gux. It… sort of saddened her that Zaax had learned about the dark side of laughter already.
She went over to him, hugging him from behind and kissing his fuzzy cheek. “Zaax… Kids are mean, especially when you’re different from them. I should know, I always got teased about my freckles.”
“Tea...zed?” Zaax asked, confused about the word.
“Made fun of? Laughed at meanly, instead of with?”
“Ooooooh…” He looked her in the eye, shaking his head. “Freckles like spots on fur! They nice! Make mommy very pretty.”
She smiled warmly, then nodded. “They are! And thank you. But, if you’re getting teased, let them know it’s a bad thing to do. It’s like your bullying, but for the heart.”
Zaax slowly connected the dots, nodding. “And I no like tease… like they no like push?”
Lily nodded. “Exactly! They should know better by now. So if they tease you, let the teacher know, and if they don’t do anything, then let me know after and I’ll talk to them. Nobody’s going to hurt my little bud, you got that?”
Zaax thought about it for a long while, his muzzle screwed up and his tongue out as he thought, the face he made adorable. After a few seconds, he looked at Lily suspiciously. “Get friends after?”
Lily laughed. “The whole pack, or at least those that can come and play.”
Zaax slowly nodded. “I go school…” He went outside, as did Lily, who looked up to see the sun already relatively high in the sky.
“Oh no! You’re running late!” She turned into a deer, motioning for him to get on her back. However, she saw Zaax focusing, and, after one or two false starts, turn into a small wolf cub, though he still had his coloration from his normal fur. Still, Lily was so floored that she went back on two legs, covering her mouth, only to remember that’s not how a doe’s body worked. She went over, nuzzling him lovingly, and Zaax growled and yipped playfully, the wolf cub quite annoyed at the doe nudging it. Lily just smiled, then started off at a slow trot so Gux could keep up, running playfully all the way to the school.
The school “building” was a small area where the trees all grew together, forming a natural alcove a group could sit in and listen to nature without being distracted by the sounds of people doing their daily business. Mr. Kuromatsu was already in front of the class, starting by asking the young learners, who were as diverse as the druids in the commune, with different ages, genders, and races all under one roof listening to him talk, about what kind of transformation magic they saw around them when Lily and Zaax came in the door in their animal forms. The kids all looked at them with confusion before Lily transformed back. “Sorry for the distraction, kids, just had to make sure he got here on time.”
Zaax stayed as a wolf a little longer, looking rather sheepish, ironically, but he was pushed forward, and eventually decided to turn back into his own form, much to the surprise of the kids. All except one older dwarven boy, who scoffed. “Looks like he’s still stuck as a dog!” A couple kids laughed, but the glare from Lily shut the whole group up in a moment. She then looked at him like a mama bear protecting her cub.
Mr. Kuromatsu, however, let out a surprise chuckle. “An interruption, to be sure, but a welcome one! Welcome to class again, Zaax. I hope you can understand me a little better now.” Zaax nodded, widening the smile on Kuromatsu’s face. “And, it seems, he’s already ready with the first steps of animal shaping. This is a trick that all druids learn how to do, some better than others. First, you need to start off as land animals, but, Mrs. Lily, if you will…”
Lily shrugged, then turned into a colorful bird of paradise, flying around the class to ooohs and aaaahs before she landed on a branch above the ‘writing’ area. “Thank you,” Kuromatsu continued. “Eventually, you learn more complex shapes, and with practice, some druids are able to turn into any beast they’ve ever seen! This magic is guided by the ever-changing nature of the moon… but don’t forget, once you learn how to do this, that you can only do so twice a day. Only so much transformative essence can be taken from the earth before your body is full up and can do no more. Thank you, Mrs. Lily.”
Lily let out a pleasant, lilting chirp, before she flew over to the entrance, keeping an eye on Zaax and the dwarf for a little longer. “Now, class, apart from Zaax, have any of you been able to turn into a wild shape?” All the kids shook their heads except, once again, that dwarf, who stood up proudly.
“Watch this!” He focused, and turned into a bear cub, letting out a roar. However, halfway through, his form popped back, and the roar was far less ferocious coming from a bent-over kid. The kids started to laugh, but Kuromatsu stopped them.
“Very good, Beardroot, you keep that up and you’ll be transforming with the best of them.” Beardroot, who, fittingly, already had the scruffy beard of a young man despite being about 8, looked proud, settling down in his seat for the lesson to continue. Lily didn’t need to hear it, though, and flew back to the house and into the woods beyond it.
She wasn’t very good at tracking or anything like that… She rather liked the plants and that part of being a druid, but she knew enough about nature to find the wolves hunting, and she landed in a tree nearby before turning back into her elven form. She then pulled some magic from the world around her before clearing her throat. “Excuse me down there! Are you the pack that likes to play with Zaax?”
The wolves turned to her, glaring as, at the sound, a rabbit scurried off, the one at the head of the prowl missing it by inches. She turned to look at Lily, snapping “Argh! I was close to that one!”
Lily cringed. “Sorry! I didn’t mean to scare them away! I can give you some berries that will feed you through the day.”
The beta wolfess looked proud. “We don’t need your food… we can hunt on our own. It was bad enough that Gux was getting in the way of hunts… we didn’t need his mate too.”
Once more Lily found herself blushing… everyone, it seemed, was going to know about that today. “Well, he really likes animals and doesn’t like seeing things hurt… He really is the sweetest. Anyway, do your pups play with Zaax, or is that another pack?”
The alpha and beta were both ignoring her, but the omega wolfess slowly slipped away, padding to the bottom of the tree. “My cubs play with him sometimes. Why? And… I’d like one of those berries, if I could.”
Lily conjured up the berries from the tree she was in, dropping one right into the wolf mother’s mouth. “He was good today and really surprised me, so I was wondering if your cubs would like to come by this afternoon to play with Zaax? He really likes his friends.” “After… noon?” The wolfess looked very confused. Lily sighed. “Right after the sun starts to go down in the trees.”
The wolfess padded the ground thoughtfully, then nodded. “I will let them know! Thank you… um…” “Lily.” “Lily. I’ll send them over.”
“Thank you!” Lily grinned, eating a berry herself and tossing out the rest to the other wolves, even if they didn’t want them. She climbed down from her branch, starting to walk home when she heard behind her “Ugh… I am getting sick of berries. No matter how good they are, we’re going to get lazy!” Lily just laughed and made her way home.
In the afternoon Lily heard some growling and wrestling outside, and went to find a small group of six wolf cubs playing near her garden. She had to stop herself from trying to shoo them off, not used to seeing so many and nearly forgetting her earlier promise. She was glad she did stop herself, though, as Zaax came running up to them, barking out happily in gnoll “You guys made it! Thanks mom! School was good, but this is the best!” Lily laughed as she watched them all start playing and tumbling together.
“You be careful, Zaax, and have fun!” She went to her garden after that, able to hear them playing as she tended to her plants. It was hours later when she finally finished… and it was only then that she realized she didn’t hear them playing any more. She figured they’d tired themselves out and headed back to the house. “Zaax! Are you hungry? How was your day?” Only quiet greeted her, and as she went through the house, she realized it was empty. She woke up Berry. “Did you see Zaax today?”
“Not since this morning. I heard the pups playing outside, and then I think I heard them all scamper off into the woods… Maybe twenty minutes ago?”
Lily froze, fear hitting her. Had she lost Zaax? No… No, it was less than twenty minutes. He couldn’t be that far off. She’d just turn into a bird or something and go out after him. She went outside, starting to focus on the transformation, when she remembered she’d hit her limit, the energy running up against too much already built into her system. She groaned to herself… She shouldn’t’ve shown it off for the teacher. She then went out into the forest, her light dress swirling around her as she moved through the brush looking for her son.
She searched high and low, but as the sun was starting to set, she returned to the house, panic starting to hit her. Had he really run off? Where could he have gone? As she returned to the house, she found Gux putting away his armor, a smile on his face at seeing his wife. “Hello honey. Where you and Zaax go?”
She looked bashful, digging the tip of her toe into the floorboard. “Umm… about that… I think Zaax might have run off with the wolves and I don’t know where he is… Umm… It’s nothing big, but… I can’t find him.”
Gux looked at her and laughed, sure she was joking, and when she didn’t start laughing too, his face finally went serious. “Oh… Him with wolves? The den nearby, or outside forest pack?”
She looked relieved. “Oh, good, you know them! They know you… You apparently bother their hunting a lot, and they treated me like bitches when they smelled you on me… and I scared away a bunny.”
Gux groaned. “Them? They are bitches! I find, you come along?” Lily nodded, and the two of them went off into the woods, Gux seeming to know exactly where to go. Just before dark he came to a small cave burrowed in the ground and he peeked his head in, knocking on the stone outside and summoning up the magic to speak to the animals. “Excuse me! Looking for small gnoll, little taller than you long, you see?”
The alpha female growled. “Gux, please, we were about to sleep! And my pups wouldn’t be found dead with your cub. Check one of the others.” Behind her, her mate growled, along with the three big pups they had together.
Gux nodded. “Sorry to bother you.” He rolled his eyes, making Lily giggle as he went to the next den. And the next den, going down the line until he got to the final one, the home of the omega. She was all alone in her den, looking a little frazzled and fast asleep when Gux knocked. “Excuse me, have you seen our son Zaax?”
The omega shook her head. “No, I… pups, you were playing with Zaax, do you know where he is?” Seven little wolf puppies shook their heads, and she shrugged. “Haven’t seen him.” She curled up again, immediately falling asleep. Gux frowned, sure this would be the spot.
Lily squinted in the cave, then held up a hand with a little bit of flame dancing on her fingers. All the pups cringed back at the light except one, his lighter, brown fur with spots very unlike the grey of the other pups. Lily looked at him with annoyance. “Zaax, you can’t just play with your friends all day, you have to come home.”
The puppy whined. “But moooooom! Their mom let me stay over, and-”
“No butts except marching home, mister!” Zaax’s ears drooped, his tail low and dragging on the ground as the other pups all waved goodbye and promised to play with him again soon.
The omega watched him go, looking confused. “I thought I had one too many… But who even knows anymore. Thanks for finding him, I would’ve kept him safe though.”
Lily sighed, looking at Gux. “How did you not catch this either?”
Gux shook his head. “No color in dark… Wolves no color at all. Might miss Zaax’s fur.” He then chuckled. “Clever, but would run out with-”
Zaax’s magic ran out then, turning him back into his normal form as he looked between his parents. Lily looked mean and worried, while Gux, while worried, looked friendly and impressed. He ran to Gux, hugging his dad tightly and talking in gnoll. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to scare anyone… I just wanted to keep playing.”
Gux chuckled. “It’s okay… we’re just glad you’re safe.”
“We just… want bud safe,” Lily said, hugging him as well, showing she wasn’t mad. “You scare us.” Zaax nodded, still looking sad, when both his parents kissed him, each taking a cheek. “Us go home. You tell about day.” Zaax started talking as they made their way back through the darkened forest, the family heading home safe and together.
