“Oh hell no.” I backed up as far as my legs would work.

  The fae-beast let out another growl with a pointed bark that pierced through coherent thought. I hit the wall with my back and crumpled to the floor.

  “You are trapped.” Its voice was low, rumbling between my ankles and twisting around. It skulked forward, breath smelling of offals and rot, “Alone. Naked. Feeble.”

  I tried to reason it out. The creature wasn’t an actual wolf. It was something else. Something without claws and fang, or it wouldn’t have had to shapeshift at all. Something hung on the edge of my thought process, the key to unraveling this situation.

  The creature let out another sharp bark and it dissolved to nothing. The wolf-dog lowered its butt, and I recognized the universal language of four-legged meat eaters.

  It was hunting.

  ‘Do not listen.’

  Hwari’s voice penetrated through the mental haze that the Fae’s words had created. She spoke, and the fog cleared even more. ‘It lies. Glamour. The power of Fae. Wol and I will take care of this.’

  “We must be quick.” Wol padded between me and the dog, impossibly small against the other familiar.

  “A cat?” The beast laughed, guttural and rough, “Small cat. Not even a bite.”

  ‘Size is not everything. Size through lies, even less so.’ Hwari chimed at me.

  “State your name, beast.” Wol said proudly, “And I will expose your lies.”

  “False promises! False promises!” It coughed with each bark, jerking its head to the side as if it was sick. “False promises!”

  “Truer than you are in that form.” Wol slyly turned his head at me. “Watch and learn, young Caller.”

  Hwari spoke in his stead, floating by the dog’s ribs. ‘We are truer than he, for we have you. The truest in this room. He is here alone. Without his anchor.’ Silver-black scales melded into shadow, ‘He will be punished.’

  “Who said that?!” The dog leaped to the side, crashing over wooden chairs and splintering them.

  I realized the dog couldn’t see Hwari. He couldn’t hear her either. Not unless she wanted him to.

  ‘Fae work through lies. We must expose those lies.’ I don’t know when and how, but Hwari’s tail fins wrapped around Wol making him look bigger than he was. ‘Or make lies of our own.’

  “Clumsy oaf. Look at the mess you made.” Wol’s tone changed. His voice was higher in tone and decidedly condescending to a fault, like he was a king talking to a peasant.

  “I am no oaf.” The fae-wolf righted himself. Fur bristled, and the beast appeared larger as the shadows were drawn towards him. “I am Exanguin. The blood-letter.”

  Wol’s laugh came a split second after the fae-wolf’s words. “A blood letter? What could that possibly mean?” He slunk forward, tail high in the air. “A wingless oaf, preying on the ankles of unaware passerbys? Children splashing in a creek?”

  “That is not what it means!” Exanguin barked back.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  ‘A worm. Suckling.’ Hwari appeared above the dog’s head from the shadows.

  Exanguin reacted with immediate violence, twisting his head and trying to bite the shadowy koi. But when his fangs clamped around her, she dissipated into smoke.

  She emerged between his front two legs, singing, ‘Blind. Helpless. Crawling.’

  …was it me, or did he just start blinking rapidly?

  “Who’s there? WHO?”

  “It is I, Wol. The cat who fished the moon.” Wol said proudly.

  “And I am the wolf who devours the cat.” Exanguin shook his head, like he couldn’t see then stepped forward gingerly, afraid that he might lose his footing. “The dog who hunts rats and the rat stole the cat’s seat.”

  Wol stiffened. “In that court, the Fae respects cats.”

  “I don't serve the Twelve Beast Court.” Exanguin shot back.

  ‘Wol.’ There was a note of warning in Hwari’s voice.

  Wol seemed to sigh, then straightened himself. “Wolves cannot devour cats. Cats climb trees.” He jumped on top of the nearby rubble that Exanguin had created. “All you can do is howl at the moon. A moon I already fished.”

  It definitely wasn’t my imagination. He tried to copy Wol’s leap but failed. His legs had grown shorter, stumpier somehow. He wasn’t the same great beast that had slipped inside unnoticed. The wolf was regressing into a dog, and losing more of his lupine features with each exchange.

  “No! Dogs can climb!”

  “No, dogs are afraid of heights.” Wol corrected.

  “Cats are afraid of heights.” Suddenly, the dog expanded in size again. His teeth sharper, eyes glowing with hunger. “I’ve seen it. Men whose souls are full of flame, bringing ladders and screaming cars. Climbing trees to save scared little kittens.”

  ‘He gains power, because he roots his lies in truth.’ Hwari told me.

  I saw Wol rock back as if he got hit. The feline familiar narrowed his eyes down at Exanguin. “Yes. But cats can climb. Dogs cannot. I do not need to climb down. You need to climb up.”

  “No!” Exanguin barked, clambering up on the pile. His claws shortened into stubby paws and his majestic wolf’s pelt turned a ruddy brown. His long tail disappeared into a nub.

  “Just like a housepet.” Wol said, “Trying to get up on an owner's lap. But he can’t. Too little. Too short. Too weak.”

  Hwari flew down from the ceiling, floating before Exanguin’s eyes. ‘Truth he speaks.’

  “N-No! That’s not true!” He kept barking at Wol, each successive bark turning higher in pitch.

  “It’s the scared ones that bark.” Wol slammed his paw down, a claw extended. His golden eyes gleamed with victory. “Tell me. What are you scared of, Exanguin?”

  ‘Scared?’

  “Who said that?!” He jerked to the side to where Hwari was, but she had flitted just out of reach. He kept looking back and forth, continuing to grow small. “No! I am brave! I am big! I am strong! I am courage!”

  There was no wolf. Not even a big dog.

  A pug. A chihuahua, maybe. Even smaller.

  “Like the cartoons.” I pushed myself against the wall, standing tall and straight, “Courage. He’s also a cowardly dog. Just like you.”

  Hwari burst forth from underneath Exanguin in a shower of ink, her thoughts bouncing off the walls. ‘Him and you, peas in a pod, pair of two.’

  From the start of this whole exchange, Hwari and Wol had begun drawing from me. Gaining power through my presence, making themselves more real in ways that the dog without his own Practitioner could never do. There was a ring of truth to my words, and it hammered into the lies that Wol and Hwari had been laying out.

  The words had filled the air with magic, and with my participation they imploded right in front of the fae.

  Exanguin yelped and turned tail. His transformation came undone halfway. A boy with dog ears and a bird’s nest on his head. Exanguin, now in his real form, slipped out the door leaving the three of us alone.