Change of Heart

Heart
    by Mary Calmes
    "Yes."
    "So you'll accept me because of this," I said, trying to keep the chill of out my voice.
    "No, not just because of this," he said softly. "I know now that your very presence is a blessing. I didn't understand that yesterday."
    In his eyes, I saw only sincerity. The difference from the day before was like night and day.
    "Can you forgive my blindness?"
    "Yes." I nodded before I started to eat. If I were stuffing food in my mouth, maybe he wouldn't notice that I was close to tears. I had never been emotional, but since Logan had come into my life, I was a wreck.
    "I was scared that Logan would lose our tribe, but this morning, people started showing up."
    I tried to act like I was listening, but he couldn't know that the words weren't really important, only the way he was looking at me. The father of my mate was excited, and he radiated warmth and acceptance. I could barely hold my fork because my hands were shaking.
    "Jin? Are you all right?"
    I nodded, taking a sip of my coffee to wash down the lump in my throat.
    "This must all be fairly overwhelming."
    He had no idea. No matter how hard I tried not to get excited, I could feel it welling up inside me. I blamed Logan.
    In a matter of days, the man had managed to tear down walls that had taken years to construct. I was so close to having a 179
    Change of Heart
    by Mary Calmes
    family again, and I was scared to let it happen and scared that it wouldn't.
    "You were banished from your tribe for being a reah, or for being gay?"
    I cleared my throat, but still my voice came out hoarse and cracking. "Both."
    "I can only imagine. There you were at fifteen or sixteen, changing for the first time, only to discover that you're a reah. Your father had to have been terrified."
    I shook my head. "He was horrified."
    He nodded. "I'm so sorry."
    No one could know the extent of the ambush. In a matter of minutes, my father had gone from being the person I admired most in the world—my teacher, my friend, my hero, my protector—to the man who tried to kill me, all in the course of one afternoon when I was sixteen. I had already changed several times without telling anyone. My parents had both been waiting for the day I could first shift into a panther, but when I had finally done it and become a werepanther instead, taking the form that was half-man, half-beast, I knew I was a reah. It made sense, because even though I loved girls, I had never had the urge to make love to girls. I accepted being a reah, and at the next hunt, before we began, in front of my father and my semel and the entire tribe, I announced that I was a reah, gladly accepted being gay, and shifted for them into werepanther form so there could be no mistake.
    I had anticipated confusion and shock, not outrage and anger and my father calling for my death. I was vile and 180
    Change of Heart
    by Mary Calmes
    filthy. My mother called me an abomination and ran away, my brother turned his back on me, claiming I was dead, refusing to speak to me ever again, and while I was staring after them, the tears streaming down my face, my father attacked me from behind, putting me in a choke hold and hurling me to the ground. Then the beating began. I lifted my head only once, to look for Crane because I could hear him screaming.
    It took three men to hold him down. I wasn't able to see him for long, as my semel had delivered the first kick to my face.
    There were pieces I remembered and time that I lost. I was ordered to shift back to human, but I was afraid that in that form, I would die, so I remained in a ball while they did their worst. I went in and out of consciousness. I woke up once, and my father, whom I loved, was cutting off my hair with a knife. When they saw I was awake, they beat me until I passed out. The second time I woke up, my sheseru, Crane's father, was yelling at the men gathered around me.
    He would bury me alive, he roared, before he let anyone rape me. He told them that if they violated me, they would then be no better than me, a perversion. I understood that he had saved me from that horror even as he proceeded to break my arm in two places with a baseball bat. I had never known pain like that.
    I woke finally on the side of the road, naked, bleeding, gravel embedded in my skin, pieces of it torn off from where I had been dragged, Crane told me later, behind a car. When I heard the running footsteps, I thought I was done, but when my eyes lifted, I found Crane. He wasn't