Honored Vow

bullshit. It’s crazy. I mean, it’s
    hard enough to live your life as a human being, but then you have to add
    the whole panther bullshit on top of it? How do you do it?”
    “It’s different for me, like you said. I don’t have the whole animal-
    versus-human war going on in my head all the time. I’m just me.”

    42

    Mary Calmes

    “What is that like? You shift and you’re still you, still Jin, aware of
    everything, making sense of—”
    “Except when I change into my nekhene form,” I told her.
    “What?”
    I cleared my throat. “In Sobek, I changed into my nekhene form; you
    saw it.”
    “Yes. You saved Logan and Markel from the semel-aten’s men.”
    “In that form, I’m not me,” I confessed to her.
    “But my God, Jin, you have to either be threatened with Logan’s
    death or with forced separation from him to bring on that form. That’s not
    just something you choose or don’t choose to become. Circumstances
    make you into your nekhene form; it’s a purely visceral reaction.”
    And it was, but I didn’t like it.
    “What’s interesting to me about that is that the form you take
    changes. The first time you shifted, Logan said you looked more like an
    enormous werepanther, that form that only a semel or reah can be, and
    then another time he said you looked more like a dragon, and then when I
    saw you, it was like you were a cross between a scorpion and a panther,
    almost like a giant spider with a cat muzzle.”
    “All those forms sound horrible. I just want to be a panther or a man,
    nothing else.”
    “Well, you can have the panther form, I’ll just be me.”
    “If you shifted faster and it didn’t hurt, you might enjoy the freedom
    of being in your panther form.”
    She smiled at me. “That’s another part I don’t get, it seriously
    doesn’t hurt you even a little to shift?”
    “Not at all.”
    “But I’ve seen you shift, and it’s amazing. It’s like I blink and you’re
    a cat.”
    “We can increase the speed of your shift if you want.”
    “We can?”
    “It’s a skill just like anything else; if you practice, you’ll get faster.”
    “I’ll think about it.”
    “Okay.”
    We were silent for several minutes, just walking together, enjoying
    being outside in the cool night air.

    Honored Vow

    43

    “Jin.”
    I turned to look at her.
    “If protecting you is hardwired into Yuri specifically, then why does
    every sheseru want to protect you, and not just him?”
    “It’s hardwired in a sheseru to protect the mate of his semel, his
    yareah, but a reah, that notches up the feeling and pulls it from every
    sheseru that’s encountered. And in Yuri, because he is my sheseru—”
    “God, poor Yuri, he must want to sleep with you.”
    I gave her a look.
    “No, I just mean he must want to be with you and protect you all the
    time.”
    “Yuri’s stronger than people think, and I’m not talking about
    physically. He’s very disciplined mentally.”
    “Yuri’s a brute.”
    I shook my head. “He’s really not.”
    “I’ll take your word for it.” She sighed heavily. “So back to these
    akers, where are they in hierarchy in relation to a sylvan and a sheseru?”
    “Like I said, they report to a maahes, and he, the maahes, is on the
    same level as a sylvan and a sheseru.”
    “So you think what? You think Russ got taken by a maahes?”
    I nodded. “Or a manu or a bakhu. I doubt the semel even knows he’s
    here.”
    “So, then, what’s your plan?”
    “This bistro was picked so whoever could talk to Russ. His answers,
    whatever they were, didn’t make them happy, and so they took him. We
    just need to go in there and talk to whoever approaches us.”
    She sucked in her breath. “I’m a little spooked, I have to be honest.”
    I squinted at her. “You’re with me, why would you be scared?”
    “See, this is what I don’t understand. Anybody passing through
    another semel’s territory must alert that semel that they’re there.”
    “Wrong.”
    “Oh God, could you just tell me?”
    I turned, and she stopped walking to look at me.

    44

    Mary Calmes

    “If you are going to spend more than a week in another’s territory,
    then and only then must you make that semel aware of your presence, or if
    you are traveling with more than two other panthers.”
    “So, like, if you were here with Logan and Yuri and Mikhail—”
    “Then we would need to call the semel of Los Angeles and ask his
    permission to be here.”
    “But since it’s just