Trapped

around her neck and memorized the size and position. She whinnied and stamped on the ground with her hooves, one leg at a time, no doubt marveling that she had four of them. I crafted the first part of the binding that would allow the necklace to shrink back to human size when she shifted.
    » Okay, shift back to human. I know you want to run, but this isn’t the best place to do it. There are leopards in the trees here and other hungry things. «
    Granuaile snorted and shifted back to human form. » Atticus, that was amazing! Four legs! Hooves! Incredible! «
    » I know. Check your necklace. «
    She looked down and saw that the necklace was fastened around her neck exactly as it had been before.
    » You rock. «
    › Don’t swell his head. It’s already the size of a zeppelin. ‹
    I unfastened the necklace again. » Okay, kitty form. «
    Granuaile shifted and became a sleek black jaguar. I could tell by the shorter, thicker tail and the wider head. She sneezed a couple of times here too.
    » Congratulations. You’re a jaguar. «
    Granuaile’s joy at this news elicited an extremely loud roar, startling Oberon and me and the surrounding woods into silence.
    › I think every creature near enough to hear that just pooped, ‹ Oberon said, › and then it went into hiding. Hunting tip number one: Stay silent. ‹
    Granuaile lowered her ears and managed to convey a sense of regret. I took measurements for her necklace and had her shift back to human.
    » Sorry, Oberon, « she said as soon as she got her voice back. » It’s Helen Reddy’s fault. It was the whole ‘I am woman, hear me roar’ thing. «
    › No problem. You still have infinite slack. ‹
    » All right, « I said, retrieving the necklace. » Let’s see what kind of bird you are. Fly a bit if you want, but don’t keep us waiting long. «
    Granuaile shifted and I whooped. » You’re a peregrine falcon! Fastest bird alive! Fly! Be free! «
    With a screech of victory, Granuaile took wing; for a moment it was a majestic scene out of Animal Planet , and then it wasn’t, as she promptly crashed after an awkward banking maneuver. She tried again, crashed again, and then, on her third attempt, climbed toward the moon so she could dive back down at two hundred miles an hour. When she landed in a sort of sprawling skid and shifted back to human form, she groaned and clutched her stomach.
    » Oww. Atticus, I don’t feel so good inside. «
    » It’s because you’ve been shifting back and forth so quickly. When you thumb your nose at the laws of physics like you’ve been doing, the universe tends to get you back through biology. «
    » I’m not permanently damaging my spleen or anything, am I? «
    » Nope. It’ll fade. It’s just a pain you can’t heal or suppress. How was your flight? «
    » So awesome. The third one, anyway. I can tell I’m going to enjoy that form a lot. «
    » I’m sure you will. Last one: sea lion. «
    She shifted and clapped her flippers together. Oberon chuffed at her, and I chuckled as I adjusted her necklace.
    » Okay, now hold still in this form awhile. I’m going to make all the forms and sizes recursive so that you can shift directly from horse to falcon or jaguar to sea lion, and the necklace will change properly along with it. « A few minutes and it was done. » Okay, shift to jaguar from this form and we’ll hunt. «
    › About time! ‹ Oberon said.
    Granuaile shifted to her jaguar form and I shifted to a wolfhound. We both sneezed. My coat was reddish with a white stripe down my right front leg where my tattoos were; I looked like a slightly different dog, since I was in truth one of the old warhounds of the Irish that eventually were bred to become the deerhounds and wolfhounds of today. It made no difference to Oberon, though; to him I was a wolfhound, part of his pack.
    › Okay, now take a really deep breath through the nose, ‹ Oberon said to Granuaile. She did and promptly began to sneeze uncontrollably, more violently than she had upon her initial shift. She even tried to cover her mouth with her paw, which was pretty funny.
    › Heh! Never knew the world could be so pungent, did you? ‹ Granuaile managed to find some space between sneezes to growl at him. › Aw, you’ll get used to it in a few minutes. Okay, we need you to lead us to some dik-diks without running into any baboons, hippos, crocodiles, or other big cats. ‹
    We failed miserably to find any dik-diks, but Oberon wasn’t the least bit