Best-Solution - 3. Chapter 3

Miah was the only one of us actually clean; I didn’t know if that would help or hurt us in their opinions. His mom looked very prim in a brown dress, loose and blousy, with a skirt that went down to her calves, and his father was dressed much like Miah did, in a pair of loose pants and a flannel over a t-shirt.

It was a far cry from my skinny jeans and tight t-shirt that showed a strip of my belly, and Moshe’s dirty shorts—and nothing else.

Though at least if I was trying to avoid their gaze, I had something good to look at. Moshe’s muscles flexed as he fidgeted. He had some mud flaking off between his shoulder blades, and I nearly reached up to brush it away.

“What are you doing here? Don’t you have to clean up after the storm?” Miah stared up at his parents.

“The Dravisson boys are doing it.”

Miah snorted. “So the guys I was supposed to hire are already working on your stake?”

His dad shrugged. “I thought this was more important.”

“Well we don’t have time to chat at the moment. Somehow between letting them out this morning and feeding time, eight head have gone missing, including the lead cow. We’re gathering some gear and then we have to go looking for them. I’m damned lucky it isn’t the whole herd.” Miah finally began moving again, and Moshe and I trailed in his wake.

“I’ll make some food,” I said. We could put it in the pack on the back of Miah’s hover chair again. Moshe went inside to change, and Miah began to gather some rope and other supplies from cubes stacked to one side that hadn’t made their way out the barn yet.

“Let me help,” Sarah offered.

“Most of my food is out in the shuttle.” I watched when she hesitated, but when I turned, unwilling to wait for her to make up her mind, she followed right after me. She looked around curiously, but kept her hands folded together at her waist until we got into the galley area of the shuttle.

“Miah will leave some space in the bag, but not much. I was going to throw together some hot sandwiches and wrap them. It’s still chilly out. I have a thermal bag that will keep them from cooling.” I began pulling meat, cheese, and vegetables out of the cooler.

“Where’s the bread?”

Sarah didn’t talk much after that, but between us we had eight hot sandwiches packed up and placed in pack within a few minutes. Moshe would scarf down any extras we had.

At the ramp I hesitated. She hadn’t even introduced herself to me formally, and this was the parent of one of my bonded. All protocol had gone out the window though, in the emergency. Every single cow was precious for Miah.

“Could you take these to Miah? I’m going to stay behind and shift; I’m of more use that way than human.” If she couldn’t accept me because of my true form, then it was better to know now. It wouldn’t change what we had with Miah, for me or Moshe, but at least we’d know and no longer be in limbo wondering when they’d freak out. There was no way I was getting bare or shifting in front of them, though. Even I had limits.

“O-oh. Okay.” Sarah took the heating bag from me.

“Thank you.”

She studied me for a moment, looking from my blue frill of hair I’d left down this morning to my feet encased in a pair of way too fancy to be called work boot boots, but didn’t say a word.

“I’ll be out in a few minutes.”

Sarah flinched and flushed. Okay, Miah definitely got that from her. Her skin changed colors just like his did. She nodded and fled.

Was she wondering what it was like to see a shifter change into his true form? Wondering what mine would be? Trying to figure out why her precious son would want to be with an animal—much less two?

I shook my head. She was not my problem. Finding the missing cows was. Stripping, I set my clothes down on a chair and then… relaxed. Changing into my true form wasn’t painful, though I was shrinking down and my bone and musculature did change. Maybe it hurt other people; to me, it felt like I was melting into the body I always could feel was inside me.

Propelling myself along the ground by undulating the small plates along my stomach, I crawled down the ramp.

“Ready?” Miah asked me. He and Moshe were both in the yard. Surprisingly, Miah’s dad was beside them. Guess we wouldn’t have any extra sandwiches.

“Yessss,” I hissed.

Sarah had flinched before. This time she actually came off the group. “You can talk.” She stared at me with wide eyes.

“Yessss.”

“I didn’t… I thought….” She trailed off, shaking her head.

“Mom, why don’t you go inside? There’s some books and coffee. You have the morning off; you might as well take advantage of it.”

Even from my vantage point, I could see her eyes lit up. I didn’t know if it was for the coffee or books, but I guessed Miah’s love of both probably came from her. What had he gotten from his dad? Not much, it seemed, other than a few features and his height. His mom went inside the house, and Miah turned back to me.

“You fly ahead. Start at the corral and see if you can pick up their trail; with the ground so soft, the prints should be easy to track. We’ll follow on the ground. Double back with anything you see out of the ordinary, and let us know was soon as you spot them.”

I nodded my head. Nathan hadn’t said anything, but his eyes were wide as he stared at me. His mouth dropped open when I opened my wings, the pale underside flashing as I began to skim across the ground, gradually picking up speed and height. Soon I was where I needed to be, drifting among the thermals. I looped back down and picked up the trail.

Miah was right; it was easy to follow. The cattle went in a straight line and didn’t deviate. What the hell were they after?

Oh no. They weren’t after anything anymore. I could see the cows ahead, right by the first canal, lined up at the property line that ran over the area the water went underground—before Moshe dug it up.

They were on their sides, blood seeping from their slit necks. All eight were dead. Miah was going to be crushed. I wished I could stop him from seeing this, but I couldn’t. Someone had killed the cows and was trying to send a message. Animals didn’t waste food, so it wasn’t a predator that ran on four legs.

When I circled around, I tried to come up with an easy way to tell Miah over half his cows were gone. Half his breeding stock meant not nearly enough calves next year. It would be a devastating blow. To recoup even a fraction of his money in order to survive, he’d have to sell his cattle back to Gorseman, who’d no doubt pay only a miserly amount for each, though they’d only been out of his possession for a week or so.

I swung around and flew back toward them. They were over halfway to the stream. I dipped my wings, gliding downward in a spiral. I didn’t want to crawl through the mud or shift into my human form and be naked in front of Miah’s dad, so I set myself down in Miah’s lap, draping over him to keep from falling off the hover chair. Aiming like that was harder than I expected.

“Did you find them?”

“Yes.” I nodded. My wings folded, I coiled the lower half of my body around Miah’s arm, holding on but not squeezing or locking on with the rows of barbs that ran down both sides of my lower scales. There was no easy way to say this, and I couldn’t shift to hug him, so I was doing the best I could. “I’m sorry, Miah, but they’re dead.”

“What?” He stared at me.

“Someone killed the cattle; their throats were slit. I saw human footprints near where they were left. The cow’s tracks hid them before; they actually followed whoever did this.”

Miah was frozen in his chair. I could see it; the light of his hopes and dreams fading in his eyes. I hissed to Moshe. “Get over here, and tell him we’re in this together. He needsss us both.”

I didn’t care anymore that his dad was looking on. I slipped up Miah’s arm so I could caress his cheek with my head. Moshe knelt right down on the ground, taking Miah’s other hand and leaning in close, embracing him and me.

“Who could’ve done this?”

“What about the men who you bought the stake from? You got it at a steal because of the water. What if they learned about it? I found the cows lined up right over where the stream goes underground.”

Miah blinked. “I paid fair price, even if I didn’t reveal all I knew about the water. They could’ve gotten more—maybe—but no one else had offered or even looked at the stake in years before I went to the city. Besides, they weren’t cattle ranchers; they wouldn’t know how to get them to follow.”

“So not them.”

“What about Gorseman’s foreman? He was asking a lot of questions about the stake, you guys, my plans for the future.” Miah narrowed his eyes. “That boss of his is a real snake, too.”

I hissed, and Miah jerked back, staring into my eyes from inches away. He blinked several times. “I’m sorry, Lisco, that came out wrong. Besides, you’re not a snake. No snakes I know of have wings.”

“True.” I didn’t like being compared to that ass, but really, I wasn’t a snake. My true form just sort of resembled one, just like Moshe’s true form somewhat resembled a strange creature called a caterpillar.

“Why would Gorseman be threatened by you?” Miah’s dad asked. Nathan looked confused.

“You never told him what you were doing?” Moshe raised an eyebrow when Miah shook his head. “Really?”

“I… I didn’t want to sound too… preachy.”

I hissed, and Moshe snorted. “You’re not preachy. You’re trying to help your family and friends have better lives. Less work, more food, more time with family; oh yeah, that’s a real hardship.”

Miah took a deep breath. “Yeah, well, I wanted to be able to make sure it would work before I said too much.” He shook his head. “Clearly I didn’t keep my secrets all that well. I’ll never be able to create a successful hybrid herd now. If Gorseman’s behind this, no way would he be willing to sell me new stock, and without more cows, the inbreeding would ruin the herd within just a few years.”

“What breeding stock? What secrets?” Nathan snapped. “What is going on?”

“Apparently I’m too smart for my own good,” Miah said bitterly. “Just like everyone always said.”

At that comment, I squeezed my body around Miah’s arm until he yelped. “Don’t ssay such things about yourself,” I ordered. “You are smart for a reason. You will help heal the land.”

We had faith in him; if only Miah would have faith in himself. Before his dad’s face could get any redder—clearly Miah did get his temper from his father—Miah explained his plan, in layman’s terms, for the new fertilizer compound and grain and how they’d be able to sustain a hybrid herd by producing the nutrients both cattle varieties needed for the very first time, plus give back to the soil to make it richer.

His dad gaped at him. “You came up with all that on your own?”

Miah nodded, and I squeezed his arm, much softer this time. “He did. We’re just here to help be his hands and legs until he’s better.” Right now Miah was going to need his parents; he couldn’t risk alienating them for us. I highly doubted his pride would allow him to let us keep the stake afloat.

“Apparently I told someone I shouldn’t have. Someone besides Moshe and Lisco, before you can ask,” Miah snapped when his dad opened his mouth. “They have nothing to gain by the stake failing, and a lot to lose. Gorseman only stands to gain. It was him; I’m sure of it. Him and that foreman! I’m so screwed. Damn it!” Frustrated and angry tears shone in Miah’s eyes, but I knew he wouldn’t let them fall.

“Umm….” Moshe cleared his throat. “I think you’re wrong.”