Free Unicorn Point by Piers Anthony Page B

bitch snapped at it, but Flach hovered just out of reach. He looped about, remaining ahead of them, preventing them from proceeding. Every time the bitch tried to drive him off, he came back again.
    Finally she had had enough. She changed to human form, garbed in furs, ready to take a stick to him if she had to.   That was what he wanted. Simultaneously he changed to pup form.
    Instantly she was back in bitch form, growling. Flach whimpered, his little tail between his legs. She advanced on him, teeth bared. He rolled over on the trail, exposing his belly. She hesitated, then sniffed him. He lay there, not having to feign terror.
    Finally she resumed woman form. She was of advancing age, garbed in furs, and she carried a knife. This she pointed at Flach. “Assume this form, strange creature!” she snapped.   “I be Duzyfilan, and I would talk with thee.”
    Now Flach reverted to his natural form, lying on his back on the ground. “Please, good bitch, hurt me not,” he pleaded. “I come to beg thy protection.”
    “Who and what be thou?” she asked sharply.  
    “I must be nameless, lest I be doomed,” he said, sitting up.
    She studied him, noting his blue outfit. Any werewolf understood the significance of that. “Methinks thou dost be doomed anyway,” she said. “Knowest thou not that we tolerate the likes o’ thee only for the sake o’ the truce?”
    “I have changed sides,” he said. “I must hide, lest those thou knowest catch me.”
    Duzyfilan considered. “Willst make oath on that?”
    “Aye.” And from him came a faint splash, that rippled the blades of grass and colored the air momentarily.  
    “Then must we help thee,” she decided. “No other must know thine origin. A secret spread about be no secret long.”
    “I seek only to join thy company,” he said. “And to join the Pack, and be as weres be.”
    “Thou hast no pup name?”
      “Nay.”
    “A pup be named first by the bitch who bears him,” she said. “Canst thou accept me in lieu, since I be first to receive thee in this guise?”
    “Aye,” he said gratefully.
    “Then I name thee Ba, after what I saw o’ thee that thou must ne’er again be, an thou be called one o’ our kind.”
    “Ba,” he repeated. She had seen him as a bat, so she took from that, as was the werewolf way.
    “And these three pups must ne’er tell o’ what they saw o’ this,” Duzyfilan continued briskly. “Must each exchange oath-friendship with thee, to keep the secret.”
    “Aye, an thou sayest so,” Flach agreed.
    “Turn wolf,” she said.
    Flach resumed wolf-pup form.
    Duzyfilan beckoned to the male pup. The wolfling padded dutifully forward to sniff noses.
    “Do these two o’ ye, Ba and Fo, make Oath o’ Friendship, each ne’er to betray the welfare o’ the other, in the wolven way?”
    Both growled aye, and the splash manifested. Among adults the magic splash of absolute truth was seldom seen, but among the young, who were less jaded by experience, it was common enough.
    The bitch beckoned a female pup. “Do these two o’ ye, Ba and Si, make Oath o’ Friendship, each ne’er to betray the welfare o’ the other, in the wolven way?” Again both growled affirmation, and again there was the splash and ripple.
    She summoned the second female. “Do these two o’ ye, Ba and Te, make Oath o’ Friendship, each ne’er to betray the welfare o’ the other, in the wolven way?” A third time they growled agreement, and the splash manifested.
    “Now may ye exchange what confidences ye choose, and ne’er fear betrayal, an ye be mindful who else might over hear,” Duzyfilan said. “But concern me not with it, for it be not my business. We camp ahead; we shall travel not this night.” She resumed bitch form.
    So it was that Flach joined the formation of pups, falling in line between the two females. They padded on along the trail, first Fo, then Si, then Flach as Ba, then Te, with the bitch following watchfully. This was because