Ten
Zamir
It'd been two dayssince our date, and while Nolan and I had talked almost every day—he preferred calls over texts, and I loved teasing him about being old school. Or just old—we hadn't met up again. He'd had some things to take care of at the bar, and I hadn't felt right leaving when everyone here was in such a bad mood.
None of us had realized how integral Dustin had become to us until he wasn't here. Keoni, who'd started every day by checking in on the pregnant human, had wandered around aimlessly thelast two mornings, while Haruto and Liam had left right after breakfast to check in on them and tell us how they were doing.
Draven, who kept to himself in his workshop, had turned out to be something of a whiz when it came to taking care of a pregnant person. Apparently, he'd helped with quite a few births before he came here, and while he'd never assisted a human before, he'd read every human-pregnancy-related book he could find in the library, and then he'd ordered Liam to get him more.
All in all, every single person in the Forest had spent the last few months—when they weren't falling in love and finding their mates—taking care of Dustin in any way they could, and now they had no idea what to do with their newfound free time.
Now that I wasn't a mopey idiot, I didn't want my friends to feel so down either. I'd spent yesterday trying to invent a prank that would cheer them up, but I couldn't think of anything. Everything either felt too mild or insensitive, and neither would be helpful right now.
Maybe a prank wasn't the way to go. Maybe what we needed was something much simpler.
"Hey, Dots? Will you help me?" I asked, and the cat glanced up at me, then meowed. "Yeah? Okay, here's what we're going to do."
I laid out my plan, but he obviously didn't care much for it because he went right back to sleep. Shaking my head, I glanced over at Scrappy, who sat on the cat tree Silas had brought over from Khush and Dustin's place yesterday. "What about you, Scrappy? You wanna help?"
She glanced up, considered my proposal for a moment, then hopped off her perch, padding over to me. She glanced from me to Dots, who was curled up in my lap, then gave him a firm smack above his tail.
Dots shot upright, and she raced out of the house, Dots hot on her tail as I chuckled and followed after them. I'd alwaysbelieved animals, especially cats, could understand us, though whether they listened was up to their mood.
Shouts and exclamations rang through the Forest as the cats caused mayhem throughout, and Scrappy raced past me with something in her mouth, Dots still chasing after her.
Draven stumbled into the clearing, his braided beard swinging as he came to a stop, panting. "That infernal cat of Dustin's! She stole my spanner!"
I snickered, then laughed out loud when Silas and Touya stumbled out of the trees. Silas was in his troll form, with Touya cradled against his chest in a bridal carry.
"Spiders," he gasped out, and his eyes threatened to fall out of their sockets. "They were covered in spiders!"
"Silas, you can let me down now.I'mnot afraid of spiders, remember?" Touya said, gently patting his mate's arm as he gazed up at him with soft brown eyes, and Silas placed him on the ground, though he wrapped his tail around Touya's waist. I wasn't sure for whose benefit that was.
Hmm, Liam and Haruto were at the shop, so the only one left was...
"Get them out, get them out!" Keoni demanded as he clattered into the clearing with Scrappy and Dots in his cart. They were play-fighting—I could tell since the cart wasn't covered in cat fur—and Scrappy had found one of her stuffed mice from somewhere, and the two were tangled in a game of tug-of-war.
I made a mental note to give them both treats later as I went over to get them out of Keoni's cart and placed them on the ground, where Scrappy took the opportunity to race up the nearest tree, toy still clutched in her mouth.
"What the hell was that?" Keoni demanded with a shake of his head, his blond curls bouncing all over.
"That was Scrappy being a very good girl," I said with a chuckle, and earned looks of disbelief from every single one ofthem. "Here's your spanner, Draven," I said as I picked it up from Keoni's cart and handed it over to the dwarf. He took it with a huff and slid it into a pocket of his trousers. "I thought we could hang out for a bit. I know we're all worried about Dustin, and the headmaster. Worrying helps no one, but talking it out might."
"I've been thinking, we should all visit them. Not at once, of course, but we could take turns. At least those of us who can go out and actually be helpful," Keoni said with a sad smile, and Silas patted his shoulder, making him stumble.
"I'll take you, K."
Keoni shot a smile at the gentle troll, and we jumped into planning, creating a schedule so we could all visit Khush and Dustin. Out of all of us, only Keoni would need the wheelchair Draven had devised to help supes like him, Khush, and Jacinta venture out into the human world without drawing too much attention. All it meant was that Keoni wouldn't be able to visit by himself—the headmaster insisted anyone in a wheelchair not travel alone because they wouldn't have the full use of their powers and could get hurt—but that was okay. Any of us would be happy to go along with him.
As we talked, I could see my friends cheer up, and it filled my chest with warm contentment. This was what I'd wanted, for them to stop being sad. I could understand now why Keoni had pushed me to go out. It sucked when someone you cared about was sad.
Scrappy and Dots sprawled across the grass, ready for a nap now that they'd done their job. Touya sat on the ground beside them and started petting them, earning delighted purrs from the fluffs.
After we'd settled on a schedule, we'd figure out a way to get the headmaster to accept our help. We'd be damned if we let the Sanctuary fall to pieces.
Nolan
"I'll see you in an hour," Zamir said, and I could hear the smile in his voice. This. This was why I preferred calls over texts. You could never tell what the person on the other end was thinking or feeling in a text.
