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All three youngsters lifted their heads at once. The one against my foreleg uncurled, the second abandoned Jade's boot and the third wriggled from her arms. They crossed the bank in a line, paused at the edge, then slipped into the water without a splash.

Jade rose but did not follow.

The adult stepped through the falling water. In the grotto's light her body was longer and heavier than the kits', built low for swimming with a powerful tail and broad webbed paws. Turquoise lines ran through deep blue fur from her face to her flanks. She touched noses with each youngster, then looked toward us.

Jade held her ground.

The Kelvarin made a low sound, softer than the warning cry she had given at the trap site. Her gaze remained on Jade for several breaths before she turned and led the kits through a narrow opening behind the water.

The smallest looked back.

"Go on," Jade said.

It chirruped once and disappeared.

Silence returned slowly. The pool settled first, then the hanging leaves stopped moving and the little blue flowers reopened along the bank.

Jade stood in the middle of it soaked, barefoot and covered in small wet paw prints.

I rose.

She looked at her clothes. "Corian is going to ask."

I shook water from my fur.

She threw both arms over her face as the spray hit her. "You are doing that deliberately."

I stepped away before she could retaliate.

Jade lowered her arms. Water ran from the end of her braid and dripped from her elbows. She looked toward the passage, then back at the pool.

"We should finish the route."

We should.

Neither of us moved.

She sat to pull on her boots, grimacing when the wet fabric of her pants stuck beneath the leather. I waited until she had secured both knives and checked that the route card remained dry. Ashter flowed from his stone only after she had stepped away from the pool, winding around her wrist while carefully avoiding every wet patch on her sleeve.

"Dannian was right about you," Jade muttered.

The smoke tightened.

We completed the rest of the western loop without finding anything more dangerous than a vine that tried to close around my hind leg. Jade spotted it before I did, cut the tendril without touching the main plant, and didn't bother hiding how proud of herself she was.

By the time the camp sounds reached us through the jungle, sunlight had started burning the mist from the upper canopy. I stopped beside the channel, stepped behind a screen of broad leaves and released the Veylith.

Magic pulled the borrowed shape inward. Heavy paws narrowed, my spine shortened and the water-slick fur dissolved against skin as my own body returned. Jade had the pack open before I finished shifting, clothes already out and held toward the leaves without either of us making it a conversation. I dressed while the rest of me still remembered the pool's cold.

When I stepped back onto the route, Jade had wrung most of the water from her braid. Mud streaked one cheek, and three sets of small paw marks covered the front of her shirt. A pale leaf had tangled itself into a loose strand near her temple, and she hadn't noticed it yet.

She noticed me looking.

"Not one word."

I reached over and pulled the leaf free instead. Her shoulders went rigid for half a second before she let me.

I walked beside her toward camp.