Gretta’s eyes snapped open at the touch on her throat. She let out a rumble.

Rowan tripped over himself as he fell backward.

Gretta closed her eyes again. Pain throbbed through her body, and whether from the exertion of shifting shapes multiple times in a row or from blood loss, she wanted to drift off to sleep.

“Gretta, I know you are tired, but you need to shift again,” Rowan whispered. “I need to get you to the hospital, but you’re too big to carry.”

Gretta’s eyes opened again and seemed to regain some focus. The glare was such that Rowan wanted to take another step back, but he held his ground.

“If you are in human form, I can get you on the ATV they left behind, and we can get you to a hospital. There’s so much blood, I can’t even tell where you are hurt right now, let alone stop the bleeding. Maybe I can figure out where to put pressure if you shift down.”

Gretta closed her eyes again, and Rowan thought she might be slipping away when the tiger form melded out of existence, leaving behind a woman. There was still blood on the ground, and it was soaking into Gretta’s clothing, but he couldn’t see any visible wounds.

Rowan rushed forward, his hands gently patting her to look for injuries. “Where are you hurt?”

“Hands off, creep,” Gretta whispered.

“We need to find the worst wounds and put pressure on them,” he said. “I don’t remember much first aid, but I’m pretty sure that’s step 1.” He paused. “Or is it elevate the wound? Gah! You were shot multiple times; I’ll need to elevate your whole body.”

“That’s not how it works, idiot,” she whispered. “Let me sleep.”

A groan from Dillan made Gretta roll to one side and scramble to a sitting position. “Holy shit! He’s alive.”

Rowan rushed forward and inexpertly patted Dillan down, looking for weapons in any place he’d seen one in a movie. He checked for a shoulder rig and found a gun, but then he checked for one on the belt and ankles and did not find a second gun. He did find a pack of zip ties in Dillan’s inner jacket pocket.

“He looks like he’s been hit by a truck, but it doesn’t look like he’s bleeding from anything more than a few minor scratches,” Rowan said. “I thought there’d be more damage.”

Rowan set to work zip-tying Dillan’s ankles and wrists.

Gretta shuttered. “I don’t want to be a murderer and biting somebody—yuck! Would you want to bite somebody?”

He decided not to mention that Dillan could be suffering from internal bleeding. “I don’t think killing people who are willing to use deadly force to abduct a child is murder. I’d call that self-defense, or at least defense of a child. And yes, I would bite somebody. I bit Jonathan.”

Gretta let out an exhausted sigh. “Sexual adventures aside, I meant that it’s gross to bite a human in a fight.”

“What? No. Jonathan was the other guy with Dillan here. And I gave him enough venom that he might die or, at the least, have a very terrible week.”

Gretta still looked dazed. “How do you know their names?”

“After I ditched your car, I shifted down into a spider and spent the past day riding Jonathan’s ankle,” Rowan said.

“You are one weird guy,” Gretta muttered. “Help me up. We need to track down Miguel and protect Sofia.”

Rowan stared at her. “How are you even alive?”

“Magic,” she said. “I appreciate that you reminded me to shift. That helped a lot. I had already started pulling on magic to heal, but moving my tiger form back into the Astral will make the process easier.”

“Into the Astral?”

“You can shift, but you don’t know how it works? Didn’t the Trickster god explain to you how your powers work—Oh, I suppose he’d think it’d be funny not to tell you,” she said.

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Rowan opted not to explain that he was the Trickster god. “So, you sent your tiger body to some other place?”

“All of our forms are always with us; they are just slightly shifted from this reality. When they aren’t here, they still exist—they are still us. We don’t experience them because our consciousness is here, in this reality.” Gretta looked confused. “The Trickster didn’t explain any of this?”

“Like you said, he probably thinks this is funny,” Rowan said. “So, is your tiger form still bleeding to death?”

“When our other forms are in the Astral, they aren’t in stasis, but they are experiencing a different type of reality, and they can’t die there. They will heal, given time, but I shouldn’t try to shift back to my tiger form for a bit to give it time to recover.” Gretta held out a hand. “Help me up.”

Rowan helped her to her feet. She wobbled slightly before walking to Jonathan’s abandoned ATV and getting on.

“The immediate problem for me is exhaustion. I shifted three times and used my healing. I’m barely keeping my eyes open, so you’ll have to stay alert enough for both of us. I don’t want to leave Miguel alone with Adriana.”

“Adriana’s real name is Gabriela Ramirez. I heard Jonathan and Miguel talking about her. She’s the mother of the Warlord.”

Rowan dragged Dillan over a few feet.

“Why did you move him?” she asked.

“There’s a large, active fire ant hill over there. Laying on that would make life miserable for at least a week,” he said.

Gretta grimaced. “I don’t think I could show him that much mercy.”

Rowan chuckled. “Oh, I moved him directly on top of it.”

“Get on,” she said and patted the seat behind her.

Rowan hesitated. “If we take the ATV, Gabriela will hear us coming, and she’s likely armed. And even unarmed, she’s the mother of the Warlord. She’ll have unknown magical firepower that might take us out before we know what hit us. The only thing we have going for us is that she thinks you are dead and doesn’t know about me at all.”

“I’m exhausted,” Gretta said. “I don’t think I have another shift in me. I’d probably need to sleep a few hours.”

“That’s why I don’t think you should follow her,” Rowan said.

“I’m not abandoning Sofia,” Gretta said.

“And I’m not asking you to,” Rowan replied. “I’m asking you to trust me. I can fly ahead faster than the ATV, catch her, and give her some mechanical issues. That’ll give Miguel time to gain some distance and you time to recharge. She’s never seen me, so she won’t know what hit her.”

Gretta glared. “And I’m supposed just to lay around resting?”

“I’ll come back for you, and hopefully, by then, you’ll be ready to shift into something that can move faster than a person, and we’ll head straight for Miguel.”

Gretta frowned. “I’ve already told you I won’t be able to shift back into a tiger for a while. Maybe a week or more.”

“I saw you in some sort of small cat form,” Rowan said. “That should outpace a person on foot.”

Gretta looked skeptical. “In a sprint, for sure, but moving through the desert for hours is not easy. And I’ll be tired even if I nap while you are playing saboteur.”

Rowan sighed. “Do you have any other forms?”

Gretta blushed. “I don’t use them.”

Rowan smirked. “Are you embarrassed about the gifts the Wild Mother gave you?”

“I’m not embarrassed.” Gretta’s blush deepened. “They aren’t that useful in the desert.”

“And what are they? I promise that I won’t laugh.”

“An elephant and an otter,” she whispered.

Rowan laughed. “Yeah, you’re right. Neither of those will be useful for this. Well, maybe if you are adorable enough as an otter—”

“Stop. If you don’t want to find out what an elephant can do to your toes, you’ll stop right now,” Gretta warned.

Rowan held up his hands in surrender. “Even as a human on foot, you can catch Miguel carrying a child. But, I’ll need to delay Gabriela a little extra.”

“How am I supposed to figure out where Miguel is?” Gretta asked.

Rowan pointed in the direction the ATV had gone.

“For now, follow the path that Gabriela left. I’ll fly ahead and circle back. Spotting him from the air shouldn’t be too bad, and we can avoid Gabriela.”

“What about the dog? I don’t think hurting the dog is right, but it will be an issue.”

“The dog is only a problem if the people come with it. If I stall the people, I stall the dog. Maybe I’ll find a way to keep the dog busy without hurting it.”

Gretta sighed, got off the ATV, and started trudging along the tracks that Gabriela had left. She had never been more exhausted, but she was determined to catch up to Miguel. She hated the idea of relying on a disciple of the Trickster to help her, but he was right: if she went tearing through the desert on a loud ATV, Gabriela would shoot her, and Gretta was not ready for a second encounter. Not yet.

Taking a few extra moments for sabotage, Rowan tipped Jonathan’s ATV over and yanked on the gas line, causing the gas to gush into the soil. Dillan’s ATV was already flipped over and looked mangled from the encounter with a tiger.

Satisfied, Rowan shifted into raven form and soared into the blue sky. He immediately spotted dust rising between cacti and scrub, and as he banked, he spotted the ATV riding ahead of that dust in a zig-zagging pattern. With a beat of his wings, he took off in pursuit.