6.7

She had made this trip many times as her larger self. She knew the road, she knew the rocks and stones and what she had once seen as short fences.

But the stones and earth were silent to her steps now.

The wind merely blew.

The sun was simply warm.

The assured welcoming of the fields was absent.

The Fence that was below her shoulders and hips in most steps now was over her head.

Jewel was alone and she was small.

Positively tiny.

Smithson and Paul were now ahead of her, shielding her as she hid.

Bethica felt larger than the Terror Boar itself from her diminutive vantage.

The crowding family that her larger self could afford to barely note was a teeming crowd of giants.

Even the children ostensibly the same age as her smaller self were a head or more taller then Jewel

And the words that her Husband and Squire had shared tumbled in her head, making her timid.

Cowardly.

Craven.

Her heart must be outsized for her tiny chest, it was thundering so hard and it filled her with such feelings as to utterly overwhelm her.

She had faced armies and yet the prospect of doing more than peeking around Smithson’s legs froze her in place.

Paul was speaking but it was so hard to focus on what he said compared to fretfully peering at the looming children.

She had seen them for almost a year now and yet they looked and tasted strange and dangerous to her as she was.

Bethica finally raised her head up, having either had enough of the conversation going on past her, or perhaps gotten through enough of her grazing she could afford to speak.

That deep resonant voice sounded incredibly tired of the situation.

“You vir can gawk and gab over your fiddling ways in regards to my bull to be, But go do it away from me and my grazing. ”

Smithson hesitated at that, but Bethica rolled what Jewel knew was her family eye onto him and grunted hard.

“Git on horse boy who would be a vir of station, I’ve seen to every child of this family and my own besides. Lady Jewel is as a sister to me and I’ll see to the safety of her child as my own.”

The last words were spoken with Bethica swinging her horned head around to fix each of the giant pair of children, who were struck just as still and stone faced as Smithson had been that first day.

And before Jewel could even properly move to try and follow her guardians and the adults of the family were gone, fleeing to obey Bethica as if she was in fact the lady of the land and not Jewel.

To be honest by her sheer size and muscles alone Jewel could appreciate not wanting to upset the cow.

As a wyrm she had not thought much of her in that way.

But looming over and above Jewel like this? The point of those horns? The solidity of her stance in the pasture?

Bethica was easily bigger and heavier than any man or woman, and absolutely towered over Jewel in this smaller frame.

Although she was not alone in being frozen in fear. The two children across the way were frozen in fear precisely as Jewel was.

She could see in their faces and their tense legs.

After everyone had stood there stuck frozen in mortifying terror and silence Bethica finally spoke. Voice a low groan of exasperation.

“Stars guide me, All of you calves come over close in front of me here and settle down.”

When no one seemed quite inclined to move her tone gentled to a soft friendliness somehow even gentler and more encouraging than Jewel ever heard.

“Fear and fret not youths of vir and wyrm. Words of warning are only just that, behave well and true and you’ve not a thing to fear.”

The children shuffled around in front of Bethica keeping quite clear of her flanks.

Then came around and settled to sit in the grass in front of the cow.

Like Jewel they wore simple infant smocks. Still too small for any other clothes.

Even with her shorter snout she could smell however they were brother and sister.

Although her eyes honestly could not have even begin to guess without the scent.

Both slight and small (if still taller than her).

Both with dark hair.

One perhaps a bit taller than the other.

“Smithson called you Gem wyrmchild, Come along and settle down here with Albert and Dorota.”

Jewel could not make her legs move, her hands squeezed tight into the still unfamiliar curl of her fists. This was her friend, but she was also a huge and terribly frightening beast.

But thinking of her like that was an insult and only made Jewel more upset.

Before she could compose herself more everything overfilled her tiny frame and the shaking turned to shudders and the tightness in her throat broke in a cry. Tears bursted from her eyes for the second time that day!

She was so overwhelmed Jewel shrieked in surprise when a cold wet mass and a heavy huff of hot breath billowed over her face.

The voice was softer than she had ever heard before and rumbled deep and low in a way that trembled in her bones.

It shook in the half drained mass of Wyrm Flame that in her misery Jewel had lost hold of and let seep out of her skin.

What would have lasted a day and a half was not likely to sustain a few hours more of the warm comforting fire of her larger self.

It was only the fear of losing even that which gave her the will to focus on it.

But that left her tears to flow down her cheeks and her throat to keen and cry.

“She Cry.”

Whichever of the pair of children said that Jewel could not see and her ears were such a rush of blood she could barely tell the direction.

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“Shush shush shush...”

Jewel’s face was scraped with a surprisingly dry feeling blob.

It scraped up her scales, over one cheek and only revealed itself to be Bethica’s wide pink tongue because it passed her eye on its way to her brow.

“It’s frightful to be on your own with strangers, yes? Away from your mother? Away from your herd. Alone in the open scary wideness?”

For some reason she had expected a cow tongue to feel more wet.

The silliness of it washed over her as strong as the fear and despair and suddenly her chest was shaking with hiccuping laughter.

She tried pushing against the massive head of her friend who was so close to her, but the muscles in that neck were stronger and vaster than her entire body.

Her efforts accomplished little. The cow simply nuzzled at her neck and blew hard from her nostrils, hot air tickling her throat and blowing back Jewel’s hair.

“Gehicka!”

That got a light shove in the belly that made Jewel hiccup again and fall back into the grass.

The sound of a vast overwhelming cow gently sinking to the ground herself briefly shocked her straight backed but it was only her friend laying down in the warm spring sun on soft grass.

“Hmmm, that’s close but let me see you try again. Look at me, See my face?”

Jewel was confused, but she had a suspicion this was going to be more attempts to get her to say things correctly.

Jewel had seen quite a lot of that this year.

They would say the words in front of her and then wait for her to do it right and she would fail.

But Bethica was her friend.

Jewel would make the effort.

“Gehicka”

She closed her eyes and for the trouble got another slap of a wet tongue from her nose to her forehead. The stickiness of some saliva stuck some of her hair straight up.

“No, Keep your eyes open little one, look close, watch my mouth.”

Jewel glanced at the other children who were sitting and watching her with knowing smiles.

“Beh-thi-kah”

Jewel frowned, she tried to do as her friend asked, she looked at the mouth, they moved like everyone else did.

Her friend turned the stranger side of her face around to watch Jewel.

“Now you try.”

That eye was fixed on Jewel, no it was fixed on Jewel’s mouth.

Huffing in frustration that seemed to not perturb the cow at all Jewel repeated herself.

“Greh-heh-kheh!”

Bethica turned her familiar eye back around and leaned in even closer to Jewel.

Honestly she could no longer really see Bethica’s eye around her own snout anymore. But just as gentle as she had been so far her friend spoke.

“Say Buh”

Jewel sighed and did her best.

“Guh”

She’d tried before, Jewel couldn't make the sound like her larger self did. Her throat refused to shape or sharpen the sounds properly.

It was mangled and twisted.

Tears were starting to well in her eyes, would her smaller self always be rendered dumb?

Grunting like a beast?

But instead of demanding a repeat Bethica drew back enough to fix Jewel with her family eye.

“Gem dear, can you move your lips and tongue? Like this?”

Bethica extended her tongue free to run over her own nose.

Then pursed her lips and let out a cry that was far more the speech of a woman then the call of her kind.

“MooO?”

Jewel perplexed and bewildered imitated, of course she could lick her nose.

And shaping her lips like that was simple.

But what did that have to do with speaking?

Speech came from the throat.

“GOoh?”

Bethica smiled, actually smiled and Jewel confused but also feeling a little strange had to smile back.

Lips spread wide in a grin, flat teeth closed framed by the cow’s mouth.

“Meeh?”

Again Jewel repeated.

“Geeh?”

Bethica gave a little shake.

“Almost dear... But you need to voice in your throat while your lips are closed. Then open them while you voice”

Again Bethica spoke but without saying any word in particular.

“Meeh?”

Jewel furrowed her brow as she concentrated, trying to do everything she was told.

“meaAhieek!?”

The way the sound changed! It surprised Jewel so much she squealed, losing the magic of it in her excitement.

But her friend only smiled and spoke soft and gentle.

“Yes! Very good little Gem! But keep your teeth together. Again! Watch.”

And again she made the sound, Now that Jewel was paying attention she heard and saw how the lips stayed closed and then peeled back even as the voice continued.

Jewel focused, it was not easy, it felt wrong from everything she had learned in all her years.

But if she could hold her wyrmflame inside herself she could do this.

“Mehmehmeh”

Her heart felt like it was going to burst.

It was not the same as how she spoke as a wyrm. But it was a sound she had failed to make in this tiny throat despite over a year of trying.

And it was because she had been trying with the wrong parts!

Before her friend could prompt her again Jewel forged onward.

Seeking to shape the sound now that she understood what she had been doing wrong.

“Mehickra!”

The laughter of the two children felt like a fist on her heart that only eased when Bethica told the two of them off for mocking her progress.

“Better dear, but now we need another part... Watch me.”

Jewel wiped the tears from her eyes so she could see clearly as Bethica demonstrated.

“Paaaah”