But she only said, briskly, “I will let you know. We can have the coffee table swapped out in the next day or so, and most of the other changes over the next week. The kitchenette may take a little longer, I’m afraid. I probably won’t be able to get the appliances here until just after Christmas.”
“I’ll be leaving for Boston a few days after Christmas,” Conall said, already dreading the trip. “So if they could be installed...”
He turned at an unexpected thump that vibrated up through the floor.
Gizelle stood in the doorway, the box she had been holding at her feet and sheets of paper still falling around her.
“You’re leaving?” she said in terror. “You’re leaving me?”
“Gizelle, wait...”
But Gizelle was already leaping back and shifting. Conall had one last view of her grief-stricken face before she was a gazelle, her tail twitching as she fled.
When he turned back to Scarlet in dismay, the resort manager was frowning. “Yes, I think replacing the coffee table should be a priority.”
Chapter 43
Her world was grass and gravity.
The rhythm of the nearby ocean was the only music she needed, the insects the only chorus.
Her fears were distant, and her human quiet and safe.
If she was lonely, it was a familiar loneliness, and she was free and fearless.
She nibbled at the best of the blades, comfortable knowing that she could run in any direction if danger threatened. She was fast and fleet and the emptiness inside her must only be an empty belly.
So she cropped at the lush foliage and was only a gazelle, in a weighted world of green and grass.
Chapter 44
Conall found the gazelle grazing at her favorite lawn, the ocean rippling just over the cliff in the late afternoon light.
“Gizelle,” he said, sitting wearily at the edge of the lawn where the garden started. He didn’t want to chase her, or make her feel trapped. It was the third lawn he’d checked, and he was starting to appreciate exactly how steep the island was.
He was glad to see the gazelle come towards him, head down in the grass as if the grazing was the more serious business. Finally, she lifted her head, within arm’s reach if he stretched, and considered him thoughtfully.
For a moment, Conall was confused.
It wasn’t Gizelle.
Not really.
It was the gazelle, not Gizelle who looked back at him. It didn’t feel the same as the way he looked out from his shifted form.
“Gizelle?” he asked tentatively.
The gazelle tossed her head and snorted.
Conall offered his hand anyway, and the gazelle put a tentative nose to his palm and tickled it with her breath. Though he braced himself to hear, no sounds broke through the barrier of silence with this touch.
Gizelle was in there, he knew. Somewhere.
And just as he had waited for her to touch him the first time, he could wait again for her to find her way back to him.
He peeled off his clothing and folded it neatly on a bench, then shifted to graze with the gazelle.
We haven’t done this in a long while, his elk said, stretching long legs and tossing his heavy head.