Rue stared at him, open-mouthed. Impressed despite herself. Well, golly. I guess Vanaras do exist.

Without an attempted introduction or making any noise whatsoever – could he speak in that form? – the creature advanced towards her. His eyes were riveted on the monkey charm necklace.

He made as if to pick her up.

Rue held out her hands, warding him off, not because she didn’t want the help – if he wanted to rescue her, she had no objection to being rescued – but because she would likely steal his form just as she could steal that of a werewolf or werelioness.

With a noise of disgust, the Vanara ignored her non-verbal protest as a hysterical female reaction and scooped her up with his tail. Wrapping it tight about Rue’s naked midriff.

Only to suddenly have no tail at all.

The man who now stood before Rue was comely with dark almond eyes, ridiculously thick eyelashes, and velvety tea-coloured skin. He was slighter as a human than he was in his monkey form, muscles having been redistributed into lankiness rather than bulk. As a monkey he was golden with black feet, hands and face, but as a man he was a true child of India, princely in his bearing and appearance. If not in his utter shock at being suddenly mortal.

Rue tried to look apologetic.

Only to find that it was very hard to do apologetic wearing a monkey face.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

MONKEY HIJINKS

The transformation was sudden and a great deal less painful than when turning werecat. Rue supposed not as many bones needed to break and shift about when going from human to monkey. Instead, it seemed mostly muscle being redistributed. Her hair turned short and extended to most of her body. It was a mottled dark brown colour, much like her fur in wolf form, only fuzzier. Her arms, previously so sore and tired, recovered and gained additional strength and length. Most peculiar of all was her tail. As a werewolf, Rue’s tail rather took matters into its own hands, as it were, reflecting her moods and waving about indiscriminately. As a werecat, it had seemed only mildly under her command. But as a weremonkey, she had total control over this appendage, like an extra arm with only one finger. It was rather fun.

Rue had no time to dwell. The Ganesha head was still creeping relentlessly towards the end of the cable, and the embers she had brushed out of the firebox were beginning to find fallen bits of fibre and other combustibles, flaming to life on the floor of the cabin.

Acting on instinct, Rue did as the Vanara had attempted mere moments before. She grabbed her metanatural victim with her amazing tail and ran to the doorway, carrying him behind her.

The man cried out in fear.