“Maybe it can sense that your mate’s a dragon shifter,” Ethan suggested, knowing that Destiny was disappointed even though she didn’t let it show.
The blue dragon let out a trill, as if in agreement. There was an answering meow from the next cage.
“That one’s yours,” Catalina said to Destiny. Cradling her butterfly-winged kitten in one arm, she flipped the latch.
Another winged kitten flew out of the cage. But it too bypassed Destiny, and Catalina as well. Instead, it made a beeline for Shane. He stood perfectly still as the sleek gray tabby landed on his shoulder. Its wings were more like a moth’s than a butterfly’s, a soft pearly gray like the sky before dawn. The kitten folded them neatly, gave his ear an exploratory nip, and tried to climb onto his head.
“Ow.” Shane gently detached the kitten and settled it back on his shoulder.
It meowed in protest, then jumped off and dove down like a hawk. The kitten landed on his shoe, grabbed his ankle with all four paws, and ferociously attacked his pants.
“All yours, Shane,” Destiny said as he attempted to pry it off his leg.
Ethan turned to the cage below the ones that had already been opened, but Justin was already kneeling there. That cage was the size of the other three put together, and emitted a chorus of excited canine yelps and whines and yips.
“A litter of puppies,” Justin said confidently. “Sounds like three of them. Fiona and me already have six dogs. We don’t have room for nine. Ethan, Destiny, want to take the other two?”
Destiny nudged Ethan. “Think you can cope with a pair of flying puppies?”
“Oh, hell yeah.” He was already grinning at the thought.
Justin opened the cage. Three little husky puppies stared up at him adoringly with three sets of ice-blue eyes, then scrambled out to jump all over him, barking ecstatically and wagging their tails…
Tail.
Wagging its tail.
Ethan blinked hard, but when he opened his eyes, the three-headed puppy was still there, licking Justin with three little pink tongues.
Pete’s disbelieving stare moved from the puppy to Justin to Merlin. “Okay, forget what I said earlier. That’s the weirdest yet.”
Merlin gave an elaborately unconcerned shrug. “It’s just a Cerberus puppy.”
“Who’s a good boy?” Justin asked the puppy as it rolled over to get its belly scratched.
One head panted happily, one barked, and one went on licking him.
Justin ruffled the puppy’s furry heads. “You! You! You! You’re a good boy!”
Roland cleared his throat. “This is all very
…”
“Fucking bizarre?” Pete suggested.
Roland, apparently at a loss for words, didn’t finish the sentence. Instead, he said, “Let’s just put the animals in the carrying cages and keep searching the place. We can sort out who gets what later. There’s still a human prisoner we need to rescue.”
Everyone guiltily scrambled to unlatch the rest of the cages, Shane a little hampered by the gray kitten that was now clinging to his right arm, flapping its wings and squeaking.
As Ethan opened the nearest cage, he realized that only Ransom hadn’t moved. In fact, now that he thought back, Ransom hadn’t moved a muscle since they’d started opening the cages. Ethan had gotten so used to him being quiet and watchful, it hadn’t registered before. But now that he was paying attention, he could see that Ransom wasn’t merely still, but seemed to be frozen in place. Only his dark eyes, now locked on Ethan’s, betrayed his desperation to convey some terrible warning.
Ethan reacted instantly, trusting in his gut feeling and Ransom’s intuition.
“Am—” he started to shout. But before he could complete the word, the ambush happened.
“Freeze,” said a quiet male voice behind him. “No shifting, no powers, no movement.”
Ethan couldn’t move. It was like nightmares he’d had where he was under attack and paralyzed, only in real life. He tried to struggle, but couldn’t move a muscle except to breathe and blink his eyes. Everyone he could see was frozen too.