The fact was that the boys were identical, and even for her and Thomas, it was difficult to tell. Many parents will tell you that they can instantly tell their twins apart, but Kara was convinced that it was only when they were a little older and had more distinct affectations or personalities. For now, the only difference that she and Thomas could discern between the two boys was that Khaleel seemed to have a tiny heart shaped birthmark on his left side, just beneath his ribcage, while Tiogar appeared to have none. Other than that, it was down to a color coding system.
“How can you tell?” he asked.
“He has on the yellow beanie,” she said with a smile.
“Ah, makes sense,” he told her, looking back down at the sleeping child in his arms. Thomas winked at her and smiled as they enjoyed the time together with their new little family.
“Mrs. Higgins?” a nurse said as she entered the room, her expression changing as she saw Kara.
“Hello,” Kara replied with a broad smile.
“I didn’t realize this was you. It is so good to see you again,” the nurse said.
Thomas looked at them with a confused expression. No doubt he thought he knew everyone that Kara did, but there were a few friends that they didn’t have in common, though this one was more of a client than a friend.
“You, as well. How is Humphrey?” Kara asked.
“Oh, he’s great. Feisty as ever. Anyway, I need to check your vitals, and then I will get out of your way.”
“Okay,” Kara replied, offering up her arm for the blood pressure cuff and letting her place a thermometer in her mouth.
When she was done, she wrote something down on the chart and smiled as she spoke, “Everything looks good. Do you need anything while I’m here?”
“No. I think we are all good,” she told her politely.
“Very well,” the nurse said before heading back toward the door. About halfway across, she stopped and looked back at Kara. “By the way, I don’t know how you knew about Humphrey’s diet, but he has seemed so much livelier since I changed his food to organic and added some fresh treats. Thanks from both of us for the tip.”
Thomas stared at her in disbelief and then back at Kara who was smiling, on the verge of laughter it seemed.
“You are more than welcome. Feel free to drop him off for another play date any time you need to duck into the store for a bit. I should have the office opened back up in a couple of months.
“I’ll do just that,” the woman replied before leaving.
“You’re unbelievable,” Thomas muttered.
“Did you talk to that hedgehog?” her grandfather said suddenly.
“Maybe,” she laughed.
“It’s truly a special gift. I wish I had known about it sooner. Just last week I used it to talk to a cocker spaniel about the little presents he kept leaving in my yard. I can’t get his owner to pick up after him, but he and I have an understanding that he’ll go next door and poop at the Taylor’s. I never liked them much anyway.”
“Gramps!” Kara laughed.
“Dear Lord, what have I gotten myself into?” Thomas groaned.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Do you think they will feel out of place here, when they are old enough to understand what they are?” Kara asked a few days later when they brought their boys home for the first time.
“I don’t know, Kara, but I do know that they will be taught not to be ashamed of their gifts. What I’ve watched you become is incredible. I didn’t realize how much until today, I don’t think. I honestly thought you were yanking my chain about the hedgehog incident, but when that woman came in today and thanked you for it, I realized how something that seemed so simple and perhaps a bit silly could be very important to someone.”
“Like a hedgehog,” she laughed.
“Not just the hedgehog, but also the woman that owns him. She innocently was doing everything she thought necessary to make sure her pet was well kept, but it wasn’t enough. Despite her efforts, he wasn’t doing as well as he could have been, and he couldn’t tell her what was wrong. It took someone with a gift like yours to help them.”
“I’m sure a regular vet could have examined him and told her the same thing, really.”
“Perhaps if he got truly sick then that is true, but most people aren’t going to take him in just because he is a little sluggish. They are going to only take him once he is sick, and you prevented it from getting that far. You turned things around for him much earlier than that.”
“Honestly, I just changed out of curiosity. I wanted to see if I could communicate with him, and I was surprised that I could. You joked about me talking to him, but I did, in his own language. Their sounds are understood between those like them, though it is a much more limited style of communication than ours. I know it was silly, but it gave me a whole new understanding of my gift and what can be done with it.”
“I agree. I can see how it could be used for so much more, by you and by the boys when they are older.”
“If that is what they choose to do,” she said with a smile.
“Of course. I mean, it would be a real shame for them to waste such an opportunity, so I will absolutely encourage it at every opportunity, but I will do my best not to push too hard and let them make their own decisions.”
“You just don’t lose sight of that,” she told him.
“I won’t. I promise.”
As the years went by, the village in which the Higgins family lived began to change, each year becoming more integrated among shifters. It was quickly becoming the least best kept secret in Ireland, well known about among shifters, but invisible to outsiders other than a select few like Amy and Barb, who they felt were trustworthy.
“It seems that time just flies by the older you get, doesn’t it?” Kara remarked to Thomas one day as they sat watching the boys playing in the sandbox Thomas had built for them even before they were born. It was the special project he had been working on in secret, carving special panels that he then joined together to form a box that could be folded and moved around as needed for cleaning or yard repairs.
“We’re hardly washed up yet, my love. They are only four, and we are not on our death beds by a long shot as far as I know,” Thomas told her.
“I know, but it seems like yesterday they were born, and look at them now.”
Right on cue, Khaleel seemed to disappear right before their eyes. Thomas shot to his feet, just as alarmed as he always was when something like that happened.
“Where is he?” he said, beginning to run down the steps.
“Be careful, don’t step on him,” Kara called out to him, causing him to freeze in his tracks.
“Oh, God. I spoke too soon. These boys are going to be my death. Where is he?” he moaned, looking around him in all directions.
“Khaleel, stop trying to give your father heart failure,” Kara demanded, trying to hold back a laugh. Unlike his father, she seemed to have a much better eye for their children and could easily spot the large toad sitting just outside the sandbox, looking up at them. Khaleel shifted right back into his human form, giggled like crazy, and Thomas stomped across the yard and gathered him up to look at him.
“Stop doing that!” he demanded.
“It’s funny,” Khaleel told him.
“No, it’s not. I can’t see you when you shift so quickly into something so much smaller. It frightens me.”
“Okay, Daddy. I will tell you first next time,” Khaleel said, though he still couldn’t stop giggling.
Tio tugged on Thomas’ pants as he stood there until Thomas looked down.
“Watch me, Daddy,” Tio told him, quickly shifting into a rabbit and hopping all around the sand box.
“For the love of all that is good, what have I done to deserve this?” Thomas groaned.
“You became a father came a voice behind him.”
Thomas turned to see Josh standing there, smiling at him. Tio popped back up into his human form and grabbed him arou
nd the pant leg, hugging him. Thomas put Khaleel down, and he ran to cling to the other leg. Josh grabbed them both up, putting them on either hip and lumbering toward the porch with them.
“I brought you some naked little monkeys,” he said to Kara, who looked horrified and looked at the boys immediately.
“No! You know what you did last time! Go put on some clothes,” she told them.
“Monkeys fling poo,” the boys chanted as they ran through the front door and into the house.
“That’s disturbing,” Josh laughed.
“Yeah? It is even more disturbing when you have to clean them up afterward. They need to learn how to shift into the shower on their own,” Thomas grumbled.
“Ah, the joys of parenting,” Josh observed.
“Yes, you should find out for yourself,” Thomas told him. “Feel free to borrow the boys for a while if you want some sort of trial-by-fire starter course.”
“Well, it seems that I may be learning it on my own.”
“What? Barb is pregnant?” Kara squealed.
“Yep. Just found out this morning. We aren’t telling anyone just yet. Humans apparently have some custom about it being bad luck to talk about it before you are past some magical point where you’re certain it will take, but I thought you two would want to know. Plus, I was bursting to tell someone.”
“That is fantastic. It’s about time!”
“I know. Just act surprised when she decides we can tell people, or she will kill me.”
“You mean we can’t say anything about it? That’s going to be torture. I want to go shopping for maternity clothes now!” Kara told him.
“Well, you will have to wait, but when the time comes, I’ll let you handle that. It will keep me from having to go and feign interest in tents with flowers and bows that pass for dresses.”
“What a horrible thing to say!” Kara told him with a disgusted look on her face.
“No, it’s not. I’m not talking about her or how she will look pregnant. She will be beautiful, but some of those maternity clothes are hideous.”
“Nice save, bro,” Thomas teased. “Seriously, though, I’m really happy for you.”
“I knew you would be. Listen, I’ve got to go. I’m supposed to just be out at the store, but I took a detour. If I don’t get this ice cream back to her before it melts, I fear a hormonal meltdown from which even shifting into a dragon won’t protect me.”
“Yeah, been there,” Thomas said, causing Kara to punch him lightly in protest.
Josh laughed and made his way back out to his car, telling them goodbye. The boys burst back through the front door in nothing but their underwear and t-shirts and tackled his legs again.
“I think they want to go with you,” Thomas called out.
“Next time, men. Move away from the truck so I can back out,” he told them.
“Bye, Uncle Josh,” they told him, running back to the porch and into the house again.
“Where do they get all that energy?” Thomas asked.
“I don’t know, but I wish I had even half of it. I think I use up all of mine chasing after them. I looked for them for almost an hour the other day before I spotted two pair of eyes watching me from the open door of the closet.”
“They were hiding in the closet?” Thomas laughed.
“Well, something was hiding in the closet. When I opened it, two raccoons jumped out at me, and by the time I gathered my wits again, they had shifted back into human form and jumped into bed.”
“I think we are going to have a talk with them.”
“They are just having fun. It’s what kids do,” she said.
“Yeah, but most kids don’t turn into toads and raccoons,” he said. “They need to understand the dangers of their gifts as well.”
“They will in time. For now, just let them have their fun.”
“Well, if nothing else, they need to stop giving us heart failure for kicks!” Thomas laughed.
“Kids have been doing that for centuries. I used to prank my parents all the time. I can’t imagine how much more fun it would have been had I known what I was truly capable of,” she said, then looked at him sideways with a sly smile. “Perhaps I could relive my childhood and make up for lost time by pranking you.”
“Please, Kara, I’m begging you to spare me, and I mean that in all sincerity. I don’t think I can take one more person in this house scaring the bejesus out of me on a daily basis.”
“Fair enough. I guess I’ll just have to wait for them to grow up and get even with them when they least expect it,” she said.
“Now, that sounds like a lot of fun,” he told her. “Just make sure I’m around to watch it when it happens.”
“Oh, you can bank on it,” she laughed.
Of course, in the long run, they did survive the two mischievous twins they had brought in to the world. Though it remained a favorite past time for them to play pranks on their parents, they learned to use their gift in other ways as well. It became common to find wild animals in their yard that had been brought there, by one or both of the boys, for whatever needs they had. Sometimes, it was food or water, but it also wasn’t uncommon to find them limping around in makeshift splints made of popsicle sticks and strips of what used to be a pretty decent dishtowel before they got their hands on it.
Once they were patched up, they were sent on their way to get on with their normal lives, though there were some problems with the boys not eating because they were pocketing their food to give to animals that had no food outside. Once Kara caught on to this, she insisted they eat, but they protested that they couldn’t eat while their ‘friends’ starved. Soon, she found herself setting aside grocery money for a variety of feed that went to the needy beasts that lived in or around the village.
“We’re going to go broke feeding every animal in Ireland,” Thomas told her.
“Probably, but I would rather give up a few luxuries in life in order to foster the compassion they have for other living things, than to tell them to stop.”
“I guess you are right. I have to agree,” he told her.
It turned out to be one of their best decisions in life as it only fueled a passion the boys continued to share well into their adult life. After high school, they continued into college and veterinarian school, and finally into a private practice back in the village. Interviewed by many professional magazines, they were quick to admit that it was their parents’ support of their great love for animals that drove their passion for veterinary medicine.
“We will never forget the valuable lessons we learned from our parents about co-existing with the environment with minimal impact. We were taught to leave a very small footprint but extend a very large hand out to those in need of our help, whether it be wild animals or the human kind,” Khaleel once told a reporter for National Geographic.
“We were also taught not to eat dog food unless we washed our hands first,” Tio added jokingly.
Of course, privately, either would also admit that it was that they were taught not to turn into something that would put them in danger of another animal and not to harm those animals that were weaker than themselves. In short, they learned to help their animal brothers and sisters rather than doing anything harmful to them by existing as one of them in many instances.
They quickly garnered favor in the village among those who had animals that were sick but without symptoms they could understand, regularly helping them with understanding what the animal needed to get better. Sometimes, it was loneliness or sickness, but other times, it was a matter of abuse, usually by someone the owner had no idea was doing anything behind their back.
Eventually, the village found itself with two of the best veterinarians the world had ever seen. People from well outside the area brought their most hopeless cases to them in hopes of salvation. Some were simply too far gone, but for most, they were their saving grace. When they eventually moved on to more serious conservation efforts among their tiger shifter kin in India,
it was a great loss to the village, but what was lost there was gained on a much larger scale in sanctuaries across the continent.
There were many days when either would return home, seething with anger at what had been done to a helpless animal, and it was hard during those times not to take matters into their own hands rather than merely reporting it to the local, animal cruelty authorities. It was a line that they simply would not cross, as they knew that to do so was to open a world up that put them in the seat of being judge, jury, and executioner.
Still, the Higgins boys were instrumental in assisting the animals in living in harmony with the humans that crossed their paths, but they were also useful in helping find poachers. Whenever there was an instance of poaching, Khaleel or Tiogar would be called to track the family of any animals harmed in an effort to gain as much information as possible regarding their identities, and though their communication with the animals was limited in some ways, it was enough to bring the poaching numbers down dramatically.
As for Kara and Thomas, their love affair carried on well into their advanced years, with both of them living the extended life cycles that were not uncommon for certain shifters. Many centuries later, they had relocated to be closer to their children, enjoying life among the animals and watching their children grow into powerful men that would one day be remembered in history books everywhere for their gifts to the conservation community and their incredible knowledge of the animal kingdom as a whole.
***THE END***
Cole (Bonus)
Dragons of Umora Book 1
Sarah J. Stone
Chapter 1
You are not my son.
Those were the most devastating words he could think of. He would rather hear that his parents were dead, that his older brothers, the Crown Prince and the Duke, had disowned him. Anything but the fact that he was not who he thought he was.
His blood boiled in his veins as he stood in the middle of the grand hall, the gleaming thrones mocking him. Cole had been born the third Prince of Umora, a planet so advanced in civilization that there was no pain, no suffering, and virtual immortality through science. Everyone on Umora was some sort of shifter, some sort of magical creature – whether it be wolf, lion, or otherwise. The dragon shifters, however, had always been the royal family, ruling over those beneath them. The witches, the werewolves, and the lions all bowed down to the dragon shifters.
Journey to India (Exiled Dragons Book 7) Page 12