Chapter 3
Vatten Toller
Canton Valley Farm
I waited until the enraged dragoness left before I loped through the grass to introduce myself.
Canton had warned me over the phone that his farm was larger than he could explain.
I’d spotted a few rabbit shifters on my walk across his acreage but none of them looked as if they were expecting me and from the way the cowboy bear looked over his shoulder at me neither did he.
Both of the dragons who remained with him ducked back down inside the rabbit hole as if I’d come to eat them.
The bear stared me down for a minute as if deciding whether I was a dog or a shifter. In the end he frowned at me and scooped up the cub who was chewing on his boot.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
I shifted into my human form, sitting on my ass in the grass because I didn’t particularly want to be bitten by a bear this morning. Sure, I navigated the polar bear communities I helped out in just fine, but I didn’t know this bear.
“Canton is expecting me. I’m here to train Gooseberry,” I said.
“Who in tarnation is Gooseberry?” he asked and the cub in his arms threw his head back as if he were laughing.
“Canton’s new puppy,” I said, wondering if I should ask this man who he was. Canton said if I beat him to the farm to find Philip. Said he’d be the only one in a cowboy hat but now I wondered if I found the wrong bear since he didn’t seem to know what I was speaking about.
“You’re Philip, right?” I asked him.
He nodded, held up a finger, and cocked his head to the side. He nodded and sighed as if he was listening to a voice only he heard.
“He won’t be back until tomorrow. The dog got ahold of some chocolate. He didn’t say how, but they took him to the vet. He ate chocolate. Wait…” Philip frowned. “Nope. Not even going to ask.”
“I can eat chocolate,” I sighed. It was my second least favorite question I was asked about being a dog shifter. My absolute least favorite was being asked if my alpha would take me for walks on a leash when I met him.
“I’m not usually an ass,” Philip said. “Well, that’s not true but I’ve gotten better at hiding it over the years.
Canton’s not here and he won’t be back until tomorrow.
He said he was puttin’ you in cabin three.
I’ll show you where to go but then I got things to do.
We have a party today. Someone’s movin’ in.
Plus we have so much dragon bullshit going on that the farm will be fertilized for the next century. ”
“Anything I should be concerned about?” I asked as Philip started leading the way.
“I wouldn’t get involved if I were you,” he waved me off. “Wait. Do you see spirits?”
“Not usually. I have a time or two during rituals. I’m part of a polar bear hunting guild.”
That stopped him in his tracks. He turned to look at me. His eyes raked up and down me. For a moment, I thought he might proposition me.
“Which of your parents is the polar bear?” he asked.
“Good nose,” I chuckled. “My carrier. He met my sire because he was pinned down by some non-shifters who thought they could make him a ‘working dog.’ That didn’t happen but my carrier turned them into fertilizer.”
“Sounds about right,” Philip nodded. “We don’t get a lot of polar bear shifters this far down.”
“Eh, it’s not my carrier Canton knew. My grandpa on my sire’s side started off in the Other World and eventually shifted when he came over here. Got tired of being man’s best friend and all of that I guess,” I shrugged as a row of neat little log cabins came into sight.
“They look old fashioned but they have all the modern stuff. We built them a few years ago when Canton was trying to be friendlier. That’s his MO. Not mine. This is cabin three. What sort of rituals do you do with polar bears up there?”
“It’s been a while but mostly laying trespassers to rest. Not in the ‘Rawr! We’re gonna eat you!
’ sort of way but in the laying their spirits to rest sort of way.
A lot of the bears up north don’t ask questions about trespassers.
I’m one of them at least by scent but folks who stumble in during mating season or cub season get eaten a lot,” I shrugged.
“Do me a favor?”
“Yeah?” I arched a brow wondering what this man could possibly want from me.
“Don’t eat anyone while you’re here. Ty will want way too much paperwork if he finds out,” Philip rolled his eyes.
The bear cub in his arms had fallen asleep and he turned to leave without giving me time to double check that Ty was the leader of the GGB.
I shrugged and pushed open the door to cabin number three.
Inside the living space was larger than I expected.
The living room and kitchen were a combo with doors breaking off into the bedroom and what looked from where I stood to be a fairly large bathroom.
I shrugged off my backpack and examined it.
I’d paid a pretty penny for the bag that could grow and shrink with me while I shifted back and forth.
It made traveling for work easier. At the heart of my profession, I was a domestic canine therapist. I worked with traumatized dog shifters but also trained non-shifting dogs.
At least that’s what everyone called it.
Most of my job was explaining dogs to people and people to dogs.
Occasionally, I’d smuggle a dog out if it really wasn’t a good fit.
When that happened, I had to hightail it back to polar bear territory.
If the dog ‘owners’ were particularly annoying, I’d cut through moose territory and scream my head off until the moose came over to see what was going on.
Most shifters don’t really know how big moose are until they’re face to face with them.
After checking that all my stuff survived, I tucked my bag under the bed and shifted.
I did a big stretch and yawn. Then I did my bark scream to check out the acoustics of the cabin.
I liked when my own call echoed back to me.
I waited a few seconds to see if anyone shouted for me to shut up and when no one did, I called out again.
I’d been accused of enjoying the sound of my own voice more than once.
With everything clear I decided I’d sing some more later, and it was time to sniff around.
It took me nearly an hour to sniff around the whole cabin.
Someone had taken time to clean it and try to scrub out the pheromones, but I still smelled a lot of the people who stayed here before me.
When I ran out of things to sniff, I sang for a while.
It was a Grim Howlers’ song that my carrier really liked.
It was catchy and always got stuck in my head.
I might’ve went on for longer if a woman hadn’t stopped at the door and put on her ‘I’m talking to a dog voice. ’
“Oh, did someone leave their baby locked in there?” she said.
I stopped singing and walked over to the door. I sniffed at the crack. It was a lioness. A lioness was talking to me in a sing song voice.
“I’m going to have to kick someone in the shin and tell Canton to fine them.
It’s against the rules to lock puppy dogs in the cabin when you go out.
I guess yet another guest didn’t read the contract they signed,” she said, sounding a bit irritated.
She smelled irritated too. I did know about that clause in the cabin contract, but it said pets.
I pushed the foot pedal to open the door and blinked up at her. She was tall and smelled a little bit like a bear. We blinked at each other for a second and she started to stoop down to pet me but stopped mid-motion.
“Oh, sorry,” she said, obviously picking up that I was part polar bear and thus not a non-shifting dog.
“You wouldn’t believe how many people come to visit and try to leave their dogs locked up or maybe you would.
” She shrugged. “I’m Evie. I’m the resident vet and the one who can hand out fines for people who break animal rules on the farm.
If they don’t want to pay, I get to thump them. That might be my favorite part.”
I shifted back. She wasn’t a bear, but she was mated to one, hence her unusual scent. I introduced myself and told her why I was there.
“I’m Evie. Philip and Canton are my grandpas. I wasn’t thrilled to hear Canton hired a trainer. We’ve had farm dogs before and never had one. Is there something different about Gooseberry?” she asked.
“I’m not sure yet. While trainer is the word most people understand, I’m actually a canine therapist and practice doctor-patient confidentiality. I don’t mind being called a trainer because that’s probably what it looks like to the owners.” I air quoted owners automatically as I spoke.
“Cool!” Evie grinned and tightened her high ponytail. “You should swing by the party later. There’ll be lots of food. Other dogs too. Wait. You can talk to non-shifting dogs, right?”
“Yeah. We don’t even have to speak the same human form languages. Dog is universal.”
“Evie!” Philip’s voice rang out. “That damn colt has its head stuck in the fence again! That damn dog’s howlin’ has them all worked up.”
“Duty calls!” Evie grinned.
“Sorry,” I mouthed to her and she shrugged. “It’s good training for the colts. They have to learn that noise is gonna happen and if they’re reactive bad things can happen. Just don’t eat my horses or I’ll eat you.”