Chapter 12
“H oney, when can we go swimming?”
“Are we allowed to go into the woods all by ourselves?”
“Is there a schedule, or can we pick any activities we want?”
“I want to go on the ropes course!”
“I want to go canoeing!”
“I wanna be a BEAR!”
“Okay, okay, settle down!” Honey lifted her voice, cutting across the din.
She cast a somewhat desperate glance across the dining hall, wondering what the heck was taking Buck so long.
“I’m happy you’re all so excited to be at camp, but you’re talking over each other.
I can’t answer questions if I can’t hear them. One at a time, please.”
A brown-haired, round-faced girl promptly stuck her hand in the air.
“Yes, er…” Honey squinted at the girl’s name tag, which bore an illegible squiggle. “Dorca?”
“Flora,” the girl corrected cheerfully. “It’s okay, my teacher says that my handwriting is the worst and that the only way to read my homework assignments is to pin them up and run past them. When can we go see our cabins?”
“I wanna top bunk!” Archie shouted, and—for the third time in ten minutes—turned into a bear.
“We’ll get you all settled in soon,” Honey promised. “Archie, try to stay human, please. But we have to wait until all your things have been unloaded from the buses and taken over to the cabins. Be patient, I’m sure the staff are working as fast as they can.”
The other girl, whose name tag read CLAIRE and who hadn’t said much so far, shyly put up her hand. At Honey’s encouraging nod, she blushed, shrinking back a little.
“Will you show us around the camp?” she mumbled at the table. “This place is much bigger than I thought it would be.”
“I know it seems overwhelming now, but you’ll soon be able to find your way around,” Honey told her. “I’ll make sure you know where to find everything.”
“We’ll help,” Finley added. He offered Claire a warm smile. “Me and Rufus and Estelle and Beth. We’ve already been here a while.”
“We’ll show you all the best places,” Estelle announced. “The ones even the counselors don’t—”
“Estelle,” Beth hissed.
“Graaaw?” the bear cub said eagerly. “Grr graaw graaaa-”
“Human words, Archie,” Honey interrupted. Unable to resist, she tousled his fur. “I don’t speak bear, remember?”
The bear went cross-eyed for a moment, then Archie was back. “Can we go into the woods yet? I wanna shift!”
“You literally just shifted,” Beth said with distinct disapproval.
Archie wrinkled his nose at her. “I mean properly . I wanna run around and climb trees and smell things!”
“We’ll go as soon as we can.” Honey reached for a distraction. “How about we play a game, so we can get to know each other? Does anyone know ‘Two Truths and a Lie?’”
Most of the kids looked blank, but Beth’s hand shot up. At Honey’s encouraging nod, the girl cleared her throat, sitting up poker-straight.
“I’ll go through the rules,” Beth said to her fellow campers, sounding more like she was preparing to give a university lecture than explain a fun party game.
“We each take it in turns to say three things about ourselves. Two of them have to be true, and one of them has to be a lie. Everyone has to guess which statement is the false one. The game is to try to choose unlikely truths and plausible lies, so that people guess wrong.”
“So… we all guess together?” Claire asked, sounding a little uncertain. “Or do we guess in secret, so that we can keep score?”
“What does the winner get?” Archie asked.
“We’ll just play for fun,” Honey said, to forestall that potential car crash. “Who wants to go first?”
“ME!” Archie shouted, just beating Estelle’s upthrust hand. Without waiting to be invited, he jumped to his feet. “I’m Archie and I’m a BEAR!”
“We know,” the other children chorused with varying degrees of exasperation.
Beth looked aggravated. “You weren’t paying attention to my explanation at all .”
Honey hid a smile. “That was a good idea to start with your name, Archie, since we’re all still trying to learn who everyone is.
Let’s all do that this round. But the game is ‘Two Truths and a Lie’, remember?
Try to think of things about yourself which the rest of us will find unusual or surprising, so that it’s harder for us to figure out which one isn’t true. ”
“Ummm…” Archie scratched the back of his neck.
“Well, I’m the only bear in my family, ‘cause my mom and sister aren’t even shifters.
And I once accidentally shifted at school and had to go hide in a closet, only it turned out to be the teachers’ break room.
And, aaaaaaand… one time I was out in the woods and I ran into this GIANT mean grizzly—”
“Don’t even bother to finish that,” Estelle said, rolling her eyes. “You’re supposed to make the lie believable .”
Archie looked around the table, as though hoping for a dissenting opinion. Finding none, he plopped down again, pouting.
“Me next,” Estelle announced. She bounced to her feet. “My name is Estelle, I can beat any of you at arm-wrestling, I once ate a whole chocolate cake and I didn’t even feel sick, and I’m a unicorn.”
“Now you’re the one playing it wrong,” Archie complained. “It’s meant to be two truths and one lie, not the other way round.”
“I did only tell one lie,” Estelle said indignantly. She thumped her elbow onto the table, spreading her fingers. “I am the arm-wrestling champion. I can totally whip any of you. Come over here and I’ll prove it.”
“Nobody take her up on that,” Finley advised.
Archie folded his arms, glaring at Estelle. “First of all, you totally couldn’t, because I’m a bear and everyone knows bears are the strongest. And second, there’s no such thing as unicorns.”
“Ha! Shows what you know.” Estelle’s whole body swelled with pride.
“There’s a whole herd of unicorns living right here on this mountain.
Though they’re just regular unicorns, not shifters like my family.
Me and my dad and my grandad are the only unicorn shifters in the whole entire world, as far as anyone knows. So there.”
It was a good thing the kids were focused on each other, because Honey hadn’t been prepared for that revelation. Buck’s hasty overview of shifters hadn’t covered unicorns. She did her best to hide her astonishment, wondering what else he hadn’t thought to mention.
At least Archie also looked taken aback by Estelle’s bombshell. He tipped his chin up, eyes narrowing. “Prove it.”
Estelle faltered, losing a little of her belligerent attitude. “What?”
“If you’re a unicorn, prove it.” Archie sat back, looking smug. “Go ahead and shift, right here.”
Twin spots of red appeared on Estelle’s pale cheeks. “I don’t have to prove anything to you. ”
“Anyway, it’s against the rules to shift in the dining hall,” Beth said before Honey could step in to defuse the escalating conflict. She tugged Estelle back down to the bench. “And she’s lying about the cake. She barfed everywhere.”
“I’ll go next,” Finley said quickly. He stood up, hands tucked behind his back as though he was about to recite a poem.
“Hello, my name is Finley. My mom and dad are firefighters with the Thunder Mountain Hotshots, I’ve sailed all the way from Miami to Trinidad on a forty-foot catamaran, and I can shift into a great white shark. ”
“Really?” Archie let out a low, appreciative whistle. “Coooooool.”
“That’s the lie,” Estelle muttered, still looking sulky. “He doesn’t turn into a great white shark.”
“Estelle!” Finley protested. “It’s no fun if you tell everyone the answer straight away.”
Estelle tossed her silvery hair. “Well, come up with something I don’t know, then.”
“I can’t.” With a sigh, Finley sat down again. “You and Beth and Rufus know literally everything about me. Who hasn’t had a go yet?”
Flora’s hand shot into the air. “Me!” Without a pause, she continued, all on one breath, “My name is Flora, I’ve got seven brothers and sisters, I love skateboarding and soccer and basketball and ice hockey, and when I’m in my other form, I can poop CUBES!”
“Ewwwwwww!” Claire and Beth chorused in unison.
“ Awesome, ” Archie breathed.
Estelle glowered at him. “What, you don’t want her to prove it?”
Archie’s attention was riveted to Flora. “Oh, I definitely want her to prove it.”
“Maybe later,” Honey said. “I think that’s another thing that we shouldn’t do in the dining hall.”
Finley’s brow furrowed. “Can you really poop cubes, Flora?”
“Yeah!” Flora said proudly. “Because I’m a wombat.
We’re super strong and can dig really fast, and we have pouches, like kangaroos, only I never got ride in either of my moms’ because I didn’t shift until I was three, and by then I was too big to fit.
Also, we have a thing called a dermal shield over our rear end, which is like really tough armor right under our skin, which we use to defend ourselves from predators.
When I’m a wombat, I could crush your skull with my butt . ”
Archie gazed at Flora with the expression of a boy deeply, profoundly in love.
Claire was looking confused. “So, if the pooping cubes thing is true… do you not have seven brothers and sisters?”
“I wish I did,” Flora said sadly. “But my moms say that one of me is more than enough. So I’m an only child.” She perked up again. “Which is why I wanted to come to camp! To make lots and lots and lots of friends!”
“With those talents, I’m sure you will,” said a familiar growling voice from behind Honey’s shoulder.
“Buck!” Caught up in the kids, Honey hadn’t noticed him come in. With a surge of relief, she turned, only to discover that he wasn’t alone. A gangly boy in skinny jeans and a designer hoodie lurked behind him, his whole body one enormous scowl.
“Got someone for you to meet, kids.” Buck jerked a thumb at his sullen shadow. “This is Ignatius.”
“Ignatius Aurelium Golden ,” the boy said, stressing the last name.
From the way Finley and Beth exchanged startled glances, this had meant something to them. The rest of the kids simply looked nonplussed. Honey shared the sentiment.