Change of Heart 05 - Forging the Future Read Online Free PDF

the cage, got inside with me, and closed the door.”
    I remembered it clearly.
    “Bagheera,” she whispered, and I had no idea who that was, but she moved slowly, cautiously, crawling across the straw at the bottom of the cage. “I won’t hurt you.”
    Won’t hurt me?
    “Don’t be scared, okay?” she said, her voice breaking with the end of the crying.
    It was very sweet that even in the nightmare she was living, she was worried about me.
    When her fingers grazed my fur, I purred so she’d know I was harmless, and she wrapped her arms tight around my neck, holding on for dear life. It was ridiculously dangerous, and if I’d been a wild animal merely reacting to the closeness of people to my cage and lashing out, she would have been eviscerated. But as it was, I let her hug me, cut off my air supply just a little, and basically treat me like her pet. She was little and scared, and I was her protector.
    When the attacker returned with a woman and a man and several others armed with rifles, I heard him telling them that the child had wandered into the area where they kept the animals they would hunt and had been killed. The lights going on nearly blinded me.
    “Where’s my child?” the woman screamed, and I could hear the terror in her voice. She was probably the little girl’s mother, and from the way she was hanging on to the man beside her, I was guessing he was her husband and the girl’s father.
    “Mommy!”
    Her mother was the first one to gasp.
    “She’s alive?” The man I’d mauled was stunned.
    There we were, inside the cage, her with her arms around my neck, leaning, and me, tail swishing but otherwise statue still beside her.
    “Sweetie,” her father’s voice cracked as four men lifted their guns to kill me. “Come out of there slow.”
    She shook her head, tears welling again as she pointed at the man who was still bleeding from the scratches I’d given him. “He told me not to scream, but I did anyway.”
    Not a sound from anyone.
    “He’s going to try and hurt me again. He tore my clothes, see?” she said, turning so they could see the ripped buttons on her blouse. “And he punched me on the cheek and nose.”
    Instantly I was no longer the focus of attention.
    “Mommy, I peed,” she lamented. “I’m sorry, but I was superscared.”
    “Oh, no, honey, that’s okay,” her mother soothed, gaze darting to me and then back to her daughter. “Can you come out of the cage, please?”
    “But Bagheera saved me.”
    “I see he did.”
    The little girl pointed at the mauled man again. “He wanted to take my clothes off and I tried to run but he caught me but Bagheera made him stop.”
    It took a moment for her words to sink in. Her mother was the one listening closest.
    “Take him out of here,” she ordered, and two of the men dragged the little girl’s attacker from the abandoned barn while her father and three others still trained their guns on me.
    “Mommy, please don’t let Daddy kill Bagheera.”
    “No, baby,” she promised. “This is the end of Daddy hunting anything at all.”
    Her husband sighed, but I saw him nod and lower his gun. The other men did as well.
    “Take it somewhere,” his wife said, “anywhere, and let it go.”
    “Yes,” he agreed.
    “It’s tame, for heaven’s sake,” she rasped, her voice sharp with the whip of judgment. “Jesus Christ.”
    He was horrified as the words sunk in, and I saw his face scrunch up, disgusted with himself and what he’d been about to do.
    “It’s like shooting a housecat,” his wife finished harshly. “It’s obscene.”
    I sat stone-still as the little girl hugged me one last time before she crawled out of my cage. Mother, father, and child all embraced the second she was out. I didn’t wait for what would happen; instead I flew from the cage before it could be closed and reached the barn door faster than any of them could react.
    I glanced back, and one of the men lifted his gun.
    “You shoot that cat and