"Yeah. Poor kid didn’t even seem that rattled, but I'm pretty sure he was hiding it." Good to know about the river. Stone doubts there's anything out there big and bad enough to take him, not in the woods, there just wouldn't be room. (He is probably wrong.) But it's still good to know.

He gives Kuai's shoulder a pat. "Good. My change wasn't this bad. Nothing partial about it, and it didn't hurt like most of yours did, since it basically was a shapeshifting problem. I changed shape, and it was into the wrong shape. Into one of my people's ancient enemies, in fact."