Page 49 of Renaissance Bear

On the other hand, maybe she could get Jazz to come to the fair whenshewas being Lady Alessandra, too, and they coulddo some kind of silly French farce thing as their big reveal. Alis smiled at the idea, and shook her head. "No, she's a digital nomad. Works from wherever she wants. She goes to Mexico for the winter, half the time. I swear I chose the wrong profession. Except I hate computer programming."

"Do you like kids?" Jon screwed up his face and sighed at his pizza. "I was trying tonotmake that sound like a loaded question, but I'm not sure that's possible."

"Hah! Yes, I do. I'd be miserable as an elementary school teacher otherwise. And…" Alis leaned her shoulder against his. "Yes, I do. To the loaded part of that question. Oh." She widened her eyes. "Um. Does it, uh, do you, I mean."

"Yes," Jon said, obviously both amused and understanding her. "Usually shifters breed true."

"So we'd have…baby bears…" Alis felt like individual bits of her brain were exploding as she tried to assimilate that information. In fact, she bet it was visible from the outside. There were probably fireworks going off inside her eyes, one at a time. Pew, bang, kerpow. "Wow, that's. That's. Wow."

"I am not planning to rush into that particular minefield any time soon," Jon said firmly. "Ifwe get there, it'll be in enough time for you to get used to the idea."

"Wait." Alis took her phone out and checked something. "Wait, so does that mean I'd only have to be pregnant for…how long are bears pregnant for?"

Jon's laugh bounced down the street so loudly a bunch of people nearby turned to look at them before going back to their own conversations. "On one hand I'm sorry to say it doesn't work that way, and on the other I'm sorry to say it's way more complicated than with humans. They have delayed embryo implantation, so?—"

"Nope! Nope, stop there, that's enough, I'll do it the human way." Alis turned her attention to a combination of finishingthe now-cool-enough pizza and scooting around trying to de-numb her butt, which wasn't fond of sitting on concrete. "Wait, does your butt not get numb? Is that part of the healing-shifting thing?"

"I'm sorry to report that it also doesn't work likethat. My butt is also numb and if I wanted to de-numb it fast I'd have to shift, which…" Jon waved a piece of pizza at the busy streets. "Probably wouldn't go over well."

"Right, with the running and the screaming." Alis's eyebrows drew down. "How many people here wouldn't run and scream?"

Jon's eyebrows went up as if in response, and he studied the street for a few minutes. "Maybe ten percent? There are quite a few of us out right now."

"And you can tell how?"

"The scent, a little. The look, a little. Mostly it's my bear telling me so."

Alis laughed, startled. "Your bear? What?"

His smile was warm and rueful. "It's a voice in my head. We talk. It encourages me to make rash decisions. When I shift, I'm a voice initshead. It's more than coexisting. We're the same being. But we do kind of have separate ideas about things. That sounds schizophrenic, doesn't it?"

Alis shook her head, smiling. "It sounds magical. So you really would know, or your bear would, if a shifter had been at City Hall."

"We should. Itfeelslike one was there. But it's like a blank space where all the information about it should be. It's like…" Jon fell silent, looking thoughtful. "Like having your nose plugged and your eyes covered and then given an apple to eat, except when you can see and smell it you realize it's an onion."

"What?! I can tell an onion from an apple!"

"Okay, bear in mind I haven't actually tried this myself, but, no, apparently you can't. They're supposed to have really similartextures, and since scent and vision are actually a huge part of taste…"

"I'm horrified," Alis said. "I want to try. Except I really, reallydon'twant to try. But really?"

"It's what I've read. I could try it. The bear likes onions. Raw or otherwise."

"I am not kissing you after that," Alis said firmly. "But okay, even if I'm skeptical about the whole onion/apple thing, I get your point. Someone's taken away so much information that your mouth thinks it's an apple because it feels like one, but there's evidence it's an onion from the scars on the desk." She squinted. "You know what I mean."

Jon grinned. "Yeah. And you know what I mean. So we're looking for a shifter who can hide who they are," he said with less humor. "And I've never even heard of such a thing."

"Obviously I haven't either. But there must be some way to take the plug off our noses, and remove the blindfold." Alis watched people drift back and forth between businesses, sharing drinks, food, and stories. "If you were going to kidnap somebody around here, where would you bring them?"

"Up the mountain," Jon said with a shrug. "There are a million places you could hide out. Especially if you were a shifter, but even if you weren't. Why?" He cast her a glance. "Are we going to go looking?"

"Well, you could scent out the mayor, at least, right? Or, could you? I don't really know how well bears scent."

"Only a few thousand times better than humans. As opposed to dogs," Jon said when Alis threw him a wry, questioning glance. "Who scent millions of times better than humans."

"What about wolves? Are they on the dog or bear end of things?"

"Dog, definitely."

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