Slow Shift by Nazarea Andrews (best summer reads of all time txt) 📕

scion, the living, breathing bearer of the ancient rocks’ magic, and no one knows what that means.

“It did this,” Chase says, and Lucas watches him. Chase’s gaze flicks to him, heavy and sad. “The Standing Stones chose this.”

He explains it as quickly as he can, but it doesn’t make sense to him, and the wild creature—the fox—is stirring, curious and apprehensive, and he feels the sudden absurd desire to run.

“A kitsune isn’t a shifter, in the truest sense,” Lucas says, “I don’t know much about them. They’re rare, generally found in Japan, but from what I do remember, it’s a creature of magic and wildness. Not a werewolf, but it’s—it’s a cousin to shifters, I suppose you could say.” He considers Chase, pale and sweating in Tyler’s bed, his tattoos dark against his skin, and smiles faintly. “It suits you.”

“He has a beta Shift,” Tyler points out.

Lucas nods. “Yes, well, that is clearly beyond me, and a question for another day, I think.” His expression goes cold. “We need to deal with Chelsea.”

~*~

Chase is sleeping by the time John pulls up.

Tyler carefully disentangles himself from him to go meet the Chief. Lucas is already there, his face that disturbing blankness he’s had since Chase forbade him from killing Chelsea. Again.

Tyler thinks that this time, not even Chase can stay the Left Hand, and he thinks Chase knows it.

“Is he—is he ok?”

“No,” Lucas says bluntly, and John pales. “He was tortured, but there’s nothing that won’t heal in time. What won’t go away with time is the Bite she gave him.”

John lets out a wounded noise that makes Tyler’s shoulders hunch.

How much of this is his fault—because he dared to leave Chelsea, because he loved Chase, because as much as he loves Chase, he can’t protect him?

“He’s a werewolf?” John asks, voice small.

“He’s something called a kitsune. We aren’t sure what all that means, but he’s alive, and he will get better,” Lucas says in a voice that leaves no room for disbelief.

John takes a shuddering breath.

Tyler steps aside and trails after the Chief as he hurries into the bedroom, falling into the chair that’s so often where Chase curls and reads.

Now, they wait for him to heal.

~*~

Chase looks small in Tyler’s big bed. John thinks maybe all children look small to their parents when they’re sleeping—but Chase has always been too big to be contained, moving in his sleep, filling up the world with his words, enthusiasm, curiosity, and love.

Now he lays sleeping in the bed he shares with Tyler Reid, pale and bruised against the sheets with his tattoos stark against his skin, and even that testament to the massive power that lives in his son does nothing to reassure John.

“Do we know who it was?”

Tyler shifts anxiously and Lucas says, “Yes. Chase doesn’t want me to take action against her.”

John frowns. Chase is his son, and he adores the boy, but he’s never had any misconceptions about his very grey morality. Chase has never hesitated to do what it takes to protect the people he loves, the ones he claims as his. John doesn’t even expect him to anymore.

“You know why,” Chase grits out, and Lucas snarls, a vicious animal noise that makes John want to flinch away.

Chase rolls his eyes at the display and turns a sleepy gaze on his dad. His eyes flare with blue flames for a heartbeat, then settle back to the familiar golden brown. It’s reassuring, settling some of the unease that he’s been feeling since Lucas told him Chase had been bitten.

Chase is different, but he’s still Chase.

“Hey, dad,” Chase says, smiling, and John leans in to hug him, his grip fierce and desperate.

~*~

Lucas is furious.

Chase would know that, even if he didn’t have new senses going haywire, feeding him information he doesn’t know what to do with.

It takes hours of waiting—after John relents and goes to Chase’s room to sleep on the couch, and Tyler passes out in the chair next to Chase’s bed—before he finally turns to look at the Left Hand.

He’s watching Chase, his gaze flickering with electric blue.

Chase sighs. “You can’t kill her.”

“She hurt you,” Lucas says, “Killing her would be very easy.”

“And when it’s over and I’m well, and you’re drowning in guilt? What then?”

“That is another day’s problem, Chase.”

He huffs. “I’m trying to avoid having problems in the future. I know it doesn’t make sense, but I need you to listen to me, to trust me.”

Lucas stares at him for a long time. “I—I can’t promise that. Not after what she’s done to you.”

“Will you promise to wait until I’m well? That you won’t make a decision in anger?”

The nod he gets is slow and reluctant, but he’ll take it.

“How did she get past your wards?” Lucas asks, changing the subject.

Chase groans. “Because I am the stupidest mage in the world,” he grumps, and a small smile flickers on the edges of Lucas’s lips.

~*~

He wakes up to the press of bodies around him, fingers in his hair, and the drip of tears on his face.

“I’m ok,” he croaks out, and Aurora makes a hysterical little noise, her grip on him tightening just a little. “Aurora,” he says gently, “I’m ok.”

The pups stir and watch him, human and exhausted and worried. He touches Jessica’s shoulder and gives her a reassuring smile.

“I’m ok.”

“You smell wrong,” Ezra says.

Chase nods. He closes his eyes and reaches for the wild fox washed in his magic, drawing it up. The change ripples over him like a wave of pins and needles, and he hears the confused whine Ezra gives before he blinks his eyes, now flickering white flames, at them.

“Smelling different is sorta something we need to talk about,” Chase says around a mouthful of sharp little teeth.

~*~

Tyler is careful with him.

He’s always careful after Chase has been hurt, but this is different. He’s skittish and distant, and there’s a frown that draws his eyebrows down as he reads while Chase sips his soup.

“What’s wrong?”

Tyler jerks, eyes wide as they flick to