“I’ll go help Gao, be back in a moment!”

            And he dashes out of the kitchen. I can almost see Mom tensing a bit, though he seems to have avoided smacking into anything this time around. To be fair, it really has only happened about three times, at least that I can remember.

            Thankfully, we don’t hear anything break, and the kitchen falls back into speedy dinner-making after a bit of silence. Mom and Krael have gotten the majority of the spice jars of the counter, I guess the ones she’s keeping out will end up being used for dinner.

            “What else are you making for dinner, Mom?” Ayran asked, come close to the table to peer up with her little talons tapping on the wood.

            “We’ll be having beans, moonshine.” Mom replies, reaching out a hand to tap on the table with her own finger nails. The sound isn’t as loud as ours, but it makes Ayran giggle anyway. Which makes Krael and me snicker anyway making the whole thing less, tense. At least it lasted until Gao and Torre came back, with Torre’s handling of the meat nearly knocking Gao off-balance as they tried to get it in the door.

            “W-Woah!”

            “I am sorry!” Torre blurted out in Drakkish, almost too fast for me to catch. Dad always said that Torre talks like his mouth was the wind, a lot and for a long time. Kind of weird given that really, Gaotail does not sound or talk in the least like Torre, and he’s the one that can actually make wind blasts. I have seen it only once, but I know he can do it!

            “Supposing you won’t need that cooked?” Mom asks, eyebrow raising as the pair stopped in the middle of the kitchen with the meat. Dad always skins it right away when he and the others come home after a hunt, and there’s hooks in the cellar so it doesn’t get dirty on the floor. It can be ready right when everyone comes, though, I thought there would be more…

            “Where do you think we can put this?” Gao asked, doing much better now that Torre had stopped moving, though from the way his feet were shuffling, that might not be for long.

            “On the hooks outside. You know the ones. The others are already coming.”

            “Don’t know.” If Gao only looked it, Torre had said it aloud. Mom sighed.

            “Bring out the rest; they’ll come when they smell the meat cooking.”

            “Yes’m.” Torre says as Gao hurriedly nods, and they get to work. It only takes them a few moments to get the meat out. As they’re going back, Mom abruptly says,

            “Kal, go with them, please, and get the smaller cuts.”

            I knew I was still being punished! Probably for the best not to say anything though, just in case she decides to give me more chores. That’s the last thing I need or want right now.

            “Alright Mom…”

            “Thank you, little light.”

            I snort at the baby name (she hasn’t used it in a while, I realize), and follow after Torre and Gao to the cellar.

            ***

            It is cold in the cellar. Cold, cold, cold, cold, cold, and now is a bad time to not be able to wear shoes like Mom or have the ones that form when Dad and the others look human.

            Cold toes, very very cold toes…

            “You don’t have to come in…” Gao murmurs as he notices me hopping from foot to foot in the doorway.

            “But the meat’s in here…” Torre interjects, finally looking up from getting the other deer off one of the hooks to see me. “…oh, well…maybe we can kind of carry it on the bigger piece…?”

            “No!” I bleat as I briefly jump back over the threshold. This is going to take some preparation, cause if I don’t do this, I’m pretty sure Mom will have me doing something else, possibly even worse than the cold stone floor of the cellar. “I can do this, I can do this, I can do this I can do this…”

            “Uh, can we get the deer through first?” Gao asks, breaking my mantra as he and Torre heft up the meat. I back away from the door and give a nod, letting them pass before I start again. Torre calls out a ‘good luck’ that’s echoed by Gao as they head back to the kitchen.

            “I can do this, I can do this, doesn’t matter if it’s cold, it’ll be over in a moment if I hurry, I can do this, I can do this!”

            And with that I jumped, over the threshold, touching the cold stones again with a yelp as I ran for the pieces of meat on a rack on the wall. Of course they were hooked in and it took a few minutes to pry each of the three pieces loose. Of course.

            Long story short it took a bit longer than I thought to get the meat out and to the kitchen. Thankfully no one commented, and I did pass Gao and Torre on the way back going for another deer. There were at least five more from what I saw, so they might be a while.

            When I got back, Cazhene had arrived, and Casvar was trying to climb in the window. He and the other younger one, Salem, are too young to know how to change like dad and the others. Casvar also doesn’t have front paws like the others, just legs, a tail, and wings, though he’s still very hard to keep control of (just ask anyone who’s watched him for more than a few moments).

            Doesn’t seem like Salem’s here yet, so it’s no wonder he’s a bit antsy. Come to think of it, Shoren doesn’t seem to be here either, so maybe they’ll be coming together again?

            “Casvar, that better not be talon marks you’re leaving on the window frames.” Mom was saying, sounding decidedly disgruntled and while Casvar’s antics were usually something of a show, I kind of wanted him to stop. Especially given that the punishment of more chores could easily end up happening if Mom and Dad were made angry enough.

            And Casvar is very good at making folks angry. Like Cazhene who has just picked him up in his teeth to pull him back through the window. It’s kind of weird to see them close to each other sometimes, given that Cazhene’s scales are grey like storm clouds and Casvar is orange like some of the wild flowers we have past the garden.

            “Stop, and stay next to me.” Cazhene says once he’s put Casvar back on the ground, this time well away from the temptation of the windows. He will be, at the very least, a bit less obvious about his next caper, not that that makes me feel any better about getting through the evening with no new chores added to my to do list.

            I choose this moment to put the meat down on the table, drawing Mom’s attention to me straight away.

            “Your sister has a plate for that. Hold on, Krael?”

            “Right here, Mom!” My darker sister came forward with one of the metal pieces from the cupboards, putting it on the table for me to put the meat into. I was about to put all three down before Mom cut in again.

            “No, get out separate plates for each. It will not cook if it’s stacked like that.”

            That left Krael and me looking between each other for a moment before I sent a look her way that hopefully said ‘please please just get them I really don’t want to be stuck here with these forever’. It seemed to get my point across, given that she immediately darted for the cupboard to get more just a moment later.