Luck of Nines

41

      The dorm room was blissfully empty when he returned and, after listening as best he could, he let himself shift from the fully human form that he had been maintaining.  His form grew and shifted until even curled in on itself and far from full sized the room was cramped. Even a canine would have been no match for the imposing Cerberus, but not a manticore. 

     Chipped Fang sprang over to his side, careful of the quills that lay in waiting, just barely noticeable within the thick golden orange fur, dark black stripes like those of a tiger streaked through the colors leaving the tan quills slightly more noticeable.  His mane was a dark red-orange color although it receded about his face, which mostly resembled his human one.  The ears of this form, placed not far from where a human's should be, were particularly pointy although mostly hidden in the sides of the mane and the serrated teeth particularly large, he had to keep his long tail, which ended in a sharp scorpion stinger, that was mostly hidden by a tuft of lion-like hair carefully slid so it was beneath the bed so he had space. Likewise, that large dragon wings stuck close to his side in a cramped position pushing against the wall and beds still. 

      Carefully he shifted fully to the canine form, shaking out it's lighter red-orange fur as he stretched, sometimes it just felt nice to shift into all of his possible forms; it was the same feeling of sitting in one place and then getting to streeeetch everything out in a lazy but deeply satisfying way. He stretched out his limbs now and then moved from snake to squirrel to to dhole to cat forms in rapid succession and then back again, moving about just as quickly as he did so as excitement filled him. He settled on the clouded leopards form, leaping easily up to the top of the canopy, Chipped Fang clutched carefully in his jaws, and grudgingly settling down, nobody would see him from up here and what's more the fabric was sturdy enough to hold his weight.

He lay there for awhile letting the panic and fierce determination he had felt consume him briefly; he had nearly died. He curled tightly around Chipped Fang.

'What happened?' The inquired.

'Large dog,' he responded, 'even larger than I ever am. At least for Malfoy the secret is out.' It was true, on all fours his Manticore form was above the height of even a tall person, somewhere around the height of 250 centimeters tall, but the Cerberus was even taller than that. And with three jaws he'd needed the advantage of his stinger, poisoned quills, and anything else he could get to win.

He'd dodged fast, dragging Malfoy with him, the moment the chain had broken, and taken that split second the Cerberus needed to recover to leap in full manticore form and dig his teeth as deeply into its neck as he could, his wings scraped the walls, spread for balance, as it howled and fought to shake him off.

The strong jaw of his large canine form was used to strengthen his bite as he tore, digging his claws and quills equally into the tough hide, his tail struck swiftly a few times as he tore as hard as he could and then it had been over.

But... if his initial surprise attack had failed and he had been thrown off, he would have been much worse off, if he won at all. He had a good sense of when he was beat, and if he had failed that attack then he might as well have been a small kitten again, going after a large vicious dog; this time with nowhere to run, and no trap to rely on.

      But he had made it out. By some miracle, like all the other close scrapes he had gotten into, he had made it out. Danger always seemed to lurk, trailing right behind him in his footsteps, yet somehow, one way or another, he always made it out alive. He wasn't sure how that was possible, but he didn't feel like questioning his luck for no reason. 

     'I'm glad you're still here.'

      He nearly sighed in relief as Chipped Fang snuggled closer to him and he drifted off into a peaceful sleep.

    (An:  I just want Thursday to hurry up and be here... anyway, I managed to get this published, even if it's a really short chapter this week, see you next week. -T.A.L.A. )