Ghoulies Abroad by Julie Steimle (bts book recommendations txt) 📖

was what he was looking for. Somehow he knew a wolf pack like this one would not suddenly go savage. Rick blinked, thinking hard. He looked to the crowd. There were so many of them, and there was no way that he knew of to pick a demon from a crowd this large, unless…. He turned to Chen, “I know you hate doing this, but will you help me with something?”

“Doing what?” Chen suspiciously asked.

He whispered into Chen’s ear, “I need you to shake a few people’s hands.”

Chen nodded, agreeing. “I think so too.”

“You do?” Rick wondered, examining the look on Chen’s face now. Chen’s eyes were peculiarly intense, much like when the New Year demon came to Gulinger Private Academy.

“I can feel it,” Chen hissed. “A demonic presence.”

This was useful, and perhaps part of Chen’s gift as a spirit warrior. They never really explored Chen’s spirit warrior abilities outside of that one incident. Rick wondered what else Chen could do.

“Come with me.” Rick then said to the Alpha wolf, “Tou’r, as much as I believe you wolves are innocent, it has come to my attention that demons might have followed us.”

Several of the wolves hissed whispers, sharing looks.

“They may have infiltrated the pack,” Rick explained. He then looked to Chen. “My friends with me each have a gift for detecting demons.”

Tou’r glanced at Tom and then at Chen.

“Chen will translate,” Rick said, trying to deflect the attention from him. “My friend Tom will investigate.”

Tom nodded, then took off his glasses.

Several of the wolves gasped. Tom’s orange eyes nearly glowed in the dark courtyard. Some were muttering under their breath, recoiling from him.

“Daniel, can you watch to make sure no one runs off?” Rick asked with a glance to him.

Nodding, Daniel drew his sword out of his hidden sheath. Both immediately reappeared, the red feathers of the demon bird glistening visibly from the top of the sheath.

“Zhe shi shenme?” One of the local wolves pointed at the feathers, pale in the face.

“What is that?” Chen translated.

Tom walked over to the Asian werewolf, and said, “The remains of the demon we killed yesterday.”

Chen walked with Tom on Rick’s instruction, taking that one man by the hand and translating Tom’s words. Chen looked to Rick and shook his head, letting go. That one wasn’t a demon.

They went on. Tom pointed out one who did not seem to have as many imps around her. That woman paled, recoiling. “Bu shi wo!”

Approaching her, Chen touched her hand. In an instant he shot Tom a look, nodding.

Rick approached her. “Step away.”

She shrieked, sobbing and screaming. The men around her shouted at them, trying to push Tom and Chen back. Chen touched each one, but only pointed out one of them to Tom. That one immediately whipped on Chen. That one went all wolf. Tearing off his shirt, he jumped at Chen.

Chen quickly dodged, tossing off his winter coat—quickly transforming into a huge Rottweiler in a tee shirt, baring his teeth to fight back.

Several of the wolves stepped away to get out of the imminent brawl.

“Oh,” Rick added in a would-be off-hand way to the Alpha as he also removed himself from Chen’s path, “I forgot to tell you, Chen is a shape-shifter.”

“Not a wolf, though,” the boss growled. “Order him back.”

“That one attacked Chen.” Rick pointed with a low growl, eyes narrowing. “Not the other way around.”

But the boss snarled, “Those two are not demons! We know them! They have lived her a long time.”

“They are demons,” Daniel interjected, nodding. He pointed his sword at the woman and the wolf who had backed from Chen though waiting now for permission to kill from his Alpha. “I can feel it. The hostility is coming from them. And there are more.”

“You can feel it?” Tou’r said, his eyes sharp on him. “How?”

Daniel switched sword hands. He raised his right palm, showing the burning swirling heat that emanated from his right palm along with tickling flames of light. “My hand burns whenever hostile magical things are nearby. I cannot pick them out as well as Tom or Chen can, but I feel them near.”

Thinking quickly, Rick immediately said, “The monk who was to meet us at the airport was replaced by a demon. It is just as likely that demons might have killed your wolves and replaced them.”

A murmur rippled through the pack.

“It’s a common trope in Journey to the West,” Daniel muttered nodding.

The members of the pack backed away from the woman and the wolf, staring hard. Tou’r murmured what the crowd was saying, “They have been smelling funny lately.”

“Bu!” that one wolf shouted, rising into shape as a shirtless man. “Bu dui! Wo liang ren! Nimen renshi wo!”

“But are you?” Rick asked, cocking his head and sniffing also. They did have an unusual smell—ever so slight.

The crowd pushed out three others whom they also thought smelled funny. Each one shrieked and yowled that they were not demons but wolves like everyone else. Several were begging for them to see reason.

“Chen, check them,” Rick said, indicating those pushed out.

Chen did, quickly taking human shape. Approaching them, he briefly touched their hands. Only two of them were demons. One was just stinky. Chen nudged that one to go back into the crowd. That one sobbed in relief while everyone else told him to take a bath.

“Is that all of them?” Rick asked his friends.

Tom shrugged. Then he turned wickedly toward the crowd and said, “Pinch all the demons!”

The wolves did not know what to expect, but soon yelps came from the four who had been separated from the crowd, but two others within the crowd yelped.

“Deng yi xia!” one screamed once those around him jumped away. “Wo bu shi yaoguai!”

Tom nodded. “Not him. The one next to him.” He hopped over the crowd—which was a feat in itself. The wolves stared up at Tom floating over them in the air with horror—especially at how light Tom immediately seemed. Tom landed on the shoulders of a burly looking man, tugging on his ears. “This one.”

That one snarled. Almost immediately that man’s eyes changed to red. Hair sprouted, green and nasty. It wasn’t the same demon as the nian moguai that came to their school, but he seemed nearly as bad.

“Tom…?” Rick’s heart raced, remembering that the nian moguai also ate imps.

“Got it.” Tom launched off the demon’s shoulders in a high flip as everyone backed from it.

The other presumed demons attempted to scatter into the crowd.

“No!” Chen shouted. Immediately his body shrank, contorting into a green snake which quickly left his clothes behind. The snake outside his clothes promptly expanded into an enormous golden dragon. His claws, crashed down on the fleeing demons who were shrieking in horror and transforming into wolves to garner sympathy from the pack. Others in the pack were also contorting into wolves, though Rick and the boss backed away as humans. Daniel went pale, hunching far from Chen as if he were wetting his pants.

Tom landed on the neck of the dragon. “That got ‘em.”

Chen snapped up the exposed demon in his teeth, taking a bite out of it.

“Daniel!” Rick called back. “I need you to—” Yet when he looked back, he saw Daniel white as death, fallen on the ground, clenching his sword toward Chen in terror.

Dragon’o’phobia, they had said on the plane. It wasn’t a joke.

Rick shook his head. “I need you to force those demons into shape. Can you do that?”

“CAN HE PLEASE NOT BE A DRAGON?” Daniel shouted, refusing, if not just unable to move.

Moaning, Chen shrank down into a Bengal tiger.

The wolves in the court snarled. The demons who had been under his huge dragon foot scattered.

Almost immediately those fleeing demons fell, one after the other, a knife in a back, a head, a neck and shoulder. The one with the knife in the shoulder staggered up again to run. But Chen-the-tiger sprang upon him, ending him in one bite to the skull.

It was over. Demons dead.

All the wolves stared as the demons lost their wolfish shape and contorted back into their demonic forms. Daniel quickly advanced on them, taking back his daggers while chopping off heads to make sure they were dead, panting hard and extremely pale as he did it. Daniel’s eyes frequently went back to Chen as the tiger licked his paws then transformed back into an orangutan so he could dress back into his clothes. Rick mentally tracked how long it took Chen to dress, confirming that the monkey in the hotel definitely had not been Chen. It took Chen a bit, and he put his pants on first, leaving the rest of the dressing to human hands.

“What is with you and dragons?” Chen muttered at Daniel once back into shape.

Stomping up to him, Daniel grabbed Chen’s hand, holding tight. “This is what is with me and dragons!”

No one else could see what Chen was seeing—though Chen finally got the view into one of the Seven’s pasts. He paled. His eyes fixed on Daniel, looking like he would pee his pants. When Daniel let go, he tromped next to Rick with a huff, roughly cleaning off his sword to remove demon blood.

All the pack wolves shifted away from Rick’s group. Their eyes now took in Chen with intense comprehension. Several of them muttered, “Bai Nian jiazu.”

Chen would not look at them, stepping to Rick’s other side.

Tou’r said to Rick, almost accusingly, “You brought a Bai Nian to our village?!”

Rick blinked at him. “And what is that?”

The Alpha wolf snarled. “Demon slayers. Old as time. Some say made by Nuwa. Others say cursed by her.”

“Who is Nuwa?” Daniel asked, regaining his composure. His brow was still sweaty though.

“A mythical creation goddess,” Chen replied for the boss.

Tom sauntered up, sunglasses back over his eyes and hands in his pockets. He eyed the three of them, noticing that Chen was hiding from Daniel about as much as Daniel was keeping away from Chen.

“And don’t you say an elf,” Chen snapped, shooting him a look.

Daniel rolled his eyes with a groan. “Fine. But I really doubt you are cursed by some goddess.”

Chen shot him a puzzled look this time.

“I mean, come on,” Daniel huffed, glaring at him. “You can turn into a nasty huge dragon! What can fight against that?”

“Guns,” the village boss said. His eyes were hard. Yet he looked to Rick, as he was the only wolf in the group. “Though we are grateful you destroyed demons from among us, you have to answer for why you brought a Bai Nian here.”

Rick gazed back. “I had no idea you were prejudiced against spirit warriors.”

“Bai Nian have slain werewolves!” the boss shouted.

Closing his eyes, Rick sighed. He then turned toward his friends. “Are there any other demons about?”

“I think a few ran away,” Tom said with a shrug and raised hands, sorry.

Daniel and Chen both nodded.

“You felt them leave?” Rick asked them.

They nodded again.

“When Chen became a dragon, there was a general panic,” Tom explained.

Rick nodded to himself. Of course. But that also meant demons who knew what Chen could do were now running ahead, probably to warn those among the tigers. Or even more so in hiding. Rick looked to the tou’er and said, “I think from now on you ought to vet those wolves coming into your pack. Make sure they have the true allergies if you have to.”

“And how would we do that?” the leader snapped, mostly because he was flustered to be near so many dangerous beings together.

“Do you have any humans you trust?” Rick asked.

Frowning, the leader nodded.

“Provide them a guard and give them the job,” Rick said.

Nodding more, the Alpha wolf then gazed on Rick. “Are you really going to the tiger village next?”

Rick nodded. “Yes. I suspect the tigers have demons among them also. This feud between you may be demon induced. Neither of you can afford exposure to the Chinese authorities. You know that, right?”

The tou’r nodded reluctantly. It made sense. Neither the wolf pack nor the tiger village needed