It dawned on Niccolo that the bone he still held in his jaws could be useful, but he had to hope he could hold the boy's attention. Working as quickly as possible, he pushed the bone into the dirt and tried to scratch out words. He decided his name would be a useful starting point.
He glanced toward the boy, who seemed to still be studying him, watching his actions. He hurried, desperate, as he wrote out his name in the dirt.
He turned, bone still in his mouth, and faced the boy. He whimpered and ducked his head, trying to bring the boy's attention to the name in the dirt. The scrawl wasn't a neat, legible hand that he could have done with a quill and ink, but it should be adequate.
The boy looked down at the dirt. He looked back at the dog, which appeared so expectant.
"Is that a message?"
In response, Niccolo dropped the bone and barked once.
The boy smiled shyly. "Sorry," he revealed, seeming hesitant and ashamed. "I can't read."
Niccolo felt crushing disappointment. He had thought himself so clever.
"The nobles think only they should know how to read and write," the boy kept speaking.
Now Niccolo felt ashamed for another reason. His old attitudes had dismissed servants as lowly as this stable-boy that he had hoped might be his way back to his human form. Now, his entitled life had also returned to haunt him because the boy couldn't even read Niccolo's named scrawled in the dirt with a discarded bone.