I had stepped back into the crowd to watch the policewoman become a mare under her former mount, and was thinking of doing the same to this new officer. But I wanted to try something different. I touched his mare's mind and found that the animal felt a stong bond to him. An idea popped into my mind, and I grinned as the officer started calling for help on his radio.
His voice cracked as he spoke, and he cleared his throat a couple of times. The crowd around him gasped, for they could see the years falling away. Instead of a thirty-something man, Officer Ralph was barely twenty, heading quickly back into his mid teens. His clothing vanished with a thought, and he yelped first in shock at being naked, and then at the 15 year-old body revealed.
Then I made the saddle and tack go away, leaving him bare butt against bare back. He tried to slide off, but I had already fixed him in place. Confused, he looked down and saw that his legs were melting into the mare's sides.
"Help me!" He cried out with the thin voice of a 12 year-old, shrinking to 10 as he sank into the mare's body. It was as if he were sitting in quicksand. He pushed at the broad back, trying to lift himself out, only to have his hands join in. Eight year's old, then 6 as his shoulders slipped under the coarse-furred flesh of the mare's back. His head was changing now, boy's face was becoming a foal's muzzle. White-rimmed animal eyes pleaded for rescue before even they were sucked inside the mare.
Her belly was distended, and I could see movement inside as Officer Ralph struggled. But the bulge got smaller, and the movement stopped. Officer Ralph was peaceful and content now, and in a few months, would be reborn as his mare's new foal. I made one final change - that foal would be a filly.