The Annals of Koth proclaim I liberated the Free Peoples from enslavement in the Minotaur Empire while lying on my back, and that my legend began in a convent. My arch nemesis, alone, knows that my story started as a confused youth in America’s Bible Belt, because it was their magic brought me to the Sanctuary of Kavala’s Vessel.

Before you jump to conclusions, let me first disabuse you of ninety percent of every preconception you have about nuns. It’s not that the movies are all wrong, because like all stereotypes, there’s an element to truth in each. There’s a little singing in flowering meadows like Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music; a tad bit of self-defense training like the Warrior Nun; and definitely finding family as Whoopi Goldberg does in that classic Sister Act.

If you judged my abbess from my first experience, you’d think it was Nuns Gone Wild.

Imagine my confusion, barely coherent from repeated blows to face, when my head snapped back from my drunken bastard of a father’s last punch.

Eyes swollen and unfocussed, neck searing in pain, I gulped for air…

…only to be overwhelmed by the smell of honeysuckle, gardenia, smoke, and hundreds of other scents I couldn’t identify.

“Wake up! Wake up!”

It wasn’t dear old dad’s voice—he certainly never sounded so frantic—but rather the glorious song of an angel.

Now what could panic an angel?

Chest aching, head throbbing, I blinked several times, and my vision crystalized.

Above me was the most impossibly gorgeous woman I’d ever seen, with flowing locks of a million hues of molten silver.

A million hues. I knew such a thing logically existed, but eyes could barely pick out the difference between Nimbus Cloud, Campfire Smoke, or Warm Chinchilla. Unlike the Chinchilla’s, her lustrous hair framed perfectly symmetrical features, which were contorted in an expression of concern.

“Oh, praise Kavala’s love.” She blew out a sigh.

Then covered her mouth. Her shoulders shuddered as tears trickled down her cheeks.

And somehow, I could taste the salt.

My lungs heaved as my focus shifted to the tapered point of her ear pointing out from her tresses.

An elf.

She looked like the ethereal Galadriel, not as portrayed by Cate Blanchett, but rather as Saint Tolkien had described her over the course of twenty pages. My gaze drew across sculpted collarbones, down to the cleft between bare boobs.

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And she was straddling my hips. I wasn’t certain if this was the type of beauty I wanted to be, to sleep with, or both.

Just where the hell was I? I mean, Pastor Dan had always said that’s where deviants like me would find ourselves if they didn’t straighten up, even as he’d touched places he shouldn’t. But if I’d died and gone to hell, it didn’t seem all that bad, especially since Hell was apparently a Dungeons and Dragons world.

“I thought I’d killed you,” she choked through ragged sobs.

I thought I’d died, but not by her hands. If only I could form a coherent thought through the pressure in my head.

“Deep breaths,” she said, tear-filled sapphire eyes meeting mine.

I did as told, even as my spine convulsed in rhythmic waves. Fighting through my mental haze to concentrate, I took stock of myself.

Only to find that something was definitely wrong.

I lifted my hands and looked. No longer pudgy with Jimmy Dean digits, they now ended in slim, graceful fingers. Tendrils of red ink flowed from the inside of my curiously slender wrists to my elbows, following the very same jagged channels I’d carved into my flesh. The scars that drew stares and embarrassed my parents were gone.

That wasn’t all that was different…

It felt hot between my legs. Not hard, but full; not moist and itchy like after working out in tight briefs, but actually wet. The weight on my chest was no longer the feeling of suffocation, but rather extra me.

I strained to look, and found two gentle mounds where there had been none before, peaked by taut pink nipples.

This had to be a dream.

The best of my life.

I had to see myself. Breaths coming sharp and ragged, I jolted upright, only for my vision to fade at the edges and send my head crashing back down onto a squishy surface. Tresses of burnished copper trailed my head’s descent, with some falling across my face.

Was that my hair? My heart fluttered through the tightness in my chest. My parents had never let me grow it out, forcing me to cut it short throughout my childhood. They’d even sent me to a military prep school to try to straighten me out. Even as an adult, after my first year at college where I’d let my hair grow to shoulder length, the old man had held me down while Mother Slave shaved my scalp bald.

I pinched a lock and studied it. It was the color of a brand new penny, the ones worth less than a cent and not the copper ones which were worth their weight in copper. Which given inflation in 2022…

“Easy,” the woman said, tracing two fingers in a gentle stroke along the side of my throat. “That almost went too far.”

“What…” Was that my voice? I was so used to speaking in as high a pitch as I could, my words came out as a squeak. I cleared my throat. “What happened?”

She tilted her chin with a refinement I could only wish to move with, and looked up through her lashes. “We were… I was… I… we…”

We? We must know each other. I mean, she was straddling me naked, and I was likewise undressed. If my forehead crinkled, I didn’t feel it.

“You know Kavala celebrates love in all its forms…” Pushing her silvery tresses behind prominent ears, revealing flushed cheeks, she leaned in and whispered, “… but we shouldn’t be committing blasphemy here.”

Blasphemy? Here? And just where was here? Pinching myself to confirm I wasn’t really dreaming —and wow, did it ever hurt more than a pinch should!— I went to push her off and sit up again.

The woman pressed firm arms against my shoulders, easing me back down onto something spongy. “Easy, Alyna.”

“Alyna?” Was that me?

She tilted her head to the side, again with an effortless grace. “Are you sure you’re all right?”

No. Well… “Yes.” I was definitely awake, and I’d never felt right in my own body before this moment.

Well, I don’t know if I felt right in this body, either, because everything seemed more intense. Colors looked more vibrant, the scents more strong, the sounds more clear.

Just what had happened? I needed to get my bearings and see myself.