Making A Splash

Chapter 11

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I, very understandably in my opinion, needed a bit of a break before I felt ready to deal with whatever the heck Elle meant when she said that elves were fruit. I said as much, and Mel suggested we step outside for some fresh air and sunlight. We’d all been cooped up in their living room for quite a while, so Elle and I agreed, and the three of us headed out into the communal courtyard in front of their home.

I'd seen part of it on the way in, but stepping into the center of the courtyard, I found myself in a miniaturized version of the park we’d walked through the day before. There were trees to provide shade, and benches molded from the wood itself. Instead of flower bushes filling the space, there were instead rows and rows of various berry bushes, and many of the trees appeared to be fruit trees as well. Elle had brought a basket and a pair of thick gloves with her, and broke off to go tend to some of the plants, while Mel and I continued to a bench. Taking a seat, I was surprised by a yawn that slipped out before I could stop it.

“Tired?” Mel asked, sitting down beside me and smirking.

“Uuuugh,” I groaned, shaking my head. “I just slept before I came here! No wonder nobody thinks catkin can get anything done, if they all have to sleep this much this often.”

Mel chuckled, giving me a conciliatory pat on the head. “Well, you’ve been very busy, haven’t you?” she said with a far too suggestive wink.

“U-uhm!” I sputtered out and turned my face away, my cheeks burning. “I don’t know if you can call spending an hour crying and snuggling being busy…”

“Heh,” Mel chuckled, shifting her fingers to scratch around behind one of my ears, which had me momentarily spacing out until she spoke again. “Well, Elle is going to be at it for a bit, you could lay down for a few minutes if you want to,” she said, patting at her lap with her other hand. I stared back at her for a moment before heaving out a tired sigh.

“The worst part is you’re probably completely right,” I said, scooting sideways along the bench until I could tip myself over and rest my head in Mel’s lap. I felt a little embarrassed at first, doing something like this so brazenly out in public, or in front of Elle and Mel’s neighbors at least, but it was also kind of exciting too. I had a girlfriend now. Two of them even! Take that, Chad! Sure, I didn’t know the first thing about being in a relationship, but I knew I definitely didn’t want to disappoint or embarrass either of them. And didn't people in relationships buy gifts for each other sometimes? I still had to start paying Felda back for taking me in, and now this; I really needed to get better at fishing, and fast.

As if she could sense my brain filling up with extra troubling thoughts and worries instead of relaxing, Mel’s fingers once again found the top of my head and she began to scratch in lazy circles. I purred, taking a deep breath and letting it out slow, noting the way Mel’s scent mirrored those of the berry bushes surrounding us. Between the scritching, and how soft her lap was, and how warm the beams of sunlight peeking through the trees were, I was out like a light before I even realized.

The only indication that any time had passed at all was that when I blinked my eyes open again, Elle had returned, and her basket was loaded down with fruit and berries.

“Aw, look at you two,” Elle cooed as I sat up, setting the basket down on the bench and removing her work gloves. She leaned down to kiss Mel, then moved to me, giving me another quick peck on the cheek before taking her seat beside me, leaving me flustered and once again pinned between the two of them.

“How’re they looking?” Mel asked over my head while I just sat, my palm resting against my cheek, trying to figure out if I wasn’t still asleep and dreaming.

“Good!” Elle said, beaming, pulling the basket into her lap. “The strawberries are coming in great, they should start to ripen within the next two weeks. The peaches won’t be ready for a while, but we’ve already got plenty of plums now.”

As she spoke, she offered the basket towards me and Mel, showing the large pile of juicy looking blueish-purple plums next to a small mountain of mixed berries. Mel reached out and picked up one of the plums, and I picked out a small handful of raspberries and began tossing them into my mouth.

“Mmh…” I hummed as I savored the berries, taking a few seconds to recollect my thoughts. “Okay, so,” I said, swallowing and clearing my throat. “Elves are fruit?”

“Yup,” Mel said, taking a large bite out of the plum. She locked eyes with me and chewed, slowly, while I stared back.

“Well, we're not literally walking, talking fruits,” Elle said with a giggle, holding her arm up and pinching it. “We're still flesh and blood inside, but the original elves were born from fruit trees eons ago, and we're still… maybe thirty percent fruit?”

“What exactly does that mean?” I asked, narrowing my eyes in confusion.

“Well, it mostly has to do with… uhm, well, Sammie, do you know how human babies are made?” Elle asked hesitantly.

“Yes, of course I do!” I said, rolling my eyes, but then paused. “Well, I know how humans on Earth do it, and I'm just assuming it's the same here.” Then, the implication of Elle's specific emphasis on the word “human” hit me and I narrowed my eyes. “Wait, why, does it work differently for elves?”

“Vastly,” Mel said, chuckling through another mouthful of plum. “It's actually kinda weird to have to even explain it in the first place, everyone just kinda knows. We don't really shy away from talking about it.”

“You're not about to tell me elves literally grow out of the ground from seeds, are you?” I asked, and both Elle and Mel had a good laugh at that.

Catching her breath, Mel finally answered, “No, no, that's ridiculous.” But my relief was short lived, as she immediately clarified, “only dwarves and orcs come from the ground, elves come from trees.”

As though to demonstrate, Mel motioned towards the many trees surrounding us, their branches laden with various types of fruit.

I silently brought a hand up to my forehead and just held it there for a moment.

“Are you going to be alright?” Elle asked, concerned.

“I think so,” I said, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly. “I just… a lot of my expectations are getting upended today... So, there are orcs here too?”

“Yeah?” Mel said. “Well, not many here in Rower’s Rest, but you would've seen them among the pirates that showed up last night.”

I furrowed my brow, thinking about the many varied races I'd seen spread across the pirate crew, and instantly realized which ones were most likely to be orcs.

“You mean the people with mushrooms on them?” I asked, and Mel smiled and nodded.

“Yeah, you got it. They're something like cousins to the elves, we both have our homelands to the south.”

“Huh,” I said, taking that in and tilting my head. “That's… way different from how everybody thinks of orcs from… from my world.”

I was momentarily worried about the prospect of being overheard, but it looked like Elle and Mel’s neighbors were giving our section of the garden a wide berth for the time being.

“I thought there were only humans in your world?” Elle asked.

“Oh yeah, there are, but I mean we have stories about, well, a lot of things I've seen here, like elves and orcs and dwarves, but none of them fit exactly right. For one thing, orcs are usually just big, angry, green guys,” I said, leaving out that they were usually also always evil. Distance or not, I wasn’t risking being overheard saying something else that might get me in huge trouble. “And elves are usually just all tall and pale and blonde, and a lot of times they’re real haughty assholes who think they’re better than everyone else.”

At that, Mel snorted and Elle pursed her lips.

“That is not a very flattering image,” Elle said, frowning. “I hope you didn't think of us like that when we first met.”

“Oh, no, not at all,” I said, shaking my head. “Like you said, I didn't even know you were elves at first, and besides, I never liked the stories that just went with the ‘classic’ depiction of elves anyway. One of my other friends used to say they’re only like that because everyone was just copying all their ideas from one old guy who wrote some super popular fantasy books a long while ago, and I think the elves in that were supposed to be a metaphor for… something…” I could see Elle and Mel were looking increasingly lost, so I quickly wrapped up that loose thread. “A-anyway, I never got around to reading them, but I did see the movies.”

“The what?” Mel asked.

“Ah, shit,” I said, shaking my head. “Uh, nevermind, we can go over stuff like movies and computers and… everything else later, I feel like once I get started on those we'll be at it for hours.” I waved my hand, as though clearing smoke from the air, and refocused my eyes on the pair. “So, elves? Trees?”

“Ah, alright.” Mel shrugged, finishing the last bite of her plum and tossing the core into the grass behind her. “Well, first off, do you know about pollination?”

“Like… with flowers? And bees?” I asked hesitantly, and Mel snickered again.

“Sure, though there are lots of other animals that help with pollination, but this isn’t a gardening lesson.” Tilting her head back to rest on the bench and looking up at the tree directly overhead, she continued, “So, when an orchard collectively comes to the decision that they're ready to have a kid, it kinda flips a mental switch and one of the members enters an, uh… Elle, help me out here?”

“A heightened magical state,” Elle supplied, patting Mel's shoulder and taking over in a surprisingly scholarly voice. “Their body becomes receptive to the unique mana signatures of their partners, and over the course of the next few days begins to accumulate mana from each of them and meld it together inside their body. This process is also called pollination, and it's customary for the entire orchard to spend as much time together as possible during this period. Once they're… uh, ‘full'”—Mel snorted quietly at that and Elle lightly swatted her shoulder without skipping a beat—“they just have to go to one of their community's elftrees and pass the ‘seed’ into it, where it will sprout from one of the branches and grow over the course of the next eight quarters, give or take, into a healthy baby elf.”

I waited to see if there was any more to her explanation, but Elle just smiled patiently and folded her hands in her lap, so I took in a deep breath and blew it out slowly.

“Pff… wow, okay,” I said, leaning back on the bench again. “You really weren't kidding. Well, that answers one question and raises a whole bunch more… so, elves don’t have…” I paused, still wary of being overheard, and lowered my voice to a whisper. “Sex?”

To my right, Mel burst out laughing, immediately trying and failing to stifle herself while Elle clapped a hand over her mouth, flushing green. Though they were too far away to have heard me, I saw a few of the neighbors on their porches turning their heads curiously in our direction.

“S-stop laughing, Mel!” Elle sputtered, reaching over to shake her by the shoulder, which only seemed to amuse her more, while I contemplated seeing how deeply I could burrow into the ground. When Mel did eventually regain her composure, she had to wipe a few tears from her eyes.

“Sorry,” Mel said, in between chuckles. “Sorry, sorry, that’s just… such a funny question to ask.” Clearing her throat a few times, she gave me a smirk that had me blushing even harder. “Of course we do, Sam, but sex and reproduction are different things, especially for elves.”

“O-oh… I… I see…” I said, glancing from Mel’s smirking face to Elle, whose face was hidden in one of her hands again, but I could see that even the tips of her ears were green now. It was definitely time to change the subject.

“Now I’m kind of scared to ask about how it works for orcs or dwarves,” I said, shaking my head and kicking my legs out in front of me. “And, well, I know you offered to help me understand this world more, and I definitely appreciate it, but I don't really want to just sit here and pelt you with questions all afternoon. Maybe it’s because of that nap just now, but I feel too wound up to keep sitting here either.”

“Heh, fair enough,” Mel said, chuckling and reaching across to pat at Elle’s back. “We've still got plenty of questions for you too, but we can space them out a bit. Our original plan for today was to show you around more of the village, do you still feel up for that, after everything?”

“Totally,” I said, hopping to my feet in an instant. As much as I complained about having to nap so much, it did feel great to be so brimming with energy after just laying my head down for ten minutes or so.

Elle, recovered from her embarrassment, stood up with the basket. “Ah, alright, let me just take these inside, and I should feed Clover before we go.”

“Who’s Clover?” I asked, following, and Elle visibly perked up, her ears bouncing as she turned to smile at me.

“Oh, right, you haven’t met her yet! Come on, I’ll show you!” she said excitedly, grabbing my hand. We stepped back into the house and Elle led me into the room to the left of the entrance, opposite the sitting room. I found it to be evenly split between a cozy little dining area, with a round wooden table surrounded by chairs placed before one of the wide windows, and a shelf containing more plants and a handful of books. Attached to the dining room was a small kitchen, consisting of a short counter beside a large metal stove, a waist-high box made of the same black-and-green material as Bart’s ice chest, and another open doorway into a pantry area, where Elle moved to deposit the basket of fruit.

Glancing around, I noticed a wide bowl placed on the floor made of a greenish-tinted wood, with a word carved into the side.

“Clover,” I read aloud, realizing it was the name of a pet. I wondered if it was a cat, or a dog, or maybe something else. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel if it turned out Elle and Mel had an actual cat as a pet.

“Mmhm, she’s the sweetest, I just need to fix her something to eat real quick,” Elle said, returning from the pantry. I stood back and watched while Elle chopped up two carrots and a large cucumber, then moved to the black box and opened it, revealing the inside to be lined with ice, a cold mist waving out as she dug around inside and pulled out…

“Are those bones?” I asked, as Elle collected a small handful of bones about as long as a finger, with bits of meat still stuck to them.

“Hmm? Oh, yes, chicken bones,” Elle said, smiling as she carried them over to the pile of chopped vegetables. “They’re her favorite.”

I was… pretty certain now that Clover was not a pet cat. Or a dog, even. Elle picked up the cutting board and carried it to the bowl, pushing the small pile into it, then standing up and cupping one hand around her mouth.

“Clover, here girl!” she called, then made a strange popping noise with her mouth. I waited, intensely curious, until I began to hear a similar popping sound coming from the hall, except much wetter. It grew steadily louder, until a pile of lime green ooze the size of a basketball sloshed around the corner, burbling as it went.

“There she is,” Elle cooed while I stared in a mixture of fascination and horror as the ball of slime glided across the wooden floor towards the bowl. Once it was there, it simply shlorped its way up into the bowl with the pile of vegetables and bones, which began to float around inside the mass like the world’s worst gelatin dessert.

“What… the heck is that?” I said dumbly, just watching the now perfectly spherical green orb sit and jiggle in place while its contents slowly swirled inside it.

“Oh!” Elle said, giggling. “Right, you wouldn’t have these where you come from, would you? No magic means no magical creatures, huh?” She walked over to stand beside me, smiling and motioning at the ooze. “Well, this is Clover, and she’s a green slime.”

“A… slime,” I said, tilting my head slightly and taking a step closer.

“Mmhm, slimes are one of the simplest magical creatures in existence,” Elle said, again sounding a bit like she was delivering a lecture. “They come in all sorts of colors, and they make great pets because they’ll eat almost anything. They can also provide ingredients for certain potions; every so often when she gets too big, we drain her excess slime and sell it to one of the alchemists around town.”

Huh, kind of like a pet cow. Okay, no, not that much like a cow at all, but I was still reeling from the sight of the slime and the revelation that there were other animals in this world besides just the ones that resembled regular Earth creatures.

“Can I… pet her?” I asked, looking back at Elle.

“Not while she’s eating,” Elle said, snickering. “She might try to dissolve your hand, but when we get back you can play with her if you want.”

I looked again, and sure enough I could see that the bits of meat that had been on the bones were almost entirely gone, and many of the chunks of carrot were smaller and rounder around the edges, as though they’d been melted.

I took a step back. And then another. Elle giggled, taking my hand again.

“Don’t worry, she’s just a houseslime, she’s harmless,” Elle said, leading me back to the door.

“Wait, does that mean there are slimes that aren't harmless?” I asked as Elle and I put our shoes back on.

“Oh, absolutely!” Elle said gravely. “Not so dangerous that you'd need to call in a hunter, but wild slimes can be a real threat if they grow too big, or a colony gets too large.”

“Oh,” I said, furrowing my brow. That made sense, if one slime was basically a mobile blob of acid, then a bunch of them together could probably be a serious threat to someone unprepared. “Are there wild slimes around here?”

“There are wild slimes everywhere,” Elle said as we stepped outside to rejoin Mel. “They’re one of the most common magical creatures, because all they need to form is an environment with enough mana in it.”

“Oh boy, you got her talkin’ about slimes,” Mel said, grinning. “She'll be at it for the next hour now, at least.”

“Well I'm sorry,” Elle shot back with exaggerated offense, hands on her hips. “I can't help it if I find them so fascinating!” Turning back to me, she said more genuinely, “Ah, but, I won't bore you, Sammie.”

“Are you kidding me?” I asked with a laugh, falling in at Elle’s side as we began to head for the gateway. “One of my favorite things to do back on Earth was listen to Morgan go on and on about stuff. Even if I didn't always know what she was talking about, it was just nice to see her so excited, and you're talking about magical creatures. There's no way I could be bored by that.”

For some reason, my words had caused Elle’s ears to turn green again, and she stumbled a bit before she managed to continue speaking.

“A-ah, well, o-okay!” Elle said, excitedly, and launched right back into her explanation. “So, like I said, there are wild slimes outside of the village, but you shouldn't worry too much about them. You'd have to go pretty deep into the forest to risk encountering enough of them to be in danger, and Bart could easily deal with any that wander up while you're both out there by the river. In fact, you could probably handle them better than him; you've got claws!” Elle reached down, taking one of my hands and holding it up, showing off my claws as if I didn't know they were there. Which, to be fair, I did still sometimes forget. “Most slimes are very susceptible to being slashed or pierced, except metallic slimes, those you want to bash, and then melt them if possible, but there's likely very few, if any, metallic slimes on Torgard.”

“Huh, neat,” I said. Even though Elle had finished using my hand as a demonstration aide, she still held onto it as we walked, her fingers seemingly automatically finding the spaces between my own and slipping into them. We were holding hands, and she didn't even seem to realize, but I sure as hell did, and so did Mel. When her eyes met mine over Elle’s shoulder, she just grinned and held a finger to her lips, and I got the feeling she was telling me, “Let’s see how long it takes her to notice.”

It wasn't until after we had left the residential district behind and made it all the way to the park, which I was starting to think might be the center of the village, that Elle finally did notice.

She was in the middle of explaining the role slimes served inside the ecosystem “—important not only for breaking down dead matter, but also for recycling mana—” when her emphatically gesturing free hand happened to brush against Mel and she missed a step.

“Oh, sorry!” she said, patting Mel's shoulder, the motion finally making her realize it was not Mel’s hand she'd been holding the whole time. Her head whipped around to face me so fast her ears flapped, her cheeks green and her eyes wide.

“Ah, oh, I am so sorry, Sammie!” she said, disentangling her fingers from mine and holding both hands up, palms out. Mel, of course, burst out laughing, though I tried to stifle my own snickering. Key word being “tried.”

“What're you apologizing for?” I asked, after we'd gotten it out of our systems and started walking again. “If anything, I’m the one who should’ve said something, but still, we’re… we’re girlfriends now, so, we’re supposed to hold hands sometimes, right?”

“Girl… friends?” Mel said skeptically.

“Yeah?” I said. “It’s… what you call it when you’re dating a girl, y’know? Like, when a guy and a girl get together, they’re boyfriend and girlfriend, right?”

“Huh,” Mel said, not sounding any more convinced. “I’ve heard some of the old timers use the term ‘lady friend,’ but ‘girlfriend?’ That sounds like it just means a friend who is also a girl.”

“You’re… not wrong,” I said, sighing and bringing a hand to my forehead. “Actually, it does also mean that, too, sometimes girls will call other girls their girlfriends but they’re not actually going out, it’s actually really confusing.”

“Your world is so weird, Sammie,” Elle said, shaking her head.

“Well, what do you call it then?” I said, just a tad defensively. It wasn’t like I was some kind of Earth ambassador or anything.

“Oh, there’s lots of things!” Elle said, suddenly grinning and clapping her hands together in front of her. “There’s ‘suitor’ or ‘admirer,’ but that’s for people who want to be in a relationship, Mel’s boring so she usually just sticks with ‘partners’ or ‘companions,’ but my favorite is ‘sweethearts!’”

“Euugh,” I said, sticking my tongue out. “That’s so old-fashioned! That’s like what people called each other in the fifties… or, was it the twenties…”

“The what?” Mel asked, once again leaning around Elle.

“The nineteen fifties,” I said. “Like, the year, one thousand nine hundred and fifty.”

They both gaped at that, seemingly stunned, but Elle was the first to recover.

“You lived during an era that lasted almost two thousand years?” Elle asked, clearly amazed.

“Well, technically, when I left it was over two thousand, but, yeah?” I said, smirking a little. It felt good to actually be the one on the giving end of a mind blowing revelation for once. “That's a good point though, what year is it here? I haven't seen a calendar once since I arrived, and I still haven't even managed to figure out what all the days of the week are called.”

The pair exchanged a quick glance at that, with Mel taking the lead this time.

“Well, it can depend on who you ask, but as far as most of the world is concerned, it's the year seven twenty-three, in the Era of Magic. The church of Time and Tide and the dwarves both keep their own calendars, but we can get into that later.”

“Huh, okay, seven twen— actually, hold on.” I broke off and reached into my satchel, pulling out the blank notebook I'd bought before and the not-quite-pencil thing, and flipped to the back pages. I wrote down the current year, looking up at them again. “You said ‘the Era of Magic?’”

“Uh, yeah,” Mel said, watching curiously as I scribbled while we walked. “Some people also like to call it the Age of the Mage, but it's the same thing.”

“Why is it called that?” I asked, glancing up. I had never been the most studious, uh, student, and would usually have to beg Morgan for her notes, but this was actually important if I was going to fit in better.

“Because the current era is measured from when the Independent Council of Mages was formed and first began spreading magic to the populace,” Elle said, and I had to pause my scribbling.

“Wait, magic’s only been a thing here for like seven hundred years?” I asked, and Elle let out a surprised giggle.

“I keep forgetting you don’t know anything we take for common knowledge here,” Elle said, shaking her head. “But, no, magic has been a part of this world since before the mortal races were even born, since the very beginning and probably even before, it’s just that before the Council existed, not everyone had access to it.”

Oh, I couldn’t wait to hear what that meant, but unfortunately we had arrived at our destination. I was surprised, because I didn’t even know we had a destination when we left, but Elle suddenly turned away mid explanation and looked up, announcing, “Oh, we’re here!”

“Here” turned out to be Dani’s tailoring shop from the day before. I recognized the wide windows and well dressed mannequins, and inside I could see Dani herself behind the counter, talking with another customer.

“What're we doin’ here?” I asked, tilting my head.

“Dani wanted us to bring you by, she's apparently finished one set of your new clothes and wants to see if she got the fit right,” Mel said, reaching out and opening the door for me and Elle. Stepping inside, I caught the tail end of Dani's conversation with the surprisingly large man standing at her counter.

“—have those ready well before the festival, don't you worry, Rodrigo.”

“I would never dare doubt your skills, Danella, darling,” the large man said with a deep, smoothly accented voice that had the fur on my tail standing on end.

“Oh, get out of here, you sweet-talker, you,” Dani said, pressing one hand to her cheek, holding the other out towards the man and making a shooing motion. But the man just caught her hand in his much larger one and leaned down, pressing his lips to the back of it.

“As you wish,” the man said, while Dani tittered, then seemed to finally notice the rest of us.

“Oh, girls, there you are!” she called, not at all embarrassed to have been caught flirting with a customer, like I’d expected. “Well don’t just stand there in the doorway, come in!”

“S-sorry!” I called, since I’d been the first one to enter before freezing at the realization of what I was seeing. I hurried closer to the counter just in time for the large man to turn around and face us, and for a second I thought the world’s wealthiest bear had wandered into Dani’s shop.

The man was, like most people were to me now, quite tall, with tanned skin and a swept-back mane of black hair. His eyebrows, beard, and mustache were similarly thick and bushy, but not in an unruly way, and his large forearms were also covered in the same thick black hair. He was dressed in black trousers with suspenders over a honey-yellow silken shirt, with a little half-cape that hung off one shoulder, the outside of which was black but the inside of which was some shiny dark amber material. Finally, perched atop his head was a black hat sporting a huge plume of yellow feathers.

I was almost blinded as the sunlight from outside caught the man, and his various bits of jewelry twinkled. He had multiple piercings in his ears of thin gold loops, gold buttons on his shirt and gold buckles on his boots, and, a bit like Dani, multiple bangles jangling on his wrists. The only thing that wasn’t gold was a thin silver chain with a pendant attached, hanging from his neck.

“Ah-ha!” the man said, lifting his hat off his head and giving the three of us a sweeping bow. “My apologies if I held you ladies up, I was simply concluding some business with Lady Dewglass.” Behind him, Dani laughed again.

“Not at all, Mister De Campo,” Elle said with a polite smile, and the gears in my brain finally started spinning again after I’d been flashbanged by the man’s jewelry.

“Did you say De Campo?” I asked, because if his appearance hadn’t been enough to clue me in, the name all but sealed the deal. The man’s dark eyes fixed on me, and he grinned.

“Yes, that is I!” he said, pressing his hand to his barrel shaped chest and bowing his head, still all smiles. “Rodrigo De Campo, head of the Rower's Rest Merchant’s Guild, at your service!”

“Sam,” I said automatically, then, since I didn’t really want to be too rude to this guy right away, I hastily added, “er, I mean, Samantha Fisher, local… fisher. I’ve, uh, met your son.”

“Ah, and I have heard of you!” Rodrigo said, straightening up and looking me over more closely. “From my little Roberto, in fact. Is it true you fear neither work, nor water?”

“Uh… yes?” I said, tilting my head slightly.

“Fantastic! And most curious, for one of your kind,” Rodrigo said, clapping his hands together and making his bangles jangle. “It is always wonderful to welcome new business to the village, even an independent angler such as yourself. My boy did not give you any trouble, did he?”

“Not really…” I said, furrowing my brow in thought as I tried to recall my last encounter with Bentley and his friends. I was still trying to get a read on this guy, but he didn’t seem predisposed against me at least. “I mean, no, he didn’t give me any trouble, but he did have some really shitty things to say about demihumans working with food.”

“Ah, yes, that business with the bakery, I have heard,” Rodrigo said with a shake of his head, his smile finally faltering. “I would beg your forgiveness if I felt it was earned, but I have heard some of the things he says for myself. He is… young, and impressionable, and I’m afraid he has spent too much time around the wrong sorts while accompanying me to the capital.”

“Oh really?” I asked, crossing my arms. I had been ready to just let the man make whatever excuses he was going to for the sake of his son and then leave, but I was mildly curious about what he had to say.

“Indeed,” Rodrigo said, letting out a sigh. “I don’t think I need to tell you what attitudes are like in high society, and try as they might to discourage them, the kingdom cannot officially bar their representatives from visiting the capital without attracting even more trouble, much as I wish they would. And with them they bring their rotten attitudes, their ideas of who is worth more and who is worth less, and pass those ideas off onto those who are all too eager to please them, and in turn onto their children, and, eventually, ours.”

Catching himself just as he began to scowl, Rodrigo cleared his throat and nodded his head to me.

“My apologies, I’ve gone and slipped into a speech,” he said, once again smiling pleasantly, if not as widely. “I will leave you three to your business. Enjoy the rest of your day, and if my son does give you any more trouble, pay him no heed.”

With that, he turned briefly to tip his hat at Dani one final time, then spun around so fast his cape swirled in the air, and strode briskly out of the tailor’s shop.

While the little bell hung above the door was still ringing, I rounded on Dani.

“Do you seriously like that guy?” I asked, pointing over my shoulder with a thumb. Dani gave a full-throated laugh into her hand, finally coming out from behind the counter to greet us.

“He is a very charming man, in fact,” Dani said, sweeping up to Elle and repeating her enthusiastic greeting from the day before; a quick hug and a little kiss on the forehead. Her eyes flicked over to me, then she lowered her voice and switched to elven while pretending to admire part of Elle’s outfit. “So, did you ask her?”

“O-oh, actually…” Elle said, also glancing at me. I grinned back at her.

“They did, actually,” I said, and Dani actually gasped, her amethyst eyes widening as she dropped all pretense.

“Oh, you speak Elvish?” she asked, and I paused for a moment, while out of Dani’s view Elle and Mel exchanged a glance. That was a good question, could I? Mel had said I wasn’t even currently speaking English, I was speaking “Western Trade Common,” even though I didn’t feel like I was doing anything differently, so maybe there was a way to… change the language people heard when I spoke?

Well, no time to figure that out while Dani was still waiting for a response.

“I’m… fluent enough to understand it, but I’m not as good at speaking it myself,” I hastily explained, and Dani nodded in understanding.

“I see, I see,” Dani said, smiling, her cheeks turning a little purple. “Well, I’m sorry for trying to sneak that past you, but I’m just so excited to find out if my favorite orchard has gained a new sapling.”

Dani looked expectantly between the three of us, and Elle and Mel looked to me but didn’t volunteer an answer, so I just shrugged and reached out, taking both of their hands in mine and grinning even wider.

“Oh, splendid!” Dani said, clapping her hands together then sweeping her arms out wide and enclosing all three of us in a tight embrace that once again left me feeling like a glob of jelly mushed between two slices of bread. “I am so happy for you two, and you as well, Sam!”

It took almost a full minute for Dani to finish congratulating us, though Mel and I were able to extricate ourselves from her arms and get a little breathing room while she and Elle chattered excitedly.

“She’s really happy for you,” I observed, stretching my back a bit after nearly being crushed.

“Us,” Mel said, chuckling and rubbing the back of her neck. “She’s happy for us, and yeah, I figured she would be.”

“Right,” I said, smiling down at my feet at her insistence. I’d never been an “us” or a “we” before, and it still made my heart race to think about. But it did bring another question to the forefront of my mind. “Not that I’m not appreciative, but, what is the deal with you and her anyway? Is she like… related to one of you?”

“Heh, she might as well be,” Mel said, leaning back against a shelf and rubbing her chin. “It might be hard to explain without getting too deep into elven culture, but think of her as something like… an adoptive aunt? She’s been here in the village a lot longer than us, so when me and Elle arrived, she saw to it that we both landed on our feet, helped us out a lot in the early days and… well, we’re both really grateful to her.”

“I think I get it,” I said, looking over to Dani and Elle and tapping my chin. “My… family back home had a guy who we called ‘Uncle Rocko,’ but he wasn’t actually our uncle, like, he wasn’t my dad’s brother, but they’d been friends a loooong time.” Mel chuckled a little at that, and I smiled, recalling some of the family barbeques and camping trips I could remember him coming along on, but the memories were bittersweet now.

My ears barely had time to droop before Mel’s hand found its way to the top of my head, and I leaned against her side and purred quietly while I did my best to rebury all those memories until I was in a better place to unearth them. Clearing my throat, I decided to try and steer the conversation in a different direction.

“Hey, so,” I began, tilting my head back to look up at Mel. “That guy just now, he said something that I’m confused about; he said I should know what attitudes are like in high society, which I’ve kind of figured out just from what people say about me, that catkin are only found in high society.”

“Right,” Mel said, nodding along.

“But, then, he talked about it like it was a place, not just another word for the nobility,” I said, and Mel’s nodding stopped, but I continued. “Like, he mentioned they have ‘representatives’ that visit, and that’s not the only time that’s confused me. People keep saying things like they think I come from a specific place, about me being new ‘down here,’ or referring to some place ‘up there,’ and I have no idea what they mean by that, is there some place way up north where the most noble nobles all live, or what?”

Mel stared for a moment, her brow slowly furrowing, all but confirming that this was a question I was glad I had waited to ask, because it was clearly not something anyone from this world would ask.

“Up… north…” Mel finally said, shaking her head. “No, Sam, that’s not what it means. For starters, high society is a place, or, a bunch of places. High society is the name for all the islands above the surface, and the people that live on them. They’re worse than even the most out-of-touch nobles down here, because they think living in the sky and having more money than anyone anywhere makes them better by default. That’s what people mean when they say ‘up there.’”

Mel finished off her explanation by pointing upwards. Straight up, at the sky, like I was certain I’d seen people do before, but just never realized what they actually meant.

Several things rushed back to me all at once, and it finally clicked.

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“Tweren't no island’s passin’ overhead last night…” Bart had been saying, one of the first things I’d ever heard him say as a matter of fact, while I was still lying groggy and disoriented in Felda’s bed and mistaking their voices for a tv show.

I recalled the painting that had been hanging in the hall in Felda’s tavern. An island in the clouds with a city built on top of it, and what Peter had said when he’d tried to introduce himself to me.

“My apologies, did I do it wrong? I haven’t been back to the skies in quite a while, so I’m a bit rusty on greeting catkin.”

It finally made sense. All along, people hadn’t been saying “high society.” They were saying High Society.

That’s… so dumb!

At that moment, while I was still resisting the urge to slap myself in the forehead, Dani and Elle finally wrapped up their conversation and returned to us.

“Sorry, sorry, just so much to catch up on,” Dani said as she approached, and I wiped the exasperated look off my face before either of them could notice. So there were islands in the clouds? So the place everyone assumed I was from, and the only place I was guaranteed to ever meet another catkin was some kind of ultra-rich sky society built on top of a bunch of floating islands? So… so what? This world had magic and monsters and pirates and elves that grew on trees like fruit. Was that even the strangest thing I’d heard today? Either way, it wasn’t anything to lose my head over.

“So sorry for making you wait so long,” Dani said, smiling down at me.

“It’s totally fine,” I said, smiling right back. “You said you have something ready for me to try on?”

“Indeed!” Dani beamed, putting a hand on my shoulder. “If you'll step into the back, we can see if I've got the fit right, and then if you like you could wear them out,” she said, guiding me towards the curtain that separated the front of the store from her work room.

“Wow, that was fast,” I said, impressed.

“Yeah, Dani is amazing,” Elle said from behind me. “We'll wait out here, but call us when you're ready, I can't wait to see!”

Glancing over my shoulder, I saw that Elle and Mel had indeed hung back, and I spoke before I could stop myself.

“Oh, well, you can come too if you want,” I said, then froze as I realized what I'd just implied. That sounded way too eager, didn't it? I felt my cheeks start to heat up and immediately tried to explain myself. “A-ah, I mean! N-not that I want you to, I just meant it wouldn't be weird if you did, b-because we're girlfriends now! Not that I'm saying I don't want you too either, I just—Nyaach!”

I cut myself off with a startled, cat-like yelp as Dani’s hand came down on my shoulder again.

“Slow down and breathe, dear.” Dani said with an amused smile, and I tried to do just that. After I'd taken several deep breaths, she patted my shoulder and nodded towards Elle and Mel. “Now, are you comfortable with the girls accompanying us into the back?” Not trusting myself not to start rambling again, I just nodded. Dani turned and smiled at Elle and Mel. “Would you two like to come back as well?”

“Yes!” Elle said, immediately, then flinched back, holding up a hand. “I-I-I mean—”

“Don't you start now,” Mel cut her off, throwing an arm around her shoulder and giving me a grin and a thumbs up. “Sure, we're right behind you.”

“Wonderful,” Dani said, turning back around and resuming her sauntering walk to the back room. “Ah, to be young,” she said with a sigh, then giggled as she lifted the curtain, looking over my shoulder at the pair. “I remember when I had to do the same thing for you two as well.”

“Really?” I asked as I stepped into the chaotically organized back room. Mel let out a groan behind me, while Elle snickered.

“Oh yes, there was a time when Mel could barely get up the nerve to ask Elle if she wanted to hold hands,” Dani said, sharing a conspiratorial grin with me.

“Really?” I asked again, glancing back at Mel, who seemed to have found something particularly interesting in the upper corner of Dani's workshop. “But you're the literal picture of calm, cool, and collected.”

“Yeah, well, I wasn't always,” Mel said, scrunching up one side of her face and shrugging. It was hard to tell due to the darker purple hue of her skin, but it looked like her cheeks might have been turning blue.

“It was soooo cute, I loved the way you used to only be able to talk to me while staring at your own feet,” Elle said, tilting her head to kiss Mel on the cheek, and, yup, her cheeks were definitely changing color.

“Oh, I thought you two came here together,” I said, chuckling a little. It was nice, getting to see yet another new side to Mel.

“Oh, we did,” Mel said, looking my way. “But we weren't together-together yet. It's… kind of a long story, but we'll tell you sometime.”

“Ah, alright,” I said, hoping I hadn't made them uncomfortable by touching on too private a subject too soon. Turning back to Dani so I couldn't dwell on it, I smiled and tilted my head. “So, uh, clothes?”

“Yes, yes, just step up onto the plinth, dear,” Dani said, motioning me to the small circular platform I'd stood on to get my measurements taken. I stepped up while she moved around to the various work tables, collecting several neatly folded bundles of dark colored cloth. “Now, if you'll undress please, and you two try to contain yourselves.”

I glanced back over my shoulder again. Mel grinned and gave me another thumbs up, causing Elle to roll her eyes and poke an elbow into her side.

Chuckling, I turned around and, after taking a deep, steadying breath, grabbed the hem of my shirt and pulled it up. Folding it once over my arm, I set it on the corner of a nearby table, then worked on undoing the laces on my pants. I had just stepped out of them when I caught Mel's voice on the edge of my hearing.

“Do you think she'd get mad if I whistled?” Mel asked in a whisper.

“Shh!” Elle hissed back, lowering her voice even further, but not nearly enough. “She can probably hear you!”

“Really?” Mel asked.

“I can,” I said, and could actually hear Mel’s boots scrape as she jerked backwards slightly. I smirked and flicked an ear at them, then looked up as Dani returned.

“Ah, you'll have to move your arms, dear,” Dani said, and I felt myself flush. I had instinctively crossed my arms over my chest, though I wasn't sure if it was to stop her from seeing, or stop me.

“S-sorry,” I muttered, but Dani just smiled, grabbing the first bundle on top of the small stack she'd brought.

“You're fine, Sam. Now, stick your arms out please,” she said, holding up… well, there was no other way to say it. It was a bra. More specifically, it looked like a sports bra. The only thing less surprising than how ordinary and modern it looked was how unsurprised I was. If even a day ago you had asked me what I was expecting from a fantasy world’s undergarments, I would have described something that looked like it belonged in a museum, but I had way bigger stuff to freak out about now, like the fact that there were islands in the sky.

Was I just focusing on those thoughts to distract myself from what Dani was doing around my chest? Absolutely.

“Aaaand… there!” Dani announced, pulling something tight behind my back, and I felt my whole upper torso and shoulders shift ever so slightly, my posture suddenly feeling awkward and new. “I bet that feels much better, huh?”

I looked straight down, possibly for the first time in three days, and drew in a breath.

Woah…

“Uh… yeah, a lot better,” I said, a little disbelieving as I rolled my shoulders and craned my neck this way and that. I felt like I'd been carrying something around for several days and had finally gotten to set it down.

“Not too tight? You mentioned you wanted to be able to run, so I used one of the designs I sell to some of the guardswomen and hunters and refitted it to your size,” Dani said, suddenly leaning in quite close and poking around at my side, right below my armpit.

“Nya-ach!” I yelped again, jumping so far to the side I ended up balanced precariously on the edge of the platform, with my arms raised defensively. Dani drew back, startled at first, but eventually breaking out into a smile.

“Goodness, I didn't know you were so ticklish,” Dani said, while I coughed and tried to reorient myself in the middle of the platform.

“Neither did I,” I heard Mel whisper. I shot a look back at her, but she was once again staring up into the ceiling.

“Y-you're fine,” I said, nodding up at Dani. “And, no, I feel like I could run for miles.”

“Excellent!” Dani said, clapping her hands once, then reaching for the next article of clothing from the stack and holding it up. It was the first of the shirts I'd ordered, a sleeveless top with a wide neckline, made of soft-looking black cotton. Rather than being pitch black, it had a subtle hint of lighter gray-blue undertone to it.

“Oooouh…” I gasped gently as Dani held the shirt out for me to stick my arms into, marveling at how much more comfortable the fabric was compared to the second-hand shirts I’d been wearing. It was indeed as soft as it looked, and when I tugged it down to my waist, it fit perfectly. I once again twisted myself side to side and stretched my arms over my head, feeling the fit at the sides and around my shoulders, before I grinned up at Dani.

“It’s awesome!” I declared, standing with my hands on my hips. “I love it!”

“Yeah, you did a great job, Dani!” Elle cheered from behind me.

Dani grinned, bending down to inspect her work now that I was actually wearing it. “Aw, thank you girls, but this is nothing, wait until you see the final piece.” Satisfied, Dani grabbed the last bundle and unfurled it, revealing the cargo shorts I’d ordered, just as described. They were black, like the top, but made of the visibly thicker and sturdier blended fabric that Dani had shown me the day before. And, just as I’d asked for, they had pockets for days, with two additional square shaped pouches sewn down the outside of each leg, with a little buttonable flap to cover their openings.

The shorts were such a simple thing, but I still felt giddy as I stepped into them and pulled them up my legs. I found not just the expected button and laces in the front, but also a scoop-shaped cutout in the back, perfectly positioned to accommodate my tail, with an extra flap of fabric made to loop over the top and button on the other side. Felda had done a fine job modifying the pants I’d bought, but having something that was custom made from the start to fit my tail felt so much better, and I spent several seconds just swishing it back and forth and testing out my new, much more comfortable range of motion.

“How long are you planning to stand there wiggling your butt?” Mel called out, reminding me of exactly where I was. I yelped, standing up straight and covering the seat of my pants with my hands while glaring back at Mel, who was once again doubled over with barely contained laughter.

Dani, who did a much better job hiding her amusement, smiled expectantly when I turned back to her.

“Well, how do they feel?”

“Great,” I said, lightly jogging in place on top of the platform, then bending down to feel the fabric with my hands, tugging at the bottom hem of one leg and poking experimentally into the pockets. “You were right, they’re a little more stiff, but I’m sure I’ll break ‘em in in no time. Honestly, they’re perfect, exactly what I was hoping for, and whatever I’m paying you for them is not enough.”

“Oh, stop,” Dani said, visibly preening and reaching down to pat the top of my head once. “You are just too precious. And I must say, you cut quite a striking figure. Would you like to see for yourself?” She motioned to a tall standing mirror on wheels in one corner of the workshop, and I nodded enthusiastically. “Thought so, you wait right here.”

I remained perched on the platform, fidgeting slightly. I wanted to glance over at Elle and Mel to see what their reactions were, but also wanted to wait until I’d gotten a look for myself. Dani wheeled the mirror over, keeping it sideways so I couldn’t see anything in it until she’d brought it closer, at which point she turned the mirror to face me, and I couldn’t help but gasp.

“Wooooah…” I said, staring wide eyed and slack jawed at my own reflection. I’d seen it before, obviously, and taken a few other looks at myself in the mirror since that very first time, but the difference between then and now was night and day. For one thing, between the bra and the much better-fitting shirt, it was now way more obvious that I was a girl, and for another thing…

“I look so cool!” I said, grinning now as I turned slightly to either side, then began to strike a few little poses, crossing my arms over my chest or behind my head, trying to take in every possible angle at once. Back on Earth, in addition to taking as few looks in the mirror as possible, I had also never put much thought into my choice of clothes, caring only if they were comfortable and fit right, not sparing a thought for whether I thought they looked good on me. Only now was I realizing that was because I didn't think anything looked good on me. Fashion, like hair, had felt cut off from me, relegated to the realm of “stuff for girls,” but now I knew better, and I felt like I could finally start appreciating everything I’d been missing out on for all those years.

And all it took was being magically transformed into a weird half-cat half-girl thing in a fantastical fantasy world.

Like aftershocks of an earthquake, I was struck by just how many of my problems seemingly stemmed from one single glaring issue. Ordinarily I would have felt nervous wearing something so distinctive, something that drew the eye way more than the plain and serviceable work clothes I'd come into Dani's shop wearing, but now, I think I was actually kind of excited to be seen in them, to stand out in a crowd instead of fading into the background.

The realization of exactly how much time I’d spent feeling uncomfortable and confused and out of place was just starting to sink in when Elle and Mel appeared to either side of me in the mirror, each looking concerned in their own way.

“Hey,” Mel said softly, meeting my eyes in the mirror instead of looking at me directly. “What’s up?”

“Am I that obvious?” I asked with a slightly bitter chuckle, turning my head and looking away from our reflections. “I was just… thinking about things, y’know, ‘back home.’ Kind of realizing that I… wasted a lot of time on feeling… not so good about myself, and now that I know why, I can’t help but feel a little angry too.”

“Mmmh…” Mel hummed, nodding as she listened. She raised one of her hands, holding it in my line of sight and asked, “Can I?” I responded by simply nodding, and she moved her hand to the top of my head. Meanwhile, the back of one of Elle’s hands brushed against one of mine, hesitantly, and when I didn’t pull it away, she once again slipped her fingers in between my own and clasped my hand, gently but firmly.

“Let me give you three some space,” Dani said quietly, already halfway to the curtain that led back to the front of her shop. I couldn’t help but smile as she disappeared, then leaned slightly into Mel while she lightly scratched at my scalp. A few moments passed in peaceful silence, broken only by my own purring.

“I’d say it’s completely understandable, you feeling that way,” Mel finally said. “We still don’t have the full picture, but, it really sounds like you weren’t having a very okay time back in your world.”

“Yeah…” I said, sighing and closing my eyes. “Until a few hours ago I wouldn’t have said it was all that bad, but now…” I paused, swallowing nervously. It felt so wrong, I hadn’t even wanted to think about it, but there was something I felt I needed to say, just to get it out there. “Now, I’m starting to feel like maybe I… don’t want to go home? Is that crazy? Like, shouldn’t I not just be sitting around here, eating fish and making friends and stuff like that when I could be, I don’t know, frantically searching for a way back to my own world?”

“That’s not crazy at all,” Elle said firmly, giving my hand a squeeze. I lifted my head from Mel’s shoulder to look at her, and her expression was the most serious I’d ever seen. “Of course you wouldn’t want to go back to a place where you weren’t happy!”

“I know, but… it’s not like I was constantly miserable,” I said, squeezing Elle’s hand back. “I still had my brothers, and my friends, mostly Morgan, but she was going off to college, and I… screwed up my own chance to follow her. I don’t know if I’m ready to say it was a good thing that I came here, but… I can say that right here, right now, I am happy…”

I trailed off, momentarily marveling at the fact that I could be happy given my situation. Was it selfish of me to be so quick to condemn my entire life on Earth? To not spend every waking moment agonizing over if or when I'd ever go back? I didn't know, and, frankly, I didn't really care at the moment.

“And hey,” I said, shaking off those thoughts before they could congeal into dark clouds, smiling up at Elle and Mel in turn. “I got to meet you two.”

“Aw!” Elle gasped, and before I knew it I was being crushed into another hug. “Sammie, that's the sweetest thing I've ever heard!”

Mel chuckled, using the hand on top of my head to gently muss up my hair before adding herself to the group hug. “I'll say,” she said, smirking down at me. “Sweeter than a maple tree.”

I let out a squeak and squirmed until I could free my arms from my sides and wrap one each around each of them, my whole face feeling like it was on fire.

“S-shut up, it wasn't that sweet!” I huffed, pressing my cheek against Elle’s arm. She and Mel shared a playful chuckle while I pretended to fume for a few more seconds, but I could only hold out for so long before I was grinning and laughing along with them.

“Well, whatever you choose to do with your life here is entirely up to you, and we’ll support you in any way we can,” Mel said after we’d collected ourselves and broke from the impromptu huddle. “That said, we should probably quit hogging Dani’s back room.”

“A-ah, right, good idea,” I said, nodding. I turned to take one last look at myself in the mirror again, seeing myself as I now was; short and, I was willing to admit, cute, cat-eared and cat-tailed, and surrounded by people who… loved me? Or, if it was too soon for that, people who just really really liked me a lot!

“You really do look great,” Mel remarked, meeting my eyes in the mirror again and smiling.

“Yeah, you look so dashing, Sammie!” Elle added, putting both hands on my shoulders. “You look like you mean business.”

I was grinning like a fool and walking on air as we headed for the curtain covered doorway.

“Heh, yeah, I'd like to see Bentley and his goons try and run their mouths with me now,” I said as I pushed back the curtain. Dani turned and glanced back at my entrance, as did the customer she had at the counter.

Ah. It was Bentley, sans goons.

“Fuck…” I hissed under my breath.

“All finished?” Dani asked without skipping a beat.

“Uh huh,” I said, not taking my eyes off Bentley. “He hasn't said anything shitty yet, has he?”

“Who, Lord Bentley? Never, he's been a perfect gentleman, as always,” Dani said with an amused chuckle.

“Really?”

“You seem to have formed a misapprehension that I am some sort of foul-mouthed barbarian, with a personal mission to offend everyone I meet,” Bentley said dryly, half-scowling at me over the countertop.

“Yeah, I wonder where I could've gotten that idea,” I shot back, moving to get out from behind the counter.

“Listen, you wretch, I—” Bentley started to reply, but halted when I stepped fully into view. Short as I was, he must not have been able to see more than my head and the tops of my shoulders, but now he was visibly taken aback by my new outfit, and I couldn't help but grin smugly.

“Well,” he said, recollecting himself and sniffing dismissively. “I see you've finally acquired some clothing that fits you properly, well done. You're much less likely to be mistaken for a small boy now, though no less likely to be mistaken for a thief, dressing like that.”

“Thank you,” I said, choosing to take that as a compliment. Much to Bentley's consternation, if the tightening of his expression and redding of his cheeks was any indication.

“If you're quite done,” Bentley said through clenched teeth forcibly averting his eyes. “I would like to return to my business sometime today.”

“Yeah, yeah, we were just leaving,” I said, turning to Dani and quickly dulling the edge on my voice. “I really can't tell you how much I love these,” I said, smiling and tugging lightly on my shirt. “I'll get right back to fishing first thing tomorrow morning, and I'll start paying you the rest of what I owe as soon as I can.”

“Oh, don't you even fret over it,” Dani said with a cheerful smile and a shake of her head. “You pay me back at whatever pace is comfortable for you, and don't hesitate to stop by just for a visit.”

“So, you have been practicing, hmm?” Bentley said, looking sidelong at me as I passed. “I wondered why I hadn't seen you out on the bay, but I suppose a beginner like you wouldn't have met the requirements to fish the open waters yet.”

“Oh, I'll be out there soon enough, just you wait and see!” I shouted back through cupped hands, walking backwards towards the door with Elle and Mel tailing me, the former looking like she was struggling to maintain a straight face while the latter was practically beaming. Once we were out on the street, Mel broke out into full on laughter, and continued as we walked away.

“That was so nerve-wracking,” Elle said, pressing a hand to her forehead and looking over at me. “I honestly don’t know how you can stand to antagonize him like that, Sammie. Even if he can be a bit of a…” Elle glanced back over her shoulder, then to either side of the street before continuing, “a thorny prick, he’s still the mayor’s son.”

“Eh, I wouldn’t worry, it's not like he’ll risk doing anything to her before the festival,” Mel said, and at my and Elle’s confused looks, she held up a hand. “Think about it, if he tries to force the town guards to hassle her or, tides forbid, tries to get her thrown out of town early, then it'll look like he was scared that she was going to beat him and interfered. He cares way too much about his reputation to let that happen.”

“Oooh…” Elle said, raising her eyebrows. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Well, he should be scared! I can’t wait to beat his ass in that competition!” I said, smacking a fist into my palm and then immediately wincing as I nearly punctured my other palm with my own claws. I still hadn't gotten used to the fact that my claws didn’t retract far enough to allow me to make an actual fist.

“Okay, easy there, tiger!” Mel said, chuckling and patting the top of my head. “First of all, it’s a fishing competition, not a tourney duel, so no asses are getting beat. Second of all… well, you're confident you're going to be able to win, right?”

“I mean, I haven't really had time to worry about that, with all the other stuff I've been worrying about,” I said, shrugging. “It's not so much that I think I'm going to win, it's that I have to win. When I made the bet and proposed that outcome, I thought Bentley was kind of an idiot for accepting it, because I told myself at the time that I would be just fine up and leaving this place at any time. But, well, look how wrong I turned out to be.” I smiled up at both of them, and Elle suppressed a little squeal. I reached out and took her hand in mine, surprised at how easily I'd gotten used to the motion, and the feelings it caused. Then, since I was walking between them now, I reached over and snagged Mel's hand as well, putting on my fiercest, most determined grin.

“So, yeah, for you two, and Felda and Bart too, I have to win, and I'm gonna do everything I can to make sure I do!”

My stomach chose that exact moment to let out an audible groan, reminding me that a shared platter of meats, cheese, fruit, and fish, while delicious, was not enough to satisfy me for long.

Elle giggled, squeezing my hand and tugging gently. “Here, how about we head to Baker’s Row next? I did promise to treat you to something, if I remember correctly.”

“Oh, I was just joking around last night, you don't have to,” I said hastily.

“No, but I want to,” Elle countered and, well, I wasn't going to try that hard to dissuade her from spoiling me if she really wanted to.

“You two go on ahead, I'm going to make another stop real quick,” Mel said, and I released her hand. She moved closer, once again giving me a swift peck on the forehead and Elle a quick kiss. “Order me my favorite, would you?”

“Of course,” Elle said, giggling and waving as Mel headed off, then resuming our trek to Baker’s Row. I continued to watch Mel’s departure until she disappeared around a corner.

“I'm still kind of struggling to wrap my head around the idea that I'm actually going out with both of you at the same time,” I said, facing forward and looking up at Elle again.

“It can be hard to grasp if you’re from a culture that only has pair bonding, and it sounds like that’s exactly where you’re starting from,” Elle said, gently swinging our clasped hands as she walked. “Let me just get this out of the way first: you don't need to worry about splitting your time perfectly equally with both of us.”

“A-ah, right, I guess that would be a hassle to try and manage,” I said, chuckling self-consciously. That had been the exact first thing that popped into my mind now that I was alone with Elle.

“Mmhm!” Elle said with a cheerful nod. “Contrary to what you might think, Mel and I aren't always together, and we've both got interests and hobbies of our own, some that we both enjoy and some that only one of us does, and I’m sure you’re the same way. I don't want you thinking you should feel guilty if you do end up spending more time with one of us than the other, or if you’re ever so busy you can't find much time to be with either of us, okay?”

“Okay,” I said, letting out a little sigh. “That is actually a load off my mind. Like I said, I never got a chance to even have a relationship, uh, back home, and you two seem like you've got yours pretty well figured out, so I kinda feel a little like an amateur trying to compete with the pros.”

At that, Elle let out a snort that turned into a fit of giggles, shaking her head. “W-what? Oh, Sammie, trust me, we’re hardly that much more experienced than you, we’ve just grown up around this stuff. There are some orchards back on Belanore so big they would make your head spin!”

“Woah…” I said, trying to picture what exactly she meant by that. Was an orchard of, say, ten people considered “large,” or was that reserved for groups in the dozens? My head was already spinning trying to imagine a relationship that large, but thankfully we reached our next destination before I got too dizzy.

“Aaaaand we’re here!” Elle announced as she stepped around the corner and into a more narrow street, wide enough for the small crowd of well dressed people I could see coming and going in both directions, but too narrow for carts. Her outburst had drawn a few glances our way, some of which turned into lingering stares, likely my fault, but for once that realization didn’t make me feel like running or hiding. I even met a few of them head on with a grin of my own, flashing my fangs and flicking my ears as I followed Elle deeper into the street.

Looking up towards the building we were approaching, I found a quaint little two-story red-brick structure, out of which the most tantalizing scents of baked goods were wafting. The wooden sign hanging above the door was much more elaborately carved, with swirling patterns etched around the outer edges, and the name written out on it was done up in overly fancy cursive.

“‘Sandria’s?’” I read aloud, starting to regain some of my second thoughts about letting Elle treat me here. We were even deeper into the more upper scale seeming area of the village now. “So, this is ‘Baker’s Row?’”

“Mmhm!” Elle said, taking a deep breath of the scent of baked bread and pastries. “It’s really just a nickname, but three of the most popular bakeries in town are right here,” she continued, turning and pointing further down the street. “Sandria’s, The Golden Crown, and The Flour Garden.”

I saw the two other bakeries as she named them; the former with its wood and stone exterior painted in shades of blue and white and gold with a little sectioned off outdoor seating area, and the latter across from it being all wood, short and wide with broad square front windows that opened outwards onto a small but expertly manicured garden, enclosed by a tiny little white fence. Like most of the other businesses I could see on this street, they looked more like restaurants than purely bakeries, and I felt my stomach rumble again.

“Wow…” I said, turning back to Elle. “But, why this place? Aren't there also a bunch of bakeries in front of Felda’s tavern too?”

“Oh, well, yes,” Elle said, reaching out and pulling the door open, holding it for me then stepping in behind me. “But… uh, let’s sit down first,” she said, and took my hand again. I looked around as we moved through the bakery, and the difference between it and Bonnie’s was stark and unmistakable. The walls were a cheerful cherry red color with a row of white trim running along at waist height, and the floors looked like tile, white and black in a checkerboard pattern. The tables, more than a dozen of them, were made of pale, polished wood and covered by cream-colored tablecloths, and the matching chairs had padded seats. Elle led us to an open table and I settled into one, feeling a little dizzy all over again.

“Phew,” Elle sighed as she sat adjacent to me. “That’s better… So, yes, there are a few more bakeries down by Felda’s place, but they’re right up against the docks, and, well, you might have noticed that”—she paused suddenly and glanced around surreptitiously, then lowered her voice—“some people have the impression that just being near the docks makes something worse, makes it low-class.”

“Ah,” I said, scrunching my face in distaste. “Right, that’s what Bentley and his goons were complaining about the night before too, blegh. Well, they clearly don’t know what they’re talking about, Bonnie’s place is great and Felda's cooking is amazing.”

Elle nodded in understanding at my little rant, then turned as a woman approached our table. She was wearing what was clearly a uniform; a short cut red and white check-patterned dress with a matching cap, white tights and shiny red slippers that clicked slightly on the tiled floor. Even her hair was red.

“Good afternoon!” she chirped, setting down the pitcher of lemonade she had in one hand, smiling at Elle. “It’s nice to see you again, Elle, and who’s—oh!” She jumped as she tried to turn her smile on me, a look of surprise overtaking her face. “Oh, you’re the catgirl, hi! I’ve been hearing about you for days, it’s nice to finally meet you! I’m Sarah.”

“Uh, Sam,” I said, giving her a little nod. Her announcement drew every eye that wasn’t already looking our way, several conversations starting up at once that I pointedly swiveled my ears away from.

“Well, Elle’s been here before, but you’re new, so here’s the menu for you,” Sarah said, managing to compose herself and holding out the folded rectangle of stiff paper she had under her other arm. It was a menu alright, hand written and with the same extra level of detail added to it as the sign outside, with elaborate swirly text and a little flourishing border running along the outside of the page. This place really spared no expense.

“Hmm… not really in the mood for something sweet,” I muttered, moving past the section of sweet cakes and fruit pies, my interest (and hunger) piqued by a section listed as “savory.” There were meat pies and savory buns, among other things, but one thing ultimately caught my eye and I couldn’t help but blurt out in surprise, “Salmon bagel?!”

“Oouh, yeah, I bet you’d love that one,” Sarah said with a smile, leaning over and pointing to the description. “It’s a halved bagel with cream cheese and strips of smoked salmon. It’s not the most popular, but I think it’s great.”

“I’ll take it,” I said, nodding and passing the menu back.

“And I’ll have a slice of the strawberry cake, and two ham and cheese croissants for Mel when she shows up,” Elle added.

“Coming right up,” Sarah said, smiling wider and doing a little bow before turning and sauntering back to the display counter against the back wall, and into the kitchen beyond, where I could see her speaking to two figures in crisp all-white uniforms.

“A bagel with salmon and cream cheese, huh?” I mumbled absently, just thinking aloud. It really did seem like this world was never going to run out of things for me to be surprised by the existence of, but when I thought about it, how old was the concept of a bagel anyway? And I had no clue how cream cheese was even made, but I really had no reason anymore to doubt that someone in this world had figured it out a long while ago.

Or, I realized, someone from Earth who did know could’ve brought that knowledge with them. That thought caused a tiny shudder to run down my spine. The idea that other people from my world had been here in the past was both fascinating and a little frightening, just because there was no telling what kind of influence they might have had.

“Is something wrong, Sammie?”

Elle’s voice snapped me back to the present, and I blinked a few times, turning to find her looking at me, concern evident on her face.

“Uh… no,” I said, and Elle’s brow furrowed even further.

“Your tail is thrashing,” she pointed out, and I looked back over my shoulder. Sure enough, my tail had risen into the air behind me and was swishing side to side like an agitated furry snake.

“Eh, s-sorry,” I said, sighing and reaching back to pull my tail around into my lap, petting it lengthwise to make the fur lay flat again. “It really is nothing, though, I was just thinking about, uh… other visitors from where I’m from.”

“Oooh,” Elle said, nodding and visibly relaxing. “I suppose I can’t blame you for having a lot to think about.”

“Yeah, but, I can’t really do anything with those thoughts right here, right now, can I?” I said, lifting my tail and inspecting it, flicking the tip back and forth a few times. “So, no point in getting all worked up about it, right?”

“Right!” Elle agreed.

“Though, something I can worry about right now is having to talk about this stuff in public,” I said, leaning forward and resting my chin in my hand, keeping my voice low. “It’d be pretty useful if I could figure out how to speak Elvish.”

“Oh, I’m sure that must be possible,” Elle said, scooting her chair closer to mine so she could match my tone. “You don’t know the language you’re speaking right now, and it’s supposed to be a blessing to speak all tongues, so maybe you just need to… try speaking Elvish?”

Huh. There was no way it was that simple right? And how did one even “try” switching languages when they had a magic translation spell they weren’t even aware of until a few hours ago?

Ach, no, don’t overthink it! I shook my head, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. I brought my hands up to the sides of my head, pressing my fingers to my temples and gently massaging them in circles, trying to actively perceive what was happening while I spoke.

“Eeelvish… speak… Elvish…” I muttered under my breath, ignoring a snicker from Elle and trying to feel the way my mouth and throat moved. “Eeeelf… elf elf elf elf…” There, there was definitely a disconnect between the way my brain told me my lips were moving and the way I felt them move, but it was difficult to focus on, like lying in bed trying to recall the details of a dream while they only got more and more hazy. I took another deep breath, and tried to relax, but the sensation was already completely faded.

“I don’t think this is wo—” The very instant I opened my eyes and looked at Elle, I felt something go “ka-thunk!” inside my brain, and felt my throat clench while I was still mid-sentence, “—orking… huh?”

“Oh, wow!” Elle said, her eyes wide. She sounded… different, and the same, and I could somehow tell that she wasn’t speaking what I considered normal anymore, until suddenly she was. “You did it!”

“I did?” I asked. In the very very back of my mind, I could feel for a single moment the differences in the way I was forming the words I was saying, but quickly lost the ability to perceive it. It just felt like I was talking normally, as I always did.

“Yeah, you’re speaking Elvish right now,” Elle said, tilting her head slightly. “Your accent is a little strange, but you’re definitely speaking Mainland Elvish.”

“Wooooah…” I said, rubbing the side of my head again. “I can’t believe it… it really was that easy.”

“Hehe, this is so exciting,” Elle giggled, smiling and pressing her hands together. “Oh, oh, you’ve got to show Felda when we get back, she’ll be so surprised!”

“Huh, yeah, I bet she will,” I said, blinking. I hadn’t thought of that yet, that I was going to have to tell Felda that me and Elle and Mel were… involved now. I didn’t really have any reason to worry how she’d take it, did I?

Just then, Sarah returned to our table, carrying three small plates with her, two in her hands and one balanced on her forearm.

“Sorry for the wait,” she said, distributing the dishes between the two of us. She set down a plate with a large triangular wedge of white cake with pink frosting and large slices of strawberries in front of Elle, then a second one with two plump, fluffy, flakey croissants that I could see had been stuffed from the inside with a vibrant orange cheese and bits of ham.

Finally, she set the last plate down before me, and I felt my eyes widen and my ears stand straight up. It was a bagel alright, split into halves, both sides smeared with pearly-white cream cheese and overlapping strips of what I immediately recognized as more smoked salmon. I could tell from one sniff that it wasn’t the same stuff that Elle had served, but that was fine, since that was supposed to be some kind of delicacy. While I was fine with Elle’s offer to treat me today, I definitely didn’t want her going overboard.

“It looks fantastic, thank you,” I said, grinning up at Sarah, who stared back in vague confusion.

“O-oh, uh, y-you’re welcome?” she replied hesitantly, chuckling nervously. “Sorry, my Elvish is terrible.”

Ah, that was right, I was still speaking Elvish. Now, how the heck was I supposed to swi—

“Ah,” I gasped in surprise, feeling the same mental “thunk” a second time as soon as I thought about returning to speaking in Common. “Uh, I mean, that’s fine, I was just… showing off for Elle?”

Elle giggled into her hand and nodded, giving me a sly wink. “And Elle is very impressed.”

“Aww, that’s adorable!” Sarah said, sharing a laugh before doing her little bow again. “Well, you two enjoy, and let me know if you need anything else.”

I smiled and waved until Sarah was occupied with another table, then sighed, slumping forward in my seat.

“That was close, but it answers that question,” I said, turning back to Elle. Now that I knew what to feel for, it took a half a second’s thought to switch to Elvish again. “I can switch back and forth pretty easily, actually.”

“Well, it is a blessing after all,” Elle said, picking up her fork. “In fact, maybe we should visit the temple after this.”

“The… temple?” I asked, pausing with a bagel halfway to my mouth.

“Uh huh, the temple of the gods,” Elle said, slicing off a bit of her cake with the edge of the fork. “Even if we’re not totally sure if they’re the reason you’re here, it couldn’t hurt for you to try to reach out to some of them.”

“I… guess it couldn’t hurt, yeah,” I hesitantly agreed, while Elle popped the bite of cake into her mouth, closing her eyes and groaning with delight.

Then again, if the gods of this world were real and active participants in what happened in it, it actually could hurt if I messed up. I didn’t feel like getting smited by a lighting bolt or something. Smote? Smitten? Whatever.

I shrugged off my worries about vengeful gods and took a bite of my bagel. It tasted as good as it looked; the bagel itself was fresh, the crust on the underside crackling while the inside was soft and tender, the cream cheese was much more tangy than what I was used to on Earth, and the star of the show, the smoked salmon, was once again salty and buttery and had me swaying in my chair and purring as I chewed.

I was so caught up in my reverie that I didn’t notice that Mel had entered the bakery and made her way over to our table until I felt her hand on my scalp. I jumped in my seat and yelped, covering my mouth since it was still full, and tilted my head to glare up at her.

“Miss me?” she asked, and I let out a huff through my nose before nodding, earning a bright grin in return. “Me too,” Mel said, giving my ear one more scratch before dropping into her own seat.

“So, what’d I miss?” Mel asked, picking up one of her croissants between two fingers. I grinned, sensing an opportunity to immediately get her back. I swallowed down my mouthful of bagel and switched over to Elvish again.

I waited until just after Mel took her first bite to open my mouth and say, “Not much.”

“What the—?” Mel blurted out, though it wound up sounding more like “Whaff fuh?” She grunted and coughed, covering her mouth and furiously chewing, Elle passing her a glass of lemonade while snickering. She took a deep pull to clear her throat, then sat forward in her chair, staring intently at me.

“You can speak Elvish now?” Mel asked, grinning along with me now.

“I figured it out,” I said, shrugging casually.

“Good job!” Mel said, laughing and leaning back in her chair. “That’s amazing, but it’s also definitely going to confuse people about where you’re from even more.”

“Really?” I asked, taking another, smaller bite from my bagel and trying to subtly peek around the room. There were definitely still people taking occasional glances in our direction, long after the novelty should have worn off. Turning back around, I smirked. “Good.”

“Ugh, you’re going to be such bad influences on each other,” Elle said, shaking her head with a rueful smile, that turned into a genuine one as she speared another bite of her cake, this time holding it up towards me. “Sammie, do you want to try some?”

“Mmhm!” I nodded, leaning forward and opening my mouth. Elle beamed and deposited the forkful of cake onto my tongue, and I sat back to savor it. It was delicious. Elle had made sure to give me a bite that had plenty of frosting as well as one of the thick slices of strawberry, and all together it was one of the sweetest things I’d tasted since coming here.

For several minutes, we just sat and enjoyed our individual treats. I got to try a bite of one of Mel’s croissants, finding the taste similar to an extra buttery, extra cheesy grilled cheese, and offered some of my bagel to both of them in turn.

Once there was less of a chance of someone getting interrupted with their mouth full, I turned to Mel and asked, “So, what’d you need to go do?”

“Oh, yeah, I wanted to stop by the bookstore,” Mel said, reaching behind her into her black leather satchel, which she’d slung over the back of her chair. “Here, got this for you.” She handed me a book, tall and thin with a sturdy red binding and an elaborate illustration of a crest on the front cover, consisting of a compass, a telescope, and one of those little triangle shaped tools for drawing circles that I could never remember the name of.

Annotated Traveller’s Guide to the Major Islands, Encompassing the Known World of Oceanus, By Captain Archibald Einhardt; Third Edition, the cover read.

“...huh, okay,” I said, after spending a moment just taking all of that in. Curious, I opened the front cover to take a peek inside. The first page was taken up almost entirely by a large illustration of a circular map, overlaid with a grid.

“Oh, is this a map of the world?” I asked excitedly, sitting up in my chair and placing the book down in front of me.

“Just the major islands,” Mel said. I didn't really understand what she meant by that, but assumed it would become clear as I looked over the book. However, as I leaned in and began to peer closer at the map, things only became more confusing.

There appeared to be only eight islands, most of them a fairly large distance from each other. I located Torgard first, on the western side of the map, then Eurig, the place Nils had told me about, up in the north, and an island labeled Belanore to the south. I remembered Elle mentioning that name in passing earlier, but there were many more names I didn't recognize; next to Belanore was one called Sotek, then far to the east, almost directly opposite from Torgard, was an island named Fulgar. Slightly above that was what looked like a pair of islands, but with only one name given to them: Yuusha. Just off-center of the very middle of the map, there was one named Karkinos, and I thought that was it, but I noticed one last island, tucked into the far bottom-left corner of the map, with the name Kurma.

The names weren't the confusing part though.

“Uh, why are all these islands drawn like animals?” I asked, tapping the illustration of Torgard. Instead of some vaguely lumpy landmass, like you’d expect an island to look on a map, it was clearly drawn to resemble a sea turtle, oval shaped with a head and four long flippers for legs. And it wasn't the only one that was like that; Fulgar looked like some kind of snake thing, curved into a crescent shape, Eurig was definitely a snail, and Belanore resembled a frog.

Elle and Mel stared back at me blankly, then exchanged glances, and I realized I’d asked another one of those questions, a question that nobody born in this world would ever ask and would give me away to anyone who didn’t already know my situation. I was glad that I’d remembered to stick to speaking Elvish.

“Alright,” I sighed, motioning to the pair. “Whatever it is, give it to me, I’ll try not to freak out. It can’t be weirder than floating islands up in the sky.”

“Heh,” Mel chuckled, shaking her head. “Sorry, that’s just a really weird question to hear, you’d never expect someone to ask that… anyway, they’re drawn like that because that’s what they are.”

“That’s what… they are?” I repeated, slowly, and Mel nodded. I flicked my eyes down to the map, then back up to Mel. There was no way…

“You’re not… seriously telling me that… Torgard, the island we’re on right now is… is a turtle?” I asked, leaning forward and tapping the picture again.

“Yes we are,” Mel said, also leaning forward, propping her chin up on one hand, smirking at me. “You sound kind of like you’re freaking out.”

I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose, grumbling to myself.

“Sorry,” I said, sighing and opening my eyes again. “Every time I think I’ve heard the most ridiculous thing this world has to offer… so, what, it’s a literal, actual, gigantic turtle with an island on its back?” Elle nodded, still looking completely perplexed, and I rubbed the side of my head. “That doesn’t make any sense though, what does it eat? Wouldn’t something that big have to eat, I don’t know, a million tons of food every day?”

“It doesn’t need to eat at all,” Mel said, with maddening calm. “It’s an island, and one of the great leviathans besides.” It was my turn to give her a blank stare, and she nodded. “Yeah, guess I shoulda seen that coming, here.” She sat up and scooted her chair around the edge of the table until she was seated next to me, and leaned over the book. “So, all the major islands, these eight here, are the eight great leviathans; ancient, gigantic, immortal creatures. They don’t need to eat because they’ve been blessed by the gods themselves to live forever and provide life and sanctuary to the mortal races. That’s us, in case it wasn’t clear.” I rolled my eyes theatrically and Mel chuckled, continuing, “So, unlike other islands that have to absorb vast amounts of raw mana directly from the ocean to do the same thing, the eight leviathans are completely self-sustaining, which is what makes living on their backs possible. All the fertile soil and everything that grows in it, the fresh water and the fish you’ve been catching, and the food we just ate, everything around you; it’s because of the mana that Torgard provides making the surface of its back livable. It’s the same for every island in the world, big or small, but only the eight can do it without completely draining the sea around them of mana, and that’s why they’re so important.”

I sat quietly and listened while Mel explained. As she did, I started to calm down again, and the full gravity of what she was telling me started to actually sink in. Every island in this world was built up from the back of an unfathomably massive living creature, powered either by magic from the ocean, or just literal thin air?

“So, there’s no normal islands here?” I asked, and Mel chuckled, raising an eyebrow.

“These are normal islands,” she said, and before I could roll my eyes, she asked, “but what do you mean by ‘a normal island?’”

“I mean not growing out of the back of a giant fish or something,” I said, holding up a hand. “Like, where it’s just solid land, you know? On Earth, every island, every continent, everywhere anything lives, it’s all just… earth…” Huh. When you thought about it that way, our planet's name was kind of stupidly obvious. And wrong, since there was more water on it than earth. That was one thing for this new world, Oceanus seemed like a perfectly fitting name. Shaking my head, I continued. “It's just dirt and rocks, and if you dig downward you just hit more dirt and rocks, because the world is just a big ball of rock with water covering it.”

“Ooh!” Elle gasped at my other side, making me jump. She’d also moved her chair closer to mine, and unlike before where she was looking confused, now her eyes were practically twinkling with curiosity. “I see what you mean now, yes! Well, to answer your question, no, there’s no ‘solid land’ that’s habitable above the ocean. The most you’ll see are scattered rock formations, but none of them are capable of supporting anything but the smallest amounts of life. Everything else, all the solid foundation that makes up our world, is deep under the ocean.”

“All of it?” I asked, my eyes widening. “You mean… like, your whole world is flooded?”

“That is the prevailing theory, yes!” Elle said excitedly, grabbing one of my hands. “Scholars have debated for centuries about how our world as we know it came to be, and the temples haven’t been able to provide an answer either, but most sources agree that there had to have been some sort of cataclysmic event at some point in prehistoric times that left the entire surface of the world submerged, due to the discovery of ruins and artifacts found deep on the bottom of the ocean that don’t match any currently living civilization.”

“Holy shit…” I muttered, reaching for my glass with a free hand. After taking a long, deep pull of the somehow still cool lemonade, I groaned and leaned back against my chair. “I seriously underestimated just how weird this place was.”

“Hey, rude,” Mel said, snorting and placing her hand on my head. “This is just how the world is for us, and who’s to say your world isn’t the weird one? Exactly how many worlds besides yours and this one have you been to?”

“That’s… fair, I guess,” I said, sighing and tilting my head into her gentle scratching. I looked down at the book, still open, and flipped through a few of the pages. Beyond the large map at the front, the following pages were split into sections, each one covering one of the “major islands,” with what looked like more in-depth breakdowns of the islands themselves; their history, culture, what sorts of people might be found there. I skimmed through, intending to save the more thorough reading for later, but I paused when I opened onto the section for the island named Fulgar, a single passage jumping out at me.

“Birthplace of the Fulminous Empire,” I read aloud, raising an eyebrow and glancing to either side. “Is this the Empire everyone’s always talking about?”

“Ugh, yeah, that's them,” Mel said, scoffing and scowling like she’d just bitten a lemon. “It's honestly a toss up between them and High Society on which one is worse. From the news that comes out of there, if you're not a rich or powerful human then things can be pretty bad, but they can get even worse if you're not human at all, and if you're a demi-human, well…” Her eyes drifted over to me, softening with concern, and I nodded.

“Got it. I have heard some of this already, but it's good to have a name and place to match with the warnings so I can be absolutely certain I don't ever end up there.” I studied the up close, much more detailed illustration of Fulgar above the text for a few more moments before closing the book, tilting my head to smile at Mel. “Well, thank you very much for this, I'll try to sit down and study it over the next few days. Though now I'm definitely falling behind both of you in the gift-giving department.”

“It's not a competition, Sammie,” Elle said with playful reproach, looping an arm around my shoulder. “You're just starting to spread your roots, and we understand there's going to be more important things to spend your money on than us, so please don't feel like you have to repay us for things like this.”

“Okay, okay,” I said, giving an exaggerated sigh of resignation and leaning against Elle’s side in return. I tried to take her words to heart, but a part of me still felt I needed to do something. Resolving to worry about that later, I just sat in silence with Elle and Mel for a few more moments, enjoying the ambient sounds of cooking and eating and chatting inside the bakery.

Then, in what I was starting to suspect was some kind of plot, the door to the bakery opened, and Laurence and Roberto entered.

“Ah, shit,” I muttered, drawing Elle and Mel’s attention to the pair. They appeared to be talking amongst themselves, but I was sure it was only a matter of time before they noticed us.

“Ah, about time we get going anyway,” Mel said, rising from her seat first. Elle and I followed, and we moved towards the counter as a group, but I kept one of my ears trained in Laurence and Roberto’s direction, so I caught the exact moment they spotted us.

“Oh, gods.” Lawrence's tweedy voice sounded first. “She’s here.”

“Hnm?” A questioning grunt from Roberto followed. “Ah, the cat.”

“What should we do? It's one thing for her to be skulking around the docks, but this is our part of town!” Laurence said in an aggravated whisper, and I felt some of the fur on my tail start to stand on end. Oh, if they were thinking about starting trouble…

“Bentley said t’leave her be,” Roberto said, sounding more bored than anything. “Come on, move, I'm hungry.”

“Tsh,” Laurence hissed. “I don't see why, there’s no way she'll win the competition. She's going to be expelled either way, what does it matter if it's now or after the festival.”

Before my blood had time to start boiling, Elle and Mel finished the quick conversation they'd started with Sarah while paying for the meal, and turned around to rejoin me. Whether or not they noticed my distress, (and, let's be honest, they noticed) they didn’t comment on it, and by the time we were nearing the door, I was completely calm again, and much less likely to do something that might cause a scene. Even though it did seem that Mel’s assumption about Bentley wanting to preserve his image had been correct, I wasn’t willing to press my luck just to provoke two obnoxious rich kids.

But that didn’t mean I was going to do nothing.

“Oh, hey, you two!” I called out as we passed by the window table the pair had taken, acting as though I'd only just noticed their presence. I made a show of examining the walls of the bakery around me and said, “You were right, this place is pretty great. I should definitely come here more often! Well, seeya around!”

I continued to the door, leading the bemused looking pair of elves behind me. Lawrence's face had gone even paler as he gaped at me, but Roberto actually seemed amused by the exchange, grinning a lopsided grin at his friend's expense. Well, he had spoken against bothering me here, so I didn't want to say anything to rile him up too badly.

“Oh, Roberto, I met your dad earlier,” I said as I reached the door ahead of Elle and Mel and reached to pull it open. “He says ‘hi.’”

With that, I dashed out the door after Elle and Mel, then hustled them to the end of the street, juuuust in case.

“What was that about?” Mel asked after we'd gotten what I deemed an acceptable distance away from the bakery.

“Sorry,” I panted mildly after the short jog. I definitely needed to start working on that stamina problem, and I realized that now that I had, er, “proper support”, I could finally start doing so. “I just wanted to mess with them a little. I heard them talking shit when they noticed me.”

“Sammie,” Elle said, sounding only slightly reproachful.

“Aah,” Mel said, more understanding in her voice. Then, her brow furrowed. “Wait, you heard them talking? I didn't hear them say anything.”

“Well, they were whispering,” I said, shrugging one shoulder.

Mel's mouth opened slightly, then closed, then she asked, “You could hear them whispering, clear across the bakery, while standing next to the kitchen and while Elle and I were talking right beside you?”

“Uh, I guess so? I didn't even notice any of that other stuff, but I was pretty focused on them,” I said, squirming a little on my feet at the mixed looks of surprise on Elle and Mel's faces. I cleared my throat. “Yeah, my hearing is kinda… crazy good.”

“I'll say,” Mel said, finally breaking back into a grin. “We'll have to remember not to plan any surprises for you unless you're in the other room.”

“Ah, yeah, about that…” I said, wincing. Well, if there was anyone I could ask for advice about this in particular, it was probably these two. “I might still be able to hear you even then, if I tried. Trust me, I know, I, uh, can still hear people talking in Felda’s kitchen even when I'm sitting at the bar.”

“That seems oddly specific,” Elle said, giving me a critical eye, and bit down on my lower lip.

“Yeeeeah… I’ve… actually caught a couple of conversations between Felda and Bart when they thought I couldn’t hear them,” I said, rubbing uncomfortably at the back of my neck.

“Sammie, that’s eavesdropping,” Elle said, frowning, and I nodded.

“I know, I know, and the first time it happened it was an accident, I’d only just woken up and I had no idea where I was, or even what I was,” I said, sighing and walking a few steps further, to one of a row of public benches that sat off to the side of the street.

“And after that?” Mel asked, following with her hands in her pockets.

“Well, I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t know what was going on, I just knew I needed information, and I didn’t want to get found out as… as an Outsider,” I said, dropping onto the bench and sliding down into it. Since I was trying to develop more of an awareness of my new appendages, I noted when my ears started to droop slightly. “I figured it couldn’t hurt to be able to listen in sometimes, in case I heard something I needed to know, but… I probably should come clean to Felda and Bart, at least.”

“Probably?” Mel asked, dropping onto the middle of the bench.

“At least?” Elle asked, at the same time, and the pair glanced at each other. Mel snorted and motioned Elle to join her.

“Well, first off, I don’t think you should go around telling everyone,” Mel said, and when Elle furrowed her brow she held up a hand. “I know, I know, but think about it. She’s a catkin, so everyone probably assumes she’s got good ears.” With impeccable timing, Mel gave the back of one of my drooping ears a quick scratch. “People already know better than to gossip next to dogkin and wolfkin, so they should assume the same about her. If it gets out that her hearing is even better than that, people will definitely overreact.”

“Mmmnnn,” Elle fussed, scrunching her face up in thought as she sat down next to Mel, bringing a hand to her chin. “I don’t like it, but, I see your point…”

“As for you, Sam,” Mel said, ceasing her scratching behind my ear, probably to ensure I was listening with my full attention. Which, of course, I already was. “You just promise us you’ll do your best to be responsible about this, and not abuse the trust of the town as a whole.”

“I swear I will only use my powers for good, and not for evil,” I said with a little grin, holding up a hand and then pressing it to the center of my chest.

Mel snorted and raised an eyebrow at that, then just shook her head. “Well, that’s good enough for me.”

“But you should tell Felda and Bart!” Elle said, leaning across Mel to point at me, and I nodded rapidly. “It’ll only get worse the longer you wait!”

“I know, I know, I… I’ll try to do it tonight after we get back,” I said, sighing again and letting my head thump against the backrest of the bench. We rested in comfortable quiet for another minute or so, Mel occasionally patting my head, before I kicked my legs out and sat up.

“So, temple?”

■

(Continued in Part 2)