Oh gods, what will the others think!?” the Kobold said, hands on her head.

“You just thought of that now?” I asked. “I thought you would have, you know, thought that through before asking me.”

“I… listen… I was caught up in the moment. You have to turn me back.”

I rubbed the bridge of my nose, looking at the loud, small, bouncy not-quite-dragon girl. “That’s not… that’s not how this works, T--... what do I even call you?”

“I haven’t thought of that! What do you mean you can’t turn me back?”

I sighed. “It’s like… your soul has a mould for what your body should look like. I just… align the two. It’s mostly going on instinct. I don’t, like, make any decisions when it comes to this stuff.”

The Kobold sat down grumpily and crossed her arms, pulling up the breastplate to cover herself. She was so tiny. “Now what?”

“I… uh… I could ask if someone has any children’s clothing lying around?”

“This isn’t funny!” she shouted. Or tried shouting, rather. Her voice was high pitched and squeaked when she tried to raise it, like being yelled at by a kitten with scales. I had to do everything I could not to squeal.

“Okay, there’s Kobolds in the garrison. They probably have armour in your size. I can have someone run down and get you something, right? And in the meantime you just eh… cover yourself up with your old shirt? Or something? And think about a name, because I don’t feel like the old one works as well.”

She nodded and began to fashion her old shirt into something she could wear in the meantime, and I opened the door to look for Kazumi. That’s when the both of us found out that the rest of the companions had been diligently waiting outside the door for Tybalt, instead of going back to their room.

Sabine, John and Lillian just stared. The last member of the party was the Archeress, who I’d found out was named Melamira, though everyone just stuck to Mellie, herself included. She just burst out laughing. Not subtly, softly or slightly, but loud and joyful. She bent over double laughing and the others found themselves looking back and forth between the exceedingly grumpy kobold girl and the now-hiccupping Mellie.

“What’s… what’s happening?” Lily asked.

“Looks -- hic -- looks like dreams do come true, huh?” Mellie managed between choked breaths. The Kobold next to me just grunted with annoyance.

“Don’t tell me that’s…” Sabine began, the beginnings of a smile and a laugh already dancing on her face.

“I mean, technically, not anymore, surely,” Lillian said, her voice high with incredulity. She looked like she was about to lose it, herself.

Sabine coughed and tried to straighten her face. “Okay, okay. Serious.” She took a deep breath. “What do you want us to call you?”

“I need to think about it,” the Kobold squeaked, “but for now, just not Tybalt.”

“How about ‘Tiny’,” Sabine offered with a suppressed grin. Before the girl could object, Sabine leaned in close. “See, now I’m taller than you, even if I were still headless.”

“Eep,” the Kobold said. “How about Tilly?”

Sabine stood upright and huffed with a playfully dramatic flair. “Fine, then.”

Mellie had recovered as well, and knelt down in front of the newly named Tilly. “Oh my god you’re so small. I just wanna squish your little cheeks.” Despite her words, she didn’t reach out to actually put her words to action, because Tilly was growling softly, daring her to try.

“You try that and I’ll take you out at the knees,” Tilly threatened. It was so hard to take her seriously, she was adorable. Lillian obviously agreed, because she’d barely said anything and only sighed softly from time to time, looking between me and Tilly. When she caught my eyes, she just mouthed ‘thank you’ at me. She seemed almost melancholy.

“How are you going to do that?” Sabine giggled. “Your sword is like, twice as big as you are.”

Then, Tilly surprised all of us by picking up her sword in both hands and raising it almost effortlessly. She grinned, her small sharp teeth gleaming. “Looks like it won’t be that much of a problem, Sabine.”

Sabine responded by bringing her hands to her mouth. Tilly looked at her quizzically.

“She’s so cute,” Sabine cried. Lillian nodded and I saw tears in her eyes as she was making very soft, high pitched noises.

“Merp,” Tilly said.

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“How…” Mellie started laughing again as she backed away carefully, holding her hands up defensively. “How are you going to carry it around?”

Tilly looked at her and opened and closed her mouth a few times, which made a sound like a binder snapping shut.

“Sideways,” she said, arriving at something that wouldn’t necessarily look ridiculous.

“How will you fit through the door?” Mellie giggled.

“Stop… Stop bullying me!” Tilly squeaked with indignation.

Sabine took a deep breath and smiled. “I’m sorry, Tilly. That… The fact that you’re a girl is honestly the least shocking thing about all of this. But you’re so tiny!”

“I’m a Kobold now,” Tilly said, waving the sword for emphasis. “Kobolds are small. I’m allowed to be small!”

“You know what?” Mellie said. “You are.”

Tilly smiled, then narrowed her eyes. “You’re not making fun of me?”

Mellie shook her head. “No. You deserve to be yourself as much as anyone else. Even if that is three foot tall.”

Tilly beamed as Lillian walked over to her and knelt down next to her. “For what it’s worth, I think it’s an improvement.” Tilly started to sputter again, assuming she was being mocked, but Lillian wasn’t having it. “You look beautiful. I like you this way and I hope you feel much better,” she said, and offered her hand. Tilly put her tiny hand in Lillian’s and looked up to her with surprise and the slowly dawning realization that, even though her friends were giving her shit, they were there for her. I could tell she was about to cry, and I slowly tried to sidle out of the room, which was difficult to do when you were nine foot tall, but all of the attention was being taken up by Tilly, as her companions slowly closed the circle around her and just sat on the floor to talk. They were asking her how long she’d known and so on, but I felt it wasn’t my place. Tilly was already crying quietly. I looked at them one more time, and again Lillian caught my eyes and simply nodded. I nodded back. As I walked away, Sabine caught up to me and I turned to her.

“Aren’t you going to stay with Tilly?”

She shrugged. “We’ve got time to catch up. Besides, she and I were never the best of friends. And I wanted to talk to you. Where are you headed?”

I slowed down my stride a bit so she could walk along with me. “I’m trying to find Kazumi. She might know who I have to talk to to get a kobold uniform.”

Sabine helped me look for Kazumi, and we quickly relayed what had happened. Her mouth turned into a perfect ‘o’ when she was told, and she quickly dispatched a messenger to the barracks. Sabine then suggested that Kazumi come along to my chambers.

“What I have to say will probably concern you too,” Sabine said.

We arrived and I sat down on the edge of the overly large bed. Kazumi slithered onto it and threw herself face-first into a stack of pillows. Whitehallow had been a lovely stay, but something about the absolute size of my bed here, and its myriad of pillows, was apparently irresistible to her. Sabine and I couldn’t help but smile, and looked at each other. She came close and our noses touched softly. After just a second, Sabine looked up and beckoned Kazumi over, who was starting to wrap herself around us, her soft scales warm to the touch. Sabine, however, pulled away slightly, and Kazumi and I looked at her curiously. She didn’t seem upset, so we were both just waiting to see where this was going.

“So, you know how absolutely and adorably tiny Tilly is, right?”

I nodded.

“So I’ve been thinking of a How to go with the What, and I think I’ve finally figured out how to do this.”

I gave her a cautious glance. “Babe, magic hasn’t always gone well… you know, around here.”

Sabine rubbed the back of her head sheepishly. “No offense, Liz, but… that was mostly… you know… your magic.” Fair. A little hurtful, but fair. “Trust me, love,” she said, and closed her eyes.

The magic flowed through her. It was good to see her use normal magic again. The Necromancy had made her undead features all the more obvious and she’d looked so very cold when the black tendrils had warped themselves over her skin. This, however, was a soft pink energy, dancing playfully around her fingers and lips as she began to mutter the incantation and magic became word became reality. Her fingers spun an intricate web in the air, and Kazumi backed up a little bit as glowing bands of pink light wrapped themselves around me and suddenly my vision went black. My entire body was on fire, but somehow it didn’t hurt. My head swam and I felt constricted, as if I was wearing a suit that was getting smaller by the second. When my vision returned to me, there was a strange sensation, as if the walls were getting further away from me. After just a second, it stopped, and I realized I was now looking up at Sabine.

“Did it w--” I started.

“She’s so small!” Kazumi yelped and she instantly shot over to me, half wrapping herself around me. “You’re so! Small!” I looked up at her. Her face seemed to be much larger than it was before, and I looked at Sabine again and smiled.

“That’s a yes, then?”

She nodded and walked over too. “You look… Liz…” It was clear she was getting choked up, but I couldn’t tell over what. After all, I was much the same as I’d always been, right? Just smaller. It was different, though. My head felt lighter. I reached up and found my horns missing. As my arm passed my field of vision I also realized that my skin was just… skin-coloured now.

“How did…” I started and looked at her, but she was preoccupied by staring at my face, and I was starting to get self-conscious until Sabine did what I couldn’t help but assume she’d been waiting a long time to do. Now that we were the same size, there was nothing stopping her from leaning in and kissing me, Kazumi pressed lovingly against my back. I was surrounded by love and for the first time, we were equals in height. I wondered how weird it must’ve been for them, trying to kiss a face that was twice the size of a normal one. Like kissing a statue?

Eventually, Sabine had to come up for air and I got no reprieve as Kazumi did the exact same thing. Though I was focused on other things, I could hear Sabine laughing in the background at the eagerness that was on display. Finally, we all caught our breath.

“So this isn’t really… a transformation.”

I cocked my head. It sure looked like one.

“It’s an illusion. You’re still, well, yourself. Nine foot tall, horned and strong. It’s just… temporarily… bent into a smaller shape. It’s an illusion… how do I put this… instead of fooling your eyes or your ears, it temporarily fools reality a little bit. You won’t like, walk into door frames.”

“Temporarily?” I asked, a little hopeful. I loved being the same size as Kazumi and Sabine, but being tall and powerful, being the Dragon Queen, it felt right. Sabine nodded.

“Eight, maybe ten hours. Then it wears off, and I need to apply it again. That should give us enough time to travel during the day, I think, without any nasty surprises.”

“So, if it’s an illusion,” Kazumi said carefully, “is she still as strong as she used to be?”

Sabine laughed. “Stronger, probably. The same strength, but in a more compact body. That sounds, eh…”

“Terrifying,” I said, but I could barely hear myself, because Kazumi and Sabine both said “Wow” at the same time, then looked at each other and laughed.

Then Kazumi took me by the hand and tried to pull me upright. I immediately understood what Sabine had meant as Kazumi almost fell over trying to pull me upright. She looked like she’d tried to pull a boulder ten times her weight. If she’d had human legs, then she would’ve wiped out. She looked at me with puppy-eyes and I immediately joined her as she pulled me up to go check myself out in the mirror. I wondered for just a second if my clothes were about to fall off me, but I realized that Sabine had made them change with me. That was probably for the best; I was still exploring my own wardrobe. As we stumbled in front of the mirror, I finally realized what had caused Sabine to make the noises she’d made.

The woman in front of the mirror was not the Demon Dragon Queen. It was just… a normal girl. No horns, no deep purple skin, no sharp teeth. Just someone with a soft and kind face, a slightly awkward smile, and big, brown eyes to match the brown hair. She looked so normal and sweet and lovely and I couldn’t believe that that was me. But if the past few days had taught me anything, it was that, if this felt like me, too, then that was okay. I could be a tall and beautiful demon queen and I could be a small and cute human girl. I could be whatever. I was allowed.

I looked in the mirror and blushed, turning to Sabine and Kazumi, feigning despair.

“Oh no, now you’ll be able to tell when I’m blushing,” I laughed.

Sabine laughed too. Kazumi bit her lip in what I’d learned was a sign of affection on her part.

“Liz,” she said. “Sweetheart. You beautiful… we can always tell when you’re blushing.”