After talking about healing with him, and sitting in while he tended an old lady with weak lungs, she went back to the tavern and studied roast pork, the local beer, and gator leather. Nusina was more interested in the clay for its watery properties. The townsfolk were interested in building her a basic shrine of the cheap kind they probably wouldn't use much, in return for magic access. Ruyo mentioned that a better temple would get them access to the magic postal network, but didn't press.

She rented a room, but that evening she said to Nusina, "Let's look around. We might learn more while the creatures are active and we're not guarded by some hunting party."

The spirit said, "Can you promise not to get within claw range of them this time?"

"I'll run if they get aggressive. Be my lantern though, so they don't sneak up on me."

She crept outside and left the safe boardwalks of the village for the mire beyond it. In the darkness she floated over the water with a weird sense of her spell sticking with more friction and less control than when she raced over open sea.

They explored the swamp, giving off light like will-o-wisps in the night. Creatures scuttled and splashed. She didn't know how to find any sign of the gators, so she headed roughly in the direction the attacks had come from.

Nusina said, "I might have something. There's a water magic enchantment somewhere around here. Besides us."

Ruyo searched but lacked the sensitivity to these things. She tried to follow her companion's lead. Soon, Nusina spun in a circle a dozen paces wide. "Somewhere in this area."

Ruyo was the one to spot a bundle of bloody rags in the murk. "I don't like this. And you think it's got magic on it? Oh, yes, I see something there."

Nusina bobbed. "See how it's tied up? Untying the knot or just tearing it open will set off the spell, which looks like... an ice elemental summon."

Ruyo folded her arms. "So, someone finds this bundle full of what I hope is pig meat, cuts it open, and they get attacked by a sudden angry ice monster?"

"Looks that way."

"Then we may be dealing with a dangerous idiot. We know somebody who wants to collect gator corpses for study and who knows water magic. How about we dump this bundle on his doorstep and see how he reacts?"

"Maybe something more subtle."

She went over to the wrapped offering and conjured a stick to poke it, then pick it up. "All right. I still want the proof here though."

She started back toward the village, then froze. Something ahead was splashing loudly, bearing a magelight. She put out her light and sent Nusina ahead invisibly.

"It's the doc!" she said.

Ruyo rushed him. They met in the light of blue-tinged spells, him slogging and her floating. Ruyo held up the bundle and said, "I'm out for a stroll with my midnight snack; what about you?"

"That was subtlety?" asked Nusina.

"He didn't give me much to work with."

Doc Harnor looked pale and unhealthy. "I can explain."

"Yes?"

"There was... I mean..." Ruyo just faced him down until he covered his face with his hands. "I needed to know more about the creatures. I figured that if I could provoke a few, we could get bodies to dissect. And then came that new idea of creating elemental spirits, expendable shiny things that could get their attention."

"You're lucky you didn't get anyone killed doing that. Were you on the front lines fighting off the angry gators, or did you hang back and let other people risk their lives and property for your curiosity?"

"I helped a little," he said, shrinking back from Ruyo. "No point in hiding it now. What will you do? I'll stop; if there are more attacks they won't be ones I provoked."

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Ruyo wanted to whap the fool upside the head, but conferred with Nusina. The spirit had an idea. Ruyo said, "I'll give you a choice. Either I tell everybody what you did, or you get marked." She showed off her altered, inhuman hands, and noticed to her surprise that a patch of glinting silver fish-scales had grown along her right arm. "I've been looking for a chance to practice body-altering magic, and alligator scales might be appropriate to try, wouldn't they?"

Harnor stood there shocked. "I saw that you'd done that to yourself, but you're able to change other people? You wouldn't turn me all the way, would you?"

"I wouldn't know how. But hey, you like using people for your experiments, right?"

"Yes, please."

His eagerness was a little embarrassing. "Well, I did say I'd rather empower people than curse them, so this'll probably be beneficial except when people ask why he's marked."

Nusina splash-shrugged.

Ruyo went to work, taking the man's arms and flowing an elemental around them like shackles. His flesh wasn't injured but she sculpted and adjusted it subtly, focusing on his skin. She felt it prickle, the hairs bending and stretching into rough plates. Her spell sank into him and spread like deep green ink until it covered him nearly from wrist to elbow. She pulled the water orb away from him and he hissed as though having a bandage torn off.

Harnor rubbed the rough, scaly skin of one arm with the other. "Thanks for your mercy."

"Find me in a year or so and I can probably undo that. It looks like you didn't cause too much harm, but don't do that again. Also, teach me how you linked a spell to a knot."

#

She went back to town and slept. The doc wouldn't be able to hide his changes easily, and might end up explaining them as a "blessing". But he'd know what he did. She decided not to make contact with the local gators directly, until she was more confident in her safety around them.

In the morning, Ruyo made some effort to help out the villagers who'd lost property to the attacks. Free blankets, iron, the usual. All she told them was, "I'd stay on guard, but I did a patrol last night and dealt with a little magical disturbance. That might help."

The innkeeper spoke for the breakfast crowd, saying, "We might do one of those little shrines for you, ma'am. Don't know if you solved the gator problem but you've been helpful and it's not much cost to us."

Ruyo bowed slightly. "I'll make it worth your while."

#

She prepared a crude ritual circle in chalk on the floor of her rented room, and continued her daily routine of supplying Wellspring with food and other supplies. Since the meeting at Trueharbor she had an obligation to keep sending them remotely conjured deliveries, too, helping to keep the nearby group of refugees fed while they rebuilt their village. At least she wasn't still repeating the constant deliveries of those blasted magic sticks for the army. Making bread at a remote target was simpler than plugging enchantments into items for later use. It took several hours of daily work to keep the goods flowing and she still probably wasn't feeding the whole group very well.

"How is the mana balance of what I'm getting from the Trueharbor shrine, versus the cost?"

Nusina said, "It's probably a net loss, milady, but I'd need to be at a shrine to study the flow. More incentive for you to work on efficiency."

She sent a bit of conjured pork along with the bread, just for variety.

She headed out of town at noon, but wasn't sure to where. "What do you think, droplet? Catch up with Elly, or move on?"

"We've been out of contact with everyone for days. Let's get east to the coast and head north to Follyport."

Ruyo couldn't keep up her wave-based travel all day, especially on land, so heading for the coast was sensible. She traveled along a different route angling northeast until she was back on the rocky shore.

"What do you think of the fish scales?" Nusina asked.

Ruyo was walking, taking a break from the travel spell. "They itch. I don't think they protect me much, so I'd rather go with the dolphin style."

"Do you want to change yourself more, or go back to human-looking? You could probably turn blue or grow shell plating or something."

"That's a question of what I really am, isn't it? Back in that last town, a man saw creatures that we know aren't completely dumb beasts, and decided to get some of them killed for his own curiosity. If I show up somewhere with a monstrous look, I might get the same reaction."

"If you're ugly, maybe. Jokes aside, being beautiful will be good for your marketing."

"I hope Miras is doing all right." The boar-like priest had asked to preach in Ruyo's name about "inner beauty", given his own warped and frightening appearance. "Maybe I can help him a bit."

"It's worth trying next time you're in Starshore. It's a good doctrine to preach about anyway."

She walked on, looking at her webbed hands. "Changing myself is good advertising. But it's also honest, isn't it? I'm not normal anymore no matter how I look."

"You sound regretful."

"You were never human, right?"

"So far as I know. Someday I'd like to try it! It's not a high priority for our research though."

Ruyo grinned and teased her. "Less important than figuring out how to build a 'wave pool' people can play in?"

"Everyone can enjoy that! It's not just for me."

Ruyo said, "Anyway, most people would probably not want to see a new face in the mirror. Someone might imagine going on a journey and fighting monsters, but coming back with no more obvious changes than a missing ring finger or something. That's well and good; he probably got stronger and braver and has a story to tell. But there's a whole other direction to explore, if you're willing to look different and feel different. And if it matters. That man I just changed is still mostly human, but maybe the changes will make him a better person."

"Is that something you want to do more of, then?"

She nodded, and conjured a wave of phantom water to carry her onward again. "I've already become something new. I'd like to see where I can go in that direction."