The trip through the tunnel is a short one. I quickly alight into a massive cavern, a cavern brimming with sound and magic. The magic doesn’t feel the same as the natural magic I felt outside, but more refined and subdued. My eyes follow a wisp of it to a light enchantment etched into the ceiling of the cave. Almost everything and everyone here is leaking magic all over the place, but not the same way Mia did when she transformed; there is no intent behind the magic.

  Someone bumps into me and mutters a few words, making me realize that I am standing in the middle of the entrance to the town. I quickly scurry towards the side of the road. The houses are a mix of constructions and ones carved out of the mountain itself, or maybe they were molded by magic. Starting to make my way down the road deeper into town, I observe the people walking along the street around me. Most of them seem mostly human, with little features here and there, though some have none, and others are much more like me, more not human than human.

  Am I even human still? I was, until yesterday, but my body is very different now, and I don’t feel as restrained anymore, like I can be who I want to be. Walking while pondering the question, I only notice the change in my surroundings when my head bumps into a wooden stand.

  “Oi, if you want fruit, your master will have to pay for it!” A gruff voice accosts me from above, raising my eyes; I am met with the face of a just as gruff looking man, anger evident on his face from my carelessness. Does he think I am an animal? A confusing whirr of emotions goes through me at that, anger, relief, elation, it’s odd, and more to consider later.

  I glance around, no one seems to care about his behavior, nor do they pay us any attention. Bowing my head in apology I quickly scurry away. Mia said to stay out of trouble, and getting in a fight with someone seems counter to that. The man doesn’t follow me, just grumbling more behind me as I disappear into a nearby alley.

  Peeking out from my new hiding spot, I get a better look at the area I had ended up in. It’s a wide open plaza, with many stands spread across it, selling all kinds of things, from food to jewellery and animal parts. Most of it exudes magic to some extent, some so little that I have to squint to even notice it, even with my much better eyesight now.

  Heavy footsteps approach the entry of the alley, armored boots. Soldiers. I can feel the magic wafting off of them, the amount of this weirdly unused magic in this place is starting to make me nauseous. The soldiers keep coming closer and I feel panic sneak through me, my senses are getting overwhelmed and I can’t handle another encounter with potentially antagonistic people. Especially if they think I’m some run away animal.

  Trying to hide, I start slinking back into the shadows, almost instinctively reaching out to the magic woven into my body. I don’t notice it until the world around me goes blissfully quiet, the magic leaking all over the place becoming muted into the background as my skin shifts to match my surroundings, the magic in my body following suit. It’s almost as if I isolated myself from the world, but concentrating for a moment brings the magic of a jewellery stand back into focus, standing out of its background like a beacon that would be so easy to follow.

  The soldiers appear in the entrance of the alleyway, one of them looks in my direction and meets my eyes, and yet it feels like he looks right through me. The group quickly moves on, nothing of note to be seen here on their patrol.

  With the patrol gone, I feel safe enough to explore this new state of mine. I reach out to the magic within me and prod at it, trying to figure out what it is doing. It responds to me, an answer that is foreign and yet familiar. The magic doesn’t speak in words, and there is a weight, a purpose behind it. It is here to make sure I am safe. To make sure I am strong, if I wish. It wants me to be strong. It wants me to follow my path, because my path is its path. There’s more meaning to the feeling, a meaning I can’t quite parse. Not yet. I slowly retreat from the connection, lessening it. it’s still there, always, I am fairly sure, I was just unaware before. It’s there, waiting for me to call out to it. For now though, it knows to keep me safe, and for some reason, I trust it as much as I did Anya. Probably not a wise thing, but it does not seem like it wants to actively harm me.

  My attention turns back to my surroundings. The alley I am in leads to more alleys, deeper into the town, though my gaze turns up instead, towards the roofs. They’re not all that high up, and I want to figure out just how much my body has grown.

  My paw touches the wall, and the scales on my hand respond almost automatically to my intent, latching into the microscopic imperfection, securing my grip. They easily release when I retract my hand. I place another paw and try to pull myself up, my muscles easily carry my body, and my grip holds true. A few seconds later I am on top of the roof, my tail swaying behind me. The climb had been easier than I expected, not even causing me to slip once. Looking over the rooftops, I am alone up here. Perfect to do some tests. As perfect as I can get, for now, at least.

  I crouch low to the ground and my hind legs flex, kicking off of the ground and propelling me forwards. My speed blurs the surroundings as I sail across several roofs before touching down without a sound, tail split and splayed wide behind me to increase my drag to slow down. It had been so easy and instinctual to split them that first time, and this time it had been as well; they almost had a mind of their own.

  My tails merge back together into one just as easily as they split, though as I do so, a small breeze brushes through the little follicles, alerting me to a small draft throughout the big cave. Raising my head I look around, trying to spot where the draft is going to, but I can’t find anything. The best I can make out is a few concentrations of heat throughout the city. Putting aside that curiosity for the moment, I consider what else to test. I couldn’t exactly go punch a wall, so a full speed test over a longer distance is in order. This time, it is not just my hind legs bracing against the ground, but my arms too, my tail low to the ground. I breathe in deeply, concentrating and scouting out a path ahead before I finally start moving.

  The start is a slight bit off rhythm as I find what works, but it quickly turns into a steady hit of paw against stone, only interrupted by the occasional gap between rooftops. The magic that is keeping me hidden is somehow also keeping the sound of my paws against the stone from leaking out far, so despite my gathering speed I am left unbothered. I continue moving, the air brushing through my scale feathers, exhilaration filling me, until I panickedly have to kick off to the side as I almost run into a stone outcropping on a roof.

  Tumbling to the side I curse a little under my breath but quickly regain speed, sharpening my attention. It’s hard to react with how fast I am moving, as fast as a car on a highway. As I move I try to hone my attention more. My body is clearly capable of maneuvering at these speeds, yet my perception lags behind. It feels off despite the ecstasy it brings me. It takes another close call of me leaping over another obstruction before I realize that I probably do have a solution. The magic suffusing me is capable of filtering my senses, like a second brain only letting the important things through for me to fully consider. Why, then, should it not be capable of doing something similar here?

  I slow down momentarily as I reach out to the magic in me, and find it waiting as it had before. The communication with it is strange, and I feel that I do not need to command it in this way, that it will follow my will regardless. Yet, there is an element of it that seems almost, happy, that I reach out to it. It already knows what I want, and it is happy to provide, though part of it informs me that it will change me, as it did before. I admittedly had been surprised about the changes, and yet I am not at all reluctant to permit the magic to do more of its work. It feels right, the changes it had brought before.

  Slowing down a little more, I give my permission to the magic to do its work. It doesn’t take long before I feel it start, something inside of me is squirming and growing, changing, there is a short moment of pain that is gone as quickly as it came. Shaking my head slightly, I look out towards the world again. There’s no perceptible changes, but the magic assures me it succeeded, that it can do more, but it has little to work with.

  A curious statement, but for now I must see if it is right. I accelerate again, the world around me does not blur, instead it all remains in sharp clarity. Time doesn’t feel slower, the airstream still crosses across my body as it did before, but my brain is capable of processing the information at a much higher rate.

  I come to a halt a few roofs later, slowing down at a less rapid pace than with my tail parachute. The magic had changed my brain. A small shudder goes down my back, yet I can’t tell if it is one of fear or excitement. Maybe a mix of both. I’d always taken issues with things affecting my brain, drugs of various types, medical and not, yet this felt different. This felt not like an outside influence, this felt like me becoming more.

  Yet, that wasn’t right, was it? The magic is not me, or maybe it is? It suffuses my entire body, down to every single cell as far as I can tell, and unlike almost everyone else I’ve seen, it does not leak from me. It is inside of me, a part of me. Is it the same magic as out in nature, or is it its own offshoot? I ponder the question and the different types of magic I had felt so far, when the magic all around me starts to resonate. A moment later a bell tolls throughout the entire town, everywhere at once without a central source of the sound.

  Apparently, the time to meet up with Mia had come, though the magic of the clock is unsettling, invasive in a way that other magic hadn’t been. It takes a few moments before the bell stops, and I start making my way towards the inn. I did end up relatively far, but the rooftops made it a rather straight shot to get there, so I wouldn’t be all that late. Hopefully Mia wasn’t going to worry!

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  Mia steps out of the meeting room, annoyance wafting through her as the doors slam behind her. Her so-called superior had insisted on her agreeing to patrol duties for a week, since she came back empty handed from her expedition. He was lucky that she wasn’t in a position to shatter his mind currently, so she just told him off for his audacity.

  She lets out a deep sigh as she makes her way into town. Civil unrest had been on the rise recently, unsurprising to her, though the failure of a monarchy, and the leadership they had cultivated, was very confused by it. Idiots. High on the power of their own magic while exploiting those below them. Of course this would happen sooner or later.

  Continuing her way down the streets, she makes it to the shadow’s hare just in time for the bell’s toll. The inn was squirreled away in an alley, slightly away from one of the big market places. The streets leading here had been rather full, many of the more destitute citizens walking around in the area, though this market was in a middle point between the slums and the well-off areas. Most of them usually avoided it, not wanting to be the latest target of the harassment of the guard. It was a sign that things were going to get ugly, soon enough. Ada had not arrived at the inn yet. Mia couldn’t help but worry, the atmosphere was getting more tense by the minute.

  If the guards saw her here, they’d start asking questions. She was, after all, supposed to be in the barracks. Not that she ever actually slept there, most of the soldiers were there voluntarily, unlike her, and they hadn’t exactly a lot of respect for women. Mia starts to pace, her eyes looking between the entrances of the alley, waiting anxiously for Ada to show up, where was the little creature? Had she gotten into trouble? If the guard found her, there’d be issues. They never took kindly to the more aberrant mutations.

  There’s a rustling sound above her as a face appears in her vision upside down. A cute little snout with ruby red eyes looking at her own. “Mia! I’m here.” Ada had apparently found her own way around town. Relief floods through Mia as she raises a hand to the woman’s cheek. “There you are! I was worried. We’ll have to get off the street-” She stops mid sentence as a patrol rounds the corner into the alley. They hadn’t noticed them yet, instead starting to violently knock on doors, calling for the denizen to open the door for an inspection.

  “Fuck, we can’t stay in the hare, not yet.” She glances around and motions for Ada to come down. “We have to go, there’s a protest forming in the market, and the guard is on edge, and by the looks of it they’re not planning to leave this one unpunished.” Ada follows her request and crouches low to the ground next to her, her presence is even less evident than when they first met, her eyes having a hard time locking onto her form.

  “A protest? Or a riot? I saw several armed people walking down the alleyways on my way back here.” They start moving out of the alleyway into an adjacent street, Ada’s voice is light and doesn’t carry far. “Just how bad is the situation in the kingdom?”

  Mia’s expression falls a little. A riot was going to cause a lock down, and many people were going to get hurt. “Bad, suffice to say. Most people are over being treated like lessers.” She continues to lead them down the road. No one seems to bother with them, they’re all on edge, some are scurrying home, but many are heading towards the market. “We’ll circle back to the inn in a bit. I can’t really get involved in this…” It pains her, but the powers that be wouldn’t let her get away with it. Not yet.

  Ada looks up at her, her head tilting as she seems to stalk across the ground, the eyes that do turn their way, just glance over her, ignoring her presence. “Why? You don’t like this. You want to help, no?”

  “Yes, but I can’t. I’ll… tell you later. When we’re safe and in private.” She leads them down another street, away from the market. They’re forced to take another few detours, through various side streets and alleys to avoid an increasing number of patrols, until they finally reach far enough away from the center of the commotion for the presence to lessen again.

  “There’s another inn we can stay at, it’s not as nice but I don’t think the riots are going to die down any time soon.” She looks back towards the way they came, the orange light of fire brightening the buildings. “I’d say we have to leave the town but at this point the port is most likely locked down already, and if they see me trying to leave it’ll cause even more trouble.” She sighs, turning to Ada. “I’m sorry you got caught up in this.”

  Ada looks up at her, patterns go across her body for a few moments before she speaks. “Don’t be, I wish I could help though. I haven’t seen much, but if this is how it’s already gotten, then the situation can’t be great.” She lowers her head in thought for a bit, Mia waiting patiently for her to continue. “I want to be strong. People can grow stronger, yes? You said your magic took you a long time, so you didn’t start out with it.”

  Mia smiles at her, the ambition and light in her eyes quite endearing. “Yes, you can grow stronger, though the details differ for everyone, a good place to start is to go out and hunt. I’ll take you sometime, I am not sure when yet.” She stretches before looking at their surroundings. “The other inn isn’t too far from here, we’ll be safe there.”

  Ada gives her a nod and follows her as she starts walking. “I honestly can’t tell how strong you are, little one, your presence is oddly muted, even more so now than it was earlier today.” She throws her a curious glance, and is met with a proud smile, a pattern going across her body to match.

  “The magic’s hiding me! It’s been quite nice, cooperative! Is it like this for everyone? The taste of the magic here is so… different to what it is outside.” Ada skips a few steps with a small leap.

  Mia almost stops in her steps at Ada’s words. “That… no. It’s not like that for everyone.” They reach the inn before she can elaborate, and opens the door, motioning Ada inside. “Let’s get a room and talk.”

  Booking the room is a quick endeavor, the innkeeper not asking any questions about Ada, and a few minutes later they step into their room for the night. It’s not exactly large, just two beds and a little bit of room in between. “Here we are, I am not sure how comfortable the beds are going to be for you, but it’ll have to do.” Mia takes a seat on one of the beds, and motions for Ada to join her. Ada quickly scurries up on the bed next to her and curls up into a little ball, eyes peeking up at Mia from underneath her tail.

  “Magic! Tell me about it! You said it’s different for you, yes?” The excitement is evident in her voice, and a veritable riot of lines goes across her skin.

  “Ah, sure. You said it listens to you, and… has some form of mind of its own?” Mia pauses for a reaction from Ada, a quick nod in confirmation. “That is somewhat concerning to hear, I admit. Magic, as far as I am aware, is not supposed to be sentient, it’s just another form of energy, something we can manipulate.” Ada tilts her head slightly in thought, before a short flicker goes across her body.

  “Mother said that magic is malleable, but that a gentle coaxing is more effective than trying to bruteforce it. Something about different aspects?” Her voice seems a little unsure.

  Mia raises an eyebrow in askance. “Your mother? Didn’t you get trapped in the barrier during the genesis? Although… there have been some that claimed to know about magic from before the genesis, and admittedly most people just ignored them, including me.”

  “That makes sense, I only knew a little bit, as a child. Mother didn’t get to teach me much before she died…” An expression of pained memories crosses across Ada’s face as she falls quiet. “It was real.”

  Mia reaches out a hand and gently pats the woman’s head. “I see, well, different aspects of magic do exist, I know that much, mine is attuned to fractal magic but I can brute force other spells if I must, but it isn’t the same as sentience.” She brushes a few fingers across the top of Ada’s head as she speaks. “I’ve heard some biomancers talk about the magic being eager before, but so is lightning. The only times that magic is sentient, or at least close to it, that I know of is during genesis events. When enough unbound magic gathers in one spot to create a spell of its own, without anyone guiding it.”

  Ada’s head leans up into Mia’s palm as she absentmindedly continues her caress. “That doesn’t sound right. When you transformed back to a person, I felt your magic. It felt like it wanted to do more, that it was incomplete.” Ada pauses for a moment before carrying on, unaware of the curiosity building inside Mia. “Maybe if you taste my magic you can figure it out?”

  “Taste?” Mia giggles a little. “I’m sorry I don’t think I can taste magic.” Ada’s expression droops a little in response.

  “Oh, you smell it then? Or hear it?” Mia’s eyebrow goes up at the questions.

  “You… no, almost no one can sense magic that isn’t directly being worked into a spell, and even then, it is usually the physical manifestations that people observe. Can you actually taste the magic?” Ada’s expression continues to drop, before lighting up again at the question.

  “Yes! Some magic at least, some of it is more like a sound, other like light! They all are present in all ways but they tend to be biased to one or the other! As far as I’ve seen so far at least! Your transformation tasted nice, but it had something missing! Like the spices in a dish!” Ada’s head animatedly bobs up and down beneath her tail and Mia’s hand.

  Mia considers her words for a few moments. “Clearly your perception of magic is different, better, than mine. So, if it is sentient, maybe I haven’t been able to hear it. But I am no biomancer, I can’t just magic myself new senses. And I am not sure it is safe. The magic during genesis events tends to hurt a lot of people, or change them against their will. If the magic we use has its own will, and we stop directing it…” She looks at Ada again, the adorable creature looking up at her with her big ruby eyes, almost pleading. The magic had not harmed her, it had helped her, protected her, and seemingly cooperates with her, for now at least. How much harm could there be in trying to give it a bit more freedom? To coordinate with it? “Okay, I will try to listen to it, see what it wants, if you complete a successful hunt with it.”

  Ada’s expression lights up again. “Yes! I’ll show you how nice it is! It feels trustworthy to me at least, it said it wants what's best for me, that we share a path!” A big smile reveals rows of sharp teeth, designed to tear apart the woman’s prey, in what Mia suspects would be a much less adorable display than Ada’s appearance.

  Mia considers Ada’s words for a few minutes, the two sharing a comfortable silence. It is only interrupted when a yawn escapes Ada next to her. “Getting sleepy? I am not sure how exactly the barrier worked and can’t tell how much your body has been able to rest since your transformation, but you’ve also been quite active today, if I were to hazard a guess.” She grabs the side of the blanket and lifts it, motioning for Ada to crawl underneath. “We can continue talking tomorrow, and we can start making plans as to our next steps.” Ada gives her a bleary nod, before crawling underneath the blanket, curling up into a little ball.

  Covering her in the blanket, Mia then moves over to the other bed, getting ready to sleep herself. “Good night, little one.”

  “Good night, Mia.” The voice is muffled by the tail and blanket, barely any movement coming from Ada.