I came to a stop in front of the shop, a soft breeze the only sign of how fast I’d been traveling. Not that it felt particularly fast when I was running, or anything. Really, the only difference was whether people around me were moving or not.

Speaking of, the door was already in the middle of opening, the bell above it tinkling as a figure stepped out. A familiar figure, with soft brown hair and a small smile that looked real gentle, so long as you didn’t pay attention to the cat tail whipping back and forth behind her. I didn’t know a lot about beastkin - like, whether they even had a term they preferred to beastkin, for example - but if the body language was anything like an actual cat that probably meant she was a bit agitated at seeing me.

Not that I could blame her.

“Sorry,” I said, first thing - though maybe that was a bit too abrupt of me, because she just blinked at me. “For the things I said before, I mean. I… I tend to think I’m better than the average noble, when it comes to commoners - I mean, I still sorta think like I’m one of them - one of you - a lot of the time, but I guess I’m out of touch as any of them sometimes. Haven’t had to deal with having no meals, or… well, what you’ve been through… I’m uh. Not really sure I get it, still? I mean, I like being a girl, but I’m still not sure why someone would feel the need to go out of their way and chase it like that… but maybe if I wasn’t born a girl, I’d understand better? And… I do wanna understand. At least a little, so… I’m sorry. For what I said before.”

The woman blinked at me, again. Her smile never shifted, but her tail did start to slow. 

“I see…” she murmured. “Well, if you’re done apologizing, Dame Bridgette, I do believe Lady Amy is ready and waiting for your arrival.”

“Just ‘Miss’ is fine, honest,” I hurried to tell her, before she could reach the door. “And uh… if you could? I wanted to ask a favor of you before we go inside.”

Her hand paused on the door’s handle. She didn’t turn around, but didn’t open it either.

“If my friend - that is, Lady Amy - if she comes to you, to learn how to do what you did - but in reverse, I guess? To make herself a boy? Anyway, if she comes to you for that, could you… give her guidance, maybe? Tell her what you went through, and make sure she knows what she’s getting into, and make doubly sure she does it right? She has a bad tendency of rushing into things and messing them up bigtime, from what I can tell.”

“From what you can tell?” Lilith parroted back at me, still not turning around.

“It’s sorta complicated, but I’ve only really known her for a couple weeks… she’s messed up loads during that time, though, so I’m pretty sure I’m right about that much at least!”

“You might be,” Lilith replied - and I’m pretty darn sure I heard a touch of amusement in her voice as she did so - “but I don’t think you know her very well, if you’re worried about her doing what I did. She seems quite enamored with magic, from what I can tell - not to mention the feminine form itself. If I didn’t know better, I’d think she started off in a similar state as me.”

“You mean being born as a… that is, uh…” I turned away, even knowing the lady wasn’t looking my way, and coughed a few times. “Well, uh. Good to know, I guess! Though… I’m a little worried as to how you’re so sure of that fact so quickly after you met her! She didn’t do anything odd, did she?”

“Odd? You could say that,” Lilith replied, swinging the door fully open, so that I could see what awaited me on the other side.

Which is to say Amy - propped up high on two tentacles, her feet dangling out from beneath her dress, holding up little Bean with her tentacle and swinging her around and around.

“Bridgette!?” Amy cried out, catching sight of me and stopping midturn. Sadly, the tentacle keeping up Bean didn’t stop, and instead ended up wrapping itself around Amy’s body, with Bean slamming into at the end and both of them tumbling towards the ground.

I was planning on activating my ability to keep them from actually hitting, but in the end I didn’t need to as new tentacles burst out of Amy’s shadow to catch her before she could hit the ground. “Woopsies!”

“I thought you could only summon those from underneath your skirt,” I remarked, narrowing my eyes at her. “Something about how the shadows dwell deepest there?”

“Well, it’s not strictly a requirement,” Amy admitted, blushing a little. “Technically, I suppose it doesn’t even need to be my shadow at all - though it takes a lot more power when I try to conjure them from someone else’s shadow, and I have a lot less finesse with them besides.”

“Right…” I murmured, shaking my head. It probably had more to do with her mental image than any innate limitations of the spell, but stuff like that was notoriously hard to work around. We could deal with it later in any case. “Looks like you found an outfit, at least!”

“Isn’t it perfect?” she asked, dismissing her tentacles so that she could stand up and spin about. The skirt she was in lifted slightly off the ground as she did so, revealing her dainty looking feet dressed in strappy sandals. Possibly not the most practical set of adventuring footwear - I personally preferred sabatons, or failing that some really sturdy boots - but it fit her well enough, and the outfit as a whole had a sorta ‘I guess it technically works’ vibe to it. Like, I wanted to say that the long skirt was completely impractical, but considering how Amy’s spell worked..

“Alright, I guess it’ll do,” I declared, giving it my reluctant seal of approval. 

“It’ll do?” Amy asked, sounding almost offended. “It’s perfect for me!”

“I mean, I guess,” I begrudgingly admitted, “but you should seriously look into getting some leather under the skirt, too.”

“Perhaps later, when we have time to go to a proper armor shop,” Amy replied. “What took you so long, by the way? I thought you were just going to go talk to some guards, but you actually took long enough for them to finish my clothes and then some.”

“Yeah, well, apparently the guards needed more than a little talking to. I had to threaten to get the king involved just to get them up and moving, and even then they just kept complaining about ‘some rich brat’ telling them how to do their jobs - I might have had to teach one of them a lesson.”

“You fought the guards?” Amy asked me, aghast.

“No! I mean, yes, but it was, like, a sanctioned duel! With witnesses and everything! And I mostly just pulled his pants down in front of everyone. And pulled his shirt over his head. And kicked him in the ass a few times, too fast for anyone to see it, but in my defense it made for a really big target.”

“Was that guard George?” Lilith asked, bringing a hand to her mouth as she chuckled. “Oh my. You might want to be careful with that one.”

“I’m not worried about some guard holding a grudge,” I scoffed. “Especially now some lowdown who can’t even be bothered to do his job right…”

“Oh not a grudge, no - it’s just… Well, it’s just a rumor, you understand, but I’ve heard he rather likes that sort of thing…”

I paled. “Oh for… ugh. Whatever. If he wants to come find me at school, I’ll teach him a lesson he won’t forget - except next time I’ll do it by burying him in paperwork or something. Let’s see him get off on that.”

“As you say,” Lilith replied, chuckling again. It was a cute chuckle, too - soft, and gentle, sorta. Maybe chuckle wasn’t even the right word for it? But it didn’t seem high pitched enough to be a giggle, so I’d stick with chuckle for now. “Now, as for the matter of the clothes… I think a stag should suffice.”

“Just one?” I asked, glancing between Lilith and Amy. “That’s a pretty high quality outfit from what I can tell - and you even went to the trouble of sizing it, didn’t you?”

“Well, I can hardly overcharge the ones who saved my sister and me,” Lilith replied. “And besides, Miss Johnson will likely be glad we managed to unload the thing at all - it really has been on the shelves for quite some time.”

“If you say so…” I replied, handing over a silver coin. Of course, I fully planned to slip a couple more in her pocket before we left - as an apology, if nothing else - but there wasn’t much point in arguing with someone who was trying to be nice.

“Why do you call them stags, anyway?” Amy asked, frowning.

It brought an odd look from Lilith and Bean, who were probably wondering if she’d ever even bothered looking at a coin before, but since I was pretty sure she hadn’t…

“Here,” I said, tossing her a silver. “See how it’s got the king’s face on one side, and a stag’s head on the other? That’s why.”

“Then, the reason why coppers are called stars?” she asked, next.

I flipped her a copper in response - one with three stars on the back. “Before you ask, golds are called racks because they’ve got an elk head on them.”

“A stag and an elk?” Amy asked, frowning. “Those seem awfully similar - is there a reason for that?”

“Ooh, I know this one!” Bean volunteered, waving her little hand in the air. “It’s ‘cause the king - the old king, like… the super old, way back when the kingdom started king - he went on a hunting trip with his sworn brother, and they each brought down a prey! The king took down an elk, while his brother brought in a stag - and when the duke tried to say that stags were better, the king went and replied that elks were the ‘golden standard’!”

“Did your big sister teach you that?” I asked, shooting a glance Lilith’s way.

Both girls shook their heads though. 

“I heard it from Old Man Timmothy,” Bean explained. “He rambles on about all sortsa interesting things when he gets drunk!”

“Well, it’s not quite how I was taught it,” I admitted. “I was told that they took down one animal, and just couldn’t decide whether it was an elk or a deer - but honestly, I couldn’t tell you that my answer’s any more right than yours. Pretty sure the truth was lost to time… though it’s kinda funny hearing you of all people bringing the matter up, Amy.”

“Why’s that?” she asked, frowning a little - an expression that looked somehow almost like a pout coming from her. I didn’t know how she did it - a frown from Amelia could cause a girl’s blood to freeze in place, but a frown from Amy just sorta made you wanna pat her on the head and ask her what was wrong. For all that the woman often copied the original Amelia’s actions and mannerisms, there was just something of a different feel about them - at least once you got close enough to her to see past the superficial similarities. Almost like a garnet, up against a ruby - sure, they could both shine the same, but one of them was generally considered a lot more valuable than the other… Though, thinking about it that way, I wasn’t sure which of the two were the ruby and which was the garnet.

“Bridgette?” Amy asked, tugging me from my thoughts.

“Right, sorry - it’s just… Well, the king’s sworn brother was sorta your ancestor, so to speak - the original Duke Tearbolt.”

~~~

Author's Notes

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - if anyone in this story gets a harem, it's Bridgette.*

*Bridgette does not get a harem.

That said? I didn't expect this scene to take a whole chapter - but this story does what it wants, so here we are! We'll get to the guild next time. (Probably in a couple days.)

Of course, if you're impatient, you can read 5 chapters ahead on my Patreon for as little as $1~! (Also, all members - free and paid - get access to my discord, where I post many many pictures of my lizard. Clearly very important information.)

PS: The observant among you might notice I retconned Amelia's last name. I don't generally like to do that sort of thing, but my friend Sammy insisted 'Thornhopple" was too stupid to let stand so here we are.