The Maiden of Memories

Chapter 3

When Lethe woke up, she felt different.

Strangely, her body was now resting horizontally on the surface of the water. Oh shoot! Lethe realized that her neck was above water, so she tried to shift her body to get her neck underwater, but she couldn't- she was too tired. No, she didn't want to suffocate.

Except, she wasn't suffocating.

For some strange reason, she could breathe above water. But Lethe wouldn't really mind that- she had other problems to tend to, like the theft of the Talis- oh shoot!

Lethe splashed around, struggling to try getting underwater, but the water wouldn't let her; she just kept floating on the surface. For some strange reason, the buoyancy was really forceful this time. She tried to use her tail to flip around- hey, where was her tail? Her lower-half felt weird now, like she had two thin tails instead. It was really strange, but she wouldn't focus on her strange body changes, she just wouldn't, she had other problems to focus on, like the Talisman's disappearance, yeah, she had to focus on that.

She tried to bring her hand up, trying to look for her ring. It was quite tiring, but she pulled it out of water, and she felt relieved, because her sapphire ring was resting on a brown finger-

Wait a minute. Brown?

She pulled up her hand as quickly as she could, ignoring the pain caused by her actions, and stared at her hand.

Instead of the pale blue and silver scales that usually covered it, there was just brown skin like the color of tree trunks. Heck, it was just as wrinkled as tree trunks. Instead of the sharp, claw-like nails on the tips of her fingers, the fingernails were curved and smooth and the color of raw fish flesh. Lethe stared at the strange thing that was supposedly a part of her. What was happening to her!?

Then she realized: brown skin. Two thin tails. Being able to breathe above water. It finally clicked.

She splashed around and struggled for a minute, trying to get onto land. Although it was against her very nature and instinct to climb onto dry land, she knew that she had to. She struggled as she attempted swimming, doing a terrible job with her thin tails. But after some effort and time, she made it onto dry land. And she looked at herself.

And unfortunately, she was right about what she was thinking. She looked at the rest of her body, and while she still wore the armor made of capiz pearls from the Terrien Ocean, that only covered her long torso. The rest of her body was naked, and she could see that she didn't even have a true tail anymore. It was covered in same skin that covered the rest of her, brown and rough as the river floor, instead of the silver and turquoise scales that were smooth and slippery to the touch. Her hair bun had gotten loose, and instead of dark indigo hair, black waves that were the color of the night sky had fallen to her chest and on her back. She lifted a hand to her neck, and instead of feeling rough slits for air to come in, she found more skin, probably not silver too.

Lethe had turned into a human.

She didn't scream or shout or cry. What she did instead, was to drop down on the ground, the weathered river bed and sigh. Just what was she going to do in this mess?

Deep breaths in, deep breaths out. She wasn't allowed to overreact, and she certainly wouldn't start now.

She wasn't scared, but more of confused. She didn't know how to even move in this body – just thinking about her floppy attempt at swimming would make her insides churn – but she had a job to do as a guardian! Someone had stolen the treasure of her river, and she had to get it back somehow. But just how would that happen?

Just as she mulled this over, she heard splashing from the river, and she sat up, albeit clumsily due to her lack of balance on land, and looked to see what was coming from the river. As she stared at it, she saw a face pop out from the water, with cold hard gray eyes and a harsh face full of rage, even if it was familiar and was smiling the last time she saw him. It was Posei.