INFERNAL - 𝐖𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐲𝐬 𝟐𝟎𝟏𝟖 𝐒𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫

FOUR

"Better?"

Ndete sighed as the soothing warmth of the hot springs seeped through mortalis skin, penetrating muscles and easing the tension and aches that lingered. She hissed when the spot on her back met the steaming wetness, but her wound was beneath the surface, not exposed, so even the delicate human flesh was able to bear it. She eased the bruised skin deeper into the water, closing her eyes.

"Better. Thank you for your help," she peeked one eye open, "and for not telling anyone."

Lolo's green eyes glowed in the soft light. It reflected off the water, making her blue-green scales appear to ripple, as if she too were made of liquid. Her dragon lips curved up in a toothy smile.

"About Puyu, or about you shifting again?"

Ndete let her eye fall shut. "It's so stupid. We have the ability; it must be for a reason."

"My father always said that it was so that we could walk among them unseen in the days when they still ruled the world."

"Mmm. But that was a thousand years ago. We defeated them."

"They defeated themselves!" Lolo's voice was soft, but filled with passion. "They nearly destroyed the entire planet, Ndete. Mortalis hearts are weak. They do not burn with the fire of truth. That is why the others complain when they see you take their form."

"Looking like them does not make me one of them." She spoke the words almost by rote, she had argued them so often.

Still, she knew her voice lacked conviction. The first time she had shifted, taking on the mortalis form, she had marveled at the sensations that had filled her. The way the wind brushed the fine hairs along her arms, the way that even faint smells registered on the tongue, giving tastes to things she had never even noticed before. It had surprised and intrigued her, but it wasn't until the second time that things had changed. Closing her eyes to experience the sensations, opening them to find the tiger that had come up on stealthy, silent feet. As a dragon, tigers were nothing but competitors for food, but as a mortalis...

Ndete could still remember the rush of ice that filled her veins, the way the fear had tasted in her mouth, the pounding of her heart in her chest as if it would burst out of its confinement and escape on its own if she did not move. Run! The instinct had overcome her, the unique feelings of one that is prey instead of predator, feelings that were new and foreign and delicious.

Ndete had run.

She had stretched her mortalis legs to their limit, pounding through the tall grasses, leaping over logs and dodging branches. She heard the tiger behind her, quickly gaining, heightening the sensations. Lips pulled back in a fierce grin she had raced for the ledge, refusing to shift back to dragon. The tiger closed, his grunts nearly on her, and then she was leaping, rocketing off the ledge and hurtling through open air. Behind her the tiger screamed its frustration, and her laughter was ripped away by the wind as she plummeted.

Ndete had been born with wings, but she had never truly known what it felt like to fly.

"What's it like?" Lolo's voice pulled her back from the depths of her memories.

Ndete opened her eyes to find her friend curled around the warm rocks that edged the spring. Her green eyes regarded Ndete as if she were a strange and unknown thing.

"What, the shift?"

Lolo's eyes moved over her, tracing the lines of her arms and hands, down to her fingertips. "The mortalis form. What does it... feel like?"

Ndete rolled her eyes. "You could just shift yourself, you know."

Lolo looked down, slowly shaking her head.