Despite my feeling better by the next afternoon, Aara insisted I rest one more night, just to be on the safe side. Considering I had roughly no idea where I was supposed to go I didn’t really feel like arguing too much. 

I ate the small dinner she provided (some sort of meaty stew) and watched the light outside turn golden. As I did, a thought struck me.

“The sun does set in the West here, right?” I asked.

“Hm?” Aara replied, swallowing a mouthful of stew. “Yes?”

“Ok. I just… I realised there was no reason for the planet to have to rotate the same direction as Earth… then again, things are probably being magically translated right now, so maybe the sun’s movement took precedence over the, like, magnetic field stuff defining north,” I mumbled to myself.

Wasn’t it a thing that the poles swapped sometimes anyhow? So, really, the direction the sun moved across the sky was probably a better way to orient things for translation than North and South were.

“You truly do not know much of this world, do you?” Aara asked.

“Nope. I know the name of a few gods, that there’s an evil sorceress, and that, like, Elves and… such exist,” I replied, blushing slightly.

Aara nodded a few times to herself as she ate a bit more of the stew. I was hungry enough to not mind a lull in the conversation in the name of eating and set to work on downing my own serving quickly.

“I will go with you,” she said, after a moment.

“Hm?”

“You need a guide. Someone with understanding of this world, the laws you will encounter, the currencies, the people…” she said, seeming almost as focused on convincing herself as me.

“Don’t you have a duty to this jungle?” I asked, trying to remember what she’d said about her job as a druid.

“This jungle will likely be burned if the Dark Queen succeeds in her conquests,” Aara replied. “As will many other natural lands. So it a greater duty to assist you.”

“Oh. Well… thank you. I appreciate that,” I said, offering her a smile.

---

---

Walking home with Kris was one of the nicer parts about days with English class. It was the only class we shared, since she was in a different program and in her second year of college while I was a lowly first year. During class there were still sometimes limits to how much we could talk, but the walk home was open and free. 

And, as the conversation lulled a little, I knew it was the best time I had to ask what was on my mind. What had been on my mind for a while.

“Kris, I…” I started, before finding my legs were starting to feel weak. Continuing to walk didn’t seem doable, and I ended up stopping where I was.

“Hm? What’s up?” she asked, stopping as well.

“I… I was wondering if you were seeing anyone?” I managed to blurt.

Kris blinked. 

Gosh, those dark hazel eyes of hers were so beautiful.

“Hmm? Uh… yes?” she replied, looking confused by the question.

Though I only half registered her expression. I was too busy feeling like a fool for having asked.

“Right. Right. S-sorry. I should have—I mean, you’re so cool, how could you not already… I just—well, I’m still quite happy being friends,” I replied, feeling my cheeks starting to burn as I decided to study the sidewalk to hide my shame.

“Wait. Were you trying to ask me out?” Kris asked.

“Y-yes,” I mumbled.

“Ahh… uh, because my having a girlfriend wouldn’t really be the issue. It’s an open relationship… but… um, I’m a lesbian, so…” she said. 

“Oh,” I mumbled again, feeling even more embarrassed. 

Not for the first time I found myself wishing I was a woman. However, possibly for the first time, I apparently mumbled the wish under my breath. Just loud enough Kris picked up a bit of it.

“What was that, just now?” she asked, taking a few steps closer to me.

“What was what?” I replied, feeling like I’d just sunk any hope I had of maintaining the friendship.

Surely there was no worse response to being rejected by a lesbian than trying to convince her you wished you were a girl…

“Hmm. You know, guys don’t tend to care for my… grunginess,” Kris said. 

“Yeah,” I said, letting out a sigh of defeat. I’d already dug myself a shallow grave, might as well keep at it to get properly six feet under. “I swear my tastes mean all the girls I crush on end up being lesbians… so… along with some other things, it’s a part of my life that would be easier if I were a woman.”

“So, do you want to be a girl?” Kris asked.

“… yes,” I whispered, glad the passing cars on the nearby road weren’t likely to overhear anything. 

“Then let yourself be one,” Kris said, leaning into my field of view and smiling. “It’s what I did.”

I blinked. “P-pardon?”

“You really couldn’t tell I was trans?” she asked.

“N-no? I…” my voice trailed off as I stared at her. At the soft kindness in her eyes. “D-don’t you—well, you know you’re a girl, don’t you? I just want to be one.”

“Wanting to be a girl is one of the top signs of being one,” she said, her tone soft. 

“It… it’s that easy?” I mumbled.

---

---

Waking up back in Aara’s hut I found tears running down my face. Dreaming about Kris was nice… but bittersweet. A reminder of how much I missed her.

Which meant I had to get going. I had to find that Chem guy. I had to train. Then I had to defeat Nemza. And then I’d go home.

Luckily Aara was up soon after I had woken up. She knew where things were and what supplies we needed better than I did, so I was only of limited use in the packing efforts that morning.

At least my newfound divine strength meant I could carry whatever she tossed in my backpack. Pulling out the outfit she’d found me in, we were both surprised to see there were no signs of damage on it. Aara swore all the layers (the outer tunic, the long chainmail shirt, and the padded under-layer) had been torn to shreds when she’d found me.

It seemed divine clothing healed as well as I did now.

Everything gathered and inspected, I followed Aara out into the jungle. 

The plan was simple enough. We’d head to a nearby town, then find a ship heading north. We didn’t exactly have the budget to hire a ship for a direct route (which left me grumbling about how the gods could really be helping us out more), but a small cabin on a ship already heading north would apparently be affordable. We might transfer to another ship from wherever we ended up. Until we got to a part of the continent where Aara thought someone named Chem would likely be from.

And, so, we walked. Up hills. Down hills. Crossing small streams. Trudging through mud at points. And having to double back through the winding paths more often than I liked.

There was also the slight issue that there wasn’t much to see in the jungle. After a while the dense plants sort of began to blend together. There were some birds and monkeys to be seen from time to time, but even they started to get less exciting as we stopped for lunch. 

It had been about five hours of walking. I was much less hungry or tired than I’d expected to be, but there were other concerns weighing on my mind.

“How much further is it until this town?” I asked, as Aara munched on some jerky.

“Hm? Oh… well, we’re making good ground, so, if we keep up this pace… probably just two more days? Maybe three,” she replied, seeming to weigh some variables in her mind. 

“D-days?” I asked.

“Mhm?” she nodded. 

She seemed quite perplexed by my response. Which, well, reminded me what sort of a world this was. A medieval-y fantasy world. And we were travelling on foot through a jungle.

There was nothing fast about that.

“Which direction is the town?” I asked.

“Hmm? Oh, it’s… that way,” she replied, pointing after a moment in a direction a little to the left of the path we were following.

I nodded, before waiting to let her finish eating.

Once she packed her things up again, I stepped over to her side and scooped her up into my arms.

She let out a small eep before clinging to me. “W-what are… are you?”

“Pushing up the time table,” I said, before starting to run.

After a few moments I saw the trees clear a bit above our path and leapt into the air. 

My wings then began to flap, pushing us further up. Up above the canopy. My flying was a bit clumsy still (we bobbed about in the air as I tried to gain more altitude), but soon we were high enough I could start gliding. 

“Heh… heheh… we’re… heheh… we’re flying,” Aara mumbled nervously, clinging to me.

“It should get us to the town a fair bit faster, no?” I replied.

She let out a small nod, before glancing over my shoulder. “Oh my! Your wings… they’re so much bigger now.”

Blinking, I turned to look at them myself. They really had grown. Walking about they’d been about as big as they could be without dragging on the ground. But now… well, I had heard it would take truly massive wings for a human to fly while looking for art references once. And, well, it seemed that was true.

---

Even though I was mostly gliding I did still get tired after a few hours. I wasn’t sure if it was the limit of my ability to fly or just my inexperience meaning I was still bad at it. We’d also gotten a little off track at a few points, Aara not recognising landmarks as well from in the air. All the same, we’d made it most of the way to the town, Aara having spotted it in the distance.

I didn’t trust my ability to fly (and, especially, land) at night, though so Aara helped me find a clearing to land in as the sun started to approach the horizon.

Once we’d landed I was a bit surprised to find Aara still clinging to me, however.

“You, uh… you can let go now?” I said, having expected her to be thrilled to be back on solid ground.

“Oh. R-right, heheh,” she mumbled, hopping down. Her ears seemed to flick nervously for a moment before she spoke up again. “I think we should be able to reach the town tomorrow morning, even if we’re just on foot.”

“Mhm. That’ll be good,” I replied, while starting to dig through my backpack for the canvas she’d put in there.

She hadn’t had a full tent, but a bit of cover in case it rained was good to have. As I dug through the pack for twine I flicked and stretched my wings, working out any stiffness in them.

“How… how many stares am I likely to get with these?” I asked, pointing up to my wings.

“Mmmm… probably a fair amount, actually? Sowport is pretty relaxed, where a half-Gnoll like me doesn’t get too much attention, but wings… that’s something quite a bit more distinct,” she said. “I’m not sure if there’d be trouble there… but down the road…”

“Well, that’s great,” I mumbled. “Since they can get bigger it’d be nice if they could also shrink down and…”

I paused as a very strange feeling shot through my back. Looking at Aara I saw she looked nearly as thrown off as I felt.

“They… they just did, didn’t they?” I asked.

She nodded, before hurrying around to check my back. “They didn’t just shrink, they vanished.”

That sounded right for how it felt. Which, weirdly, I had to admit was not a pleasant feeling. Having them felt so natural. Losing them again, having them tucked into my body like that…

I took in a breath, then let it out slowly, trying to focus on my back letting loose. Thankfully it worked and the wings returned, unfolding out.

“I’m only going to do that when I need to in future,” I said.

---

I did kind of wish it hadn’t been such a strange feeling that night, though. Since I was left trying to sleep on my stomach due to the wings.