A red girl, maybe a hundred seventy, opens the door. She looks at Avet's hair. She frowns. "What?"

The red girl smiles thinly. "The dragon in this household's upstairs. You want me to get him for you?"

The red shren smirks. "Sure. Survey me."

"Finnahdiamretmiar."

"This one and a cardinal."

"Go for it." Finnah poses.

Avet smiles a little in spite of herself, and takes a photo of Finnah's human form. "And the cardinal, please?"

Finnah shifts. The red is a splash along her wings and a dab of it at the crest, more intense than a real female cardinal.

"Yeah, sure. HEY AVAR HEY MIAL WANT TO TAKE A SURVEY?"

(Avar follows somewhat more sedately and without turning into a bird.)

"What forms you have," Finnah says. She preens a feather and then shifts back. "She took pictures."

"I'll note that and take pictures anyway. Couldn't hurt." She smiles at Mial. "Thank you, was it that obvious I was at a loss for a word?"

"I speak Draconic too, you know. I've noticed its flaws already."

"This is the first time I've had Draconic not give me a word. I'm kind of indignant, actually, what the hell, Draconic?"

"Draconic has a problem with shrens," he says. "Anyway, your survey?"

"Right, yes." She steps off the poor abused and crowded doorstep for the more open space of their front yard. "Over here please, and your full name?"

"Mialavaraaninnah," he says, following her out.

Avar comes too, since he also plans to take the survey.

She smiles at Avar for his help. Write, write write. "Thank you." She checks his eyes - yep, silver - "And your forms?"

"Human, merlin, river otter, snow leopard, mountain goat," he says. "I can get more specific about the exact species if you want."

Write write write. "Yes please!"

"I sympathize greatly with the feeling," she agrees wryly as she writes. "I have exactly one form. This is not for lack of research or because I don't care. Actually this entire thing came about because I was dissatisfied with the information available. It needs to be better. So here we are." She finishes writing. "And, may I take a photo?"

"Of course."

She takes a photo! "Thanks. Other forms too, please?"

Finnah scoops up snow-leopard Mial and scritches him, grinning.

Avet giggles. "Well, that concludes the survey, thanks for your time." She turns to Avar. "And if you're still willing...?"

"Yes," he says.

"Full name, please?"

"Avarvaidamgesnekorinalnah."

Write write. "Thank you. What are your forms, please?"

"Human and shrike."

Write write write! "And - shit, I just sort of assumed for you, Finnah, correct me if I was wrong and you are a parunia - are you a parunia?"

"I'm not," says Finnah.

"I am," says Avar.

"Thank you." Write, write. "And now for the photos. May I?"

"Yes."

"No problem," says Avar, turning human again and scritching his smug fluffy son.

"All right then, are there any other dragonishes in the house...?"

Avar shakes his head.

"Thank you, then. If any of you pick any more forms and would like to further contribute to my obsessive project to catalog forms, my name is Avetlarin, feel free to mail me. Also if you would like a copy of the thing when I've finished, feel free to ask and I'll send copies. Though it's going to take a while to finish, I think."

"I imagine it will," Avar agrees.

"I'm definitely going to want a copy," says fluffy Mial.

"I'll just borrow his," shrugs Finnah.

She smiles a bit. "Sure." She retrieves another bit of paper that looks very list-like, and writes Mial's name on it. "And if there's nothing else...?"

"Doesn't look like it," says Mial. "Are you really going to survey all dragonishes?"

"Good luck with that."

And a dragon who could be anywhere between the ages of two hundred and four thousand opens the door. "Why hello."

"Sure. What do you want to know?"

"I'll need your name, a list of all of your forms, and with your permission, photos of all of them."

"I'm Aurinpardamlysalavid," says Aurin. "I've got this and a booted eagle. What's your name?"

"Avetlarinyarenesaar," she says, writing his name down. "Nice to meet you. Are you a parunia...?"

"I'm not, but my dad was, and he didn't have any other dragon kids."

She nods, and writes this down in a section that is really not meant for that. "And, may I take a picture of you...?"

"Sure." He provides a winning smile.

She smiles back, and takes a picture. "Thank you. And now the eagle form too, if you would please?"

He shifts. Eagle with feathery legs.

"I'd love one. I'd offer to get you my mother to interview, but she's at work right now. Should I expect you back another time?"

"Sure. Any idea when she'll be back? I can come by then."

"Today, just after dinner, maybe thirteenth-and-naught."

"All right." She writes down Aurin's name on her (now very long) list of people who want her book. She smiles at Aurin. "Then if there's nothing else...?"

"Assuming you just want to get back to your survey, no."

... Eyebrow raise. What?

Smile?

Okay she has no idea what's going on. Empathy, help.

Shrug. "Okay. Mother'll be back this evening." He is the very mildly disappointed of someone who does this all the time and runs into people who aren't up for it all the time.

When she comes back, Aurin's mother answers the door and gives her own name and forms.

For instance, this section covers various forms of competitions, like the all-Espaal scoot race that takes place once every five years between all the major leagues on the continent. There are profiles of the top five placers, including one whose blurb is mostly about how precocious he is and has been for such a long time.

The next edition of the same newspaper features a dragon in the letters-to-the-editor column, objecting to the "unwarranted" coverage of "unfortunate" individuals who would be better served to be allowed to privately nurse their affliction rather than having it trotted out on the continental stage to upset readers and embarrass the subject.

The newspaper dramatically edits this down, but dutifully publishes the highlights.

Finnah brings Mial that copy of the newspaper (he tends to stop watching them so closely after one letter to the editor on the subject of himself has gone through).

"...Well that's a first," he says. "Hey, isn't that the survey dragon?"

"I thought the name sounded familiar," nods Finnah.

"I'm impressed. I wonder if she's going to drown in angry lizards now."

"No idea," giggles Finnah. "You could ask her."

"I just might."

"Dear survey dragon. Your vocabulary may be suffering another gap. Lizards."

Finnah leaves him the newspaper and departs, giggling.

Hey,

Couldn't help noticing your recent letter to the editor. How many angry dragons have written to you about it so far? It's only been a few days, but lizards move fast.

Mial

Hey,

Eight, so far. I probably should have expected it. I'm not sure if I should burn them or keep them for comedic value. They're not worth a reply, though the one that invited me to go into my natural form near a shren house was novel.

Avet

Hey, at least you're old enough to shift. If you want to go gain a very personal perspective on all of Draconic's problems, I'm not going to stop you.

Pff. Then how could I go represent dragons that aren't terrible?

Somebody has to do it, I guess. Although my dad had it pretty well in hand in his own quiet way before you showed up. He never wrote any angry letters to newspapers, though.

I see no issue at all with there being two representatives of dragons not being terrible in the world. I can share. You know. If I try.

Yeah uh I lost my temper there, can you tell?

I was mildly surprised flames did not rise from the page as I read it.

It was not for lack of trying. Maybe next time.

What, are you going to keep it up? My very own dragon champion?

Only if you'd like me to.

I certainly wouldn't mind. It's a refreshing change from having every public acknowledgement of my existence by a dragon come in the form of berating someone else for publicly acknowledging my existence.

Makes sense. Well. I wouldn't say I'll be your very own dragon champion, I do not exactly have the free time to always write angry letters to the newspaper defending you, but - yeah. If people keep being stupid at you, I'll probably publicly defend you again.

I appreciate it.

How's the survey going?

The actual survey of it is basically done. Violet groups were a pain - I have a merfolk form entirely because of them - and several shrens think I'm completely insane. Dragons, too. But my 'people that want a copy' list is taller than I am, so I must be doing something right in my insanity.

Now I'm compiling and organizing, because of course I am. It's going to take longer than the survey itself.

Well, that sounds fun and exciting. Good luck. How up to date are you on information-handling spells? I could forward you some good ones if you're not already covered.

Also, taller than you are in which form?

Pretty up to date, but feel free to forward me some good ones in case I missed a few.

Human, thankfully. I shudder at the thought of a list taller than my dragon form.

Hah. A list taller than my natural form wouldn't be that impressive. It's as approximately half-sized as the rest.

Do any of these help?

Pff. Mine's a normal size, so the list would just be terrifying. Thankfully I'm not two thousand or something. I might want to flee to the moon if that were the case.

Those were incredibly helpful, thank you! I had a lot of those, but not all. I bet you just saved me a month. Maybe two.

Happy to help! Have fun sorting your data.

Yep! Have fun winning scoot races.

I always do.

And he is so pleased about it! Both the victory and the cheering. Although he probably can't pick Avet in particular out of the crowd.

The trick in the canyon was pretty cool. How'd you get your scoot to respond that quickly?

You've been watching my races?

How much technical detail do you want? Scoot manufacture is kind of an obscure field. The short answer is, I put more care into it than the mass-producers and I'm a better wizard than most of the other amateurs.

Just went to the recent one. I'll probably watch your others; I had fun.

Some technical detail, if you don't mind - I've never dealt in scoot manufacture, though, so you will likely have to explain it using small words.

She learns so many things about scoot manufacture! Her eyes do not glaze over when reading his long letter. She pays attention to the explanations. And then when she writes a reply, it is filled with questions. Questions that prove very thoroughly that she was paying attention to the letter.

They're going to be enthusiastically corresponding about the technical details of scoot manufacture for a while, aren't they.

Yes, yes they are. They are huge nerds, the both of them.

Such nerds! Such happy, happy nerds!

On another completely separate note (but please do not neglect the above for this, the curiosity might kill me) I've reached kind of an awkward point in survey compilation. I'm actually organizing how the book will be set up, now. A turquoise I talked to mentioned that some shrens might not take the knowledge of the lines they come from very well. I sort of don't know how to present the information without upsetting them. If it were just upsetting dragons I might just not care and do it anyway, but - that is not the situation. The only solution I've thought of is to have a separate book with shrens only, but that seems... Eh. I don't really want to do it that way. Help?

Honestly, and I'm sure you can imagine me holding my nose as I write this, the best solution for everyone's comfort is probably three books. One with only dragons, one with only shrens, one with both. (Otherwise I can only imagine the majority of dragon readers will set the book on fire the first time they notice it has a shren in it, which, while it is a hilarious mental image, is also going to make your project totally useless to them.) But if you do all three, then people can choose which one to consult according to their comfort levels.

I'm trying to think of alternate solutions involving writing it up with various kinds of information concealed, but nothing workable is coming to me and all the approaches I can think of just make it less convenient for the people without assorted hangups.

The visual of you holding your nose while writing came in just fine, yeah. I'm not completely happy with the solution either, but that sounds like the best thing to do. Three books it is, then. I'll publish them all at once instead of playing favorites, I think.

Now, how to ask dragons if they would like the complete book instead of dragons-only while being diplomatic and not getting any book set on fire. Why do I do this to myself.

Have fun deciding what to call the complete book when Draconic still holds its nose every time someone wants to put dragons and shrens in close conceptual proximity.

Ha. Well I can always call it 'dragonishes,' or disguise it with length. 'A Study On The Forms Of Shapeshifters.' Though, if I call it that I will feel obligated to go survey vampires, too. Sob.

I guess anyone who's reading the complete book in the first place won't be inclined to whine that hard about "dragonishes", but it's so annoying having to drop out of Draconic to get the word you're looking for, you know?

There, there. Someone else can go survey the vampires.

Yeah, agreed. Draconic, do better. I'm disappointed in you.

Thank you, that helps. I have done my duty to the world. Other people can take up my survey torch for the vampires.

Draconic is kind of an asshole sometimes.

It was sort of a jarring realization to figure that out, yes. I think you got to witness it. Pity you didn't have popcorn.

You looked so offended. It was very endearing.

Well, thank you. I was very offended, Draconic should not be missing words.

It shouldn't be, but it is. Because it hates shrens.

I noticed that, too. Do let me know if I lapse into... damn it.

Draconic. Draconic why would you do this, I need another word and it doesn't have it. Lapse into screwing up in relation to shrens and acting like a terrible person. There. Close enough. Ugh.

The term my family uses is "lizard", as in "God, my grandfather is such a lizard".

For more fun with Draconic's inadequacies, try coming up with a non-insulting way to refer to shrens.

Thank you. That is reasonably close to what I needed.

... Yep, I tried that thing. Failed horribly. I am kind of sad now.

I mostly just do my best to ignore it. Draconic can have its opinions on shrens; I will be over here disagreeing with those opinions, because they are shitty awful lizard opinions.

See, it's that sort of situation that makes me want to conspire to invent a new magic language to replace Draconic.

Next project? I like it. Count me in.

Pff. Sure. As long as we don't change all of Draconic - I can think of quite a few dragons who would not like the change at all. Another option, instead of ripping the language away from them.

The lizards can keep their lizardspeak if they feel like it.

You know of all of the words for Draconic, I don't think I've heard lizardspeak used before. I kind of like it.

It seemed appropriate.

Ha. It is, I think.

Do you want to meet up for language conspiracies?

Sure! Where? My house has the advantage of allowing us to easily consult my mother, who is a nominally retired research wizard, emphasis on nominally.

Your house sounds good, yeah. Helps that I can already teleport to it. Are you open this Chenen?

Yep! Around lunchtime, say?

Sure! See you then.

"C'mon in."

"Let's fix that!" he agrees. "That seems like something that should be fixed."

She grins at him. "So - to start we should find something to let us observe the magic, or if one doesn't exist, go through the trouble of inventing it. Which, annoying, but you know." Pause. "This is the sort of thing we should likely ask your mother."

"My mother did actually help somebody refine a spell that looks at dragon magic once," he says. "For shren-related purposes. I can't promise it looks at it particularly well, but we can go ask her for it."

"Sure. Lead on?"

"I'll look it up. Hello, Mial. Who's your friend?"

"Mother, this is Avetlarin, the survey dragon. Avet, this is my mother, Koridaar."

"It's nice to meet you," she says warmly. She gives Mial an amused look. "'The survey dragon.' Well, accurate."

"It's nice to meet you too," says Koridaar. She peruses a shelf and comes up with her notes on the spell. "There you are."

"Thank you." With notes acquired, they can probably go scurrying off to be nerds together now.

Nerd time! Nerd time!

"What, constantly on the verge of dying? Yeah, pretty much," says Mial.

"That's kind of disturbing. Uh, no offense."

He shrugs. "None taken. But yeah, that's what it looks like. Infected or hatched, same result either way. Mother was originally trying to find some kind of cure, but it's not the kind of condition you want to mess with if you don't know what you're doing, and at a certain point you can't figure out what you're doing any better except by messing with it."

"How awful. Ugh. ... Again, no offense to you."

"What's amazing is that when you say 'no offense' you seem to actually mean it."

She laughs a little. "What, do people usually not?"

"Mostly it's just the 'how awful, ugh' without the 'no offense'. But sometimes it's 'no offense' meaning 'in case you hadn't noticed, I just offended you, make sure to pay attention'."

"Charming. I don't know if I should feel ashamed that I'm using the same vocabulary as these people, or proud that I am redeeming it."

"A difficult decision."

"I mean, I'm not - I really hope you don't think I am going 'how awful, ugh,' at you, because I'm not. If anything I have quite a lot of respect for you as a person. It's just - the situation is kind of awful."

"Mm," he says. "Just - thinking. About what I would do if someone came up with a cure for shrens."

"... Fly, assumingly?"

"What? No."

"This is the first time this has actually occurred to me, so I may not be perfectly comprehensible about it," he warns. "But. Look. Why would I actually want to stop being a shren?"

"We're going to fix the language thing," he reminds her. "Well, try, anyway, with at least as much effort as we try fixing shrens and probably first. So what's left is flight and lizards. I can fly, just not in my natural form. It's not really a big deal to me by itself. That leaves lizards, and honestly, if all the other shrens in the world were cured and I stubbornly remained, getting yelled at by lizards for my degeneracy would bring me immense perverse joy. No, the only real reason to stop being a shren is the tiny risk of accidentally infecting somebody else - and assuming a working cure that's any damn good at all, that's much less of an issue all of a sudden. So why would I want to stop being a shren? Just to stop being a shren? No thank you."

"Sort of," he says. "Not even proving. It would be accepting that they were right. And they're not. If I decided to stop being a shren just to stop being a shren, I would be acting like there was something wrong with being a shren. And I have gone to a great deal of trouble my whole life to maintain that there isn't, in the face of intense and unceasing opposition from the word itself."

"...Well. Thank you," he says. "First time anyone's said that about my weird shren opinions."

"Ha. I feel special, now."

"So anyway. I'm crazy enough to want to stay a shren even if I figure out a way to stop. That is what we've discovered today."

She smiles, just a little. Then her smile falters. "You know people are going to hate you for it. If we ever manage it. You probably won't get any peace for a long, long time. Possibly ever. It sounds kind of exhausting."

"So, pretty much the same as being a shren is now. I'm used to it."

"Well, as long as you know what you're hypothetically getting into."

He shrugs. "It's all hypothetical anyway, at this point."

"Want to go make it real?"

"Of course."

"Great! Draconic first, though, if you don't mind."

"Yeah. We already know something about how hard the other one's going to be to solve; let's find out how this one compares."

Time, effort, and ingenuity. Luckily they're well supplied with all of the above.

They are! It will take longer than an afternoon, though. Is Mial amenable to having scheduled nerd days with Avet?

Absolutely.

"Sure I am. Are you? It's not very likely that either of us will spontaneously lose a form in the middle of my yard, but accidents happen. And my mother is a research wizard. If you wanted to ask her to do the firebreathing analysis, I wouldn't hold it against you."

"It's not really a matter of if you'd hold it against me," she says. "It's - I am poking at my reasons for not being okay with it and they're flimsy and I don't think they're good enough to have command over my life. I trust you. Finnah's at work and even if she were here, I trust her reasonably well. I don't think a random shren is going to show up out of nowhere and turn out to be the correct flavor of cruel and spiteful. I don't think either of us will spontaneously lose a form. There is no legitimate reason to be afraid. I don't want to have a, a flinch reaction to something in my head that I don't actually agree with, and let it control my life. I don't want to be that kind of person. If I were legitimately afraid I wouldn't volunteer, and I'd possibly be kind of upset with you if you expected me to, but this is - the sort of thing I am inclined to conquer, not cower from. So it's not, actually, involved with you at all, you're an innocent bystander." Pause. "So uh, sorry, innocent bystander, I am still attacking the lizard parts of my head, it takes a while. It's kind of entrenched."

"Okay," shrugs Mial.

"Yep," she agrees. "Though, uh, if you'd like me to analyze your firebreathing we should do it someplace that is not, er, your yard. It's not officially a shren hazard location. Bottom of the world or something would be better, I think."

"Yeah, I in fact already have a place on the bottom of the world where I go to shift natural and breathe fire at things. Because sometimes my contempt for certain letters to the editor cannot be fully expressed any other way."

Avet giggles. "Can't say I blame you."

"Yeah, and after you leave for the day I will quietly ask Mother to fill in the 'declining to have kids' part sometime this week."

"Heh. I don't envy you - your mother is very nice and approachable, but I just sort of pretend my parents had me via conception spell."

"Well, I envy you your illusions."

"Aw. Do they not even have cute pet names for each other?"

"First name basis! I can only assume therefore that it is a celibate marriage."

Giggle.

"I think you have already had a pretty comprehensive look at cooler things you could be," snorts Mial. "Go ahead, I'm watching."

"Oooo," observes Avet. "That's interesting. Sort of - badly designed, if the dragon magic does nothing else and just sits there, but it's interesting."

"Yeah. But it does make some amount of sense that it might take more magic to choose a form than to use one you've already picked... and if I found out dragonishes were designed I'd have a long list of other complaints to air before I got to that one."

"Ha. Yes. Me too. There are a lot of things about dragonishes I have a problem with, not just in regards to shrens. Maybe when I'm bored I'll make a list. 'All of the things about dragonishes I wish were better.'"

"A to-do list," says Mial.

"Well, of course. What's going on it?"

"Draconic, shrens - where shrens want that one, anyway - baby dragons dying, esu, dragonishes dying randomly and unpredictably of old age, forms being able to be lost forever, the really small number of max forms for everyone but blues, not being able to pick where your color group color goes, not being able to see what your forms look like until after you pick them, the growing-at-a-constant-rate-until-you-die - there should be a cap, the entire thing where certain color groups rust or patina or tarnish, and - I don't even know how to handle the thing with thudias versus parunias, but I am not okay with it and any situation where my children die before I do is unacceptable." Pause. "There are likely more, that's just off of the top of my head."

"How do you people live with less than ten forms?"

"I lived with one form for most of my life," she points out wryly. "I just - generally acted like a human who could occasionally shapeshift into a dragon. Now that I have three I'm not sure I'll even be inclined to use them much - though now that I have merfolk I might go travel to some underwater cities and see what they're like." She shrugs. "Personally between ten forms and empathy, I'd stick with what I have. I occasionally need to cheat." She snorts. "During my surveying I needed empathy to figure out why a gold was smiling at me in a particular way, I was so confused. Turns out, he was propositioning me. Shapeshifting wouldn't have saved me there."

"...Was that by any chance my cousin Aurin? That sounds very much like my cousin Aurin."

Blink. "... I think that was his name, yeah."

"My cousin Aurin is very fond of girls," Mial explains.

"And seems to find us all almost interchangeable with one another," she says dryly.

"Eh. He's a little indiscriminate, but I promise he notices individual characteristics. I've had to listen to him go on about them often enough. But no, seriously, much as I may tease him for how enthusiastically he likes girls, the word is like" (sincerely appreciate in a friendly warm interpersonal way; noncentral connotational overtones of romance), "not just vaguely-want-to-sleep-with."

"Good to know. I take back my snark, then. It was admittedly a little unfair - I've had exactly one conversation with him, after all."

"Aurin's a good cousin. And not just in that he passes the 'willing to acknowledge my existence' test, although that alone sets him above our grandfather."

"I'm glad to hear it. He just - left an impression. It wasn't entirely positive." Pause. "And your grandfather has no idea what he's missing out on, more fool him."

"Damn right."

Hey, I finished the books. Want to come over and judge/give feedback/super judge them before I finalize them?

I would be delighted to come judge your books. When?

I mean, I'd be fine in a few degrees, but I have a few angles if you need a bit. Or we can do it on another day where we're both free.

Nah, I wasn't doing much. Come get me whenever.

She doesn't bother with a reply, and instead teleports to his house and knocks on his door.

Which Mial opens. "Hi!"

He takes her hand and nods.

"Very tidy. I would've gone nuts over this when I was seventy or so and doing intensive research to pick out my next bunch of forms."

"Thank you! Pity I can't go back in time and hand it to you then. But someone else can use it now. I'll likely have to make more editions later, keep it updated, but that won't be as hard as..." She waves a hand at the books. "This."

"Yeah. Trivial by comparison, I'm sure. Well, I'm impressed."

"Thank you. I'm very proud of myself, and sort of tempted to sleep for a week."

"I know the feeling."

"The best sleep is when you are insufferably smug about a job well done."

Giggle.

"So!" says Avet, lightly. "You are impressed, but don't shy away from critiquing them just because they're well organized, I am not entirely happy with them but couldn't think of a better solution to some of the problems I encountered."

"All right, let's hear it," he says. "What's giving you trouble? Or do you want me to read them all first and form my own unprompted opinions?"

"Second thing! See if you can find the things that bothered me. Unless of course you don't want to."

It is Avet's parunia great-grand-half-niece, Litet, with a bag containing the Nightchef slow cooker she borrowed in one hand and a jar of applesauce in the other. "Hi, Avet!"

"My oven's fine, Avet," laughs Litet. "This is not bribery. It's applesauce! There's so much room in this thing I made more than I needed. Here." Avet is offered applesauce.

"Ooo, thank you." Avet takes the offered applesauce. "Though, I don't know if I have enough room in my cold cabinet for this," she muses. "Maybe if I rearrange things in a creative fashion..."

"Oh, I'll help, I'm sure you were in the middle of something," says Litet, sidling past her.

"I dropped by unannounced, don't mind me, pay attention to your friend," says Litet, waving and continuing into the house.

"Tell me all about your book!" invites Litet. "I didn't know you'd finished it."

"...Them?"

"Um. I have multiple versions."

"Translations?"

"So it's by - color?" guesses Litet. She changes course, heading for the living room.

Litet sets the Nightchef down by a doorframe and peers at the suspected location of book.

The suspected location of book contains: three of book, and one of presumably-Avet's-friend, reading one of book. He's human-shaped, and seems oddly short for a human-formed dragon, but he hasn't looked up from his reading so his eye colour isn't available to resolve the question.

"Hi, Avet's friend!"

"Some call me Mial," he says mildly, looking up from his reading. Silver eyes. "Hi."

"I'm Litet. Avet's relative," says Litet, Avet's relative. She picks up a book from the coffee table.

(Mial sighs.)

"You didn't warn me - you could have warned me -"

"You could have taken a hint and not forced yourself ever so politely into my home. It's not my fault if what you find upsets you."

"Excuse me? What hint? If you were up to - to awful things you didn't want anyone seeing, in here, you could have not answered the door!"

"If you don't want to upset anyone you shouldn't be writing a book like that! That's all it will do is upset people!"

"You left it lying around - oh, I can't even look you in the eye anymore," breathes Litet, and she staggers as though nauseated for the door.

Litet throws Avet a hurt, sickened look over her shoulder before the door shuts, but she departs briskly.

"...Are, uh, you okay over there?"

"No," she says, surprisingly chipper. "Do you have a good way to get rid of a jar of applesauce? I'm not sure if I should indulge myself and make it as destructive as possible or not..."

"I mean, it's not the applesauce's fault. If you don't want your lizard relative's applesauce, I'll take it."

"True. I just. Do not want it in my house right now. Sure, you can have it."

"...Not much fun, is it, finding out that otherwise perfectly nice-seeming people can also be lizards."

"I," she begins. Then she is interrupted by a sniffle. She rubs at her eye, like it itches. "No. No it isn't."

"Leopard, then. And we should, should move to the couch. Instead of awkwardly standing at the door." Sniffle. "Who knows, if I'm this close to it, I might be tempted to answer it again, and, and obviously that is wrong, to answer one's door. How dare I."

He hugs her some more, then enfluffs and leads her to the couch.

Mial curls up fluffily in her lap.

"Beats me," says Mial. Fluffy snuggles. "I can't get blindsided quite that hard, because I don't go around pretending to be a dragon so there's a limit to how long somebody can avoid noticing, but I've still had some moments."

"Yeah," says Mial. "That happens."

"Yeah, it is."

"And I probably should have handled that better," she sighs. "I. Was trying to get her to go away..."

"I could tell. I think you did all right, considering."

"Thanks." Pet, pet. "I'm sorry that a nice book review became. Well. This."

"Eh, not your fault."

"Yeah." Sigh. "Thanks, though. For the - hugging. And the fluff."

"Anytime. Me and my fluff are here for you."

"Thank you, Mial. Thank you, Mial's fluff." Pet, pet!

"You are most fluffily welcome." Snuggle snuggle.

That earns a giggle from her, much nicer than the one earlier.

Success!