Hazel smiles. "I am interested in all manner of odd quirks, psychological and otherwise."

"Have you ever known someone who's actually multiple people?"

"Let me think about that..." She tilts her head and gets a faraway look in her eyes. "...I don't believe so. Not such that I was graced with the knowledge, at any rate. I did once know a pair of twins who were the same person but that seems like a distinct phenomenon."

"Fascinating. That sounds like the inverse of the situation I'm talking about though. Well... you do now. I'm one of five different girls stuffed into this one body. We're looking to use color-coding to indicate which of us is active, or fronting, at any given time."

"Hmm!" she says, letting go of her spoon to lean forward with an alert look of interest in her eyes. "The implications of such an arrangement are fascinating. Do you know whether you have one soul or five? Or some sort of intermediate situation, with a permeable boundary between you? Are there physical changes—I assume they must be very subtle or you would not need a visible signal, but I've wondered before, if you could swap out one mind neatly for another, whether the alteration in the shape of the will would be reflected in the body—"

"No clue about the souls," she says with a shrug, "and we wish there were physical changes. Nothing except body language and how we use — or don't use — the body's voice. The world we came from had no verifiable clue about whether souls even exist, so we'd have no way to know anything about our own."

"Hmm!" she says again. "I wouldn't mind doing some experiments—noninvasive ones, of course, and compensating you for your participation—to determine the answers to these questions."

"Sounds great! Probably not today, we've got another errand to run after this, but we'd love to learn more about our own weird nature. Second question: do you know of any good options for fox transformations, and ideally ones with just the ears and tails, not the rest of the fur? Back in our old, transformationless world, I used to fantasize about being a three-tailed foxgirl like that."

"I do, as a matter of fact! If you would like a mundane partial fox transformation, the transformative you're looking for is fox berries, sold commercially in the city or gatherable in the deep woods. I could easily render a few berries into a concoction that would grant you ears and a tail. For three tails, you will need to seek a rarer rumour: in the deep woods it is said that fox spirits gather, with many tails apiece, and they may be willing to part with the secrets of their own transformatives, at a whim or for a price. I would be enthralled to learn whatever you could tell me about the results, if you do undertake such a quest."

"Goodness. I would gladly take you up on such a transformation if you have time today or tomorrow, and if you don't mind helping to color them to match my hair, but I will absolutely have to investigate the deep woods once I'm better prepared for danger. Would there be any harm in going with the standard version for now and trying to sweet-talk the kitsune in such a state, you think?"

"I don't have any fox berries on hand," Hazel clarifies. "It's not a transformation I've experimented with recently. You would need to procure the berries yourself before I could refine them for you. As for the likely attitude of the fox spirits, who can say? They might be flattered or offended. I've never met one and don't consider myself particularly advantaged at guessing how someone might react to a proposed course of action. If you wanted to transform yourself into a partial fox-morph and then remove that transformation before seeking out the fox spirits, you would need to procure both fox berries for the initial transformation and mandrake root, the human transfomative, for the reversal. I can't say where exactly it might be found but the last supplier I spoke to, many years ago now, operated mainly out of the city and could perhaps be asked after there."

"I'll have to think about that carefully then. Hm. You've been marvelously informative, Hazel, and we look forward to your experiments some other time!"

"Happy to be of assistance!" she says cheerfully. "I look forward to investigating the nature of your soul at your convenience!"

And after a last cheerful wave, she starts jogging off to Palla's hut. At some point she's going to have to figure out why it's so easy to miss the hut going one way, but not the other. That's very odd.

Regardless, time to get the fish for supper!

There's Palla's hut! There's Palla's blanket!

There's a strange man lying on it.

At least, unlike Palla, he wears clothes.

And all the jogging has produced a Ruby by the time they reach Palla's hut. Oh wow, strange man! Well. She's glad he's wearing clothes.

"Hi! Sorry to disturb your nap, I'm looking for Palla, is she here?" All of this is said somewhat quickly.

"She's fishing, she'll be back in a minute," he says, sitting up. "Hi." He looks like he is trying not to smile and failing.

"Well that's great! I wanted to trade her for a fish! I'm Ruby! It's nice to meet you!"

Why would he try not to smile? Smiling's great?

"You'll have to wait your turn, I already paid for mine. Guess I wouldn't mind sharing, though. I'm Torok." The battle has been thoroughly lost. "Can I ask what might be a rude question?"

“Waiting's fine too! And sure!"

"Are you human? It's just, if you are, I think you're the first one I've met since I came to Mareth."

She gasps. "Oooh! Yeah! Are you the other outworlder Lily told us about?"

"Seems very likely! I got here just a few weeks ago. It's been..."

His smile falters.