Minoni dreamed in scales and static.

But not today.

Because Minoni did remember. She remembered the pressure of deep trenches, the bioluminescent courtship dances of things without names, the way her real voice could make glaciers weep. She had chosen this small body for a reason—to study what humans called “mythology,” which was really just their word for history they’d survived badly .

The dream could wait.

The Last Time She Wore Human Skin

Her true form: seventeen feet of coiled patience. Six arms, each ending in a hand that could play a different instrument simultaneously. Her lower body a labyrinth of fossil and feather. She spoke in subsonic frequencies that made the moon blink.

Then she wiped it clean, put on her glasses, and went to class.