A Salamander, but Mighty

Tamara's monster reflexes were fast enough to make her jump to the side just in time to avoid the large, knife-thick claws of a monster that was at least three times her size and feline-like in appearance, with ferocious jaws and a hungry expression.

Tamara stood sideways and lowered her head towards the ground, waving her large tail nervously as if it was a whip ready to strike, this had been the instinctive response of her new body rather than a reasoned reaction on Tamara's part.

Tamara's reasoned reaction was instead to run away as fast as she could.

“Tamara! You have to fight!” The luminous sphere exclaimed, “I cannot protect you now, if I did I would attract the attention of the Divine Court!”

If it weren't for the fact that there was a giant cat that looked like a very angry lynx trying to kill her, Tamara would have asked some questions about that statement, which in itself already sounded suspicious.

"Fight?? With what? That one has claws and jaws as sharp as swords! I just have teeth that look like a joke!”

The big cat tried to bite Tamara again, this time it managed to slip away with a speed worthy of a lizard rather than a salamander, however, the control that Tamara had over her new body was not yet perfect and so she ended up tripping over herself and ended up rolling belly up still within quick assault distance from the big cat.

“HELP ME!” Tamara shrieked in beast-like noises, “HELP ME OR I’LL DIE HERE!”

“Okay, here goes nothing!"

The big cat leaned towards Tamara, stretching out its paws and showing its white and glittering claws like knives, it was a few inches away from tearing Tamara's abdomen when one of the trees lowered a branch and moved it as if it wanted to give the big monster-cat a slap, which connected and knocked it aside and fell onto its side, although it got up very quickly.

“This is the best I can do, if I intervene again the Divine Court will realize that I saved you and will destroy both of us!”

“Then there is only one way out of this.”

"What?"

"Flee!"

Tamara started running and screaming, moving her four legs quickly at maximum power; the big monster-cat had not yet surrendered and didn't want to abandon its prey, so it chased her among roots, bushes and stones, all in the setting of a late sunset that had now become indistinguishable from the evening.

"Wait!" The light in turn chased Tamara and the big monster, easily reaching the fleeing salamander monster, "try to stay along the banks of the river!"

"Why should I??" Tamara asked hastily, too focused on trying not to crash into something or trip over herself.

“If you stray more than six hundred feet from the banks of the river I will no longer be able to follow or assist you!” replied the light, “I am a guardian spirit, my abilities are limited to the course of this river!”

So that light was neither Lyndvrath in disguise nor even another deity.

“Okay, then lead me to a hiding place!”

That was something the guardian spirit could do, and without even using her powers and thus end up attracting the attention of the deities. The spirit then began to guide Tamara's escape, making her approach the banks of the river again where, thanks to the spirit's knowledge of the place, she knew she could find a suitable hiding place for Tamara. The chase lasted for a few minutes before the guardian spirit managed to lead the salamander monster to a place where another monster had dug a lair which, she was sure, had been abandoned.

“Get in there!” The spirit exclaimed.

“In that hole? But I can barely get through!” Tamara protested.

“Would you rather die??”

“I'm going into the hole!”

After all that stampede, Tamara had learned to have decent control over her body; it jumped and closed her paws close to her new body, ending up head first inside the hole, hitting her face - better defined as a snout - and her long abdomen on the earth and stones. She began to move her paws immediately, letting out a cry of terror when she felt the cat monster's claws graze the tip of her tail.

She ran so deep into that hole and curled up in it to the point that in addition to not seeing anything due to the almost non-existent external light, she could only hear the feral cries of the monster that had followed her while it was threateningly trying to reach her, scratching and clawing at the ground at least three feet away from her.

Go away, please, go away. Tamara squinted her eyes.

She had no idea how long her pursuer persisted before giving up, but eventually, it decided that it would have spent more energy persisting in trying to get her out of the hole than it would have gained in eating her.

"Spirit? Are you still here?" She asked softly.

“Of course. Don't worry: I got your back,” said the spirit in a reassuring voice, reappearing inside the hole without it seeming to hinder her even in the slightest, like it wasn't really there, “how do you feel?”

Tamara's heart was beating wildly, her scaly back was still pressed against the bottom of the burrow she had crawled into and her eyes were fixed firmly towards the exit of the burrow, the only place where the darkness wasn't absolute.

“I'm… I'm fine, I think. Just a little shaken." She said after a long moment of silence. She opened her mouth, taking a deep breath and began, very slowly, to approach the exit of the den, just to take a look around, "has that monster gone?"

“Yes, it seems it has gone in search of new prey, perhaps your brothers and sisters,” the spirit said in a voice that rang with amusement.

“Those are not my brothers! I…” Tamara walked out of the entrance to the lair with only her head and moved her completely black eyes left and right, she hesitated, “I am not a monster.”

“You're right, sorry,” the voice coming from that orb that appeared luminous in Tamara's eyes but which gave off no light to the real world became more hesitant for a few seconds, “but now you're trapped in the body of a monster, and there is nothing that can be done about it."

“Thank you for saving me,” Tamara said, there was fear in her voice, “now what will become of me?”

“I honestly don't know, I can't follow you if you go too far from this river. I… I haven't thought about your rescue plan up to this point.”

“I see,” what else could Tamara do? Surely picking on her savior wouldn't help her in any way, antagonizing her? Perhaps that could have been even worse, especially considering that that spirit was behaving much more empathetically than the two deities she had encountered. “Maybe it's better if I stay in the den for now and rest until dawn.”

The spirit responded enthusiastically, “yes! Maybe it's the case you sleep on it and tomorrow with a fresh mind I will explain to you how to protect yourself in this world!”

“Thank you,” the salamander monster retreated back to the back of the den, “oh, I haven't told you my name yet. My name is Tamara.”

“Nice to meet you, Tamara. My name is Velen, and I'm the guardian spirit of the river Velenaria” Tamara imagined the light bowing to her, “see you tomorrow, if you need me, just say my name.”

“M-mh…” Tamara nodded, closing her eyes, fighting her mind to fall asleep only to be rewarded for her efforts with a horrifying sequence of nightmares.