Ktulu's singularly worded question couldn't have been more appropriate, though Lakota was loathe to answer it truthfully. She'd awaited this moment for seasons, and yet she feared somehow she'd be found lacking in some manner by the God that had always favored Ktulu. Whatever could be thrown at her, she'd take it in stride the best she could. Damn those who thought Ktulu didn't love her, or that Lakota could ever be an unfit mother. She would show them plainly that they couldn't be more wrong, and then kick their asses into the flames of the Heart for ever daring to doubt her and her mate. Gritting her teeth with a flare of determination, taking courage from it, she nodded tightly. They were not left waiting for long, and the pull of magic in her body caused a momentary flicker of apprehension. As she was transformed, the blue reached out in a last touch of her beloved's skin, taking strength from it as her bones were mended and frame distorted. It wasn't painful, as this was no punishment but a trial, but it felt odd and wrong wrong wrong in every possible way.

The first thing she felt was the terror of no air, the odd sensation of...were those fucking gills?! But swiftly she was plopped into the water, and though the sensation was far different from breathing in her normal form, at least there was no danger of impending death. Blinking stupidly and breathing too harshly, more out of panic than any real prolonged lack of air, Lakota realized that she'd been turned into one of the most humiliating forms. She was a fucking fish.

The gleam of the smooth red stones below her was far more prominent, but as she fearfully tried to use her new fish eyes she saw that her mate had been cruelly changed into the predator of her own form. Instinct clenched in her little fish belly and she awkwardly maneuvered her new body into the shadows, clinging to the silky tops of the stones in an attempt to conceal herself. Was it possible for a fish to frown? Because if it wasn't, Lakota was seriously going to have trouble. The instinct of her new form told her to fear her mate, to hate her even. She despised it. This was no test! This was a punishment after all. The Poisoner had only ever feared her mate once, when she was infected and wraithlike, but the scar upon her normal form's spine was proof that they had overcome it together. Forgiven what Ktulu had done.

When she returned to normal, and she would if only by sheer stubbornness and force of will, she'd let the God of the Earth know exactly how she felt about this. This was cruel, to make her fear the one she loved so deeply, to want to avoid and hate her to preserve her own life. Especially when Lakota would give her life without a second thought or moment of hesitation if it meant Ktulu could go on living. The second anger came from being, of all things, a fish. Couldn't they have at least made her a mouse?! That was prey, too! Fish were fucking awful. She'd better have the most colorful fucking scales, damn it.

Can she even talk as a fish? She certainly tries, has to attempt to talk to Ktulu, to try and find that connection she longed for already. And even then she can't help the bitterly amused words that spring first to her...ew, fish lips, Gods don't let her think about that ever again in her life. "Really? A fucking fish? Worst imagination ever," she...glubbed? Even as her stomach did awful twirls at the mere idea of forcing the attention of her the predator onto herself. She could do this. She could fight the instinct. Nobody could make her fear or hate her mate against her will. She'd die before she let that happen.

Post-outburst, Lakota was left instead with a sick desperation that Ktulu had heard her. It calmed only when her name fell from awkwardly shaped beak...lips? Whatever it was allowed them to communicate, through water and differing species, Lakota would not question it lest it be removed for good. Her fears settled merely hearing her mate speak, and she flicked her deep sapphire...tail fin with a disgruntled splash of water. The (clearly useless) primitive side of her new fishy body screamed at her like she was a daft, suicidal idiot. Why attract the attention of the predator Ktulu had become? Her pale snowy scales were already target enough, and with nowhere to truly hide with the smooth-stoned flooring she'd been given. Lakota snapped right back at that side of her, because she had all faith that Ktulu would never hurt her. The ferocity of her beliefs could not be quelled, a fire that would consume anything and everything attempting to refute them.

Her mate's laughter, weird and disgusting as it may have been in her new form, still eased Lakota's frantic mind as it always did. Whether fishes and froggies could smile was yet to be seen, but if she was capable that'd be her current state of affairs. Flicking her long fin, trying to rely on fish-instinct-self instead of Lakota-self for the process of swimming, the Poisoner tentatively moved closer to her beloved. If she was fighting tooth and nail for every stone gained closer to Ktulu, then surely her mate must be feeling the same desires to...well...eat her.

And okay, maybe she shouldn't find her mate eating her funny, but she made a little bubble-laugh regardless. Gazing up at the eagle her mate had become, Lakota didn't know what to do. What was the purpose of this exercise? Trust? Well then it wasn't a very good one, she scoffed to herself. She trusted Ktulu beyond conceivable measure, no Godly interference could change that. But of course her mate had to go and break the moment (one-sided though it may have been, Lakota sometimes couldn't restrain her sappy nature) with a teasing comment.

Turning her fish-butt towards her mate with a dramatic swing of her tail, she slapped the water and sprayed it towards her mate's face playfully. "Shut up, at least I'm not a feather-head," she laugh-glubbed, swimming around to view her mate once more. Again, she found herself sitting still, fighting the instinct that told her to swim as fast as she could to the darkest shadows of the pond and hide herself as well as she could. But...what purpose was this supposed to hold? "So what are we supposed to do? Because I fucking hate this fish-brain telling me you're going to hurt me." She spat it out like a foul weed amid her daily grazing grass. This was a sick joke to play on Ktulu. The mare already suffered through the guilt of harming Lakota while she'd been a wraith, like hell she deserved anything worse, a reminder of a time she could not control.

Had Lakota known the consequences of her actions, she would not have attempted to lighten the atmosphere. She could only guess Ktulu's instincts were far worse to deal with than her own, especially as a newly-turned predator. Instead, she flicked the long angelic span of her tail fin (maybe she could get used to this, if only because the gossamer satin of the fins were so pretty) and spun away from Ktulu's form and further into the depths of the bloody-stoned water. It seemed she could not completely ignore the call that tore her further from her mate, even as she fought it with all her might. Instinct was hard to fight, and even harder to combat when faced with a situation that inspired something as basic as fight-or-flight. And with her current physical form, neither were really an option. Her little heart couldn't seem to calm, even as she internally snarled at herself to calm the fuck down. She didn't want to fear the only one that had ever made her feel loved and worth it, the one who had accepted her despite all her flaws.

Bubbles escaped her lips at Ktulu's witty quip, popping into the air with the streams of her laughter heralded on their pale canvases. It was a welcome distraction, the banter between the two that they'd had as long as she could remember. Since they'd met, they were on the same wavelength, and their witty battles had turned to flirtatiousness rather easily. "At least I don't literally preen myself," she shot back playfully, only to be taken by surprise as Ktulu whirled around and suddenly began screeching at the sky.

Instinct be damned, she wasn't going to let her mate be alone in her distress, whether it be anger or otherwise.

Flicking her fins she wiggled as close as she could to the shallows where Ktulu was pacing and scratching at the soft earth, nearly beaching herself (was that even possibly as a fish or was that just for whales and larger mammals?) to get closer to her mate. She couldn't comfort her, not in her current form, but her own reaction to Ktulu's anger was to be at her mate's side. Despite her reluctance to listen, to accept that they really had to just sit and wait it out like trapped mice, Lakota knew Ktulu was right.

"I'm sorry, Ktulu. I expected something we could actively push back against, not...this." Finishing lamely, she awkwardly swam in circles, decidedly uncomfortable and nearly...bored. What were they supposed to do? "I don't see what more we're supposed to do to prove ourselves like this," she hissed unhappily, slapping her fin against the top of the water in frustration. Why couldn't they have been awarded a quest that actually made sense? One that actively tested their limits and loyalty to their desires? Lakota simply couldn't grasp the purpose, the meaning, behind this quest. "Well I love you, feathery or not," she laughed softly, big purple eyes gazing out of the water towards the bird that was her mate.