Jon groaned, smacking her palm to her forehead. "Why that page?" she moaned. "Dammit, why that one?"
Karyn shrugged, suppressing a smirk. "I guess it's random," she said. "Kind of stupid that it wouldn't be designed to let the user pick, but I suppose that means you can claim dissatisfaction."
"No kidding," Jon said, sighing and shaking her head. "It just better not put us into the book, that's all."
"Why not?" Karyn asked. "I thought you were excited about that."
"Well, because now I'm stuck in the role of the princess," Jon said. "I don't remember the plot, but if there's one near-constant in fantasy literature, it's the princess getting kidnapped."
"Hey, you picked the book," Karyn said. "Besides, for all we know, this character might turn out to be one of those naive innocents who discovers her true ass-kicking potential in the second act. They're not as common, but they're out there."
"Let's hope," Jon said. "At any rate, your turn."
"Okay," Karyn said. "Looks like you got the shortest straw, anyway." She grabbed the bookmark and inched it toward the book. As it had for Jon, the bookmark snapped to one of the pages like a cobalt magnet to a fridge. The two of them watched as Karyn began to change.
The first obvious change was her hair, which changed from the light blond it had been ever since the day Jon told Karyn about the stone to a brilliant, fiery red, even redder than it had been originally. It grew long and wavy, growing to halfway down her back. Karyn, feeling it brush past the base of her neck, grabbed a few strands and brought them around front for inspection, grinning when she saw what had happened.
But that was just the beginning of her changes. As Jon watched, two bony structures began to sprout out from the neighborhood of her shoulderblades, growing in size and complexity until they were clearly the beginnings of bat-like wings. Dark red skin grew out and covered them, large flaps of skin filling in between the "fingers," forming into complete wings. In the meantime, two bony projections had formed on her forehead, forming into small, straight horns. Karyn's eyes widened and she abruptly dropped her pants. Jon was a little surprised, but the reason soon became apparent: her coccyx had un-fused, and was extending into a full-fledged tail, thick at the base, but taperin off along its length. It was covered in satiny red scales, with creamy yellow ventral scales on the bottom and tiny plates along the top ridge like the plates of a Stegosaurus.
With that, the physical changes were finished. Next, Karyn's clothing began to change. Most of her clothes simply evaporated, leaving her in her underwear and shoes. The underwear quickly altered into the stereotypical wrought-metal bikini, with a layer of cloth underneath an artful framework of brass, and her shoes changed into simple leather sandals. Finally, a sword materialized at her waist, its sheath hung from a simple cloth belt. She had become Kiya, the wild dragon-girl, and the other side of the bookmark had changed to reflect that.
