Moving and Maneuvering
"Does that still mean what it used to mean?" The great Leonberger, shifting an armful of flattened empty boxes to one side, pointed to the handle of the dorm room door, grinning broadly. The well-dressed wolverine to his side, carrying his own share...
Natural Habitat Interviews 5: Ophelia, and The Ten Questions
James Lipton: We welcome now Ophelia Featherstone, Esq., whose anthropomorphic form is that of the _caniformia musteloidia mephitidae._ OPHELIA: You can say "skunk." There's nothing the least bit wrong with it. James Lipton: I suppose that I'm...
Ever I Saw Your Face
This is the story I'm not sure I should write, or even if I _can_ write it. Some memories are so intense, so personal, that to set them down on paper (or electronic document or whatever) may somehow crystallize the memory into something that can only...
Commission: Flora and Fauna
Flora and Fauna _ Moonless, cloudless; air thick with damp. Silent but for an irritation of crickets itching in the miniature crevices of crusty earth. Movement. Reach out, brace, pull, rest, repeat, repeat, repeat. No thought, no desire, only the...
Unsportsmanlike Behavior
A November Saturday afternoon, well into the football season, became my turn to meet some of Aleksandr's friends. I confess that I was more than a little nervous; as an old bear who hadn't enjoyed sports that much when I was being ridiculed and...
Grace
Somewhere beyond the lonely cabin, deeper in the woods, the woeful cry of the wild wolves thrilled upon the chill night air. Within the one-room space, lit only by the small fire in the hearth, the gray-furred fox listened with a fascinated...
Kubla Khan
Nate didn't really understand seasons. He wasn't stupid; he understood planetary orbits, growing seasons, the endless cycles of life. He just didn't have much use for seasons in general. His element - perhaps literally - was ice, and it was the one...
Seem and Substance
_Let be be finale of seem; The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream._ --Wallace Stevens A sharp double-trill resounded from several locations in the large, empty house. After several untended rings, the answering machine, that delightfully...
Grooming
**_Saturday Morning_** Emmanuel was having an unusual dream about being in some kind of horse racing arena, with a mixture of feral and anthro horses, lined up in some variation of a starting gate that was able to accommodate all of them. A raucous...
Tenderness
"Good morning." The soft voice in Eoin's ear made him smile softly and stretch a little even as an arm reached around and pulled him closer, his bare back to a very firm and equally bare chest and belly. He wrapped his own white-gold furred arm...
The Day
Gabriel lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling, trying to let his mind drift. Beside him on the bed, curled up and facing away from him, lay the beautiful cremello mare who had shared with him delights he wasn't even entirely sure he could have...
The Soaring Gryphon
"Hyromaq, would you please play for me?" "Of course I would, my little princess. Would you like something special?" "Would you play the windsong again?" She could hear the smile in his voice. "With pleasure." The strings came alive before her,...