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This would be Irfan’s first true test as Seonag’s new trade advisor. He couldn’t have a hair out of place.

Irfan painted his claws, delicate wooden brush held carefully as its deep green polish glimmered in evening light. The emerald shade matched the sash tied about his waist, giving some color along his plain white skirt.

He contemplated the box of jewelry on his little table. It was fine palm wood, striated throughout the intricately-carved top, nearly looking like gemstone beneath the finish. Irfan hadn’t touched the latch in two years. But this was by far the most powerful court he’d ever served, so perhaps now was the time to don some noble attire. One bracelet wouldn’t be ostentatious, even if its Deltan style did mark him out as a foreigner. And most of the other advisors at Seonag’s meeting hall would be nobility of her kingdom, so Irfan would at least declare himself an equal.

But even as he just rested his palm on the box, his stomach tightened. It would be, after all, a lie. Within this box was all the nobility Irfan had been able to take with him. His throat grew hot. Irfan wrapped the box back in its leather carrying case, slipped it beneath his narrow but well-furnished bed, and returned his focus to his room’s mirror.

Thankfully, black fur hid tiredness well. This last week had been one of long nights poring over ship manifests, alternate sea routes, tariffs, and endless expense calculations. He could still feel the abacus beads shaping grooves into his pads. His only breaks had been meals and his… encounters… with Prince Raghnall.

He smirked bitterly into the glass. The great royal fatass might have spent the last few weeks lounging in a perpetual current of sex and food, but at least Irfan hadn’t earned himself a cage between his legs. He began to wonder whether Raghnall was the first prince to ever be punished with one, but the thought brought up too many memories of his own judgment back home. Before cold shame could grip his chest too tightly, he took a breath and refocused his mind on the here and now.

Irfan had barely met the other advisors sitting on Seonag’s court. He’d spent entirely too much time sparring tongues with the Prince, even if Raghnall did deserve someone stumbling his unearned swagger. And Irfan couldn’t deny that it had been fun playing Crossing with him. Raghnall could have been a very valuable man to know, if he weren’t such a shameless hedon. But Irfan didn’t give in to wishful thinking, and knew well that he would never be able to pull his reputation free if it got caught under those sweat-drenched crocodilian rolls.

“Gods, please,” Irfan hissed at the sudden warmth in his loins. He glared at himself in the mirror, trying to will the image, heat, and smell of Raghnall out of his head. Over the course of a few breaths, slender chest filling behind glossy black fur, Irfan managed to drag his thoughts back to his work.

With any luck, Raghnall would be too busy trying to satisfy himself to show up this evening.

***

Irfan ran numbers and names across his teeth as he walked down towards the hearing hall, so lost in trade details that he only noticed Queen Seonag as he walked into her shadow.

“Careful,” Seonag said playfully, “nearly walked into the door, Irfan.”

Jolting back a foot, Irfan lifted his gaze from the floor and took in the space around him. The lower halls of the palace were stacked up from vast cyclopean stones, ancient and threaded through with vibrant moss. Caged braziers cast warm light and long shadows, flames not quite able to stand up against the size of the halls themselves. Irfan stood up straight, trying not to be lost in the vast space, although he was still dwarfed by the hearing hall’s arched doors.

“My apologies, Majesty.”

Seonag, on the other hand, dominated the hallway without effort. It was all clearly made for a saltwater crocodile, the stones and moss matching her emerald scales, the doors carved with forms like hers. The dim firelight even lent itself to her robes in their thick, folded maroon, and glinted from the golden flowers of her collar. Irfan tilted his head back to met her gaze and found it brushing across the green on his waist and claws. She smiled faintly. “Well, at least you’re right on time.”

With a mere shift of her tail towards the doors, a pair of guards swung both open. Seonag beckoned for Irfan to walk with her. Her servants fell behind, while that caracal bodyguard, Ganbold, peered deep under Irfan’s skin.

Despite the feline’s glare, Irfan could barely contain his excitement at entering beside the Queen. Little else could give such a strong first impression. Although, even standing with his chest puffed, he was at risk of being ignored beneath such a large and impressive figure.

The hearing hall was yet more wholly designed for crocodiles. It wasn’t quite a ‘hall’ as Irfan imagined when he first arrived in Uisdain, as there were great empty archways in place of walls, opening the whole space to a manicured stretch of swamp. A light rain had begun to fall, and though there was no roof, not a single drop landed on Irfan’s head. Atop each arch, a series of stone-carved glyphs glowed with faint orange light, turning the rain to a warm mist as it descended.

Of course, that did not mean the hearing hall was dry. There was no ceiling, no walls, and no floor. Instead, it was water. The swamp itself flowed into the hall, though the water turned to a clear and dark blue as it passed beneath the archways. Sediment billowed and turned away before it could cloud the pool. Another feat of ancient magic, Irfan supposed.

Rising above the water, in the center of the hall, was a vast circular table of dark stone. Square pillars stood beside it, providing expansive seats.

At the far end of the table was the largest of these pillars, adorned with a tall back and scaled hides draped across the seat and armrests. That whole side of the table was empty save for a chubby otter who was fussing over some massive, covered platter—though it wasn’t set before the throne, but one of the seats to the side.

Most of the seats were already taken by various noble advisors, some dressed lightly, others in thicker finery, and all somewhat damp. They spoke fervently among themselves, not yet noticing the new arrivals. Irfan’s breath tightened as he wondered whether he was meant to swim to the table. But, thankfully, he glanced around and found a few paddle-wielding servants on wide reed rafts. Perhaps, he dared hope, Seonag would have him ride on hers.

However, waiting on the edge of the entrance landing was General Dugald. His great, blue-gray form stood bold in nothing but a loincloth and limb-guards. “My Queen,” he lowered to a knee as his voice boomed through the open space, “your loyal servants are gathered to offer their words.” The musclebound crocodile smirked as everyone at the table scrambled to stand and lower their heads in deference. Irfan took the chance to shuffle out of Dugald’s shadow.

Seonag’s gaze flashed across the various seats, gathering every figure. She lingered for just a second on the empty seat behind the platter. Irfan felt a stone settle in his stomach as he realized who would be seated beside the Queen. Worse, Dugald took his entrance from him, opening his arms. “May I be of service, Majesty?”

“Yes, General.”

Dugald stepped off the landing, vanished beneath the water, and reemerged with his broad back cresting the surface. “A pleasure as always, Irfan,” Seonag said loud enough for everyone to hear and strode calmly onto Dugald, claws planted on his shoulder and hip. Despite the weight of two crocodiles, Dugald’s muscles flexed powerfully under his hide and he carried the gracefully-balanced Queen to her throne.

Irfan waited for her servants and bodyguard to be ferried on those little rafts to smaller pillars by Seonag’s side. He would not be seen riding with commoners, even if it left him the last to take his seat.

Ultimately, the crane ferryman took Irfan to a place of unclear respect. He wasn’t closest to Seonag, nor was he directly across from her. But Irfan was reassured as Dugald swam to the seat at his right, and he noted that the antelope to his left was dressed in the heavy finery of a wealthy lord. More concerning, only a few spots separated him from the final empty pillar. Irfan recognized the otter who sat on a small place beside that one—the same servant he’d run into this morning in Prince Raghnall’s bedchamber.

Irfan gathered his papers on the table, hoping that the capricious prince had changed his mind about attending. He sat, cross-legged, although the hard stone would surely leave him with a sore rump by the end of the meeting. After all, he didn’t have quite the indulgent cushion of lard that a certain royal crocodile sported.

A sea lion woman began to glance around as everyone else had settled, hunching forward over the table with barely-restrained energy.

Irfan had done enough research on previous discussions to recognize her. Captain Stoica, representing her family’s vast merchant fleet and the Queen’s navy.

Despite Stoica’s clear impatience she stayed her tongue, waiting for Seonag to speak first. The Queen herself seemed wholly unbothered by the quiet. However, the minutes became dreadful for Irfan as his stomach tied a knot of anxiety despite his measured breaths. Servants on rafts lit small braziers on the stone table, but even so the dusk gloom left it difficult to read his notes. He kept a cool face, hands resting atop each other before him.

Without prompting, the antelope lord beside Irfan leaned over and muttered while glancing at the empty seat beside Seonag, “Normally I’d assume he’s insisting on having thirds while we wait, but I suppose he’s grown too lazy for even his own dinner.” His heavy-lidded eyes lingered on the covered platter, then drifted curiously to Irfan.

Irfan could feel the antelope picking apart his Deltan clothes, gauging whether he was anyone worth speaking to. While he scoured his memories for the nobleman’s name, Irfan matched his sneering tone, “I’m sure he’s filling his snout with another sort of meat.”

As the antelope snickered, Irfan glanced at a signet ring on his finger, putting noble sigil to name. Lord Anholts readjusted his heavy tunic about the neck, as mist continued to settle in the fabric. “Sir. Thorley,” Anholts drew in the golden eagle seated to his left, a man in a loose skirt, robes, and ornamented bracers, “Care to take bets where our illustrious prince’s snout is buried? Irfan thinks he’s sampling another man.”

“Is it still ‘sampling’ for one so familiar with the taste?” Irfan asked, careful to keep his snout pointed away from Seonag.

Anholts laughed louder than he should have. He stiffly tugged at his tunic and pretended to be clearing his throat as a few eyes were drawn to him. Still, he couldn’t quite help himself from continuing under his breath. “I say he got too impatient to wait for whatever feast he ordered and has been stuffing himself on tavern fare until there’s no room for thoughts of our languishing ships.”

Thorley drummed his fingers in rhythm, weighing both proposals. Then, his beak turned up in a good-natured smile as he snorted. “If I bet on both at once, will you pay me out double?”

Anholts fixed both of them with a compatriot’s look. “Shall we say twenty golden scales?”

Irfan’s fingers tightened painfully under the table. Queen Seonag paid him well, but that was a ridiculous amount to throw away on a stupid bet—not to mention risking the troubling reputation of a gambler since he didn’t have nearly the established name as these two Saltlands noblemen. But, if he refused, he’d lose the camaraderie their mockery had started to build.

He was saved by the sudden opening of the hearing hall doors behind them. Irfan turned and set his eyes on the great mountain of belly fat that preceded Prince Raghnall’s entrance and sloshed with each of his strides down the entrance platform.

Even from this distance, Irfan could see the sweat coating his flank rolls, brazier light reflecting easily off wet scales. Irfan’s breath caught for a brief moment as he wondered if Prince Raghnall was completely naked. But, with narrowed eyes, he just made out the fabric of a simple white loincloth desperately struggling around his obscene hips. The whole front of it was covered with his belly, whose handles bulged from the fabric pulled tight around his sides.

One of the raft-paddling servants had to bend his neck back just to look up past the prince’s heaving breasts. Raghnall brushed him off with a few oversized fingers. Instead he half-jumped, half-slumped into the water, letting his own fat drag him down then buoy him up. At least he wouldn’t smell quite so strongly of the sweat trapped in his blubberous folds.

Once in the water, Raghnall moved faster than Irfan would have expected, showing off how much meat must have filled out his tail beneath the padding. Irfan tensed as the Prince approached the table, but Raghnall glanced away from him and swam along the other side, even though he had to cross behind his mother’s seat to take his own.

Raghnall looked the part of a lumbering beast as he dragged himself onto his stone pillar. Water poured in great rivers from his hanging moobs and the great sacks of fat smothering his biceps. Even though his seat rose only a few inches out of the water, it took him nearly a minute to heft so many indulgent pounds up that terrible height. There he reclined, tail draping carelessly into the water, and took a few long huffs. He was wholly unconcerned with how his loincloth clung, translucent, to his hips. Everyone at the table could see the scales of his ass whether they wanted to or not.

Much as Irfan hated to admit it, those shiny emerald scales gave his immense form a breathtaking quality—dripping wet and barely dressed as he was, Raghnall still looked like a prince.

Raghnall’s little otter servant, Firk, lifted the covering from the great tray, releasing swaths of steam and the sweet scent of roast pig.

The Prince’s scaled brows lifted and, as he struggled to prop himself up on an arm, shiny saliva started to gather on his snout. Melted fat reflected in Raghnall’s deep cobalt eyes, which had little interest in any of the important figures at the meeting.

“Gods,” Lord Anholts uttered. He stared, snout curled, while Raghnall dug his greedy fingers into the pig’s leg and tore it off, filling the quiet with shameless chewing and slurping at the abundant lard. “You’d think he might worry about where that sort of gluttony got the pig.”

“You think some farm animal can match our royal fatty?” Sir. Thorley watched with more of a look of amusement than disgust.

“One pig can’t even satisfy him,” Irfan murmured, barely audible over Raghnall’s hungry grunts and sharp, poorly-planned breathing. He tightened his crossed legs to smother the first shreds of warmth trying to grow between them.

As if her son weren’t gorging himself on enough meat for the entire rest of the table, Seonag gestured with an open hand. “Captain Stoica, care to begin?”

Lord Anholts looked as if he wanted to speak, but kept his snout pursed rather than fight the barking that erupted from Stoica.

“Are we really going to sleep on our chance at the southern seaway? We have the navy to take it.” Her chest had no shortage of breath and boastful pride.

“Enough to hold it?” Seonag asked, trailing her claw through the air in a languid way, indicating she already knew the answer.

Stoica answered with a bit less bluster, “Assuming no unified opposition. My family has quite a few ships out of service right now, we would gladly help shoulder the responsibility of guardianship for such a valuable stretch of water.”

“And the rewards, no doubt,” Anholts muttered under his breath. Then, he sat up straight and took the opportunity to argue his point, “If we’re all going to be paying for greater naval might, why should we actual merchant houses also be expected to give up on perishable goods and pay all the extra wages of a longer voyage? Let us simply push through Curaveia’s strait anyway with our navy as escort. I sincerely doubt she’d risk open conflict for the sake of some childish posturing.” The antelope drummed his signet-ring adorned finger on the table.

Irfan knew the power of houses with extensive farmland, but also their precarious nature—especially given how much food exporting the Saltlands engaged in. Still, Anholts’s plan was volatile at best.

Across the table, Raghnall snorted derisively, not able to do much more with a pig’s leg in his snout.

“Raghnall?” Seonag asked, turning fully away from the rest of the table to keep them from interrupting.

The prince glanced away from his feast and swallowed the great, greasy mass of pork that he’d been stuffing into his gullet. The vast collar of fat around his neck jiggled from the gulp, and as he spoke the verdant air of the swamp turned to a hot mire of lard. “It’s not childish.” His deep, rumbling voice had a natural gravitas despite the spoiled glutton it came from. At least, when he wasn’t whining about his desperate loins.

Seonag gestured for him to go on.

Raghnall sighed, refusing to lift his shoulders too far from the platter of torn meat and crispy skin below him. “She had the laws of her strait ignored as if it didn’t belong to her. If we force our way through, we’re only proving her caution right.”

“Well, do enlighten me, my Prince. How many ships does Curaveia have at her disposal?” Anholts countered.

Raghnall merely shrugged, and licked a smear of half-cooled fat from his claw.

“Have you ever fought sea dragons before?” Stoica demanded of Anholts.

Irfan was glad for the distraction. Raghnall had gotten dangerously close to agreeing with the proposal he’d brought to the table. The last thing Irfan needed was to have the fat brute’s reputation tacked onto it.

“The Southern Seaway is entirely too far for anything but indefinite goods!” Anholts blurted.

“Only for northbound shipments,” Sir. Thorley reasoned.

“Only?” Anholts’s eyes widened with mounting frustration. “Do you have any idea of the amount of fruits and grains we sell to Boreas? I don’t suppose the Queen’s Army will be marching trade caravans all the way across the mountains while we wait on our hands for Curaveia to come to her senses?”

“There will be no need for that,” Seonag said. Her tail swished slowly behind her, a subtle show of agitation that dampened the argument quickly. Across the middle of the table, her shadow swallowed up the old dark stone, besting even her behemoth son’s as he hunched down to lap scraps of roasted pork fat from his platter.

Despite their similar forms, Seonag and Raghnall could scarcely have seemed less alike sitting beside each other. Her, in gold and maroon, every bit of crocodilian might measured and controlled before her advising council. Him, in a waterlogged loincloth and a thick sheen of melted grease that showed off every curve and fold of his pillowy chins. Even now, Raghnall was slurping at the bones.

“Irfan,”

Seonag’s voice slapped his snout, wrenching his eyes away from Raghnall’s disgusting display. He shifted his thighs to smother his manhood before it could try to harden. “Yes, Majesty?”

“You’ve heard enough by now, I’m sure. What do you recommend?”

Irfan cleared his throat and unrolled a few parchment scrolls for ease of reference. He’d practiced this, and the Queen herself had given him the floor, but Raghnall tugged at his focus like gravity on wet sand. The melted fat had dribbled down the Prince’s vast breasts, catching firelight along every bit of soft-scaled meat and blubber fighting for space under his arms. Irfan dug his claws into his palm to distract himself from the aching between his legs. “The Southern Seaway can deliver most goods to the lands which lie along it, but Lord Anholts has a point on the importance of northern trade.” He plucked a stylus of bone and traced it along various noted figures. “Not just agriculture, but meat, fish, fabric— among similar goods—make up more than a third of the Saltlands’ entire trade economy.” Irfan had to keep his eyes locked on Seonag lest they wander right, especially as Raghnall brazenly cracked open a thick bone to slurp at the marrow. “Obviously, transporting all that by land is impossible. Not the least because half of our partners aren’t even reachable that way.”

“Exactly.” Anholts puffed his chest.

Irfan didn’t relish having to turn good will sour so quickly, but his duty was to Seonag, not her vassal lords. “However, if we ignored Curaveia’s forbiddance, the cost of proper naval escorts alone would be staggering. Even if we grouped ships together to the greatest extent possible, it would be much the same as pouring chests of gold into the ocean.”

“And that’s assuming Curaveia doesn’t just sink them all anyway,” Raghnall huffed, his resonant bass easily overpowering anyone else. He gazed at Irfan with some clumsy—and no doubt lecherous—thoughts running behind those cobalt eyes. But agreeing with Irfan at the table would not be earning the prince an escape from his punishment.

“Yes,” Irfan responded curtly, avoiding eye contact. “Trying to hold the Southern Seaway is similarly ruinous, considering the many powers with coastline and naval docks surrounding it.” He could feel the eyes on him, lords and courtiers glaring at the foreign stranger who insisted they all were fools. Irfan would have to smooth over a number of egos or else find himself on someone’s chopping block. He swallowed, returned his eyes to the scrolls laid out before him, and rallied his voice. “We can spare occasional escorts for the Southern Seaway, but the only viable option we have for northern trade is to use the Sheertooth Waters.”

“Advisor—” Lord Anholts scoured Irfan’s form with his eyes, trying to parse out whether he might have a more fitting title, “you must not have heard of the fees those sharks demand for sailing their territory, allow me to explain—”

“I’m sure he knows already,” Raghnall interrupted, huffing with impatience. He gnawed hungrily on that bone, showing off all the power of crocodilian jaws with shuddering cracks.

Anholts whipped his snout around to the grease-stained prince. But whatever vitriol he had to throw at Raghnall, he bit down hard on his tongue to keep it from escaping.

Stoica picked up where the antelope faltered, ire churning in her throat, “Is this how Deltans run their kingdom? Put up your swords and give away however much treasure is demanded of you?” She slapped a fin on the table. “Majesty, better a coin spent on bronze and reagents than a coin given away to someone else’s coffers.”

As the debate continued without meat to distract him, Raghnall slumped forward in his seat, shifting his hips and breathing heavy with frustration. His eyes drifted aimlessly.

Seonag started to match her son in attitude, her own nostrils flaring wearily, although she maintained her dominant posture at the head of the table. “I have no interest in going in circles. You’ve all spoken your piece—save for you, Raghnall.”

Despite his clear wandering thoughts, Raghnall clumsily gathered his attention and lifted his snout. “My piece?” His brows furrowed.

“Our Prince,” Anholts muttered with mock honor.

Irfan’s ears perked. He caught the Antelope with a glance and joined in, “Come now, he’s only had fifty or so pounds of lard tonight, you can’t expect him to think on such an empty stomach.”

Anholts’s icy gaze melted under a snide snort. “Best be careful, he’s been eyeing you like another bit of meat.”

“Seems that really is the only thing on his mind tonight.” Irfan imagined Raghnall’s thick, greedy cock twitching away helplessly in the tight iron of his cage, precum struggling even to make it beyond the trapped folds of his foreskin.

He nearly jumped as Seonag’s voice brought him back to the moment, “You know well the prospects of sorcery at sea. How best would our arcanists’ power be spent?”

Raghnall scratched at the banks of fat that passed for his chin. “Well…” he grunted in thought. “I wouldn’t contest old draconic magic on the waves, especially not from sea dragons. And anyway the ocean is a wild place. Magic there is unpredictable at best.”

“How very helpful,” Anholts said.

Raghnall’s great scaly brows hardened and he huffed such a vast, hot breath that the scent of roasted pork fat poured across the far end of the table.

General Dugald took the chance to cut off further rounds of argument, addressing Seonag directly, “So, My Queen, have your advisors served you well?”

She answered him without bothering to look at the various lords and ladies around the table. “If they still stand by their plans, I’ll expect them to supply Irfan with lists of the coin, arcana, ships, and men they’re hoping to spend on them.”

Irfan heard a number of people shifting in their seats, impatience written on crossed legs and faces alike.

Seonag refused to say when she would have a decision, and nobody dared speak to demand it. Instead, the Queen simply gestured to the entrance of the hall. “This meeting is adjourned.”

***

The various advisors meandered slowly around the hearing hall’s great stone landing, each pretending to linger for some reason other than the chance that Queen Seonag would call on them to speak privately. But just as she had during the meeting, the graceful emerald crocodile didn’t give any hint to whose position she favored. She spoke closely with Dugald, and her servants left no space on her other side to try to interrupt.

Irfan knew better, but he lingered too. Departing too quickly would only other him further from the Saltlands nobility. Already, he heard some of them gossiping about him.

“The Queen’s new pet…”

_ _

He couldn’t tell who’d said it, whispered in the crowd. Irfan suppressed any reaction on his face and maintained a stiff, proud nobleman’s posture. He’d been called much worse before.

Then, the feeling of eyes fled from Irfan’s fur, drawn by the wet thud of something massive slapping down on the edge of the landing.

Irfan couldn’t help but glance, then stare, as Prince Raghnall rested his fat-smothered breasts on the stone. Water shimmered as it dribbled down his endless sloping shoulders. Most of Raghnall’s body was still submerged, and Irfan recalled the first night he’d met the Prince, how he’d barely managed to pull himself out of a cool spring.

Was Raghnall really going to make such a pathetic show in front of all his mother’s advisors, dragging all the spoiled pounds that had become too much for him to handle? The thought did bring a slight smile to Irfan’s snout—Prince Raghnall rendered no more than a tipped cow. He certainly wasn’t much of a bull right now, after all.

The nobles glanced between each other. Were Raghnall any other prince, it would be an obvious thing to offer him a hand out of the water, but very few people simply had the strength to be of any help. Irfan’s own slender muscles were nowhere close—not that he would dare be seen as one of the Prince’s little servants anyway.

“Anholts,” Seonag’s voice broke the air like a clap of thunder, even as she kept it to a soft rumble, “give my son a hoof.”

“Oh! You’ve snuck up on us, my Prince.” The richly-dressed antelope turned his head with a dramatic lift of the brows as if he hadn’t just been looking that way. “How is it that a man of such an impressive figure can swim so silently?”

“Would you like me to teach you?” A grin curled under Raghnall’s eyes, which were an ocean blue deep enough to arrest the night sky. “You’ll need to shed your robes, of course.” Beneath the teasing surface, Raghnall’s lust roiled uncontrollably. Irfan’s ears twitched at the hot depths of the Prince’s voice.

To Anholts’s credit, he didn’t let a sliver of disgust show. He gave a good-natured chuckle and tentatively lowered his hand. “I’m afraid I’m no crocodile, Majesty.”

Raghnall’s great mitt swallowed up half of Anholts’s forearm, the other planting heavy on the stone landing.

“Best lift with your legs.” General Dugald snorted a laugh. “You just let me know if he’s too impressive for you.”

Irfan peered between Dugald and Seonag. The Queen swished her tail lightly against his but kept an easy smile. Did she somehow not catch Dugald’s prods at her son’s weight?

“I grew up on my family’s trade caravans, General.” Anholts puffed up his chest. “I’ve slung quite a bit in my day.” He bent his knees and reached for Raghnall’s shoulder as the crocodile began to push himself out of the water. Through gritted teeth, Anholts heaved breath after breath, all while trying not to shake from the sheer effort.

Raghnall huffed openly, especially once his great banks of belly fat were heaped on the landing. Then, just before it seemed Lord Anholts’s arm might be ripped from its socket, Raghnall dragged one leg after another up from the pool. A bit of firelight glimmered as mischief in his eye, and Raghnall’s tail suddenly thrashed in the dark water. With the help of more muscle than Anholts could’ve ever had, the Prince lunged forward.

Anholts collapsed, losing his footing and falling on his backside. He spent a brief moment staring, aghast, at the enormous young man looming over him on all fours, belly rolls pressing water into the antelope’s fine robes, loincloth so thoroughly soaked that one could make out the finer details of his ass cheeks.

All that fat hanging from Raghnall’s belly and filling out his thighs did him a great kindness, completely hiding the cage that would surely be visible through wet cloth.

“Lord Anholts, are you alright?” Irfan asked, careful not to be noticed gazing at the meaty curve of the Prince’s backside.

“Of course,” Anholts blustered. Then, remembering himself, he scrambled to stand and readjusted his robes. “My apologies, Prince Raghnall. I must have slipped.”

“The stones are wet. Think nothing of it.” Raghnall spent half a minute or so lumbering back to his own feet. He would obviously get no farther with Anholts than a few lecherous taunts, and a shade of frustration settled again over his eyes. Here he was, the loose-legged prince in dripping underclothes, and even if he could entice one of the men staring at his enormity there would still be that unrelenting iron binding his loins.

What a spoiled, desperate boy.

_ _

Irfan nearly slapped himself to cast out that thought, which turned over the smoldering embers between his legs. It was a good thing he didn’t bring the key with him, lest his hand betray him by reaching to feel its cruel power. He tore his gaze away and shuffled carefully towards the landing stairs, trying to adjust himself so that nobody would see the slight bulge under his skirt.

Hopefully, Irfan could offer Anholts some condolences for the embarrassing scene he’d been made a part of, soothe the noble antelope’s pride for the night.

Raghnall’s footsteps shook the landing. Irfan tried to keep some distance, but by the time he reached the base of the stairs, those vibrations ran up his paws and tickled his spine. “Irfan,” the Prince rumbled.

Irfan turned, painfully aware that they were standing in front of the only exit. Raghnall’s bulk was more than enough to block the stairs for anyone else, unless of course they wanted to press themselves against his body to squeeze past. And whether due to his hundreds of pounds of crocodilian flesh or his royal emerald scales, nobody save Seonag or Dugald would dare demand that he move.

“My Prince,” Irfan answered formally with a half bow. He steeled himself before the behemoth frame that blocked out much of the night sky. Even with his paws near the edge of the landing, Irfan had precious few inches of air between himself and the crests of Raghnall’s blubber. He had to crane his head back just for the privilege of peering up past the twin mountains of the Prince’s breasts, and even then half of Raghnall’s face was hidden by the rounded cushion of fat that had swallowed his neck.

He watched Raghnall’s extra chin fold and squish under his lowered snout. “Seems the next week will keep you quite busy.” The Prince’s breath rolled down his own body like a waterfall and banished the cool of evening where it broke across Irfan’s shoulders. Raghnall dragged out his words awkwardly, clearly unused to belaying his point.

Irfan met Raghnall’s eyes and answered, “With important work, yes.” He tried not to breathe too deeply and risk burning the Prince’s oily scent into his nostrils.

Raghnall glanced away. Although he pretended to simply be letting his eyes wander with boredom, Irfan caught the nervous shifting of his massive tail. “We ought to make the best of your one free night.” He leaned to the side, showing off the bountiful softness of his belly and thighs. “Have you been treated to a barrel of mango wine yet? One of our kingdom’s finest treasures.”

“You would think of wine in ‘barrels’, wouldn’t you?” Irfan muttered before he could catch himself.

Raghnall’s eyes flicked back to him, bright and eager despite being insulted in front of everyone. “We’ve got all night to finish one.”

Irfan had drunk mango wine from the Saltlands before, back when he enjoyed such luxuries as a lordson was entitled to. And yet, he found himself protecting Raghnall’s excitement with a lie, “No Prince Raghnall, I’ve not tasted your fine vintage yet, though I’m sure it’s delicious and strong.”

“Then you’ll share a drink with me tonight? We could enjoy it on the terraces, under the mango trees themselves.”

Irfan imagined how generously Raghnall would fill their cups, his flesh soaking up the alcohol and turning even more eager to have Irfan’s hands on it. All those tender belly scales and glossy gemstones across his back sliding under Irfan’s fingers, from mountainous shoulders to the breast fat overflowing beneath his arms. Irfan could toy so easily with that expansive canvas of belly, tricking Raghnall onto his back where his drunk limbs couldn’t possibly push himself up. His stupid, horny smile plastered on his snout while he begged to have his cage released, ‘just for your last free night Irfan, please.’

After such a long time without that kind of touch, this man of unparalleled pillowy heat weighed as heavy in Irfan’s head as he did on the landing beneath them.

But behind Irfan and his Prince, the remaining lords and ladies murmured amongst themselves, and Irfan didn’t need hear a thing to know what passed their snouts. To be Raghnall’s ‘pet’ was far different from being Seonag’s. Perhaps this new advisor was merely a foreign whore to sate the Prince’s appetites.

“You’ll have to enjoy the barrel yourself, Prince.” Irfan turned away from Raghnall before he could see the crocodile’s expression drop. “I’m sure Lord Anholts and Lady Stoica will want to speak with me about their proposals early tomorrow morning.” He looked to Lord Anholts for some agreement to soothe the sharpness of his excuse.

“Hm?” Anholts glanced at a servant beside him, breaking away from some whispered conversation with another advisor. “Oh, yes, I’ll have one of my men deliver my estimates sometime after lunch. I’m sure you can handle it from there.”

Irfan’s brows furrowed at being treated as some kind of servant himself, but he bit his tongue under Seonag’s lingering eye. Pride was a poor quality for an advisor.

Raghnall’s footsteps ascended the stairs, each one drumming on the back of Irfan’s head. After a long minute or so of the Prince’s huffing and the unfocused dragging of his great tail behind him, that thick oily musk started to fade.

Irfan could finally breathe easy again. But he crossed his arms, surprised how cold the night air suddenly felt.

***

“Might you lift your royal belly for me, Lustrousness?” Firk asked while trying to bow with his hands full of Raghnall’s half-unwound loincloth.

Raghnall snorted, staring at the pool of cool water taking up the right third of his chambers and the barrel of mango wine that had finally arrived from the cellars. “I’m tired, Firk.” He wasn’t even sure if that was true. Raghnall’s veins pumped hot with unsatisfied need, cock pulsing as hard as his heart. How could he be concerned with anything like sleep?

Nodding penitently, Firk babbled, “Of course, dear Prince, my apologies, I’ll take the utmost care with your weight.” He started to reach for Raghnall’s great waterfall of belly fat.

“No. Just tug the cloth out from underneath.”

Raghnall couldn’t see Firk’s face, his own tits and gut easily capable of hiding smaller people from his sight, but the otter’s brief pause gave away his confusion. Normally, Raghnall relished the entertainment of watching people try to handle his heft. A growl settled in his chest as his manhood tried, yet again, to force its way out of the tight iron cage.

“Yes, Majesty,” Firk squeaked. With a few soft grunts and straining grasps, he slowly unwound the cloth, revealing what swaths of Raghnall’s scaled body weren’t already bare to the world. Aside, of course, from the cavern his belly and thighs made of his loins. Firk stepped back, hands ‘coincidentally’ curled around the stretch of cloth saturated with Raghnall’s sweat and precum. All told, the fabric smothered the otter’s arms, plentiful enough to enrobe the whole of his body. “What else might you desire, my Prince?”

“You’re dismissed for the night. Let the guards know I don’t want to be disturbed.” Raghnall’s crotch itched for touch. Surely, he could find some way to pleasure himself with a little time alone.

Firk bowed his head and reluctantly turned to the broad staircase leading up to the main chamber doors.

Raghnall stared at Firk’s slumped shoulders and sighed. “And have my loincloth washed in the morning. I’m sure you can find somewhere to put it until then.”

Unable to keep his ears from perking, Firk at least pressed his tail down to keep his reaction subtle. “As you wish, your Grace!”

Finally alone, with his hips and thighs freed from that sodden cloth, Raghnall eased his vast form into his chambers’ pool. It deepened further in, but near the edges he could sit on a ledge wide enough to comfortably take the cushion of his ass. Raghnall reclined against the rim of the pool, huffing in pleasure as cool water and tilework refreshed his flushed scales and took the weight of his great fat tail. With muscles already sore from the sheer effort of lumbering around the palace all day, Raghnall’s flesh eagerly melted into a smothering, fatted landscape, a royal island rising from the surface.

Displaced water overflowed around Raghnall’s arms, framing the batter-like fat pooling from his biceps and the sides of his moobs. He spent a few minutes merely catching his breath, which came slow and powerful as his lungs lifted such opulent layers of blubber across his chest. Then, with a lazy rumble, Raghnall said, “Pour me some…” before remembering there was no servant to hear.

Raghnall glowered over the collar of fat getting in the way as he turned his head to the barrel and goblet. For all the burning torment of his loins and the solitude of keeping it hidden, this damned cage had also reduced him to pouring his own drink? He grunted and seethed, struggling against the heft of his breasts and arm until he finally managed to open the tap.

Within minutes, he’d lost count of his refilled cups. Raghnall’s throat welcomed wave after wave of the sweet wine, full of the indulgent flavors of ripe mango. With a belch, he wiped his snout and let the warm hum of intoxication soothe his aching thoughts.

Even so, the slender phantasm of Irfan refused to leave. Raghnall had known better than to hope that the jackal would unlock him early, but a night of drinking with him and being teased by those exacting paws could have made Raghnall’s desperation into something enjoyable—even if it would be maddeningly so. He stroked his nipple, but it wasn’t anywhere close to the feeling of another man’s touch there.

What was the point of caging Raghnall if Irfan wasn’t going to play with him while he suffered? And even if Irfan was content to just let him languish in his prison, Raghnall could at least be good company. He gazed down into the goblet, staring at the glum, padded visage of his reflection. Hadn’t Irfan had fun with their game of Crossing? The jackal was uptight, sure, but he’d sought Raghnall out as often as the other way around, and Raghnall saw the way his eyes ranged across the curves of his body. Maybe Irfan thought he was stupid, but then he seemed to get on with Lord Anholts just fine.

Raghnall shut his eyes and tipped back the goblet, lapping every drop before setting it back down on the side of the pool. So far in his life, he’d only found one way to get a man off of his mind.

He readjusted his weight on the pool’s shelf, spread his thighs, and leaned back to keep his belly and breasts from folding against each other too much as his arms reached down towards his groin. One great mitt had to grasp at his belly fat, hefting it into the crook of his arm and pulling upwards to free as much of his crotch as possible. The blubber flowed between his thick fingers, struggling to escape the confines of his similarly-laden arm. He ignored the budding soreness of exertion by focusing on his other hand, whose claws trailed across thigh flesh and onto the pillow of fat smothering his loins. With knuckles struggling to dig beneath his remaining gut, Raghnall shivered at his own touch.

Sure, his fat pad made it difficult to reach himself, but the scales across it tingled with enthralling promises of pleasure. Hot, excited blood flashed through his loins, and his cock tried in vain to harden.

Raghnall grunted and, eyes screwing shut in effort, managed to bring his hand all the way down. He found the tamping cage half-buried in fat. Its stark metal stood out painfully amidst all the decadent softness, and presented a terrible challenge for the Prince.

Raghnall was no stranger to his own body, and had a few half-formed plans to work around this commoner’s punishment.

He groped for his balls, huffing harshly until he just barely managed to pull them into his hand. With plush, padded fingers he stroked and massaged those fat fruits. The skin around them flushed under his touch, and he could feel all that royal seed sloshing inside, demanding release. He tugged at his sack and purred from the deep hum of warmth that sent through his thighs. But his balls were too big to hold in one hand, and try as he might they just couldn’t push him over the edge on their own, leaving him with a sore hand and an ache in his manhood to match his size.

“Come on,” he whined at his full arm, whose muscle was starting to burn under the strain of his bunching rolls. Already, he was losing his grip and letting his belly start to pour back between his thighs.

Forcing his free hand back up, Raghnall tried to press his fingers down past the cage. While Raghnall loved having another man dig through his fat pad, it was an exercise in frustration and exhaustion when he tried himself. He could feel the root of his dick hard as iron, unlike the part ensnared in metal. But it was buried deep under the sea of fat that had swallowed up most of his inches.

He huffed and puffed, struggling to fill his throat against the pressure of his breast meat and his lungs against all the hundreds of pounds of belly he was pushing up. For all that effort, Raghnall’s cheeks flushed under his scales and his free hand grew slick with sweat and precum. He couldn’t get a single claw past the lower rim of the cage. There was just too much cushion to dig through, it filled his palm completely before he could get close.

By now, his left arm was shaking, and he pawed desperately to keep some of his own fat from denying him. “Please,” he begged, wheezing, “just let me—_huff—_reach something first!”

He couldn’t keep his whole hand on his manhood, but managed to hold a few fingers up to the tip of the cage. Belly fat continued to press on him, threatening to take even that away, so he worked with feverish speed.

If there was one part of his body that gave Raghnall his favorite hedonistic bliss, it was the luscious foreskin covering his dick. He managed to slip a claw into the piss-slit of the cage and rooted delicately around that skin. But its plentiful folds had been turned from a source of sweet pleasure into another tantalizing refusal as they smothered their own opening within the cage. Struggle as he did to find the tingling ridge that gave way to his wet and tender inner skin, he couldn’t dig past the outer scales. Those were silky and sensitive enough to send soft shivers through his hips, but they were incomplete, a mere appetizer for what his body truly desired.

Between rushing gasps of breath, Raghnall tried valiantly to finish through just the rubbing of that one poor claw. He could feel the meek waves of heat from it, the glowing ends of kindling, but he just couldn’t get it to catch. Cups of precum mixed into his pool. His great, sweating bulk warmed the water. And as his left arm finally gave out, a tide of crocodile blubber banished his own touch, smothering his manhood back into its dark, slick cave.

Raghnall let his head rest back on the stone, vision fuzzy and spinning from the drink and lack of air. He filled his lungs and blinked tears of desperation out of his eyes, then slowly rolled his exhausted body across the shelf of the pool, returning to a stretch of cool water closer to the keg of wine. Each movement brought with it a moan from his deprived balls, especially as he couldn’t keep his thighs from pressing on them.

At least the collar of fat around his neck made for a nice cushion as he rested his snout on the edge of the pool.

Worse than ever, Raghnall’s head swam with all the men he’d like to have between his legs. But the only one who knew of his predicament, whose quick eyes lingered hot on his body, wouldn’t even bother to share a drink with him.

Raghnall growled into the floor to keep softer, whimpering sounds from escaping his throat.

He didn’t even have the energy to lift his head as someone knocked at the door to his chambers. Though he heard the heavy wood creak open, Raghnall didn’t move. The only thing someone could see in the water now was his ass. One of his usual guards called down from atop his chamber stairs, “Prince Raghnall, are you alright?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Raghnall groaned.

“We—” the guard hesitated, picking his words carefully, “we thought you sounded in pain, Majesty. Is there anything you need?”

Raghnall’s eyes drifted up just enough to make out the gecko’s stocky form, limbs thick with muscle and fat made even more alluring by the tight bronze guards tied to them. He sighed. “I’m fine, Galenos…” he paused, unable to resist the chance at any small bit of satisfaction tonight, “actually—” Galenos turned sharply back around, “have a servant bring me something from the kitchens. Fish. Fried in tallow.”

He could feel Galenos’s wide brass eyes lingering on him, though with a great deal of concern smothering the usual slight interest. “As you wish, my Prince.”

Raghnall waited until the door closed and let the last bits of energy drain from his body. A cook would have to fire up the stoves again this late at night, so while his loins throbbed and his drunk, forlorn thoughts lingered heavy in his chest, Raghnall sulked, cheek squished against the floor.