FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Some time later, the lioness wasn't sure exactly how long, they sat together next to a smaller secondary fire, eyes locked on a green aspen spit suspended low over a bed of coals, where a dark red, almost purplish chunk of deer liver was impaled, hissing and sizzling.

They'd relocated to the very back of the shelter, the air around the rack had become quite smoky, but in a decent, almost pleasant sort of way. The meat was doing well under its layer of moss and the two of them, fox and lioness alike, were warm and fully dried off.

She'd leaned up against the stone, the tip of her tail twitching, trying hard to keep from salivating too obviously over her slowly cooking breakfast.

The fox wasn't much better off, she could see the tip of his fluffy tail twitching impatiently. Neither of them had said anything for a while but the silence felt natural.

"I think it's ready." The fox said, breaking the silence, glancing up to the lioness for approval. He'd cuddled up against her, as seemed to be his custom, fur dry and warm and fluffy, almost impossible to keep from hugging.

The lioness looked over the liver for a half second, briefly considered the proper culinary techniques of cooking organ meat, then quite consciously let her hunger win out, tugging the spit from over the coals and holding it out to the fox, who bared his knife and began to slice, juggling a red dripping chunk of steaming liver between his paws for a few moments before offering it out.

The lioness leaned forward and accepted it delicately between her teeth. It was almost too hot to eat but she snapped it down like a wild animal, red staining the fur around her mouth. The fox maintained a similar level of table manners and for a few minutes the only sounds were contented smacking and chewing before the lioness replaced the spit over the fire and leaned back, feeling decidedly full.

"Mmm." She opined.

The fox glanced over from where he was in the middle of licking his fingers clean.

"Still think it wasn't worth it?" He asked.

"Hmm?" The lioness raised her eyebrows.

"When we first got here, you said tracking down the deer wasn't worth it."

The lioness nodded slightly. Oh right...she had.

"Tracking it through the ruin wasn't worth it," she clarified, "though...I mean..." For a moment she entered a contemplative silence, "I guess we can laugh about it. Now that it's over..." The lightness of her words belayed a cold shiver of fear that ran through her like a splash of ice water. Had that really only been a few hours ago?

"Now that I think about it," the fox said, "there probably weren't any traps."

"You think so?" The lioness asked, a tendril of skepticism working its way into her voice.

"Well...maybe," the fox shrugged slightly, shoulder moving against hers, "I mean...if the deer got through alright and we made it back in the dark, with no trail to follow..."

"I dunno," the lioness said, "every time I hear about someone going into an old ruin they always get lit up by traps and stuff. Or the whole place collapses on top of them."

"Yeah..."

"I mean, general rule of thumb is just to leave ancient stuff alone, no matter how safe it looks. I mean, look what happened to them. Had to be for a reason."

The fox was silent for a long moment.

"Sometimes I wonder what it must have been like back then. Before everything fell apart." He admitted, settling his head against the lioness' shoulder.

She reached over to scratch behind his ear, enjoying the little fluttering motions it made beneath her fingers.

"Eh..." She shrugged, "I think things are pretty good the way they are now."

"Not saying it would've been better back then," the fox said, brown eyes turning up to meet hers, "just...curious. Haven't you ever watched the little moving lights at night?"

"Sure."

"I wonder about those. How'd they put them up there? How come they don't fall down? Stuff like that."

"Hmm." The lioness vocalized, turning her eyes to the needles of rain slashing down outside of the shelter. The storm was still going strong, showing not the slightest sign of abatement.

"So, you gonna turn into an explorer or something?" She asked after a silent moment, continuing to stroke behind his ear.

The fox smiled wanly.

"I'd be really bad at that," he said, "the only reason I didn't freeze up in the ruin was because you were there."

"You convinced me to go in there in the first place."

"I guess we'd be alright as a team," the fox hypothesized, "plunging headfirst into ancient ruins."

"Trust me," the lioness smirked, "there are other things I'd rather you be plunging headfirst into."

The fox blushed, ears wriggling under the lioness' paw. All the same, he seemed slightly calmer regarding the whole situation. If he had any fear left it seemed to be of a vague, philosophical nature, rather than the hard edged moral panic that had consumed him before.

"Well..." He glanced up, still blushing through his fur, "I can't say I blame you..."

The lioness raised an eyebrow. Was the fox actually returning fire on her lewd banter? That seemed promising.

"Oh dear," she chuckled, "I've corrupted you. Whatever will the priests say?" But though she laughed, the fox's ears flattened and his eyes traveled abruptly to the ground.

Shit...that had been the wrong thing to say.

"When I go back," he said, with a deliberative sort of worry in his voice, "I'm not gonna be able to tell anyone about this."

"Yeah..." The lioness let out a breath, "probably not."

"What would your people say if you told them about me?" He asked.

The lioness contemplated for a moment. Let her paw drift lower, until she was tracing the edge of the fox's muzzle with one finger, enjoying the tickle of his whiskers.

"I don't think they'd care, so long as I said it was a fling or something. They probably wouldn't like all these conversations we've been having."

The fox furrowed his brow, turning his head slightly away from her paw, exposing his fluffy white furred throat to further petting.

"Why?" He asked.

"Eh. Might fuck things up the next time we go to war if there are cats and canines who are friends."

The fox nodded halfheartedly.

"Oh. Right..."

"But hey," the lioness nudged him with a shoulder, "I promise I won't spear you if we run into each other on the battlefield."

The fox was silent, eyes downcast.

"What's the matter?" The lioness asked.

"It's starting to sink in," the fox said quietly, "we're gonna go back to our people and...we probably won't ever see each other again."

Yeah...that was about the shape of it.

The lioness opened her mouth to iterate that point, perhaps even to commiserate, then hesitated. Something about the fox's dejected body language, the flatness of his ears and the stillness of his tail, froze her tongue and scrambled her thoughts.

"Well..." She let out a breath, unsure of how to proceed. Canines hunted in packs...that would make it difficult for the fox to slip away and meet her, even if they set predetermined meeting times and places. They'd only ever run into each other by chance in the first place.

The lioness took a breath. Dismissed those problems and took the plunge, if only to erase the gnawing feeling in her gut.

"We could still meet from time to time," she said, "surely you could find some excuse to be in the woods alone for a day or two...I mean, you can do that, right?"

The fox looked unsure.

"I don't know..." He slumped a little further, his ears now fully flattened, whiskers drooping, "but..." He blinked, looking up at her, almost surprised, ears pricking.

"What?" The lioness asked.

"You know what I think I could do?" He asked.

The lioness raised her eyebrows in silent expectation.

"I bet I could..." He trailed off, expression growing conflicted, then dissolving into disappointment, "no...that wouldn't work."

"What wouldn't?"

"I was thinking I could tell them that I hunt better alone, but that would just make them suspicious."

"Why?" The lioness asked. She couldn't wrap her head around it.

"All the work is pretty communal with my people," he said, "everything's for the benefit of the family and the pack, you know?"

"Yeah. I think we had an argument about this last night." The lioness shifted her position, letting her legs stretch out in front of her, paws nearly touching the stones bordering the smoking rack.

"Right," the fox winced, "but...anyway...everyone works together and keeps an eye on each other."

"Ugh." The lioness stuck out her tongue in unhidden distaste. "That sounds horrible."

"It's a good system," the fox said defensively, stiffening slightly, "just...inconvenient. That's all."

"You could always get lost again on your next hunting trip." The lioness suggested lightly.

"They'd get suspicious." The fox sighed.

The lioness was silent for a moment, watching smoke curl up through the moss stacked atop the smoking rack.

"Alright," she said, "if the system is that impenetrable then don't go back."

The fox stiffened against her. Pulled away, looking horrified.

"No." He said flatly, like she'd just suggested he cut his own ears off. "God...no, that's...that's everything." He looked stricken and the lioness straightened up against the rock, her own ears flat against her head.

"Hey," she said, "I'm just...putting things out there."

The fox sighed.

"I know," he muttered, "but, how would you feel if I asked you to give up your pride so we could keep on meeting?"

"I wouldn't have to," the lioness said defensively, knowing she was deliberatively missing the fox's point, "my people trust everyone to be alone for a few days without imploding the whole social order..."

"Things are the way they are for a reason." He growled.

"Things are they way they are because your system is tyrannical," she shot back, "and you're defending it. Why?"

The fox stared. Shook his head.

"Not this again," he muttered, "why do you have to be so..." He bit down on the word about to leave his mouth. Shook his head.

"So...what?" The lioness asked, "say it."

The fox didn't hesitate.

"So sensitive." He raised his voice, whiskers trembling with mingled anger and more than a little fear. But he didn't break eye contact.

The lioness felt a cold spark of anger ignite within her.

"Sensitive?" She repeated. "Oh fuck you Lewis. God forbid anyone have a problem with how you fucking people live..." She got up and stalked past the fox, over to the mouth of the cave, turning her back on the fox. Rain spattered her fur but she hardly noticed, staring out at the forest in front of her but not really seeing it. Her vision was distorted with anger.

The fucking fox...

She gritted her teeth, so hard they squeaked against each other, balled her fists until her claws almost cut through her pads.

The lioness glanced back into the shelter, through the smoke, and saw that the fox had turned to whittling on the unused spit, aimlessly reducing the stick to shavings, his knife strokes jagged and unfocused, face unreadable. He didn't meet her gaze, though she could tell he knew she was watching.

A part of her wanted to reignite the argument, just to feed the acidy surge of anger bubbling in the bottom of her gut, but the rest knew that it wouldn't do any good.

Fuck...

"I'm getting more firewood." She said, voice kept flat and even.

The fox offered no response.

Shouldering her bow and quiver, hatchet kept sheathed against her thigh, the lioness stepped out into the rain, almost surprised that steam didn't burst off of her in great, billowy clouds, like she was a red hot chunk of iron being quenched at a smithy.

Instead it just matted down her fur and ran into her eyes in stinging sprays. The lioness found the hatchet's leather wrapped grip with one paw as she walked and took it out, gripping it hard, blade kept flat against the sheath on her thigh.

After a few dozen yards, when she was well into the trees and out of sight of the shelter, she stopped and dragged her free paw over her face, swiping some of the rain away. It did nothing.

She knew she was getting wet, knew that it would take a long while to dry off not only herself but all her gear as well, but somehow the lioness just couldn't bring herself to care. Not when she was so angry.

She found the rotted log and went around it this time, raking the blade of her hatchet along dark, rain soaked wood, leaving a tiny runnel behind, a few grainy bits of wood clinging to the blade as she pulled it back.

It sank in deep, punching through into the hollowed out interior, and the lioness levered it free, watching rain drip into the crack. This would be less than worthless as firewood but she didn't care. All she wanted to do was break something apart, and better the log than...

Fuck.

The lioness stuck her quiver and bow beneath the log, where they'd remain somewhat dry, and sank into a sitting position, back up against the grainy, rotten wood, knees drawn up to her chest, hatchet held across them.

This wasn't solving anything.

The rain continued to come down, dripping from the ends of her whiskers, soaking her clothes and gleaming on the polished blade of her hatchet. She could see the sky faintly reflected in each drop, a dark, angry gray, the clouds roiling above her.

She wished there was lightning. She'd always liked lightning. But, no matter how long she stared, the sky remained bland and blank, a solid mass of cloud and rain that possessed no real features at all.

Not too far away she could hear the stream roaring. Wondered briefly if it would burst its banks and flood the valley before deciding that even if it did the shelter was up too high for even the largest flood surge to reach.

Might hit the ruins though.

The lioness couldn't say she'd mind if that happened.

Her eyes drifted back to earth, thoughts following. She was quite cold now, clothes clinging to her fur, soaked through with icy rainwater. Her paws, clamped onto the hatchet, trembled.

From behind her, a tiny noise, just barely audible over the rain.

She sprang up, spinning around, hatchet at the ready.

It was the fox. He flinched back, paws raising up, pads facing her, a look of real fear flashing across his face. Slowly the lioness relaxed, shoulders slumping back down, and shook her head irritably, hatchet sinking back down to her side.

"Oh." She said. Turned away and sat back down, tail twitching unhappily.

For a moment the fox was still, she could almost hear him deliberating in his mind, then he stepped forward, looping around the log.

He took a seat on the log, a few feet from her. His fur was flattened down with rain as well. He hadn't brought a thing with him other than his loincloth. The lioness almost wanted to call him out on that, what kind of person just walked off into the woods without so much as a knife? But then it hit her.

He'd come after her unarmed because he trusted her not only not to hurt him, but also to serve as a protector just in case. He hadn't wanted to resolve an argument while holding a spear.

The lioness ducked her head a little. Felt acutely bad. Still upset, but weirdly guilty as well.

"I'm sorry." She muttered, voice tiny and rough with emotion.

"Me too." The fox said a moment later. Sniffed. "I shouldn't have said that to you."

"Same. I was being stupid," the lioness chewed at the inside of her cheek. Tasted blood, "...I shouldn't have said you should leave the pack."

"I guess we'll always hate the way the other person's people live." The fox said.

"I guess." The lioness echoed. Sniffled, trying hard to erase the fogginess in her voice as her anger imploded into a dark pit of self loathing. "I just..." She sighed. Shook her head.

"I want to keep seeing you," the fox said, gingerly reaching out a paw and settling it on the lioness' shoulder, "I just...don't know how."

She silently put her paw over top of his. Squeezed gently.

"I know," she said, "and I do too. I didn't really consider that you might have things to lose."

"I have a sister." The fox said after a small moment, filled entirely by the hiss of falling rain.

The lioness was silent. Looked to the fox and waited for him to continue.

"Her name is Wren," the fox said, "like the bird. She's older than me, has a mate and cubs, but we were best friends when I was little. She pretty much raised me."

"She sounds nice." The lioness said quietly.

"She is."

"She'll be happy to see you," the lioness said, eyes traveling down to the ground, "when you go home."

The fox's smile was tinged with melancholy.

"Yeah..." He looked to the lioness. "What about you? What's your family like?"

The lioness shrugged.

"The pride's my family," she said, "like...blood relations aren't very important. I know who my mother and father were, I know who my siblings are, but they're all just...pride-mates at the end of the day." She glanced at the fox. "Does that make any sense?"

The fox contemplated for a silent moment.

"I think so." He said at last, but there was an expression of faint unease in his eyes. The lioness decided not to press him on it. She lacked the energy to do so.

Instead she sheathed her hatchet and fetched her bow and quiver from under the log. Her paws were shaking and she could feel her teeth beginning to chatter. The fox wasn't much better off. He stood and moved in front of the lioness, extending a paw to help her up.

"Still friends?" He asked.

The lioness smiled wanly and accepted his paw, standing up, an uncomfortable numb tingle running through her legs.

"Still friends." She confirmed, and they traipsed back to the shelter.

The lioness stripped her clothes off the moment she stepped out of the rain, wringing her wet shirt and pants out, water dripping from her fur. The fox hesitated, then did the same, more as a show of solidarity than anything the lioness suspected, she didn't think the loincloth he was wearing would impede his dryness all that much.

He also didn't avert his eyes this time, though the blush remained as he moved on past her, to the secondary fire. He stacked a few more pieces of wood onto it, stoking the flames with one half of the mutilated spit. The lioness shuffled some wood shavings aside with a paw and sat down with a sigh, laying her clothes out in front of the flames, next to the fox's loincloth.

"Guess this was my fault." She sighed, forcing a wan little smile.

"What was?" The fox asked.

"Us being cold and wet all over again." The lioness had to avoid the fox's gaze. Though her tone was light her heart remained clenched up, an undercurrent of ugliness roiling at the bottom of her gut.

"I don't mind," the fox shrugged, "it's kinda nice being in front of a fire."

The lioness said nothing.

"And...um..." The fox searched for the words, whiskers twitching and ears folding back as he blushed, "we could always huddle for warmth." He smiled anxiously, still clearly unversed in his flirting.

A little smile wormed its way onto the lioness' face.

"You're cute." She said, and leaned in for a kiss, glad to be doing something to numb the ugly feelings inside of her.

The fox leaned into the kiss, a paw finding the lioness' chest, tracing the subtle curve of one breast. She was sure he could feel her heart beginning to accelerate.

She broke the kiss, moving to whisper in the fox's ear.

"Lie back." She said, a purr blurring her words, an almost desperate need coming into her motions as she guided the fox down onto his back. She could see the tip of his cock poking from his white furred sheath and she encircled it with a paw, enjoying just how warm and full it felt, bursting with erotic potential.

The fox squirmed at her touch.

"Ah...cold..." He managed but the lioness didn't let up, allowing the fox's body heat to warm her paws, stroking along his growing member, swirling her tongue over the tip, doing her best to get every last drop of pre she could.

She let her mind empty, focused entirely on the moment, sliding her paws along the fox's shaft, squeezing his knot as it inflated, pushing free of the sheath. The fox quietly gasped and groaned, letting her do as she pleased, eyes half lidded with pleasure.

She thought he was about primed for action.

Straightening up, the lioness wiped her mouth and straddled the fox, letting the soft fur of her inner thighs caress his saliva slick member before guiding its pointed, pre dripping tip to her entrance.

She didn't bother with teasing, like she might have otherwise done, and just relaxed her thighs, sliding down over the fox's shaft, letting his girth stretch her hole almost to the point of pain. His knot ground against her entrance and she leaned over him, paws pressed against the fox's chest, almost hard enough to cut off his breath, riding him with short, merciless pumps of her hips.

The fox gasped, mouth falling open and the lioness kissed him hard, shoving her tongue into his mouth, pressing the fox as flat to the ground as she could, possessing him utterly.

Behind her she could feel something soft and fluffy batting insistently against her lower legs. It was the fox's tail, she realized after a moment, wagging hard.

She rode him harder, pressing against his knot with such force that little sparkles of pain flashed through her lower body, melting seamlessly into the greater sense of pleasure growing within her. She could feel it sinking into her once more, a molten ball of pulsating ecstasy that seemed to be growing larger by the second.

Then the fox was moaning into her mouth, his paws gripping her hips as he erupted inside of her, hips jolting and body stiffening. The lioness rode out his climax, squeezing hard on his member with each pulse of seed he shot into her, the fox letting out little breathy whimpers as she milked him. His eyes seemed almost unfocused.

Slowly, panting, the lioness broke the kiss and straightened up, heart hammering in her chest and entire body trembling. She let her paws move back to her sides and let out a breath.

"Oh..." The fox sighed from where he was lying. He looked dazed.

The lioness glanced back behind her, to where the fox's tail was still twitching sporadically, trying hard to wag.

"Was that, uh...I might have overdone it..." She winced.

For a long moment there was silence, then the fox lifted his head slightly.

"No," he breathed, "that was..." He couldn't seem to find the words to describe it.

His head lowered back and the lioness let out a small, relieved breath. Her mindset during the act itself had been...

She was just glad she hadn't accidentally hurt the fox.

"Did you, um..." The fox blushed, ears pinning back, glancing to where thin trickles of alabaster fox seed were beginning to leak from the lioness' hole, "...cum?" He seemed horribly embarrassed asking the question, but his sentiments were sincere, the lioness could tell.

She nodded.

"You're great." She said, injecting a purr into the words.

The fox's blush intensified, but the smile she provoked was unquestionably genuine.

The lioness slowly guided the pair of them onto their side, then, holding the fox tight, rolled onto her back with a contented sigh. She'd come to enjoy this position. It felt nice, still stuffed full of fox, a warm, fluffy canine blanket rested atop of her.

It was just too bad that pretty soon...

She expelled the thoughts from her mind before they could form.

They'd simply have to cross that bridge when they came to it.