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Waking up to her had perhaps become the favourite part of Isiat's routine. Like Scion, in a way, he had become a beast of habit, rising just before the sun, getting dressed, and reviewing the daily meetings while he waited for breakfast to be delivered.

She'd thrown that out the window for him, both figuratively and literally. She'd taken one look at his schedule the first morning he'd had the gall to wake Shadi before the sun had crested the horizon, and hurled it from his cabin onto the streets of the Oasis below. He hadn't even thought to protest while she'd led him back to bed by means of enticing kisses all the way to the pillows, where she'd promptly gone right the hell back to sleep.

He couldn't even be mad at her for it. After all, his conditions had explicitly stated that Shadi wouldn't have to do anything she did not want to. Getting up before sunrise was something Shadi was very, very loathe to do.

And honestly? He was fine with that, more and more so with each morning Isiat woke by her side.

Even now, the lioness's scent was in his nostrils as he chuffed, still in that blissful nirvana halfway between sleep and waking. Shadi was curled against his chest, with his tails draped over the pair of them like an encompassing cocoon of warmth. Even with his windows open, the night chill had been a non-issue with her sharing his bed.

The first light was slowly emerging to the east, but the actual sunrise was still a while off yet. Neither of them had been willing to open their eyes, content to stay right where they were, snuggled and cozy and warm, and still smelling like their fun from last night. Isiat rumbled at the memory, and shifted slightly, a warm firmness nudging its way up between their bodies, rising as the sun would be soon enough.

Sleepily, Shadi murmured and kissed him on the lips, her paws sliding between their bodies to grasp his emerging length and give him a few encouraging strokes. His breath caught in his nostrils, huffing as she did. His hips pumped on autopilot, while the blood that had been flowing to wake his brain was instead diverted elsewhere in his anatomy by the feline's skillful paw.

"Mrhmm, good morning... Certainly, an early riser today, aren't you?" Shadi purred with a warm, cozy murmur that spoke volumes of her contentment at her new bedding arrangements. She'd more than earned her worth with this visit. He was more than happy to let her enjoy her little lap of luxury however she wanted. If it was with him in his quarters, all the better. Merely having her nearby was an incomparable boon to his happiness and his health in general. She gave him a simple sense of joy that nothing else could compare to-

She ran her thumb across the tip of his length as he humped forward again, giggling quietly to herself.

"Leaky and eager this morning, aren't you?"

"Mrhmm... You make it hard not to be... Gods I love you Shadi..." He said breathily, a sudden rush of nervousness and relief both rushing over him as he gave voice to the words he'd concealed from her for so long. His tails wagged rapidly around their tangled bodies as she snuggled closer to him, nibbling her teeth along his throat with a playful growl before she pulled back, curling her fingers around the base of his cock.

She giggled, kissing him on the nose in response while she started a slow, gentle rhythm of rubbing his shaft, precum leaking onto her leathery paw pads.

"Do you tell that to all the pretty girls in your bed?" She asked. He cracked one eye, finding a far too cunning grin upon his pretty dancing slave's lips.

"Just the ones with their paw around my cock before the sun has risen." He quickly said, covering his unnoticed blunder further with his deceivingly smooth charm.

"And you of course." He added before his brain could recognize he was stepping right back into his last blunder. Sooner or later, trying to confess his feelings that weren't meant to be was going to come back and bite him. For now, he rode the wave out, contented that in at least one goal, he had succeeded in making Shadi feel safe and secure with him. Perhaps it was enough for now, but his heart yearned for more with her.

His prick throbbed in her paw as she stroked him, earning another pleasured, eager grunt from the vulpine. There were other obvious upsides to their relationship as it stood as well, of course...

"You just like me because I'm the best at it on the ship, and Larise is too baby hungry for you to touch." Shadi purred, sliding her way down his stomach, leaving a trail of gentle kisses in her wake until he felt her hot breath caressing just below his navel, right where his-

"Nggh... Good girl." He groaned blissfully. Warmth enveloped his cock as she eagerly plied her trade upon her master's flesh, descending until her lips were kissing his unswollen knot, though it wouldn't stay that way long.

Certainly, he could get used to getting up early if this was his reward. One of the unique perks of their arrangement.

Scion, of course, had objected to Isiat moving Shadi into his quarters, making some complaint about a master resting with his slave in the same room. There were enough stories of lords and kings waking up to a knife in their chest from a disgruntled slave that most wouldn't have even given it a second thought.

Isiat was not like most lords though. One made better and more lasting progress with a carrot than with a stick, and after his own experiences on the end of a lash, he had no love for those who were quick to beat and whip their slaves in line. He'd sworn off of it the moment he had acquired High Fortune, and he'd stayed true to his word on that ever since.

Shadi purred around his twitching shaft, guiding his cock into her throat and working her tongue across his dappled flesh eagerly, one paw on his hips, the other cupping and rolling his heavy sac around in her palm, playing with him like a fun, exotic toy.

"Gah, easy there Shadi, you're going to spoi-ahh~" Whatever he was going to say was utterly lost as she went down on his knot, popping one of the swollen lobes between her lips, sucking firmly on the sensitive flesh.

There was little he could do after that. His paws found her ears and held her down on his shaft as he began throbbing within her muzzle, pouring his seed down her eagerly swallowing throat. She didn't miss a drop, huffing in bliss as she tasted her master's essence, savouring every drop she coaxed from his clenching sac.

She pulled back with a satisfied pop, licking her lips clean before she kissed him on the lips hotly, sharing the lingering flavour of his seed with the lust-hungry male. Isiat could barely think, his paws all over her body as they made out like a pair of horny teenagers in the feline pride territories, groaning and moaning in his afterglow.

She pulled away at long last, straddling his lap with a wicked grin as she pushed him into the bedsheets, her eyes meeting his with a crafty, knowing grin.

"I want double portions this morning." She didn't so much as request as she simply gave him her order, reaching between their bodies to angle his sensitive prick against the hot warmth of her slit. She ground upon his cock, sliding along the length of his shaft and smearing his dappled flesh with her slick honey.

Isiat wasn't exactly in a position to, nor about to argue with her, and nodded fervently. Shadi grinned as she lifted her body, the spade-like tip of his prick parting her heavenly folds as she began to sink lower upon him, her body welcoming the male into her wet and warm embrace. Isiat gripped her hips with his paws, helping her down into his lap as she moaned.

A roguish grin split his lips.

"Mhmm, as long as you don't stop, you can have whatever you like, but you know what Mack is going to tell you later though-"

---

"You're getting fat, Shadi." The scruffy grey dire wolf's assessment was perhaps as blunt as most of his bedside manners, though he said it with a fondness that was born from a place of genuine care for his patients. Matthew stood slowly, the old, grizzled wolf reaching up with his three-fingered paw to rub across the nape of his neck, lowering the exam bench.

The little tan and brown lioness slipped down from the edge, fetching up her clothes from the table in the corner of his office, and without any sort of modesty, began dressing again, now that they were done. Politely, Mack busied himself with some paperwork and his notes while she made herself decent. Shadi's long, silky tail flicked once through the air, a playful sort of swish that brought its oversized tip down to whap the old dire wolf's muzzle with the poofy mass of fur. Gently, of course. Mack had been nothing but kind to her, and despite his almost fearsome appearance and reputation from stories she'd heard, he was really just a big sweetheart deep down.

"You know this is what my kind naturally are shaped like, right? We're soft and plump where it matters!" She chirped pridefully with a laugh like birdsong, slipping back into the emerald green dress her owner had brought her. The colour complimented the thick band of gold that was welded around her throat, small canine runes and Isiat's ownership mark the only things that marred its otherwise flawless, polished surface.

"Yes, and a stunning figure I'm sure you would cut even more were you a few inches taller, but Isiat is spoiling you, and someone has to play the bad guy and tell you that moderation is the key to a healthy lifestyle, yes?" He gave her his best doctor look, and ignoring that he was closer to twice her height than not, Shadi couldn't help but feel like he was looking down on her like a disapproving father figure might have.

She pouted playfully for a moment before she gave a defeated, dramatic sigh.

"Fine. I'll cut back to one snack per day, happy?" She said, compromising with the stubborn wolf.

"No, but I rarely am, or so everyone tells me." He grumbled and fondly reached out to pet between her ears, a gesture Shadi accepted with far more gratefulness than his dieting advice. Pulling him down to her level gently by his whiskers, she placed a soft kiss upon the old wolf's cheek beneath his eyepatch, bumping her nose against his for just a moment.

"So can I go and get lunch now?" She teased. Mack rolled his single golden eye with a dismissive grumble, playfully pushing her towards the door.

"Go on and get you, before I start treating you like more of a spoiled child."

"If you want to spank me, you'll have to pay Isiat first!"

She left him red-faced and stammering protests after her as she skittered off quickly and bounded up the nearest stairway to the top deck, two steps at a time.

Above, the ship was as busy as Shadi had ever seen it. Work crews crawled along the spindly propeller mounts that covered every side of the massive vessel that was High Fortune, cleaning solar panels, adjusting the pitches, and clearing sand accumulations on gears. All of the busy work tasks that had been pushed back while they were landed now had to be completed for them to prepare to leave. She even saw a few of the mostly avian helm crew making their inspections while speaking in their musical native tongues of birdsong. It was one of few she didn't understand and certainly couldn't reproduce herself.

Almost a full month now they had been landed, the massive props turning only with the wind, and the balloons overhead that kept High Fortune aloft had lain dormant, just another trader among a sea of them. Isiat expected them to cast off within the next day or two, and now that the trader's conference had officially run over its allotted time, the elder dragon Orthani had bid all of his guests' fair travels and get the hell off of his land.

Isiat himself had been eager to get underway. He'd sent her to dance for Yzetz, the golden dragon who had been sent to collect her vulpine master's debts and managed to buy him an additional fortnight for travel after a night of very long, very hard and rough negotiations. Gods above had she been sore afterwards. Isiat had given her the entire next day off, and the little tan lioness had spent it sprawled out upon his bed resting in the sunlight while he'd attended to his business of doing business.

A cacophony of exciting shouting dashed by behind her in the form of half a dozen waist-high terrors, chasing across the deck with wooden swords and shields, loudly shouting and clacking against each other. Behind them, Larise strode like the image of motherly grace, just quietly laughing while her kids attempted to bludgeon each other to death with their beating sticks. The pretty honey-coloured sundress matched her fur, and catching Shadi's eye, she wandered over and greeted her with a sweet kiss on the lips.

"Well, how did it go? Did Mack give you a good flogging yet?" She asked. Shadi purred as the buxom coyote snuggled up against her side, bumping her hip against the lioness. Larise was open like a book when it came to showing her love and affection. Shadi loved her for it.

"No, but he said I was getting fat!" Shadi said indignantly with a huff.

"Is he wrong?" The coyote grinned, one eyebrow raised questioningly. Her tail was wagging back and forth in quick, playful whips.

Shadi ran her paws down along her sides and over her belly. Her stomach had just a little jiggle to its plumpness. Perhaps she was just a touch. She was certainly far, far softer and fluffier than she had been when she first came on board, and a touch rounder to boot... But that was how her kind looked naturally! Plump and soft, perfect curvy women.

"I mean... It's still not a nice way to say it."

"Mack isn't nice, but he's honest, which, in a doctor, I value far more than bedside manners. A nice doctor would have cost me at least three of my little pack of hell-raisers, but Matthew? He's the reason I and they are all still here today to enjoy the chaos of screaming young ones. You'd be lucky to find as good a doctor or man both in the free lands." Larise chuckled, before leaning against the railing with Shadi as a wistful sigh escaped her.

"You seem awfully fond of him." Shadi teased, to which the coyote just gave a wry, knowing sort of shrug.

"Why wouldn't I be? I'm not convinced Declan isn't his, not that he's ever admitted to anything. A perfect little tan wolf that left the ship before you came aboard, but if you looked close enough at their faces..."

Shadi choked on the flask of water she had been about to sip from, spitting across the railing as he steadied herself. Larise smacked her on the back and laughed boisterously.

"And you call me the harlot!"

"It was one time! Okay, two if you count the morning, but still! He's nice, and he's very male. They all have needs, Shadi, even those too good to admit it! Now come on. You can walk me to work if you're not doing anything more pressing."

---

Sometimes, what was needed was a brief power nap to get through the day. From kings to field workers, oftentimes, a brief siesta could mean the difference between tackling a problem refreshed and alert or tackling it like guards piling upon a drunkard in the streets after a particularly hard work week.

And so, looking to avoid becoming the second, Isiat had simply snuck out of his last meeting, giving Scion free reign to harass the last few traders who the dragon had slipped onto the schedule so that the vulpine with too many tails could sneak back to his quarters for thirty minutes of uninterrupted sleep.

Part of him had hoped that he might bump into Shadi, or that she would be waiting for him, sunning herself upon his bed as she'd made a habit of doing since moving into his quarters with him a few days prior. Alas, it was not to be. It was probably for the better. He doubted much rest would have occurred if she had been.

And after all the damn frustration of this morning, I doubt I'd have wanted to shut my eyes unless she was sitting on my muzzle.

With a soft chuckle at the thought, he climbed the ladder to the floor hatch of his cabin, and gave a gentle push upwards...

Only to find that the hatch popped open soundlessly on its own, already unlocked. And he knew for damn sure that hadn't been Shadi. He could hear papers being rifled through now, so it certainly wasn't an unexpected stop-in by Scion, not that the dragon could have possibly overtaken him on his way up here either.

There were footsteps now, circling his desk. Broad, flat-footed steps that were without rhythm or timing.

One two. Pause. Shuffle. One. One. Shuffle. Onetwothreefour. Wait.

So it was none of Isiat's people, that much was sure. All of them knew better than to touch anything Scion had meticulously spent his morning organising. Even the dragon had a certain ebb and flow to his motions that were instantly recognisable to the keen-eared Vulpine.

He silently wished for his sword at his belt, but he'd left the damn blade in its sheath on his bookshelf. Daring to lift the hatch slightly more, he took a peek. It was still right where he had left it, though the sneak thief was out of sight, concealed as they rummaged through his desk drawers that shouldhave been locked.

Quiet as he could, he pushed the hatch up a little more, planning on wriggling his way through.

The rummaging stopped. He paused. A split second later, he was damn near knocked back down as a heavy weight bounded onto the top of the open hatch, slamming it back down before the thief dashed for the main doors to Isiat's quarters.

With a curse, he pushed himself back up and scrambled through, going right for the bookshelf, and more importantly, his sword. Two massive feet collided with his chest and bowled him over like a pin, the pair of figures slamming into the ground, each with a distinct grunt of having the air knocked from their lungs.

Spinning, he locked eyes with the startled-looking long-ear hare, and there was a fraction of a second's hesitation. Isiat's eyes glanced at the bookshelf just over the lapine's shoulder, and the rabbit seemed to sense that he was suddenly in much more danger than it had initially appeared. Both of them scrambled in opposite directions, the hare going right for the bookshelf as Isiat dived under his desk through the middle section, scrambling for something to fend the other off with.

They both rounded on each other in the same instant, the brown-furred hare clumsily drawing Foxbite from its scabbard as Isiat raised above the desk, something far more dangerous in his paw. The god-almighty bang made the hare yelp and drop the sword with a loud clattering, covering his ears as ringing filled them. The revolving dragon-smoke pistol in the vulpine's paws was still whispering vapour from the end of its barrel.

A thin stream of dust and pulped wood drifted from the neat, finger-tip width hole in the ceiling above the hare's head.

He cried out in one of the grassland tongues. Isiat had no idea what the hell the male had said, but the slow raising of his paws above his head was as clear a sign as any. Isiat levelled the weapon at the Hare with a growl.

"Just who the hell are you, and what are you doing in my office?"

---

"It's Voruz nothing! 'But It's Voruz though' owes my lady two Draskar for the night, plus two for the other night, and five for the wild night before that! 'But it's Voruz though' owes ME another twelve Draskar for his unpaid bar tab for the year to date, plus ninety-seven silver drakes for damages, sheet repair and replacement, and meals served in the house. He owes me forty-five coppers for candles, perfumes, and miscellaneous services, and another three for the spilled drink! 'It's Voruz though!' had better pay his goddamn debt soon, or 'It's Voruz though' is gonna find Voruz's kneecaps will fit up his own asshole with proper lubrication from that spicy beef crap he cooks all day long!"

Shadi had to all but press her back into the wall of the corridor of the lower deck hallway beside Larise as a red and black salamander scrambled out from the front of a bright red archway, the swinging sign of a stretched lady's leg above the red lantern-lit doorway enough to tell her all she needed to know of the situation. The salamander staggered a few steps, smooth scaly skin glistening as he frantically tried to pull his pants back up around his hips.

Before he had even made it a dozen steps, the hulking form of a blonde-striped hyena matriarch had rounded the door after him, winding up with the boot gripped in her paw.

"Hey, It's Voruz though! You forgot your fucking shoe!" Her throw clocked him right in the back of the head and sent the male tumbling to the deck in a string of expletives so long and fast it would have made a nun blush.

Dusting her paws off, the hyena huffed, the matter clearly settled for now at least. Her attention quickly rounded on Larise, who was still as stiff as a board against the wall, as if quietly praying that by not moving, the busty matriarch before them wouldn't notice her. Not a chance.

"Ahhh! About time you showed up! I was beginning to wonder if I was going to have to yell at Isiat for having his whore taking up all of your time-Well hello there!" As if suddenly aware of Shadi standing inconspicuously beside the Coyote bitch, the Hyena turned, stooping down to meet Shadi at her level, fully a head and some below the striped hyena's height.

"Aren't you just the sweetest, shortest little gold-collared pleasure slave I ever saw! I'm Shael sweetheart. Surely Larise has mentioned me!"

"Only good things!"

"Larise, you're a shitty liar, now get in there before I volunteer you for stockade night so I can tan that little golden arse of yours pink! Get!" Larise squeaked in a most undignified way as Shael's broad paw smacked across her rump with an immensely satisfying crack, sending the Coyote scampering away inside the brothel.

Shadi gulped as once more the Hyena's gaze found her, and with a single finger, beckoned her over. Before the little lioness could protest further, Shael had daintily hooked a finger through Shadi's collar and led her inside as well, past the thin veils obscuring any further view just inside the door. She chattered on amicably as she led Shadi across to a smooth wooden bar, where a topless doe was busy serving drinks to a ragged-looking group of males from the forge decks.

The establishment itself wasn't at all like Shadi had imagined, running across multiple floors from a stairway in the back corner. Larise had mentioned in past all the private rooms were up there, decorated as lavishly as the whores who worked in them. A stage with dancing poles dominated the centre space, groups of hollering patrons tossing coins up to the current dancer, a busty tigress who flauntingly shook her perfect shapely ass for the crowd to a beat on the music box nearby.

Without waiting for input, the Hyena forced Shadi's attention back around on her, slapping a pair of glass flutes filled with wine onto the counter between them.

"Whatever Isiat is paying you, I can promise you fifty Draskar a week on top of it."

Without a word, Shadi reached into the folds of her dress, and pulled out her latest pay note, left for her by Isiat that morning. She slipped it across to Shael, whose jaw dropped. A single paw reached up and scratched her head with a dumbstruck look. The Matriarch sighed in defeat. Isiat's smug words rang in her ears from a few nights before while he cuddled her in his bed.

Even the Dragons, for all their wealth, wouldn't make such a generous offer to a freeman, let alone a pleasure slave.

"Dragon dicks on a dogpile. That's how much he's paying you?! I've heard of a golden goose before, but never a golden cat!"

"Plus he also doesn't make me do anything for anyone I don't want to, so..." Shael baulked upon hearing that.

"How the hell does a man like that possibly hope to turn a damn profit! Where the fuck do I sign up? Ha!" She cackled, downing her wine glass in a single gulp. "You must be something in show then. Maybe I can buy myself a private performance from your master..."

"Well, I'm sure if you asked him nicely." Shadi giggled and sipped her wine almost daintily. She liked this one. The Hyena was scary, but Larise had often told her tales of Shael's stand-out personality. Like Isiat, she seemed almost larger than life in a way, and in a crowded space such as this, Shadi doubted the lady would have had any issues standing out. That you could hear her from across the room without her trying to even raise her voice only added to that.

"So pretty thing, You're Isiat's little dancer he got from the dogs. I've heard some rumblings about you from some of the Canine coalition boys before they got kicked out of the conference. Men love to unload with whores in more ways than one you know. Supposedly, you were meant to be a prize little whore of some Direwolf bigshot who got himself skewered." She grinned toothily, leaning down on the bar.

Shadi didn't answer right away, but something in her expression must have given away the truth of the matter, as Shael just let out a quiet, thoughtful hum of acknowledgement.

"Oriz..." Shadi muttered and took a much larger swill of her wine to suppress her revulsion at the mere mention of his name. It made her stomach flip-flop in an entirely unpleasant way. "I bit his fingers off when they were forcing me to practice with him. After it was done, they still threw me to every dog with enough coin and their guards..."

Shael's teeth bared with a quiet growl, but if she had any personal stories to share, she kept them to herself for now. Before she could get another word out, their glasses were refilled from a bottle nearby. Larise sauntered over, now dressed in a very racy little leather harness that left nothing to the imagination, straps encircling her body beneath a thin bit of lingerie that was barely passable as 'modesty concealing.' Even wearing so little though, the coyote's curvaceous, motherly figure stood out, as did her breasts, still perky despite the number of children she'd birthed and fed. Her sandy tail swished with each hip-swaying step she took.

"Much like Larise in a way, though Larise came aboard already knocked up. Her scumbag of a mate sold her to slavers once he realised his debts were coming due. You're lucky you dodged that bullet."

"Hey, it's not all bad. Just because I love the feeling of being fucked full and while full..." Larise whined softly, snugging herself up against Shadi's side. Shael laughed at that, an amused hyena cackle.

"You just like it because you're probably the best whore aboard, and there's not a damn thing that'll stop you from doing what you love." Shael reached out, and almost sweetly ran her finger along the side of Larise's jawline. Like an obedient pup, she whined and folded her ears back, tail wagging with enjoyment.

They shared a surprisingly tender kiss that left the coyote's cheeks flush, eyes half-lidded.

"See? Larise is a good girl, aren't you?" Shael teased the dog, and with a quick pinch of her nipples, a spin, and another echoing slap on her arse, the Hyena sent her scampering off, tipping as she bounced up the stairs. The Hyena laughed as she ran away, her plump little golden rump bouncing with each step.

Once she was out of earshot, Shael turned, flashing a toothy smile at the little lioness by her.

"So, little sweetness, do share. What tales from the captain's cabin do you have, hmm?"

---

Isiat sighed, rubbing his brow of sweat from the midday heat. Even with all the windows open, it was often oppressively warm, but now with all of them securely locked and shuttered, it was simply stifling. On the upside, at least their captive thief was enjoying the warmth as much as Isiat was. His tails flickered in a fanning motion, though it did little to actually help.

The Hare on the other paw seemed to be coping far worse than either the vulpine or the dragon in the room was. Scion's tongue darted from between his angled, draconic snout briefly, tasting the air in a very serpentine fashion, but otherwise, he gave no indication of it bothering him. His kind lived within the mountains where the world's heat was trapped beneath thousands of tons of stone. The only time Isiat ever saw him bitching was when they travelled in winter, or high above the peak where the air grew frigid and biting.

"We've been here an hour. He hasn't spoken more than three words, two of which were 'Fuck yourself.' Are you sure you don't want me to simply toss him over the side and be done with it?" Scion's maroon scales flashed almost threateningly as he grinned, his broad, leathery wings flexing.

Isiat glanced back over at the hare. They had done well securing him, binding him with an iron collar which bound to the back of his wood-framed seat by a very exactly measured length of chain. Far, far more tricky to get out of than ropes alone, and Isiat wasn't going to risk having him slipping away while they weren't looking. They'd even left the room for a few minutes to discuss the problem he presented and returned to find him right where they left him.

But perhaps if he wasn't willing to talk to them... There were others on board who could make him sing.

Scion had done his best, but after half an hour and all manner of threats without no reaction, they were growing tired. The rabbit was resilient at least, or at least paid and disciplined enough to resist the usual methods. Scion had taken care not to smack him around more than strictly necessary. Had the ship still belonged to the Dragon clans, the punishment for thieves would have already cost the Hare both of his hands.

And all the while the hare just looked defiant, almost cocky and confident in a way. Perhaps it might have been better if Isiat had just shot him once for good measure, but Scion had stayed his hand. Dragon-smoke weapons had been all but shunned for decades as unreliable and as dangerous to the user as the target. The fact that Isiat even kept the antique thing around irked Scion like his scales had been rubbed the wrong way, and he'd been sure to snidely comment that he was lucky to still have the hand that fired it.

"No... No, not this time. I'm confident I know who hired him. But just to make sure... Strip this one, bring him to the greenhouse, and then go fetch Shadi from wherever she's run off to. Tell the cat I've something for her to sink her teeth into."

---

Mercifully, after talking her ear off and copping a few playful feels of Shadi's rump, along with fawning over her tail, Shadi was surprised when Scion had marched into the whorehouse, all regal looking with his scales shining as if he owned the place.

Considering that he does, technically... She mused with a catty grin, her tail swatting back and forth as she spun on her stool to face him. His eyes were already upon her, a single finger curling towards himself. She looked side to side before meeting his gaze, mocking surprise.

"What? All this way for me? You must be desperate, searching for me here!" She teased the dragon, leaning back against the bar with a very feline stretch, arms reaching high above her head, her chest and breasts pushing forwards towards him.

"Not me. Isiat is the one looking for you. We've got a... special client that requires a feline touch."

"Oh? And if I say no?" Shadi's playful face quickly fell away to one of curious defiance. She was practically begging the dragon to make it worth her time. Though, considering the dragon had already come all the way down here to track her down, that already spoke that it was clearly worth his time.

Though just what Isiat could want that would possibly need him to send Scion to play messenger to a slave...

She fingered her collar quietly, running a single paw pad across the smooth, polished gold, bumping over the engraved markings. Perhaps it was a nervous habit, but she was suddenly very much aware of her status once more. Isiat was nice and kind and sweet to her, but at the end of the day, he did still own her, and the Dragon before did too, in part at least. She could try her luck with her master another time. This clearly wasn't it.

"Then I'm to leave you to your devices. But you won't want to. It'll be fun. Tell me Shadi, you were from the savannahs. Your siblings ran down prey with you when you were young, yes? I presume you hunted?"

Now that was something she hadn't expected. At once, her overlarge ears perked with interest.

"Oh? I love hunting! What's the prey?"

---

As it happened, the prey wasn't a what, but a who. The greenhouse was as quiet as Shadi had ever heard it, and when she entered through the frosted glass doors with Scion, he turned, and pointing her down the path, locked the doors behind them. Isiat was waiting in the large clearing towards the centre of the massive structure.

The waterfall nearby gurgled quietly, and the few bird species Isiat kept within chirped happily. For once, the place was devoid of the artificial background noise that she was so used to hearing nearly constantly. There was no hum of engines, no slicing of propellers, and not even the soft melodies of the few instrument players aboard who came here to practice in peace. For once, it was silent, and for just a second, Shadi closed her eyes, imagining herself back at the waterfalls where she and her siblings had played so often, before... Well, everything had happened.

It was a warm and fond memory, like the touch of the afternoon sunlight upon her fur in wintertime. The weight of her collar lifted for but an instant, but it was a small moment that she cherished nonetheless. She could hear her sister's laughs in her mind, see their broad, leonine grins and they played tag back and forth through the watering hole, pouncing and splashing about.

Reluctantly, she forced herself to part from the memories, tucking them safely away in her heart to entertain later. Soon... She mouthed the silent promise. The weight of the thick gold band around her throat reasserted itself and the sound of Isiat clearing his throat interrupted her daydreaming.

"It's much nicer when it's quiet here, isn't it?" Isiat asked, looking at her with a vulpine grin of his own. This one was mirthful and mischievous as if he had set up the perfect joke and was holding his breath for the punchline. Whatever he was up to, for certain, it was no good, and Shadi's tail flicked in synch with the rapid wagging of his own. It only took her a moment of watching to catch on to his tempo, and flawlessly, she fell into step with it, her paws moving just as every third tail reached the zenith of their swishing.

Isiat's grin only got wider, if it were at all possible, delighted by her attention to detail as ever. Though speaking of details, there was an elephant in the room that needed to be addressed, or rather, a hare, in this case.

"So why is that one naked?" Shadi broke the peaceful silence with the pointed question, gesturing over to the lapine sitting on the grass. Really, it seemed like the most obvious and pressing thing, and likely the reason she had been called here. The chocolate-furred long-ear looked at her a moment, just as puzzled by her appearance as she was his. The male's long, broad feet and paws were shackled together, wrists to ankles, and his cottony tail was tucked downwards over his rear, hunched over to conceal at least some of his modesty. Scion was busy fishing his ring of keys from his pocket.

"Well, that one, I apprehended sifting through my business files uninvited and unwelcomed. He's been rather tight-lipped though as to who he is and who sent him. I know a footpad when I see one... So, we figured a little fresh air and exercise would help him get his thoughts in order." Isiat chuckled as he said it, and as if to punctuate the moment, there came a click of the manacles locks being released as Scion knelt over them.

Seizing the opportunity, the rabbit wasted not even a breath, and pushed off of Scion with his powerful feet, before he bounded to his feet and sprinted into the tall brushes down one of the winding paths. Shadi looked confused. There was no exit in that direction...

"He doesn't know we locked all the doors. I want to play a game Shadi. A hundred Draskars, a hundred minutes. Do whatever you please. I'm subtracting a coin for each minute that passes. I want his name, who sent him, and what he was after. Get all three of those, and I stop the clock-"

Surprising both Isiat and Scion, Shadi immediately kicked her sandals off and began tugging the green, silky dress up over her head. She knew damn well she couldn't catch a hare trying to run in the garment, and she had half an idea of what Isiat meant when he said Whatever you please. You got further with a carrot and a stick than with just the stick after all.

She dropped to all fours, and with an almost primal thrill jolting through her system like a lightning strike, she took off after the hare, her broad, thick meathook-like claws fully extended and tearing into the soft manicured grass as charged after him.

Scion chuckled, and turned his head to Isiat, beating his wings once to unsettle the earth that had gotten on his polished scales.

"Aren't you worried that the Hare might hurt her?" He asked with a barely perceptible hint of concern.

Isiat batted a paw dismissively.

"She's not the meek cat we purchased in the castle anymore. I'm more concerned she'll break the poor bunny before he says anything useful. Why don't you go find his master and bring her here? I'm sure she's skulking about on the ground near the aft somewhere. I'm going to follow Shadi and watch the spectacle!"

---

It was supposed to be an easy job! Ha! This was the last time he ever fell for that again! What an absolute fucking cock up this had turned into! Now he was sprinting for his damned life again through the thick tropical ferns and bushes, ducking under branches and using all of his rabbit cunnings to try and throw the lioness they had brought!

It wouldn't work of course, and his hammering heart and racing mind already had reached that conclusion as soon as he'd reached the edge of this massive greenhouse, its arching roof seeming very high up indeed. The windows were far too thick for him to break, even with a brach he'd picked up, and his frenzied blows hadn't even left a scratch. He'd tossed the branch and taken to running again, staying off the paths and trying to make the frantic trails he was leaving as confusing as possible.

He weaved and ducked and sprinted his way through the thick trees and plants. What sort of eccentric asshole had a fucking greenhouse on his ship anyway!? It was humid and hot like the jungles, not at all like the steppes where his kind thrived!

Coming to another set of doors on the side of the greenhouse, he pushed at them uselessly but didn't waste time trying to get out that way once they didn't budge. Perhaps the other side. There had to be ventilation right? Or some kind of piping for the massive waterfall. There had to be other ways in and out, he just had to find them. He turned, dashing out along the edges of the clearing in the centre of the greenhouse again, daring to risk being spotted for a faster way through this maze.

If I can just make it to an exit, I can-

---

Shadi pounced.

Perhaps pounced might have been too elegant a word for the motion of a lion exploding from the bushes and crashing bodily into its prey. It was like watching a rider being dismounted from their steed by a low-hanging branch. One instant, they had momentum, and the next, they simply didn't, and their only destination was the ground.

She crashed into him with the force of a hammer blow, knocking the wind entirely from the hare as they tumbled in a tangle of limbs, Shadi's hind paws tucking against her chest to kick at him repeatedly while he tried to do the exact same, their blows deflecting the others for just a moment. The hare found purchase first and managed to dislodge the tiny, angry Amasii lioness with little more than a tuft of hair between her teeth. He rolled away with a startled yelp, and in his panic, managed to smack his head into the trunk of a tall palm, serving only to addle his senses further.

Rising and turning, the naked rabbit took a boxer's stance, feet spread and fists raised protectively. Shadi's claws smacked into the tree trunk on either side of his head, claws digging into the soft bark, and with a panicked squeal, he recoiled back and brought his paws up to cover his face from the feline now trapping him against the tree.

"I yield! Just don't hurt me!" He clamoured as Shadi's wet, raspy growl rumbled from her chest.

"Hurt you? Oh no, I just needed to ask you some questions!" She spoke with a broad, wicked smile upon her muzzle. "Well, he does. Isiat, that is. It's his ship. What's your name?" Her tone had softened into a sweet singsong, though she could practically hear the rabbit's heartbeat through his neck. His jugular twitched in time with the rapid pulse of his panic.

"Teyroo! It's Teyroo! Of the Broadfoot!"

Shadi's eyes lit up with delight at that. One down, and she'd barely even started!

"Oh! A northerner! I met a few of your clans when I was younger. So very skittish around cats! My brother used to see how many he could make faint jumping out at them." The poor hare's eyes were darting back and forth. She might have felt bad if he was a slave like her, but the hare bore no marks of servitude or indenture upon his body. He'd chosen to try and rob her master. Every thief knew the risks they took. At least his wouldn't end with a missing paw... Probably.

"So what were you here for then?" Shadi gave him a silky smooth purr, rubbing her cheek along the underside of his throat like an overly amorous cat was like to do. It was a perverse little thrill she got from being in charge like this, her tail swishing back and forth as she supported herself on the tree, keeping him nice and pinned. He was panting hard as well, breaths coming nearly as fast as his heartbeat.

"Gold! I was... looking for coins! I live on the streets here." He lied, and it wasn't even a good lie. Shadi was almost disappointed by his choice of excuse. She ran her nose along his throat, inhaling his earthy scent deeply, but there was something else there that tickled her senses as well... If he was from the streets, he did a poor job with his cover story.

"Awfully nice perfume for a street urchin..." She teased, licking along the edge of his throat again. Her purring was louder now. She was excited, wriggling hips and tail giving it away. Perhaps this was how Scion felt when he tried to take charge of her, though the dragon was still a pushover. He didn't bother lying to her. This hare was just bad at doing it under pressure. She let her feline fangs drag over the pulsing skin under his rough pelt.

It was thrilling, in its own way. As a younger lioness, she never understood her brother's obsession with hunting his partners, but now, with her prey pinned to a tree and entirely at her mercy, she understood the appeal. It made her own body warm, and whatever drug the canines had given her only enhanced the tingles of excitement racing from her core. Her eyes roamed across the panicky hare again, but this time saw even more opportunities to have some fun. After all, it wasn't as if playing with your food was shunned in this context... It just depended on how you planned to get a mouthful of them.

"Now, if you're going to just lie, this isn't going to be fun for any of us. So how about I make you a deal, bunny? You tell me what I need to know, and I maybe let you enjoy this question and answer session..." She delicately unhooked the claws on one of her feet from the soft wood of the palm, dipping her toes between the hare's legs and trailing them upwards slowly along his thigh. He almost jumped out of his skin again at that first touch, frantically trying to cover his exposed nudity and protect his manhood.

She couldn't help but giggle a little at his uncontrolled stammering. With a low, playful growl, she leapt up the tree further a single bound, digging her claws back into the tree. Her hips were level perfectly with the lapine's face, his nose mere inches from her glistening little slit. She could feel just how wet she was, but since she'd escaped from the castle, her body was almost always like this. Her heart was beating like she was on the hunt, drumming with a primal excitement that she felt all through herself.

"I won't eat you... Promise. But you might want to think of a better answer to give me before you get done with your meal." She wriggled her hips before his face, looking down over her chest at the male.

His nostrils flared as he inhaled her scent, instincts overruling logic. Cautiously, he raised his hands up to her thighs, and for a split second, Shadi expected him to try and throw her down, or to duck under her and try to run again. Instead, he edged his blunt muzzle forwards, and Shadi barely stiff led a sharp inhale at the first touch of his tongue against her lips as he hesitantly complied with her suggestion.

She suspected in truth that Isiat already knew all he had asked her to find out and was merely using her as an excuse to confirm what he suspected. It didn't matter to her right now. A hundred draskar was no small sum off her debt, and even if she took her time, well... She had other ways to ensure her master fairly compensated her for this little play he had set up.

Until then though, she just tried to focus on the warmth of his tongue's delicate touches against the petals of her flower, slowly getting a taste for the flavour of feline. Hell, the poor boy had probably never been with a predator in his life, let alone pinned down and ridden by his partner. Oh, he was in for a treat... Shadi purred, and pushed his head back against the tree with her hips alone, letting out a lewd groan as she tossed her head back.

---

The sun beat down almost oppressively. As the conference was wrapping up, more and more traders were departing, which took airships, tents, and shade sails from the oasis, once more opening the paved desert roads to the sky. Even with her head wrapped, tall, Lapine ears standing from gaps between her Shemagh, it felt like she was standing in an oven. That was atop a fireplace. Atop a pyre.

She reached down, taking the flask from her belt to sate her thirst some as she looked again up the aft of the High Fortune. It wasn't her first encounter with this particular airship, though it was her first seeing just how massive the vessel truly was up close. Rows of boards, plates, portholes and external pathways seemed to stretch upwards to infinity until one reached the massive white undersides of the balloons that provided the majority of its lift.

And somewhere up there, Teyroo had been keeping her waiting for over an hour.

For a moment, doubt crept in. What if he'd been captured? What if he couldn't find what she needed? What if something had gone horribly wrong? The lady hare's foot tapped against the flagstone under her feet. It was a nervous tick of her ancestors, once used to warn of danger, rooted in her genetics themselves, and despite many attempts to train herself out of the habit, it kept creeping back in moments of tension like this.

Robyn Thaddeus was a trader of renown! Of repute! This entire plan was below her, and yet, after she'd lost two of her airships to mechanical failures and internal fire, it had felt like there was no other option. She had a signed agreement that clearly put financial responsibility for those losses on herself, and for recouping the losses of her partner in that particular deal. Namely, one Isiat Carcer, aboard the Mass Conveyor High Fortune.

It would have all been fine if the damn canines could have kept their rage-boner for war in their pants for just a few months longer, but then they had gone and invaded the felines, and she'd managed to somehow end up screwing the pooch, both figuratively and in one unfortunate case, literally to avoid having her last airship impounded for their war efforts on some jumped-up bullshit charge...

And so now, with but a single ship to her name, she had slunk back to the trader's conference, hoping to try and recoup the majority of her losses, and maybe even buy another airship. And then that arrogant, smug, predator ex-fuckslave had shown up in his massive fucking airship like he owned the show, and started taking her business right from under her nose!

She was already desperate, barely inching towards breaking even when she'd hired the pad foot. It hadn't been hard. After all, in places like this, spies and thieves were a draskar a dozen. It was almost an expected business expense of any large gathering.

Of course, though, problems emerged if your spy got caught. If the trader was merciful, a few fingers and a fine might be the worst of it, or some unfavourable terms of a new deal. At the worst, well, hiring a thief was as good as having one's hand in the jar itself.

Maybe if she just left now... cut her losses and got away. And thieves worth their salt wouldn't talk right away. By the time they discovered who sent him, she could be long gone. That was the best thing for it. He'd been too long already, and she had spent far too much of her life waiting on the whims of men to stay any longer. The further she could put herself now from those damn obligations, the further back she could push them. Perhaps he'd die first if she was really lucky.

The hare turned on the spot, her foot giving the well-trodden path beneath her a final thump when a voice called out, and she stopped. The panther was tall, grinning like he owned the place in sharp contrast to his silky, midnight fur.

Typical fucking predator. She barely hid her frustration.

"Robyn?"

"And just who are you?"

"Victor." The male stated bluntly, his long, feline tail giving a single flick. "My master would like a word with you."

She racked her brain, trying to think of anyone else who might possibly be looking for her. She came up blank.

"Well I don't know you, and I don't care either. Tell your master he can go fuck himself. I'm not available."

"His master would be me, and your presence isn't a request. It's a demand."

She recognized the dragon's voice a second before it would have helped her. A cloth hood was yanked over her head from behind, muffling her curses and yelling while she was dragged into the shadows beneath High Fortune...

---

One two three- One two three- One two three four.

Swish swish swish swipe swish swish swipe.

Isiat's tails flicked to and from behind himself in the grass on the edge of the clearing, sitting propped up on his paws while Shadi all but straddled the tree and poor Lapine's face. Not that he seemed to be minding his 'torment' too much if the feline arousal clinging to his fur was anything to go by. He seemed to be quite enjoying himself. The poor bunny's tapered prick was sticking from his fur like a little red arrow. Even from across the field, Shadi's purring and moaning were as clear as the daylight.

He watched as she used those dancing skills she had learned in the canine castle and honed in her time aboard with him. Her hips gyrated and rolled independently of the rest of her body, clinging onto the tree and just riding his muzzle like he were a wild mustang to be tamed. At one point she freed a single paw from the soft wood of the trunk, and bundled up the lapine's ears, using them as a handle to better manipulate the pleasure he was giving her.

But gods above had he made the right choice in freeing her. She was absolutely worth every gold Draskar he had thrown at the canines to secure her purchase. Her dance was erotic, moving to a rhythm of ecstasy only she could hear, but one he could follow just by watching the way her tail swung through the air, changing direction with sharp, sudden flicks.

The hare must have finally found her clit, because her motions grew jerky and stiff. Her lustful cries became sharp and high-pitched, interspaced with blissful feline caterwauling. And then she slammed her hips forward, and pinned the male to the tree between her thighs, her claws in the trunk tearing gouges into the wood as she came hard.

He chuckled, tails beating a rapid pace behind himself. No doubt there was a certain voyeuristic thrill in watching her perform her art on someone so unsuspecting. For sure the Hare was getting the face ride of a life. If he hadn't been so hard, Isiat might have even gone so far as to say he was jealous of the rabbit's precarious position beneath the hips of an apex predator. Being a gold-collar slave certainly didn't remove that aspect from the lioness. There was something intensely, fiercely desirable about her, and it made Isiat's heart beat just a little faster to behold her.

Momentarily lost in his thoughts, he almost didn't hear Scion approaching. The black-bagged jill with him on the other paw was almost impossible not to hear. Oh, she was a feisty one, that was for sure, cursing and threatening up a storm, even with her paws bound behind her. Scion marched her across the green to Isiat's spot on the grass and unceremoniously pushed her to the ground.

"Right where we expected." Scion explained as he knelt, the small, bejewelled dagged appearing in his hands. With a neat slash, he cut the ropes binding her and stood back up, his wings flaring out. With an angry growl, the woman tore the bag from her head, quickly looking around.

When she saw Isiat just waiting casually in the grass for her, she sighed. The panic left her, replaced instead by a somberness akin to defeat, while still managing to be defiant. She was still the feisty bitch he'd first met years ago, but she clearly realized her situation and how well it ended depended entirely upon his good grace.

"See? You didn't even have to wait for an audience, though we certainly appreciate you waiting for your thief." Isiat gave an appreciative nod towards the pair against the tree. Shadi had finally relented a little and backed off the Hare's face to let him breathe.

"He's not one of mine." Robyn spat, wringing her wrists where the rope had been digging into her fur as she sat upright.

"And I wasn't once a dancing slave for a king whose throat I opened with the very dagger Scion released you with. We can say bullshit all we want Thadeus, assuming you still go by that name. It doesn't make it any less bullshit. But soon enough. You look well, Robyn." He mocked her dishevelled appearance with his almost disarming grin. Her robes were bunched up and dust-stained, and the shemagh she had previously worn was nowhere to be found now, leaving her hair and fur looking like she'd just woken. Even her large ears looked dishevelled atop her head.

"Say whatever you want, pleasure slave." She switched her tongue quickly to that of the desert folk, just to spit the curse at him like a cobra's venom. "I know well the price of hiring a thief here. I wouldn't stoop so low." Even as she said it, her ears folded down as she caught sight of Shadi and the thief against the palm tree. She was practically admitting her guilt as far as he was concerned, not that there had been any doubt of it in Isiat's mind.

He glanced back over towards Shadi and the hare. She'd let herself slide down the tree trunk to return chest to chest with him, and was busy holding one of his shoulders hard against the tree while she bit naughtily across his bared pecs. His glistening pink prick kept disappearing just between her thighs, hidden from view for them. It was obvious what she was doing though, teasing and tormenting him with promises of what she could provide. By the frantic shaking of his head, he was doing his best to resist. It was a pointless gesture of course. The cat always got what she wanted in the end.

"I'll make you a deal. Let's go ask him ourselves. And if you can get me off before he sings like a canary for Shadi over there, we'll consider the matter settled. Fair enough?"

She spat in the grass towards him.

"You kidnap me and then expect to fuck me so, what? You can prove you're no better than any other predator out here?"

Isiat tutted softly. "Not at all. This isn't kidnapping. I haven't left the ground yet. This, Robyn, is blackmail, like what you did to me last time, and if I recall, you got to fuck me then as well. The only difference is that it was your idea then. Turnabout is fair play." His gaze was levelled at her, deadly serious. Of course, she hadn't outright objected to his proposition either, Isiat noted. Details were important after all. Her foot thumped the ground rapidly, indecisive.

"Unless you'd rather me have you and our documented agreement brought before Orthani. I'm sure he'd be happy to settle the matter as an independent third party. How is your little air fleet these days, hmmm?"

He stood and offered her his paw up, tails resting like a cape behind him as he did. He knew her airships were all but gone and with them any hope of honouring her end of their previous arrangement with it. As far as he was concerned, he was doing her a favour by giving her an out from that disastrous venture.

"No hard feelings of course. It's purely business, but at least we can both have our fun with it."

Oh, he could tell in her eyes that she would have cut his hand off then and there if she had the means to. It was only through force of sheer fucking will that she didn't try something to spite him.

"Fine. But you won't get either of us to admit to a damn thing, and only because you were a good mutt last time."

Well, she had the upper hand once, and now we're just levelling the playing field. The thought brought a grin to Isiat's muzzle. She finally took it, and Isiat hauled her up to her feet.

"Strip down as well. You don't want to throw them off by getting close still clothed. Besides, I'm sure Shadi will appreciate the view..." His cocky smirk was no doubt infuriating her, but that was the idea. If the hare Shadi was busy tormenting with her scandalous dancing didn't give up the whole plot, a hasty reaction from Robyn no doubt would.

He almost casually drew his shirt off, tossing it on the grass while he kicked off his trousers. Glancing back, Robyn's vivid green eyes had gone to his thigh, stopping her midway through tearing her own top off. He knew exactly what she was looking at. His slave brand, the desert script symbol for a royal pleasure slave burned into his skin with a red hot iron. The fur didn't grow back there, leaving it obvious and exposed like a raw, angry knot of scar tissue on his flesh. There was a reason he kept it hidden around all but those few who knew his past.

"I'm less embarrassed by that mark than you are of being caught stealing." He pointed out quickly, his tails fanning like a wave as they settled behind him.

"Allegedly. Allegedly stealing. You've accused me, have your slave riding that poor boy like he was a steed to get a confession, and now you're doing what I guess passes for what? Vulpine courtship rituals?" Robyn's words dripped with sarcasm, but the jill had already shed most of her robes, leaving her brown and white patched fur exposed to the sunlight coming in through the glass panes high above.

With an almost delicate grace, she shimmied her way out of what little scraps of fabric protected her remaining modesty. The thickset hare reminded him of Shadi's figure in a way, but more lean prey muscle with a soft exterior from living the luxury life of a decently successful trader. One didn't get chubby from a life spent sustaining on the minimum required.

Still, she wasn't by any stretch of the imagination unattractive. Quite the opposite. Larise would have gobbled her up, but the coyote had a thing for prey as well. Perhaps it was just ancient instincts coming to the fore, an over-indulgence in instinct, those most primal ones buried deep within...

To run, to hunt, and to fuck.

The thrill made his tails give a momentary flicker, disrupting their normal order. His eyes roamed across Robyn's body in true predator fashion, tongue darting out to wet his lips. Plus she had some nice tits...

"Play along hare, maybe you'll find out." He smirked, before, like a proper predator, he gripped the scruff of her neck letting his vulpine claws prick gently into the nerve-filled fistful of fur. She didn't resist too much at least as he led her across to the palm tree, shoving her roughly against the opposite side of it to Shadi and the other hare, her face against the bark so she could see them clearly. Her eyes were mere centimetres from Shadi's embedded claws in the trunk.

"So, what have you got out of him so far?" Isiat smirked, and Shadi stopped in her torment for just long enough to meet her master's eyes with a mischievous smile of her own. Those pretty mismatched gemstone irises of Shadi's positively sparkled with delight.

Oh, what hadn't she learned? He'd given her his favourite colour, where he was from, that he was here for an agreement of some sort. That a 'damn Jill' had set him up'... Shadi had been busy after all, and all she'd needed to do was dance and let the bunny babble to himself. She'd thought that maybe Jill was the name of his employer, but looking at the naked, thickset lady hare Isiat had marched across, he may as well have blurted it out. An anxious glance on his part pretty much sealed it. The jill shot him a glare that threatened to castrate him if he said so much as a word in turn.

"His name is Teyroo. He's from the Broadfoot! Also, he's a bad liar and trying to cover up that he was here to steal something, but it wasn't coin. In his words, "A damn Jill set him up", but he didn't give me a name... yet." The male hare squirmed under her, but like a fish that had already taken the bait, Shadi wasn't letting him go that easily and rolled her hips down smoothly to trap him further.

Her lips parted in a quiet moan as his rigid shaft slid up into her, heat and tight, gripping wetness engulfing the male's tapered rabbit hood. She let herself drop halfway onto him, and the male's hips did the rest, drawing a sweet cry from her as he penetrated her fully, his furry sheathe bunching against her soaked nether lips.

Oh, his tongue had been nice, but Shadi hadn't had the pleasure of fucking a rabbit before, and she was keen to make the most of a new experience. She sincerely doubted the male had ever fucked a predator either. It was something new for both of them. Long and smooth, he pushed deep, slick friction making her entire body tingle as he bottomed out within her. Her juices dripped from her splayed sex lips, messily coating her thighs and his sac as it tapped up against her body. She dug her claws into the soft bark of the tree as she tightened her hold on the male, determined not to let her prey go now that she'd caught him.

"Mmmhm... And he feels good. Not the same way as you, but... He's energetic prey. And he's got a nice cock." Shadi's voice was a purr as she gently rocked and rode her captive, half for her enjoyment, and half with her eyes locked on Isiat. She could see his tails wagging, but the sight of her dancing never failed to entice her master's lusts. It was like dangling a piece of fresh meat before a hungry stray. His enthusiasm was as obvious as the jutting rod of dappled maroon flesh, slowly dribbling and smearing precum as he ground it up against his own captive hare's upturned tail.

"Hare's often are. They're made for speed, but once you pin them down..." He gave a playful growl, and he and Shadi took on their roles of predators in this encounter. "Well, I'm sure you can feel how fast his heart is beating. This is Robyn by the way. She sent your entertainment. Be sure to thank her." He chuckled darkly, nipping at the jill's tall ears. Robyn flicked her head to the side, trying to avoid his muzzle, and ended up instead with his teeth gently closed around the rim of one. She huffed and tried to at least make it look like she wasn't enjoying the attention a little.

"I did not and you can't prove it, damn you."

"Oh, but I can. He found it, you know, what he was after? Before I caught him, of course. Our little agreement..." Isiat's growled words made her entire body tense, her heart racing. He could feel it in her ears through his tongue, and in the way her body had stiffened like she'd been petrified by a ghost. Every little motion in the hare was intensified simply by how still she had become. Even her breaths had grown short and rapid.

"The way I see it, this can go one of two ways... You can line me up, and I can absolutely ruin you for your Jack friend with my knot, or I can keep going on about just how thoroughly screwed you are from trying this little play of yours..." The primal way he simply growled the words left no room for negotiation. She had screwed herself, and Shadi paused for just a moment in riding her own captive hare, leaning past the tree to kiss Isiat on the lips above Robyn's head. She gave an almost sublime purr of mischief, her whiskers twitching.

She was not the meek slave she had once been, first boarding High Fortune with her new master pushing her scared, skinny frame aboard. She had bloomed into a very skilled and very spoiled dancer since then. The collar around her neck right then was as light as a feather and glittered with all of the proof of her high-class status. She let her lips curl in a wicked little smile, tightening her inner muscles to make Teyroo squirm and whine pitifully beneath her, his lengthy prick pulsing inside of her as he fought back the climax she was artfully coaxing from him. His head turned to the side.

"Don't. You. Fucking. Dare." Robyn snarled under her breath, trying to get as close to the male hare as she could to speak her words. Isiat was grinding up against her hard. Shadi could see the way the jill was biting her lip each time her Master's tails flicked with a roll of his waist. Shadi's sharp ears picked up on them right away. She stifled a laugh and addressed the other female.

"Oh, he might dare just a little with the way he's twitching... But not until he's done answering what I asked him." She put all of her focus back onto her captive Jack, pressing her hips down hard into his own. The way the end of his shaft tickled and probed her cervix whenever she hilted the male made her body sing. She could feel his coarse sheathe fur pressing against her pouting sex lips, and made a mess of it unashamedly as his fuzzy sac tightened against its base.

Her paw whipped down, quick as a flash as she slammed herself down to the hilt again, mashing her cunt and scrunching his sheath down around what tiny portion of his staff was still hidden at full mast. Her fingers nimbly clenched around the base of his shaft, arresting his impending orgasm as he whines and tried to buck his hips. She had him entirely pinned, and she wasn't going to let him pop until she had gotten all she wanted from him, and perhaps then some...

"Not so fast there Rabbit. You still haven't answered my questions." She purred with a silky smooth tone, nibbling along the side of Teyroo's neck. Her sharp teeth danced across the thin flesh beneath his fur, her tail lashing back and forth with each twitch of his restrained dry climax.

"Ahh~ Fuck, please-" He pleaded with her, voice high and desperate as he thrust what little she would let him.

"Not a chance. Now, what were you looking for?" She gave a demanding roll of her hips, her body clamping and rippling like she was trying to suck his soul out through his prick. Her own peak was quickly building, and the hare's cock was just a most delightful toy to scratch her body's itch with.

"Don't say Aaahhh-ngh~ Fuck, some warn-hah.... A warning would have been nice!" Robyn called out as Isiat neatly lined his prick up with her slit and thrust himself home, rocking the tree even more with the motions of two pairings rutting against the trunk.

"Well, it's not fair if you're trying to coerce your friend into speaking falsehoods." His growl answered her as his hips plopped loudly against her upturned rear. He started rough with her and only got more so from there, quickly thrusting into her and leaving the Jill breathless as his knot came flush with her already stretched sex after just a handful of thrusts.

Shadi just smirked from her own little vantage point as she rode Teyroo. The other trader might have complained loudly, but it was clear from the far-off look her eyes got for a moment as her Master's knot pushed against the taut sex that she was enjoying the treatment as much as Teyroo was Shadi's own.

She dug her claws into the soft wood of the palm's trunk and let herself lower down until the pinned rabbit was hilted snuggly in her rippling and squeezing honeypot, a mess of her own and his leaking around dripping back down to coat his furry sheath and the tight sac drawn up beneath it.

"Come on..." Shadi whispered with a seductive grin, tightening her muscles around his length and earning a groan of agonized bliss from the hare.

"If you tell me, I'll let you try your luck at breeding me... Just one little answer and you can put the pent-up load right where it belongs... Or I can keep you on edge until you pass out from exhaustion. Your call." She teased with a low, sultry purr, delighting in the way that Robyn tried to glare at her from the other side of the tree while having her brains fucked out by Isiat.

She licked her lips and leaned around the tree to kiss the Jill flush on her lips, and was surprised when the moaning hare lady kissed her right back, their tongues intertwining and wrestling for dominance. Shadi's hips gyrated with the skill of a dancer, and the naughtiness of a whore, feeling every delightful little needy twitch and throb from Teyroo's long, tapered rabbit cock.

"I- I can't. It's too much. Robyn-" He started to plead, but the Jill yanked her muzzle away from Shadi's to scowl at him, biting her lip even as she did. Shadi's master had passed her tits and was really going to town on her now, humping her tight little Hare snatch like an excitable mongrel mutt.

"Oh, so you do know each other! So what were you finding for her?" Shadi's grin was ear to ear, and teasingly, she dragged her tongue along his throat, feeling his racing pulse just beneath the fur. He reeked of fear and rut in equal measure, but his pumping hips frantically trying to give him some desperate stimulation told her clear as day which of the male's two brains was winning in that battle.

Isiat for his part was growling in Robyn's ear, his hips a blur as he fucked her hard against the tree trunk, his knot throbbing and swelling more with each wet slap that rang out from between them.

"Come on now, I can feel the way you're clenching. Surely you're not going to let them win that easily. You can do better than that. Just look at his face. You can tell how close that poor hare is to making a mess of my little dancing girl, and then-" Robyn shut him up by whipping her head around and reaching one paw back to bring his muzzle down to her own, long and slender vulpine meeting the shorter, more blunt facial features of the hare as she kissed him as roughly as he fucked her.

Robyn's hips started thrusting back against him, splaying herself wide around the inflated bulb of his knot, her body desperately trying to keep the too-large mammal's anatomy out of her twat while her mind work desperately to do the exact opposite. Once he was knotted, there was no stopping his climax and she knew it. All she had to do was get him a little further, and her body would slip tight around him, and she would be home free from their little wager.

"F-Fuh- It was an agreement! For Robyn!" Teyroo suddenly cried out, unable to take the blissful torment anymore, and Shadi purred right in his long, flopped-down ear, her eyes locked on Robyn's as she ground herself down, and started working her hips in a rapid, gyrating motion that had his prick pushed against her cervix.

"Oooh, tough luck..." Isiat winced in mock sympathy, even as he dug his claws into the soft earth and shoved himself forward. Robyn's fluent cursing in the tongue of her people was cut out by a cry of bliss as Isiat's knot sank home with a loud smack of her sex lips sealing around the root of his vulpine cock. Dismay wrote itself on her features as Teyroo cried out, his sack pulsing hard as he hosed the little lioness's cunt with his pent-up seed. A few more thrusts from Isiat and he peaked as well like he'd been holding himself back exactly as long as he had needed, and Robyn wasn't far off either as she felt the male's warmth blooming in her belly.

Shadi meanwhile just rode the waves of pleasure out with her eyes closed and head tossed back, her body milking the hare for every ounce of his seed, a deep set purr rumbling from her throat. She pressed her breasts against his chest and lightly rest her teeth upon Teyroo's life vein again, feeling him tense and throb even more intensely, before at last, he simply seemed to collapse, sliding out of her body and down the tree to topple sideways at its base.

Shadi blinked, dripping slowly between her legs as she slowly lowered herself down the tree trunk, looking at the apparently unconscious male.

"Uh... Is uh... Is he okay?"

Robyn groaned against the tree and rolled her eyes, not given much choice but to wait it out grinding herself on Isiat's knot now that he was tied to her. Her sex was lewdly stretched around where the male's hips were joined to her. Isiat didn't seem at all displeased with the situation. His tails were merrily wagging behind himself, even while he was busy emptying a load into the trader Hare.

"Mmhm... You've never been with a hare before, have you? The Jacks are all like that... Very one-and-done. Unlike this one, urgh... I'm going to need a dose of those damn contraceptive herbs before I leave unless you want a little black rabbit with a dozen tails hopping about demanding an inheritance."

Shadi couldn't help but giggle, her long tail swishing as she stretched out, dropping to all fours to give a very feline arch to her back. A shudder ran down her body from head to toe as she felt her own partner's seed sloshing about in her, reaching a single paw down to scoop some of the mess before it dribbled onto her thighs. As it stood, she was already going to need a long soak after this.

"Mack will set you up before I kick you off my ship. Usually, I would dog you about that agreement, and even though you lost, I think knocking you down a peg and not having you keep some bastard of mine will suffice."

Robyn panted quietly, still catching her breath against the tree. Her eyes went to Shadi, looking at the little dancing lioness in her polished golden collar as she stretched in the sunlight, her curvaceous body on full display.

"Lucky she doesn't have to bother with the herbs after Teyroo... Hares are especially virile, but even they can't knock up someone who's already had the deed done- Ahhh, Fuck! Knot!" Robyn snarled and kicked back at Isiat as he pulled himself from her, looking at her with bewilderment.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"You can't just yank a knot out of a hare you know! We're not built like tha-"

"The other part!" He snarled. His paw went for his waist as if to grab Foxbite on reflex, despite his nakedness.

"What? You didn't realize?"

"Realize what?" Shadi had heard as well, though her reaction had been a sudden lurch in her stomach as she looked down upon her body, paws protectively covering her breasts and belly. She couldn't be, right? Mack had said...

"Your dancing slave is Pregnant. Just look at her! I'm a hare. If anyone ought to have realized it-"

---

"What do you mean she's pregnant? I thought the herbs were supposed to prevent that! How did you miss it?! You've been checking her!"

"Aye. Or poison the egg if it's not far along, but she reeks of heat Isiat! Even you can smell that much. You could put her in a kitchen and it'd be the only thing you'd smell. She's so damn small that outwardly, she looked like she was just getting back to her kind's normal weight!" Mack snapped back at the vulpine, his temper and expertise not things to be trifled with.

Poor Shadi was sitting on the exam table and openly sobbing. This wasn't at all what she had wanted. She had known the canines were cruel, but forcing someone to be gang-raped and bear a bastard by their captors out of spite... She had seen such things, terrible things within the canine's castle. Girls who had been hauled to the upper guest quarters only to be thrown back to the slave pits and caves until they began openly showing signs that a canine's seed had taken root.

It was a fate she had done everything in her power to avoid. Once someone fell pregnant with one of the dogs' spawn, their collars were marked, and they were shipped off to be sold or used as breeding stock to help with the eventual extinction of their species. To the coalition, they had been little more than cattle.

And now, Mack's words had confirmed her worst fears. She looked down at her belly with trembling paws, her mind racing as the snarling faces revisited her one by one, and the taste of the foul concoction of liquid they had forced down her throat to induce her heat filled her senses. She fought back the urge to dry heave. Isiat, Scion and Mack's arguing had faded to little more than a distant background din. Her tail coiled around her body as she brought her knees up to her chest, hugging herself tightly.

Mack at least was attentive enough to notice, and with his sweet tenderness, draped a blanket across her shoulders, his massive paw gently petting Shadi's shoulder with a reassuring touch.

"She's far smaller than most of her kind, so it's not surprising I didn't see it sooner. Based on her size though, I'd say she's a way along, and probably conceived just before you purchased her Isiat."

Isiat grumbled at that, his tails flicking with his frustration. They were entirely out of sync with one another, and even watching on, she could discern no pattern but rolling chaos. Even his eyes had narrowed to aggressive slits as he looked back and forth between Mack and Shadi. At least when he looked at her, his expression softened somewhat, and slowly, his tails brought themselves back into order.

"It figures that the only reason they would have parted with her was that she'd already served her use. We may well have been part of a much larger ruse..."

"Wha... What do I do? What did I do to deserve this?" Shadi sobbed softly, more to herself than anybody else. Isiat looked at her with worry, as did Mack. Scion was standing in the doorway, looking as stoic and unreadable as ever.

"The herbs won't be effective now. Any dose large enough to end the pregnancy would be large enough to likely harm the mother permanently as well... Plus, if that was going to work, I suspect it would have already. It's possible whatever potion they made you take to force you into heat as they did might have altered your body's reaction to them as well. I can only speculate. We still have no idea what it was."

"It's possible my kin might know. It would be worth checking when we reach the Clanhomes." Scion nodded thoughtfully, though he treated the situation like it was an academic question, rather than one of Shadi's well-being. He may have been with Isiat for a long time, but undoubtedly, Shadi realized, he was a dragon through and through. His mind didn't see the world the same way, and perhaps, never would...

"That doesn't help me now. I don't want this." Shadi gave a choked growl of frustration as her temper rose to the surface. She jabbed at her bared belly, shuddering as she thought of the nightmare of Oriz's or one of her other rapists' bastard cub growing in her womb.

"Shadi, any dose that would cause termination would poison you irrecoverably as well. I'm good at what I do, but I cannot fix dead. Even if you were to beat yourself senseless the odds are the child would be fine. Feline wombs, and especially those of big feline predators like yourself, are naturally made to be resilient to outside forces. Your feral ancestors would have been hunting, kicking and fighting prey weeks before birth, and the litter would be as fine as they would have been laying down that whole time."

Mack, for all his size and strength, knelt by her side to come level with the short lioness. He explained it all as gently as possible, but it didn't change the outcome for her. It didn't make her feel any better that she had one of her tormentors' mongrel bastards growing in her. She resisted the disgusted urge to use her claws to rib it from her belly.

"So... There's nothing you can do? I'm stuck, is that it?"

The greying dire wolf sighed, and nodded slowly, setting his three-fingered paw upon her thigh as he met her gaze with his single golden eye.

"It's beyond my skills. Anything I could do would as easily risk your own life in the process. I'll be here to support you and help no matter what. My first duty is to the crew." Mark gave a solemn nod, and Shadi, still shaking slightly from her nerves, leaned forward and placed an appreciative peck upon his brow. His ears folded slightly as he smiled, and stood back up.

So she couldn't get rid of this... The realization stung, but there were other questions on her mind as well. She tried to give voice to a few of them, desperately trying to pull herself together and stop sobbing. Her father wouldn't have wanted that of her... But what on earth would he think if he knew?

"What about my debt? You said I would be free in no time, not forced to stay here while some dog's pup grows in my belly! Who is going to want to watch a fat, pregnant cat perform?"

Isiat, Mack, and Scion all paused at that, sharing a momentary look of knowing.

"Oh..." Isiat started. His tails wagged, making his opinion on it pretty obvious before he opened his mouth.

"Well..." Mack scratched the back of his head.

"You know..." Scion hummed.

Shadi's tail swept around and baffed Isiat and Mack both over their ears in a single motion. Scion was spared, beyond her tail's reach as she managed a short, sad laugh. At least they didn't think any less of her...

"Perverts..."

---

Isiat had walked her back to his cabin after Mack's checkup, leading her quietly by the paw. Her thoughts were still tumbling wildly, and he had insisted that laying down for a while would be best for her. The previously quiet engines of the airship had once again moved into motion as they had lifted off from the trader's conference in the late afternoon, the golden sandstone buildings and blue waters of the oasis fading to distant specks as the mighty airship had gotten underway.

A soft knocking on the floor interrupted her lack of actual sleep. Instead, she'd spent the last few hours sitting by the windows of Isiat's quarters with his bedsheets pulled messily around her. Solemn depression had set in. She would not be earning her freedom any time soon.

Not now at any rate. She didn't even bother to acknowledge the knocking when it came again. Larise showed herself in, closing the concealed hatch with a soft click behind her.

"Hey lovely... Isiat said you'd be here." The mother coyote's fuzzy tail wagged slightly as she approached, gently sliding down beside Shadi. One arm went around her shoulders comfortingly.

"Honestly, I'm amazed you didn't know! I'd simply thought you weren't wanting to talk about it, or-"

Shadi's eyes turned to Larise with a look of surprise, and perhaps just a touch of hurt that she hadn't said anything sooner.

"You mean you knew?"

"For weeks sweet girl! I didn't mean anything by not saying anything... I'm just so used to knowing from the moment I start even feeling a little different! Some of the girls will talk your ear off about it, and others won't say a word until they can no longer hide it. I'm sorry Shadi, honestly. I thought you were just keeping it hush-hush from Scion and Isiat. It's scary. How many of the girls on the lower decks do you think have found they're carrying an unwanted bastard only because Shael or I brought it up?"

Her voice was laced with genuine sympathy, and Shadi couldn't help but feel a pang of empathy for the coyote. Her breasts sagged with the number of cubs she'd fed from them, and her eyes had constant tiredness hiding just beneath the surface, but even not knowing or being with any of the fathers of her cubs, somehow, she had found joy and happiness in her predicament in a way that Shadi wasn't sure she ever would.

"I... It's okay. I understand why you wouldn't say anything... I just... I don't know what I'm going to do. The herbs should have worked! I've been taking them since the second day I came aboard. And just even... Those dogs, they- I don't want a cub. I don't want some rapist fucking dog's bastard mutt!" Her voice was wavering with the strain of keeping her emotions in check. Larise wordlessly pulled her into her warm embrace, hushing Shadi gently while she burst into sobbing again against her chest.

"There there Love, it's okay... It's all going to be okay. I know it's not what either of us wanted for you, but whatever I can do to help, yeah? If I could carry the pup for you, I would. Don't hate it though. Hate is a cruel thing Shadi, and children are not the sum of their fathers. Almost all of mine were unplanned, and three of them were children of rape. But they've grown into good, sweet and kind souls, and that's because of how I raised them. And if you must carry the child to term, then I'll be right there with you, and I'll even take it once they're born. The younglings would be delighted to have a new sibling." She managed with a half laugh, half sob. She knew well the pain that Shadi was feeling at that moment.

But it was a dark, dark place Shadi was in, and even the light of Larise's comfort felt a long way away.

"I hate them... They took my home, my pride, my life! I was my father's favourite. I should have been at home laughing at the boys from other prides trying to win my affection while Alzeer scolded me for not wanting to choose one, and while Troy made lewd jokes about my sisters sleeping with them so I wouldn't have to. I should have my family to support me, to help me... Instead, I have this, and a canine's whelp inside me."

One of her claws clinked off of the golden collar around her neck. Realistically, it was likely worth more in the material than she would have ever needed in her life. Instead, all it served as was a heavy reminder that she was, at the end of the day, property to strangers. Not even worthy of being equal. She was a thing. A dancer. An entertainer. A pleasure slave. The runes stamped into the metal made that much obvious to all who saw her and read them.

Larise sat quietly, pondering what to say. What words really could comfort a victim like her? She had been used to make an example of the felines for the canine lords' pleasure, and in the end, they had gotten from her exactly what they wanted. Another of their kind to slowly tip the scales in their favour. Shadi had lost and now had to bear the consequences of it. The coyote bit her lip, and blew a warm chuff of air between Shadi's ears, petting her hair softly until she was no longer wracked with sobs against her breast.

"Well, I mean.... If you held Mack down for me, we could both have one in us by the springtime I suppose. I think we'd need some rope though."

Shadi choked a sad laugh and squeezed her all the tighter in her embrace.

"Shhhh. Hush now sweet thing. We'll figure this out, even if it's just one day at a time. At least here, you've all the support you could wish for. Certainly, nobody thinks worse of you for it. Here-" The Coyote reached into the small bag slung across her hip and pulled out a purple bound book with gold lettering on the cover.

"I spoke with Ama' in the library earlier, and she gave me this to pass on. A little something she picked up at the conference."

They cuddled a while longer, and once Shadi had finally calmed down enough to at least not burst into tears every few minutes, the Coyote kissed her on the nose and left her be to attend to her children.

It took another five minutes past that before Shadi actually looked at the book, and sitting up on the corner of the bed, opened the cover.

It was not a happy tale, per se. It told the tale of Leeshe, a gazelle pleasure slave in a fictional kingdom that perhaps resembled the Sultanates a little too closely for it to be entirely coincidence. She too was a gold collar and a highly prized one at that. But it was there that the similarities ended.

Not once was there even a hint that she was treated unkindly by her captors. Even when she was sold and traded like property, her owners treated her with respect and dignity, providing clothing and shelter and food, tending to her needs like she were a prized possession.

Not once was she beaten or raped or humiliated for her captors' amusement. Not once did she have her clothes stripped away, forced to bear her body to her masters without respite. Not once was she drugged and gang raped by a line of suitors who had paid enough for the chance to have a pretty gold collar sire their bastard whelps while she had her throat chained to the floor so they could best fuck her.

It was a sweet version of her story, where her owner loved her, where everyone was kind to her, where there was no canine rapist's child growing in her womb. Where she hadn't watched years of her life slip past, naked and cold in a dungeon beneath a castle, subjected to weekly beatings and rapes. It was a fool's novel, written by a fool who had probably never interacted with a real slave in his life!

Disgusted, she tossed the book aside with a snarl and retched onto the floor, nearly losing her stomach as she started shaking once again.

She thought she had been safe here, that perhaps it would be an easy time dancing and serving and pleasing her master until he was satisfied her debt was settled and he returned her freedom. Instead, she'd almost been sold back to her previous owners, and they had still spitefully found a way to make sure she kept suffering even after escaping her prison.

It was all too much for her, and at that moment, she felt very, very small and afraid, like a cub crying in the dark.

---

It had been a long day for all of them, and preparing High Fortune for departure had been the absolute least of it. The revelation about Shadi had been the final pebble atop the pile, however, and Isiat had spent the afternoon keeping deliberately busy to avoid addressing it until he was good and prepared with what he wanted to say. Words left unsaid both haunted and seemed to mock him within his mind.

But it figured that the canines had given her up when he had asked perhaps just a little too easily for it all to be in order. After all, what use did they have for a pregnant slave? He'd wrung his hands on what to say to her for the last hour, pacing back and forth along the aft of the ship until the air had thinned and the sun set enough to induce a biting chill.

He'd watched as it dipped below the horizon over the great dune sea, almost reversing the trip they had taken previously. This time, they angled slightly more to the south, in a curving path that would see them across several disputed territories and to the ancient Clan Homes of the dragons in their great mountain fortress.

Ten days travel to the Dragons, another four to refit and repair everything with the avians. God knows how long stuck behind red tape and bureaucracy...

He dragged his fingers through his hair with a drawn-out sigh. His tails were beating slowly to and fro, without order, meandering in their motions as if lost with the wind. It was as sure a sign of his mind's workings outwardly as any could hope to read. The situation was messy, but far from unmanageable.

Another child on board wouldn't truly affect him in any way. Childcare wasn't his job. Leave that to Larise or Amarill, or one of the other dozen or more parents aboard the vessel who had bound together to find working arrangements. Let Mack worry that they were healthy and their medical needs were taken care of. Let Amarill and her staff that maintained the ship's vast library care for their education. Let Scion worry about the budget allotments for the shipboard services and ensure the pennies were all counted and counted again.

He paused mid-step, his tails coming to a dead stop as well as he turned, his gaze going along the length of the deck and the structures, past the greenhouse and the desk access, the rows of maintenance pathways and cables holding their dirigibles to the rest of the vessel.

That was the dragon's method of thinking. Everything was a problem to be logically broken down into steps. Actions and results. Causes and effects. It ensured that everything ran smoothly, but there was one thing it did not account for, even with the simple reality and order that clarity and fact brought.

Nowhere in its great equation did it once account for feeling, and with that, it lost its soul. It was machine-like. Cold, efficient, perfect and unwavering in its deduction. But so too was it heartless. It knew success, but not the joy of it. It knew loss, but not the grief that came with it.

Isiat spent so long thinking like the dragons he dealt with, sometimes, it was hard to see himself as anything but like them. And yet, there was no doubt he was absolutely not a dragon. Scion certainly would not let him forget it, all too quick to point out Isiat's Draconic habits, but that is all they were. Habits. The Dragon was just as quick to remind him of that fact as well.

And that, he concluded, was no bad thing.

Shadi deserved to be heard as well. And clearly, she had been upset about the news, and just as shocked as Isiat. It was unexpected certainly, but not insurmountable. But it was too late for her to abort the cub, and there was nothing Mack could do with what he had aboard without harming Shadi as well and putting her life at risk. Regrettably, the best course of action would be for her to keep it, and it pained him to admit that their best choice for her was that she had no choice.

When she came aboard, he'd promised her that she would not have to do anything that she did not want to. Yet here he was, with the canine's having forced this choice upon her, and with him left holding the bill, unable to provide any meaningful alternative. They had not even so much forced his hand, as they had forced this hand upon him, and in doing so, made him cross paths with his word, and made a liar of him. It was not a feeling that Isiat enjoyed at all. Something at his very core had been wronged, and he struggled to find a way to make it right.

In a way, his world had lost its rhythm, and for once, even the steady beating of the propellers seemed disjointed and entirely without tempo or timing, just a chaotic beating of blades against the air, frantically trying to keep the massive airship aloft and on course.

A mixture of grief, fury and confusion clouded his mind as he paced back and forth, his feet treading a path on the polished deck that didn't quite shine the same as all else, no matter how well it was cleaned.

Overhead the stars rose, and he paused, looking up towards them. Their distant, twinkling light was pristine out this far, unpolluted by the light of settlements and industry. Below, the sands stretched to the horizon in a rolling purple mat of dunes and valleys. On any other day, it might have provided all the peace and quiet he required to right himself, but this...

No, there was far more at stake here than merely a deal or some coin.

He cared for Shadi. Far more deeply than he was willing to admit to his precious little dancer. Scion was right. He had spoiled her, and rightly so in his mind, but from the moment he let himself play to his own fancies, perhaps he had doomed himself to the pained feeling in his chest he felt now.

Perhaps the poets would call it love if they ever wrote a tale about his life. It was a fanciful and fleeting thing and not one that Isiat had at all been expecting or prepared to encounter when he had moored High Fortune at that damned canine castle. In truth, it had not been something Isiat had expected to encounter, well, ever. His position made any long-term relationships inconvenient at worst, and impractical at best. It was hard to allow oneself to become 'tied down' when by necessity, moving was a part of his career.

Without thinking, he found himself back at the door of his quarters. He could hear Shadi's quiet sobbing from just inside when he pressed his ear close to the door, and the sound gave him pause, and pain. She was hurt, and it hurt him in sympathy. His chest tightened, and politely, he raised his hand to knock.

The door opened in a rush and Shadi wrapped her paws around his middle, pulling him into a tight embrace.

"I-" He opened his mouth to start, but her frantic head shaking silenced him. She squeezed him tighter.

"I don't. I don't want to think about it right now. I've been thinking about it for hours, and I can't anymore." She buried her face against his chest, and at a loss for words, he did the only thing that came naturally. He leaned down, and tilted her face up to look at him, then kissed her.

It was only a soft thing, a sweetness that perhaps gave but a hint of his true thoughts and feelings away, and though it was a sad thing, his tails couldn't help just the slightest flicker of a wag behind him.

"Come sleep with me then. The questions and the worry, the tears... All of it can wait until morning. And no matter what tomorrow brings, I promise, I will be here for you. Together. I..." He faltered, on the cusp of saying it after so long and all they had been through. But now, the only way through was forward.

Say it you damned fool. Before you miss the chance to. One two three, one two three, one two THREE.

"I love you Shadi." The words seems to take forever for him to say and yet raced from his lips like an arrow from a bow.

---

Shadi stopped and just looked up at him for a very long time, her eyes wandering curiously across his face like she was scrutinizing his expression for any sign that the words hadn't been spoken in good faith. It took longer still for the implications of the words to hit her, and when she finally did give voice to her thoughts, there was no mention of it further.

"What am I going to do now?" She was still his slave after all. A pregnant dancer. Men often said stupid things when confusing lust for love. He felt strongly for her, of that she had no doubts.

But he's a stupid male at the end of the day, and still selling me to his clients for his own ends. He's as confused as you are, silly girl. Her thoughts childed her like her parents once had with her childish daydreams. Whatever they shared between them, was not love. A master could only love his slave insofar as a lord loved his possessions. Her father had taught her that love was shared between equals. Where that equal footing did not exist, neither could love, and Shadi understood her position well enough to know that perhaps the vulpine standing before her hadn't thought his words through before blurting them out.

Even as upset and stricken as she was from all else the world had thrown at her today, she didn't try to turn his foolishness into a weapon or berate him for his thoughtlessness. He was just a smitten male. Maybe tomorrow would bring clarity for them both...

If tomorrow is something I still want.

"I'm tired." She lied. Isiat didn't argue it and simply led her inside while she held back another bout of sobs. Had he hoped to cheer her up? She had been raped and bred by those canine fucks, and he had brought and used her the same as they had! He might have been kinder than they were, but in the end, they were more alike in their treatment of her than either he or the canines would have admitted.

Still... He had saved her from what had been a fate far crueller than the one he offered her. At least aboard the ship, she had a choice, to an extent.

There was one choice at least that she did have full control over, and her mind lingered dangerously on it until Isiat was fast asleep at her side, his tails draped over her body until she had cried till she could cry no more.

He lay by her, his paws and tails holding her close, protectively, possessively.

Silently, she stood, and with just a thin silk robe covering her modesty, walked to the door.

"Hmm.... Shadi?" She heard her owner's half-asleep mumble from behind her as she closed the door to his cabin.

Alone on the deck, with nothing but the moon and the stars for company, she walked, feet barely making a whisper as she moved. It was cold, but Shadi did not feel it. A single-minded determination guided her steps, like the echos of a siren's song.

One two three four.

Step step step step. She pulled herself against the railing of the ship.

This can all be over. No more slavery. No more hurt. No more worry. No bastard son forced to nurse from your breast. A few brief moments, and you'll be another name in a story. Let the world solve its own problems. Better to have one last moment of freedom than a lifetime in the collar.

Slowly. She climbed up and looked down at the dunes below. The wind whipped about her, but her feline grace gave her stability.

This was her choice.

Not natures.

Not Isiat's.

Not the Canines.

Hers.

Just one more step and the story ends. "They only do it once though, true enough for all of them." Larise's words whispered in her mind. Maybe she would tell Shadi's story...

She was ready. One leg extended beyond the railing into the void, and gravity did the rest.

"SHADI!" Isiat's voice called out, laced with a terror she'd never heard, nor would ever hear again. She didn't turn, even at the last moment to look back.

This was her choice. He would not take it from her.

"They only do it once though, true enough for all of them."

Shadi stretched out, and let the ship race past her in a brown blur. The sound of the propellers, the low hum of the ship, all of it faded away as the wind raced by. She closed her eyes and waited.

Shadi fell.