Chapter 3

The shimmering, broad-bladed grass rushed by underfoot, but the field was such an expanse and the sky so absolutely still, it was as if she were running in place. Evelyn kept pace with the coyotes as they loped ahead of her on all fours, weaving playfully to cross each other, giving the girl a chance to keep up. And she was running -- really running -- through this open, moonlit field, the warm summer air rushing over her skin, blowing through her hair, even as her breasts and every other soft part of her body jolted and bounced. She felt a corporeal awakening, and it was as freeing and exhilarating a sensation as the moment she shed her clothes in the garden. She laughed through heavy, panting breaths as the sensation of the moment overcame her; this was true physical freedom.

The coyotes finally slowed to a stop at the crest of a modest hill, the male upright and sniffing at the air. For a moment, they were an island of warm bodies in the night, gazing up to the perfectly round moon, and Evelyn heard the sea of crickets chirping all around them before a sound rose from deep in the back of the coyote boy's throat.

'Hooooooowl . . .'

The other joined in, 'Hooooooowl!'

When they repeated their call, Evelyn felt encouraged to add her own imitation. 'Hooooooowl!' She stood wide-legged and tall, facing the sky. The full moon bathed her like a spotlight, highlighting her nakedness for all the nocturnal world to see, like it was shining a light right through her, illuminating the animal at her core. And she bayed alongside the coyotes in naked, animal communion.

When their howling died down, they all waited in expectant stillness. In the distance, over a dark tree line, a response called out to them, and shivers ran up Evelyn's spine. Tall ears turned like dishes to the echoing sound, and both coyotes ran after it without hesitation. Wiping away the beading sweat from her forehead, the girl followed suit, keeping up with the packmates to the edge of the field. The trees cast inky shadows as they enveloped her, and she continued into the forest cautiously. The evenness of the grass gave way to a clutter of roots and leaves, and she navigated the darkness step by step, testing the terrain under her toes. She followed the audible bustle of her companions, and the slats of light peeking from between the trees gave her a vague sense of direction, growing wider and more plentiful as she continued. Broad leaves tickled her skin as she passed through, invisible in the dark and tracing soft, sensuous arcs over her where she met them. Emerging from the darkness, her canine friend waited for her, tail patiently swaying side to side.

When the forest finally gave way to a moonlit field on the other side, Evelyn immediately noticed several more coyotes seated in the grass together and she froze in her tracks. The pads of a reassuring hand stroked over her arm and brought her attention back to her companion, warm eyes encouraging her to follow. Approaching the group with her coyote boy, she was the subject of tilted stares, ears askew and noses judging from afar. But his bright yips seemed to put them at ease, and she even began to suspect the simple nudity she shared with these animals set her in stark contrast to other, less friendly humans. Still, it's amazing the kind of trust a Hot Pocket can afford.

The coyote boy sat among them and Evelyn quickly joined, completing a small ring of six. She sat with knees up, doing her best to stay inconspicuous, nervous to see exactly how well his friends would tolerate her presence. Close up, Evelyn suddenly realized one of the males had his knife working at the carcass of a skinned rabbit, glinting brightly as he cut. The girl on Evelyn's left (her suspicions apparently relieved) knelt forward on all fours, yipping eagerly, ears high, and received a rabbit leg of her own; she immediately tore into the meal, separating strip from juicy strip with expert carnassials. Evelyn was briefly absorbed in the animalistic scene as the hunter slid his blade with a 'thack' cleanly into the leather sheath strapped firmly to his well-toned thigh. He handed off the other leg and Evelyn's coyote boy passed it straight to her, his soft, thankful eyes meeting her with a heart-fluttering warmness. But almost immediately, she was nose to nose with the reality that this rabbit leg was a gift . . . and one not to be refused. She'd fed him, after all, and this was his repayment, a symbol of mutual trust.

Evelyn swallowed hard. Even the grass beneath her was more appetizing than the pale, meaty thigh cradled tentatively in her hands. She thought she saw one of the deep muscles convulse and this turned her stomach sharply. But the coyote girl to her left was busy devouring her dinner with quasi-ecstatic snarls, and the male was still sitting there, watching with soft eyes. Evelyn opened her mouth wide around the thing, ready to straight-up engulf it, but ended up with only the smallest little bite between her teeth once she'd backed off comfortably. She tested it; the flesh wasn't hot, but there was still a lingering warmth to it, and the vaguely metallic flavor rolled around on her tongue as she chewed at it juicily. A smile spread on the coyote boy's muzzle as his tail flitted behind. Swallowing the first tiny morsel, Evelyn studied the rest of the leg before stripping off a larger chunk with her blunted canines, making a suitably vicious face in the process. However bland the rabbit was, the texture wasn't surprising anymore, and she continued down to the bone, ripping away at stringy bites. The coyote boy seemed especially gratified when she snorted a snarl of feral enthusiasm, his tail wagging all the more.

Evelyn felt brief pangs of dissonance, being out there in the moonlit field with these coyotes, herself and everyone utterly naked, yet it struck her in the moment as surprisingly familiar. She wondered, how could she possibly feel this kind of ease, even something like 'belonging', in such a wild place? But at some point, sitting in this little ring of warm bodies under the starry sky, the space between the civilized human and primal animal collapsed.

And she basked in it.

The slow, warm air caressed her, and the grass crept up beneath and all around, scratching and tickling at her skin. Setting aside the stripped legbone, she leaned back on her hands, savoring the easy, exhibitionistic display, baring her chest to the moonlight. The coyote girls' cream-furred breasts were athletically svelte, their dark nipples naturally fat and supple, giving easily whenever brushed by a passing paw. Evelyn's heart beat giddily, lending each drawn-out breath a soft staccato. She felt her own nipples rise stiffly and prominently on their broad areolas and drowned the urge to hide them in modesty. In her young adulthood, she sometimes looked at the darker skin that spread boorishly over her B-cups and wished they could be smaller, paler, more elegant and without all the little bumps, so she could shed her bra with confidence whenever the time came. But in the moment, the self-judgement felt petty. She had been consistently shy with her body around others, but here in communal nudity she was refreshingly unbound. Her coyote boy was sitting with knees up, the fur of his plump scrotum peeking matter-of-factly from between his thighs and resting gently on a bed of grass. She eased her own thighs apart in a little indulgent ambition and exposed herself, the grass mingling with her pubic hair. Her heart pounded when she felt eyes on her, sitting back and tending to her teeth postprandially, belly pleasantly distended, the cleft of her vulva baring rosy lips. The simple sensation was exhilarating.

Her display seemed to rouse the coyote boy's tip from his sheath, and she blushed deeply as it peeked out. But he had other plans, and after a moment of shared admiration, he very suddenly leaned in for a lick and bolted off. Stunned, Evelyn silently touched the wet spot on her cheek, watching the black tip of his tail flutter as he ran. In the next moment, she laughed, got to her feet, and ran after him with her own enthusiastic version of a canine 'yip!'

Evelyn struggled against the aches rising in her lesser-used muscles, moving with more verve than she had in a long time. Running through the rough grass, now even closing distance on the coyote as the others joined at her side, she felt intensely liberated. The coyotes seemed mystical, druidic, moving easily through the land, like a natural part of it. The whole moonlit night was their domain, and now, for a while, it was hers too. Up to this point, most of the girl's life had occurred in four-walled rooms, between which she moved in essentially predictable ways. It was, really, the normal fate of anyone in her world who had the sense to behave herself. But out in the field, with the wind all over her and the cloudless night motionless and brilliant above, her body revealed something ancient and timeless that her mind had never really grasped on its own. Some instinct deep inside was roused, having laid dormant since she first learned what it meant to be a 'good girl', but which could never be driven out.

The young male slowed, descending on his hind feet as the grade steepened and the grass thinned to give way to the muddy shores of a creek that wound its course though the rolling hills. He sat beside the water, tongue out and chest heaving on his lithe frame, looking back to see the human girl even more noticeably winded. The other coyotes caught up with the pair, some continuing right up to the stream and kneeling to lap at the cold, bubbling water. Panting, Evelyn fell to her knees on the ground beside her friend, feeling the subtle give of dark mud beneath her shins. Eww, what? her hands recoiled up feeling the moist soil beneath her. The response was deeply ingrained. Oh yeah, I guess it doesn't matter. I can just wash myself clean. Evelyn forced a laugh as she wiggled further down into it. The coyote's muzzle bore a wide smile, but it slowly softened; his tail, just wagging, was now motionless. The girl stared at him with growing eyes, the moment growing quiet and still, like the building of force. And . . .

“Yip!"

It was Evelyn who gave the sharp and truly canine sound when the coyote boy leapt at her; the leather-tough paws of his broad hands pinning her chest, her back now fully in the muddy ground as his nose prodded at her neck. The broad smile returned with a very coyote laugh and she echoed it gleefully. Evelyn pushed back with her own hands, sending him off balance, and scrambled to her knees vying for power in the very sudden wrestling game. Her grasp dug into the ruddy fur on his sides, feet struggling for purchase on the slippery mud while he fumbled at her shoulders. In a moment, she was on her back again, pulling the male close with her arms and legs, front to naked, muddy front. For a second, she held the warmth of his short fur tight against her bare skin all the way up their entwined bodies and, using their momentum, rolled him swiftly around on his back. Evelyn planted her palms flat on his chest, pinning him to the ground and gave a brief, ecstatic victory howl like she imagined a coyote girl would.

The two were panting, breathing the wild summer air, his chest rising and falling under the weight of her hands, her breasts rocking between her arms. Their smiling eyes instantly met and lingered; they found themselves locked in a moment of sudden, unexpected intimacy and she realized that the way she pinned him her fuzzy vulva was straddling the girth of his furry sheath. Evelyn's face grew hot as her eyes descended the coyote, his strong, slim, nude body smeared in streaks of glistening mud in their wrestling -- descended past lean abdominals and narrowing hips until she saw the blush pink of her own lips swelling around his firm sheath as her mound eased and spread in unapologetic, receptive excitement. Before her thoughts could even catch up with the surprisingly intimate situation, her body responded to his, eager and willing.

The warm, enveloping touch quickly coaxed the coyote's bright pink tip from its sheath. His length emerged before her in instinctive arousal, inch by lustful inch. Behind the tapered head, his canine penis widened with the swell of his engorged shaft, adorned luridly with a roadmap of sensitive, serpentine veins. Evelyn's heart was pounding way up in her ears, face burning red as her genitals embraced his. The susurrations of the stream carried on in their silence, behind the splashing of his packmates, but it all seemed miles away. They basked in the sensation of their nude bodies intimately touching – scratched, muddy, and brimming with a wild, latent energy that begged for release.

The coyote's arousal was plain and natural, and he didn't shy away from it. His penis throbbed between them, matching his heartbeat, shiny, liquid excitement beading at his tip until it dripped a slow, wet trail down his length. The fleshy mouth of his sheath settled in a stretched 'O' around the base of his long, glistening erection. Her swelling clitoris peeked from its hood, caressed by the tickle of his genital fur, and the pit of Evelyn's stomach tightened. At college, she imagined meeting a cute guy, going out for coffee and getting to know each other through shared idiosyncrasies, and only then giving herself permission to even consider opening up to this kind of intimacy. His warmth was intoxicating . . . Was there really something as simple as animal attraction? Was it okay to set aside these daydreams and grand plans? Humans were selfish and deceitful creatures, as she'd been warned all her adult life, and if she didn't guard herself, she risked getting hurt. But sitting on top of the coyote, each of them locked in the other's gaze, amply leaking their own expectant lubricating juices, the intent was pure, animal, and mutual. She remained there, touching, unflinching, her vaginal wetness seeping into the fur of his sheath, letting the visceral excitement speak for her as her pulse thumped in agonizing anticipation. The moment simplified profoundly as she let go of her learned, human fear and sank with atavistic inevitability into the fact that he was very willing, and very ready, to mate with her.

Evelyn sat up, releasing her hold on the male and, in the same moment, he swiftly pulled himself from under her. The girl pivoted on her knee and turned the broad swell of her backside to the coyote as he found his footing behind her. Raising her rump high, Evelyn's mound easily parted, her dripping-wet lips swollen on lewd display, the wrinkled star of her anus exposed and tensing rhythmically at the sensation of the open air. The next thing she felt was the aggressive embrace of leathery pads on strong hands grasping around the soft curves of her hips and pressing deeply; he was crouched low on his haunches, knees at her sides, the warm fur of his pale frontside inches above as he moved into position behind her. There was no fear or hesitation and, after a few glancing prods around her vulva, the narrow tip of the coyote boy's penis landed between her lips, sending the muscles all the way up his lean body into erotic tension at the touch of her slick skin. Prodding further, his tip pushed wetly up between her folds until it nestled into the hot, intimate opening of her vagina. The two were so wet from anticipation in their young, primal excitement that it was only a few easy thrusts before his whole length filled her and the two froze in the intensity of a sensual shiver that shot through their intimately connected bodies, her bare skin squeezing longingly around his.

From down in the creek, ears and eyes turned to the pair, but Evelyn was too engaged to want for more privacy, and her partner was obviously unashamed of his natural urges. As he overcame the sensation of their joining, the coyote fell into an instinctive, rhythmic thrusting, his furred hips bumping against the soft give of Evelyn's buttocks. Kneeling on all fours, her breasts swung below, erect nipples dragging over the mud as he leaned into her and humped at her dripping vulva with increasing vigor. He began to huff with a growl deep in his throat that sometimes produced half a whine, like an insatiable, little puppy had awoken inside him. The girl allowed herself to vocalize her own pleasure, moaning timidly at first, but with the rapid thrusting filling her over and over with the swell of her partner's penis, she dropped on her elbows with a loud 'AH!', way down on the ground, tousled hair spilling around her flushed, desirous face as she arched her spine to present herself to his humping. The coyote fought for stability, squeezing roughly around the girl's hips, planting his feet to either side of her knees and scrunching his blunt-clawed toes, squeezing mud through them, never slowing the audibly wet smack-smack-smack of their sudden, impassioned mating. The glistening, red flash of his penis emerged after every deep thrust, and with it slick strings of their combined juices that dripped down between them. His balls hung between spread thighs, swinging wildly and smacking the blonde tuft of her pubic hair with every plunge home, flinging messy strands as their mixed wetness trailed down his scrotum.

Evelyn was ground back and forth, breasts squishing against the slick mud and forearms sinking into it. The coyote pulled close on his haunches, his pounding grew shallow and rapid, his growl-whining louder and more insistent. The base of his shaft swelled, her lips squeezing tight around it, while his tip poked and nuzzled at the sensitive ring of her cervix. As his hunched body heaved, looming over the girl, his penis planted precum-soaked kisses deep inside, promising the imminent gift of his seed. A strained grunt escaped Evelyn as her slick walls stretched around the pressure of his growing canine knot, her plump mound bulging behind his girth as he continued mating her. With a gasp, feeling himself intimately linked with her, the coyote boy's whole body shivered under the crashing waves of orgasm, plunging as firmly and deeply as he could, grinding the female's buttocks as the first powerful surge of his seed erupted inside her. His knot was massive, firmly locking the two in place as his pulsing penis spurted stream after generous stream at her tender cervix, bathing them both in a growing pool of his thick, milky semen. An intense shudder worked up from Evelyn's groin spreading through the rest of her body and, with little convulsions, she clenched as hard as she could around the full length of her friend. The ecstasy of her own orgasm rippled for several long moments, pushed over the edge by the rawness of their natural, spontaneous mating, the building heat of his seed warming her and unable to drain around his knot.

The sensation was new and unique and overwhelming, unlike any of Evelyn's personal sexual explorations, and she rode through it in willful submission to her animal desires. The coyote's hands wandered over her affectionately, firm pads and blunt nails sweeping over her flanks, massaging the give of her hips. She responded by snuggling her rump back into his warm fur, feeling his penis make little throbbing twitches as it contributed some more spurts, and she sprawled on the ground, nerve endings firing, delirious in the visceral glitter of their shared afterglow. The fringes of their moonlit world turned a different color. After several minutes of delighting Evelyn with stroking and nuzzling and sporadic reflexive humping, the coyote had softened enough to withdraw his bright red knot with a wet, squelching 'pop', followed quickly by the splatter of his seed as it drained from her vagina into a milky pool in the mud below, and the girl uttered a moan of intense gratification as the breeze began to caress her dripping lips. She was surprised, though, to feel the broad span of his tongue in the next moment, lapping dutifully at her swollen labia, gliding over every fold to clean up the last of his eagerly offered semen. It was odd to the girl, but she enjoyed succumbing to the messiness inherent in their mating even as the pungent odor of his milky virility filled her nose, and the aftercare felt incredibly sweet.

Sitting upright from her well-worn spot on the ground, her breasts now wearing a thin coat of dripping mud, Evelyn moved close to the coyote boy and gave a long, affectionate lick over his lips. He smiled with a playful growl and returned the lick, tinged with the scent their mutual orgasms. They both laughed softly in their little, intimate world.

Evelyn rose to her feet slowly, worried that the ground would slide up to meet her. At least three coyotes were wading in the stream and with shaky, off-balance steps, she plodded down to join them. The coyote boy followed, splashing the mud away as she did the same. She clenched her teeth in the cold water and her skin tightened in goosebumps all over as she bathed. The water was black enough she couldn't see anything below the surface, but she could feel the smooth river stones beneath her feet.

She equivocated, holding up the pastel nightshirt, preparing to don it and return to the comfortable confines of the life she knew. She'd never been more unwillingly cognizant of the barriers between the civilized and the wild, between where the world expected her to be and where the moon called her to be. In a small act of defiance, possibly spurred by the residual coyote flowing through her blood, Evelyn bunched up her clothes and walked the rest of the way through the garden nude. With delicate footsteps, she navigated through the backdoor, up the stairs, and quietly, imperceptibly, closed her bedroom door before collapsing in bed and drifting into swift, exhausted sleep.

* * *

“Evelyn?"

Knock, knock, knock.

“Sweetie?"

Evelyn forced her eyes open just enough to see her brightly lit room, the door still mercifully closed, realizing she'd awoken as nude and messily sprawled as when she'd collapsed the night before. “Yeah, mom?" She grumbled, tugging a corner of the puffy comforter over her.

“There's breakfast waiting in the kitchen. Don't let it get cold!"

She managed to produce a couple more waking syllables, “Thanks, mom . . ." The girl stretched and pushed herself up, rising primordially from the mire of tangled sheets, slipping on her shirt and shorts before shedding them again in the privacy of the bathroom down the hall.

If her mother knew – well, she wouldn't. And even if the insistent nagging of fear and guilt were to roil up, for the moment they were miraculously stayed. Last night Evelyn tasted the implicitly forbidden fruit of self-defined freedom, and she was more herself than she'd ever allowed herself to be.

She studied herself in the wide mirror, barely recognizing her ragged reflection through the haze of dizzy, half-lidded eyes. Tiny flakes of leaves still clung to her tousled hair as she combed through the blonde mess with fingers spread. The rosy scratches on her breasts were obvious in this light, and she remembered crawling on her back under that iron fence for a vivid moment. Little scrapes showed up almost everywhere she examined her bare skin. Twisting around to see her backside, something turned in Evelyn's gut and her head immediately spun. Dropping weakly to her knees, she lifted the toilet seat and retched, unloading the contents of her stomach. There was surely rabbit in the amorphous mess, but she wasn't dying to verify this. She hunched, shivering and tearing up reflexively, hocking up acrid saliva and spitting until there was nothing left to give up. It took a long, refractory moment before she summoned the will to get up and rinse her mouth, sipping up water from cupped hands, but when Evelyn rose to see her glistening eyes, her wild, exhausted body, scratched and sore and naked and beautiful, she laughed.