Familiar Pact

3. A Travelling Circus

We had traveled for two days before we got to town big enough to justify stopping for a few days. Oreo had been the entertainment the first  night. He had cum at some point or multiple points during the day from the vibrations in his ass, and by evening had been broken enough to beg to do anything his master's wanted in order to stop the torture.

The next morning he had been healed, but apparently the mages had decided the tail was a success, so he had to keep wearing one, though I think it was enchanted differently. The healer had also had fun removing stripes of melanin from his naturally dark skin so he could "always remember that he was a zebra, and the night he had truly accepted his fate!".

He had been given a pair of tan cargo shorts as a reward for knowing his place, of course with a hole in the back for his tail. I figured it would be another week before he was completely tamed and a couple of days after that the majority of the mages would became bored.

For the next fortnight I would have to make sure I was completely unremarkable. I did not want to be chosen as the next project. I had almost stopped feeling awful about hoping that they pick someone else. Of course, I now feel awful about not feeling terrible about that.

They've made it survival of the fittest in this cavalcade of circus lorries, where all animals are prey, and you cannot trust anyone. I'm lucky my panther is naturally a creature of stealth, of fading into the background, of silent staring and careful judgement. In a place like this, of constant fear, our beasts influence our actions, making herd creatures try to form groups to be inevitably betrayed by either someone they see as a friend, or by their own nature as they try to protect their pack. My panther encourages my solitude and silence, protection of myself above all else.

Oreo will soon either join the attendants or return to his beast form. Likely the attendants, as humans can be packed into smaller spaces than zebras. He will join in the twisted jockeying for position that occurs among them, and likely end up as a favoured one in the equine herd. I've got better at judging where the die falls over the year, and Oreo's new skin will either make him favoured or a runt, though with his passive nature and youth he will not be dominant among the attendants. Either way, it is a cycle that will repeat with the next poor sod picked, as Oreo has repeated the journey of the other unlucky shifters before him. It is the way of the circus, and will continue as long as the mages prevent the development of trust among us beasts, encourage envy, fear, and the need to survive that we are all guilty of...

The lorries circle in the field provided for the circus. Mages descend from vehicles like the eruption of a kicked wasp hive, erecting tents with subtle use of magic as the evening darkens. It is a well choreographed spectacle by this point, with each mage knowing their part. The beasts and attendants stay locked in their cages until the wards are up, though the cage lorries are thankfully opened to air them out. Whilst I have got used to the stink of piss and fear, I welcome its dilution, and the distraction of more interesting scents.

The wards are an innocuous band of colourful bunting that goes around the entire set-up. It is enchanted to only affect shifters, and projects peace and hopelessness over the entire area. Within a metre of the bunting it projects pain, though I've only felt it twice. If you don't have a circus collar it also puts a temporary tracker on you when you cross. I've heard Ringmaster say that it is the most successful enchanting he has ever done, that it has earned him millions.

I'm almost certain this is how he has caught the majority of the shifters here. The types not needed in a circus disappear every few months. I hope they get a better life than what they would have here.

I don't think he kills them.