Beauties and Beasts

Chapter 2: brought to you by 'Wish-Fulfillment'

A feline witch doctor, more half-naked people, a return to the shack, and more! And what ho? New clothes? Measurements? Haven't these people ever heard of straps or pillowcases with holes for the head and arms? Probably, but the lack of use of proper clothing is probably due to the same thought process that leads fat women to wear yoga pants in public.

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The last time either of the girls had been picked up so easily and run about with was probably when they were 5. Thus, the sensation was akin to being pulled along on a rollercoaster. Both couldn't help but be...just a little bit pleased.

I'd think models would be less muscled thought Neara, remembering how Shay had described the people they'd seen so far and smiled. This has been freaky so far, but maybe she's right. Maybe we can have fun with this. It's not like this can stay real. For some reason, even with the imminent threat of rape, this didn't make her happy.

As the leopard men carried them back down the hill to the cluster of shacks surrounded by the pine and aspen forest, Shay took the time to consider her captor's face. He had a wider jaw and larger eyes than Parker, this Calvin, but they both shared the same strange, speckled amber eyes with slitted, cat-like pupils. Calvin's blond hair also had a reddish tint to it.

Eventually he sensed her gaze and glanced down. "What?"

"Why do you have blue tattoos on your face?"

He frowned. "What?"

She tapped one of the two spiky blue stripes on his eyebrow. He jerked it to the side minutely and his eyebrows raised.

"You don't know what these are?"

Neara bit her lip, wondering if she had said too much. Her family often told her that she did and that keeping her mouth shut was a virtue she desperately needed.

Calvin's gaze seemed to soften at her expression, albeit minutely.

"They're signs of my strength. A beastman can have many, but we haven't seen more than four." His frown returned as he refocused on where they were going, having just entered the village. "What clan did you say you were from? I was assuming fox clan, with your beauty."

"Um...do I have to have one?"

"You can't be saying you grew up in the wild." His eyes dropped back down to her, darting over her figure from foot to head. "This cloth is too fine. And this color...are you really unmarked?"

Without warning, he pulled up her pink shirt, baring her bra to the world.

Neara shrieked and yanked her shirt back down, ignoring the fact that, just for a moment, the man had been carrying her entire petite, yet curvy, 150 pounds with one arm.

"What's he doing!" came Shay's cry from up front. "If she even has a scratch on her, I'm pulling all your fur out!"

"Calvin isn't going to hurt a female, idiot," said Parker.

Calvin just grinned down at Shay. "I'm going to be your partner. There's no need to be shy."

"I don't think so."

"But I saved your life. That means you're obligated."

"Says who?"

His grin fell. "You really know nothing. Did you...not have parents?"

She was saved from answering by a new male leopard man, one without stripes on his face, long wavy hair, and a cloak made of loosely woven pale cloth. He had a softer beauty than the other two, albeit the same golden colorings.