As wrapped up in my issues as I was, when I heard there was a greater beast heading towards our town, I… realised I didn’t want to die.

“Sip? Where are you?”

I stepped out of my room, looking down, not wanting to see the face my mum made.

She scoffed and reached over, trying to pull off my cardigan. “This isn’t the time for your nonsense.”

“Yeah, so let’s go,” I said, nails through the fabric, not letting go.

She gave one last tug, then huffed. “Your pa went to join the militia.”

I knew what she wasn’t saying, blinking away the tears. “I’m not going.”

“Well, Tami’s already gone with your aunt, so we’ll meet them over at Whimford.”

“Okay.”

Going out in the crowd, I felt my stomach churn, even though I hadn’t eaten since last night’s dinner, head jerking around every time I bumped into someone, heart pounding in my ears, hearing the crying and angry whispers between every beat. I felt like I was going to die, trampled after falling. Or lose my mum and end up in the militia. Or upset the wrong person, not like anyone would notice a murder right now.

I rubbed my arm, trying to remember the pain to clear my head, then clutched my tail again, scared it would get stood on.

Somehow, we made it to the edge of town, going out into the fields. I felt a little better, but still had to hunch over, dry-heaving as my mum pulled me along, then finally breathing, the fresh air settling my stomach. We made it about ten minutes from the town, then—

A crack of lightning.

The rushing crowd suddenly came to a stop and turned around, me too. On the far side of town, flashes of light lit the bottom of the clouds, bright and vibrant colours—pinks, gold, turquoise, crimson.

And eventually, silence, silence followed by thunder—no, clapping and cheers. Like a wave, it rolled back, soon everyone around me joining in.

Everything from there was a blur, going back home with fragments of story passing by us. “—a witch—”“—fell the beast—”“—by herself—”

Living on the far side of town, we went through the town square. Despite the crowd, I saw the wounded there, some people dead, others missing limbs.

And I caught a glimpse of the witch.

In that moment, she knelt down next to someone, a glowing, glittery light over them, and… they grey back a leg.

That sight stuck with me the rest of the way home, no other thoughts. It was burned into my mind. Only when I was back in my room, door locked, wrapped up in the blanket I’d knitted, surrounded by piles of my clothes, squeezing my tail painfully tight, did it finally click.

She could fix people.

Not heal, but fix—give them something they were missing. Fix. That word, fix.

I snuck out my window, climbing down, then went back to the square. It was still crowded, but the militia were sending people away. So I stood in the queue to see the witch, clutching my tail, staring down at my feet and hoping no one said anything.

Shuffle after shuffle, I got that little closer. When I could see her, I watched her fix people—fix burnt skin and broken bones and bloodied cuts.

And I didn’t think about what I would tell her.

“Is it your arm?” she asked, reaching out.

Overwhelmed, I said, “Sorry,” then ran. I ran to the edge of town, to the wooden wall made of huge logs, finding a dark spot to squeeze into, crying into my tail.

I was so stupid. So, so stupid.

So stupid I didn’t even notice someone was right in front of me until they said, “How interesting.”

My heart squeezed, breath stuck in my throat, then I looked up. There was a… vulp’hym? But she looked so beautiful, fur like snow, and it looked even whiter with patches of mahogany—such a lovely and rich brown, but some red mixed in, warm and inviting.

And then I remembered there was a person looking at me and lowered my head, trying not to shake.

“My lover wants me to make sure you’re not hurt,” she said, her voice so nice too. It was a little deep, but so rich—no one would think she was a man.

“I-I’m fine,” I mumbled, then what she said sunk in. “Your lover… you mean the witch?”

“Yes.”

“But she’s… you’re both….”

She chuckled. “Is it strange for two women to be together, or for a hym and a hymoid?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

Seconds passed and she didn’t say anything, and I thought I upset her. I knew I was rude, but that was something everyone knew. Just because someone said the sky was pink didn’t mean it was rude to tell them it was blue.

“Strange isn’t the same as bad, and normal isn’t the same as good,” she said, a whisper just for me to hear.

And I heard it, like she knew everything, and maybe she did. Vulp’hyms had really good noses, so she could probably smell my secret that everyone knew.

“Come meet her. Even if she can’t do what you want, she knows a lot about very strange things and probably has something helpful to tell you.”

I wasn’t really convinced by what she said, but I trusted her, probably because she was beautiful and confident, so I let her lead me through the town to a room in an inn. For a long time, it was just us and she told me her story, even how she… bedded the witch Siya and lagowoman Dandee. She talked like women bedding women was completely normal, like it was normal to have two lovers, like it was normal for her and her lovers to bed each other and even other women—even a low-hymoid.

She asked me a few questions too. My name, my age—she smiled when I told her I was nineteen, then told me she was only a few years older. That surprised me. The way she comforted me, gently stroking my arm like she was used to it, made her seem so mature. She also gave me some water to drink, leftover snacks too, everything somehow staying down.

Eventually, there was a knock on the door.

“Come in,” Ka’ne said.

Not just the witch, but a lagowoman and testuhym entered, and I felt my stomach clench.

“Ah, our little friend is shy—maybe just Siya for now?”

I silently thanked her, feeling better when the other hymoids left. But then I saw the witch—Siya—and felt another problem starting. Ka’ne had told me so much, I couldn’t look at Siya without… imagining. I leaned forward, covering my lap with my hands.

She pulled a chair over to the bed and sat in front of us. I glanced up and she was beautiful. I mean, I thought the same of pretty much every woman. There was always something about them I liked, envied.

Her dark hair was just as beautiful as Ka’ne fur, made the colour of her face warmer, and it was so neatly braided—I felt jealous, wanted to braid it too. And her hands—I liked hands without fur. Slender fingers. I liked when women were slender or soft. Hated how, just from helping with my pa’s shop, my arms were bulky.

I couldn’t speak, so Ka’ne answered the questions Siya had.

“Sip? That’s a nice name,” she said.

That cut so deep, I couldn’t stop myself, tail snapping side to side. “I hate it.”

And I hated myself, eyes prickling, knowing they hated me. How irritable I was, how I cried all the time, how I dressed like this, how I was—

“D’you have a name you want me to call you?”

I heard her question, but couldn’t believe it, slowly raising my head until I looked her in the eye. And she was just smiling, softly smiling. So gentle. “I don’t,” I whispered.

“Then what about… Artie? Just for now.”

I didn’t know what to think, but, when she said “Artie”, it did sound nice. “Okay.”

“Well, Artie, you lined up, so is there something you want me to do? I don’t mean to brag, but I’m pretty powerful.”

I knew what I wanted to say, but I couldn’t bring myself to say it—not until Ka’ne squeezed my hand. “I, I want to be a woman.”

Siya didn’t laugh at me. She didn’t call me disgusting. She didn’t tell me to stop saying stupid things.

No, she softly smiled, like it was a perfectly normal thing to ask. Thinking about everything Ka’ne told me, maybe it was perfectly normal for them. Like they were living in a different world to the rest of us.

“If you don’t mind talking about it, that’s a… difficult thing to do,” she said.

I nodded. It looked like she fixed broken things easily, but I knew this wasn’t exactly the same.

“I guess you’re saying you want me to change your body, and I can do that, but I don’t really know how men and women look different for your people. I mean, you already look so cute,” she said, pausing to chuckle. “But you probably mean your… genitals, right?”

Words stuck in my throat, I squeezed Ka’ne’s hand—careful not to hurt her—and nodded.

“Right now, I can’t really do that. So, can I talk to you about… what being a woman means to you?”

I frowned, confused. It seemed like an obvious question. “A woman’s a woman,” I said.

She laughed and, for a moment, I felt irritated, but she said, “Sorry,” and I calmed down. Then she carried on. “It was just funny that we think the same.”

That only made me more confused.

“What I mean is, you want to be a woman?” she asked. After a second, I nodded. She smiled. “Then you’re a woman to me. I mean, I think everyone should choose their name and how we talk about them, if that makes sense. Artie, she’s a cute woman—I love her tail.”

As strange as what she said was, my heart squeezed when she called me Artie so sweetly, when she called me a beautiful woman, when she said her tail. And for once, my heart didn’t squeeze in a bad way. I blinked a few times, feeling my eyes prickling, a lump in my throat.

“I know that’s probably weird, but, like, how many people actually see you naked? If you keep wearing such cute clothes and move somewhere else, everyone you meet will think you’re a woman. And… do you maybe want to be a woman who likes woman?”

My head was pounding, feeling like everything I knew was crashing down, but I nodded.

“Then it might even be nice that you can have kids. You know, I’m actually looking for magic that can give me a real dick, just for a bit. You saw Dandee—the lagowoman? She wants to have a litter with me one day. Maybe I won’t ever find the magic to do it and we’ll adopt a bunch of babies instead, but we’re not in a rush, so I’m trying to learn while we travel.”

And there she went again, saying the most absurd things I could imagine like it was completely normal.

Her smile faded. “I can help you look different, I can change your voice, I can even give you teats. But I don’t know if I can ever give you… a vulva and womb. If I learn how, and I come looking for you in maybe a year… will I find you?”

My arm ached, knowing what she was asking. “I, I don’t know,” I whispered. When she asked me like that, I only thought about how my family would never believe me, how no one would, and how terrifying it would be to leave, to have to talk to strangers, always feeling like they knew, like they found me disgusting, and—

She kissed me—on my forehead. And she was hugging me, holding me, her hand gently brushing my ears. I didn’t know how she knew, but that really calmed me down, impossible to ignore her touching me there.

“I can… change the outside so it looks like a vulva, but I’m worried it might end up… broken? Your balls might ache if they swell, or you might have trouble peeing, or it might tear when you get hard,” she said, and I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

Not because she was saying something weird, but because she sounded… scared. The witch who took down a greater beast by herself and grew back limbs like it was nothing… was scared she’d hurt me.

“But if that’s what you need, I’ll try my best,” she said.

I didn’t know what to say, what to do, but imagining just having something there that looked like a woman’s, I felt—it felt right. “I need it,” I said, my voice cracking.

“Can I… try something first? It might make you uncomfortable, and I’ll stop as soon as you say if it’s unpleasant,” she whispered.

I had an urge to deny her, feeling like she was going to ask me for more than she was giving me—but I would have given her anything and everything. “Okay.”

She let go of me and shuffled back to her chair. I looked up at her, saw her eyes were a bit red. Guilt flooded me for a moment, feeling like I was hurting her asking for this, but… I was hurting too. I was hurting so much.

Cutting through my thinking, she said, “Can you undress?”

I froze up, not expecting that. But Ka’ne stroked my hand and, well, if she was going to change how I looked down there, she was going to see it anyway. So I stood up and carefully undid my cardigan, careful not to break the buttons, then pulled up my blouse, the soft fabric tickling my ears.

Even though they were pointless, I felt self-conscious and covered my nipples. After a deep breath, I hooked my thumbs into my skirt and knickers, easing both down at the same time.

Standing there naked, I felt so… disgusting. I couldn’t look at her, but I hated looking at myself, looking at what I was without my cute clothes, so I closed my eyes.

“She’s cute.”

I heard her say that, but didn’t, couldn’t, believe her. Still, I glanced up and… she was looking far down me. And I—when I thought about her calling that cute, I, something twinged inside me and it moved. I couldn’t stop it. The more I thought about it, the more it twinged, and I saw her staring at it, heart pounding, and it kept growing, getting harder.

“She’s a beautiful dick,” she said, then she finally looked up at my face, smiling. “But it’s hard to stop hating a part of yourself, isn’t it? Do you want me to make it look different? Maybe a bit feminine?”

Hating myself, so embarrassed, I begged her. “Please.”

“I have to touch it, is that okay?” she asked.

I nodded.

Slowly, she reached out and, the moment she touched it, I gasped, a shock running through me, and it twinged again, the tip bouncing a few times. I swallowed the lump in my throat, trying to keep my breathing normal.

She touched it again and I felt that twinge, but she held it still. Then I watched as a gentle light covered it, sort of pink and purple, flickers of reds and blues, swirling, and I felt her hand grow—no, I was shrinking down there.

The light faded and what was there… didn’t look like my thing. A bit smaller, slender, sort of like her fingers. The veins didn’t bulge, and it sort of drooped, not sticking up. My balls also looked smoother, sort of pulled inside a bit.

“Does this look like a woman’s dick to you? I tried going for something demure,” she asked.

The strangest question someone had ever asked me, with the simplest answer: “A little.”

All of a sudden, Ka’ne reminded me she here, walking in front of me and then, like Siya, she looked down at my… woman’s dick. Seeing her stare at it, I twinged again, my woman’s dick bobbing a bit.

It made no sense—woman’s dick—but I repeated it over and over until it sounded like gibberish.

Then Ka’ne looked up at me, her eyes, something strange about how she looked at me. “Artie, can I touch it?”

The situation was already so absurd, and she was so beautiful, and I, I was horny, too horny to hate myself. “Yes,” I whispered.

She touched it so gently, touched it more, stroked it, sitting so close I felt her breath. And it felt so good. Not even a minute passing, I knew the feeling building up, trying to hold it in.

“S-stop,” I said.

She did, pouting. Looking up at me with big, sexy eyes, she asked, “Did I do something wrong?”

“I, I’m about to… let it out,” I said, for some reason saying that the most embarrassing thing out of everything that happened.

Her gaze flicked down and she licked her lips, so sexy I shuddered. “Can I taste it?”

“I—d’you know what I mean?”

“Your seed is ready to come out?” she said, one of her ears flopping down, and it looked so cute.

I nodded.

“I want to taste your seed—can’t I?” she asked, her down ear flicking up, up ear flopping down. So, so cute.

Then I thought about her question and I nearly released over her right then. “I, if you really want to,” I mumbled.

She eagerly nodded, both her ears perking up. Before I could say any more, she opened her mouth, and I saw her tongue sort of roll, wetting her lips. Already barely holding on, feeling her mouth around my woman’s dick made me tense, seed pumping up. She held me just inside, tongue swirling around my tip, and I released spurt after spurt. I hadn’t jerked off in so long, it felt so good, shivering, breathless, mind empty.

When I finished, I looked down and she looked so happy. “You taste nice,” she said, smiling.

“Thanks?”

“You don’t eat meat, do you? Or much fruit? I’ve noticed meat makes our essence taste a little bitter, while fruit adds a sweetness.”

Maybe they finally broke me because I answered her without thinking how weird the question was. “Yeah, I mostly eat grains and vegetables.”

She grinned for a moment, then looked down again at my woman’s dick. It was still hard.

“Can we mate? I want to feel your seed inside me,” she said, face forward but eyes up, looking at me through her eyelashes. My woman’s dick throbbed—

“No!” Siya said quickly. “We don’t have protection…. Wait, you’re different hymoids….”

I was confused for a second, then remembered something else she’d talked about. Oh gods, if I filled Ka’ne with my seed, and she got pregnant—I shuddered, something about that just so erotic.

“Artie, can we?” Ka’ne asked.

Her pleading voice mixed with my imagination and all I could do was whimper. “Please.”

While she guided me to the bed, she talked to Siya, words lost as my heart pounded in my ears. But then she asked me a question, asked it twice before I heard it: “Do you want me to show you how to make her feel good?”

“Yeah,” I said, my shyness forgotten for now.

In a heady haze, I ended up lying down, tail flat against my back. Ka’ne grinded against my thigh, and then Siya was sitting next to me, touching Ka’ne.

“She likes you playing with her teats. Gentle squeezes, and lightly pinch her nipples.”

Ka’ne stole my attention, sliding my woman’s dick inside her, and I shivered at the incredible feeling.

But Siya moved her mouth close to my ear, her breath making it twitch as she said, “Your woman’s dick is inside her vagina,” her cute voice emphasising the important word, like she was teaching me.

Then her hand dropped lower, for a second making me think she was going to touch my woman’s dick. But she touched the top of Ka’ne’s vulva instead and, instantly, I felt Ka’ne tighten around me, letting out a sharp moan.

“And here is her clit. She’s pretty sensitive, so only touch it lightly and through the hood—that’s the bit of skin at the top.”

Sort of desperate to know, I stared, mesmerised, seeing the little nubby thing, almost like the tip of a nipple. And I knew whenever Siya touched it, feeling Ka’ne’s reaction.

It was incredibly strange in the most amazing way, focused on her erotic lesson, listening to Ka’ne’s moans, barely noticing when my moan joined hers.

One thing led into another and another, not finishing when I quickly filled Ka’ne with my seed. I tasted what she tasted like, what I tasted like mixed with her taste, what I tasted like on her tongue. And they—I watched her bed Siya, saw how they did it without a woman’s dick, and then I was covered in a blanket and Dandee joined them, Mo sitting to the side to watch.

Eventually, I realised that I didn’t hate the thought of bedding a woman any more. For over a year, I couldn’t get hard, hating myself so much every time I imagined doing anything to a woman. But Ka’ne didn’t hate it, didn’t hate me. None of them did. Maybe she was someone who also bedded men, but I—I didn’t care. A woman bedded me. She knew everything and still bedded me, and that was enough.

Eventually, their bedding slowed down and Siya was left alone, breathing deep, sort of just gently rubbing herself. I won’t lie, I was really turned on seeing that, but after releasing twice, I wasn’t uncontrollably horny.

“Siya?” I whispered.

She looked at me, clearing her hazy eyes with a few blinks, but she didn’t stop rubbing herself. “Is everything okay?” she asked.

What I wanted to say was so difficult, for so many reason, but I owed it to her. Earlier, she was hurting for me. And I still hurt. I felt it still there, buried underneath everything else for now, but I knew it would come back.

“If you… made my dick look like a vulva for a bit, that would be okay, right? Just while I’m here, so you can… put me back to normal if it goes wrong.”

Her hand stopped and she bit her lip, sexy. After a long few seconds, she gently nodded, then asked, “Do you want me to do anything else?”

So we ended up on the floor next to the bed, sitting on some towels and talking for a bit. Then, like earlier, I felt her magic enter me, fill me, felt my body change. A little shorter, lighter, muscles going soft, nipples bigger, teats growing, ears smaller but fluffier, tail sleeker and shorter, not so bushy—all the things I ever dreamed about while staring at the mirror.

And then my woman’s dick became a yoni—that was what she called it. It was hard to see, so Siya handed me a small mirror and I angled it. Not quite the same as hers, but similar, and she told me what all the parts were called.

I couldn’t have a real vagina, more of a pocket—I tested it, about as deep as my finger. My clitoris was bigger than hers and right next to my urethra. The inner and outer lips—labia—and the general shape and size of my yoni was the same as hers.

I felt like I was supposed to look at it like that wasn’t me, like the mirror was really just a super-lifelike painting, or that it was a magic mirror, showing me someone else’s yoni.

But it didn’t. I looked at it and I knew that was me, the real me. Not perfect, but no body was. Ka’ne’s labia were a bit lopsided, Siya’s one teat was slightly bigger, and Ka’ne told me Dandee sort of leaked a lot of essence, kind of messy; I didn’t know anything about Mo, just that she had something called a cloaca instead.

Anyway, staring into the mirror, I saw the imperfections, but they were my imperfections.

My throat was clogged, words impossible to get out, but I forced them out, never needing to say this as much as I did now: “Thank you.” And my voice was higher-pitched, softer.

I sort of felt like that was the end of my dream. That she would return me to how I was and send me home, and I would remember this evening every time the pain got too much, giving me hope.

Then Ka’ne suddenly appeared, her face behind the mirror. “Ooh, can I touch it?” she asked, looking up at me.

Next to me, Siya giggled. “She likes you.”

Both things I heard bounced off each other in my head, then I looked at Ka’ne, this kind of lightness in my chest. “Please,” I whispered.

So gentle, she touched me, licked me, nuzzled my yoni, and I felt like crying. Not because I was upset or angry or ashamed. No, I was happy. So happy.

Siya gently rubbed my shoulder, comforting. “You probably didn’t notice, but she marked you earlier,” she softly said.

“What?” I asked, confused, hard to focus with a tongue licking my yoni.

Ka’ne paused to helpfully say, “I peed on you a little.”

“W-what?” I asked.

Siya giggled and squeezed my shoulder. “She does that if she really likes mating with you,” she said.

Mating with my woman’s dick.

Reminded of that, I started growing disconnected from what was happening now, falling into old thoughts. Then Siya rubbed my cheek, her thin fingers touching my skin and bringing me back to now.

“We’re staying here for a few days, so you don’t need to decide what you need tonight,” she said. After a few seconds, she added, “Or you could come with us. We can talk about that tomorrow, but Ka’ne really likes you.”

Ka’ne still licking me, I barely managed to concentrate on what Siya said. But I heard, so there was something I had to ask: “Do you like me?”

“W-well, I mean, you’re cute, so it’s fine.”

“Cute enough to mate with my woman’s dick?”

Barely a whisper, she said, “Sure.”

I couldn’t believe I asked that, couldn’t believe she agreed. An unbelievable afternoon.

The start of an unbelievable journey with people who accepted me—all parts of me.

mialbowy

I’m going to finish off the arc with the next chapter—don’t want it to drag on too long. So that will be more of a self-indulgent chapter, full of my worldbuilding ideas, and will not-so-subtly set the narrative on the path to the epilogue.