Every part of the man wanted to tell her what she had done wrong, tell the girl in front of him that she wouldn't have lost all her clothes if she had just talked to him to start - well, she would have still lost her horse, but that wouldn't have happened if she wasn't wandering in the forest all by herself.
Everything about this was unprecedented. Never mind the shifting, what was a female doing by herself? What was a fox at all doing by itself this far out? They know better. Survival of the fittest was the law of the land, and the fox - the female? The anomaly in front of him had lost on every front. On top of his pondering, intrusive and instinctive thoughts were rippling up, clawing at his spine, his mouth, his entire insides.
-Take the girl.-
-Bite her. -
- Mark her. Either way is fine. It's what you were born to do. -
His eyes dilated even more, if it was possible, giving a long, low hiss, bringing his face nose to nose with the woman, teeth itching to bite into her, to coil around her naked body, claim his territory. Sneering, he pulled his lips back to do just that, fangs bared, when she suddenly looked up at him and met his vision, eye to eye. And in that moment, another emotion hit him like a tidal wave.
The fox girl stared into his face, no longer with fear, but with determination. Resignation, yes, but behind those diamond shaped eyes was a glint of defiance... wildness. And the snake realized suddenly, that nothing, prey, beastman, or woman, had ever had the guts to look at him. Actually look at him, not shrinking, shaking in fear or otherwise, or rolling their eyes in disgust.
With a shudder, the rational human, and truly human, side of him took over, lowering his lips, snorting at disgust in himself for wavering.
"Let's make a deal. I don't mark you right here and now, and while we go back to find your clothes, you'll speak more than six words to me."
Before Shuule was able to answer, the man's sweeping tail coiled around her up to her shoulders, concealing her, this time not threatening to squeeze the life out of her. When she wiggled her arms, he loosened his grip to allow her to bring both out to rest, crossed, on his scales.
---
They were not nearly as far away from the starting point of the chase as Shuule had imagined, because of all her twisting and turning through the underbrush. The snake was taking a quicker path, scenting out where they needed to go with his forked tongue, though in truth, the forest in this area was his home, and he had a good idea of his surroundings anyway. The questions came calmly, monotone like everything else he had said so far, and all of them questions she expected, and couldn't answer.
Her parents were normal. No, she wasn't part boy. No, she didn't know how. Yes, her siblings were normal. No, she knew of no one else like her.
The snake paused his questions before asking one more in depth. "Why, WHY would you be out here by yourself?"
Shuule sighed deeply. "My village was too small. I want to go to the city and I had no mates to go with me." She kept it to herself that the village head wanted to keep her, demanded she stay as property of the village, as the only female under thirty years old. She didn't want to be the wife of several foxes. In a society where the non-feral and non-rootless were supposed to hold the women on a pedestal, she certainly didn't think holding her as a captive in forced marriages was keeping up the standard.
He wasn't fooled by this. "Too small, was bored," was not a good enough reason to set yourself up to be eaten or captured, but he also didn't press. He said he wanted more than six words out of her, and honestly, she answered more than he expected her to.
"What's your name?"
...The question he should have asked first, but didn't want to get too familiar with the girl. It was better that way, considering what he was expected to do. But at this point, he was too intrigued.
"Shuule - I know, don't tell me you don't get it, it's fine," she growled, her red ears twitching, which she had allowed to reappear since she wasn't trying to keep up appearances anymore.
The snake stopped moving slowly as she answered, looking back at her. "I wasn't going to say that. We both chose differently. I'm Set. Your clothes are right here."
He loosened his tail so she could stand on her own, picking up and placing her clothes on top of his body so she could dress out of his line of sight within the coils. He could tell she was a cherished female by what she had been wearing, both her skirt and her halter top being the deep blue hue of a blue tailed fox - wild and no relation to the beasts themselves. It was a rare fur and hard to obtain, but someone had taken the time to gift it to her, he figured. On her olive skin, it stood out vibrantly. He watched her reach up to tie the knot at the base of her neck, which was all he could see, and then run her hands through her hair to wrap its length back up out of the way into a messy bun. Suddenly aware that she had a pair of eyes on her, Shuule shot a glare back at him.
"What," she snarled through her teeth.
As seemed normal at this point, Set held his response long enough to keep the upper hand and uncomfortability in the air, but assuming she was properly dressed now, he removed his tail from around her body entirely, swooping it back behind him. Reaching out, he touched the side of her face with the back of his hand, gently this time.
There was a knot in his stomach that threatened to kill him. She was stunning, to him.
Pulling his hand away, he straightened back up, and spoke blandly again as if he was unbothered.
"Alright, well, Shuule, my prediction is that you'll be killed or captured by tomorrow, but it won't be by me. It was too easy, I'd be embarrassed. But remember," He leaned down to be closer to her face again, though this time not trying to scare her down to her bones, "You're all afraid of me, but I'm better than a scorpion. And I'm better than the Rootless. South takes you towards Flame City. East takes you to the Second Great City. I suggest you figure out your surroundings before you find a fate worse than me."
Shuule watched, utterly stunned, as Set turned fully into his serpent, which took one last pensive stare at the girl, before casually turning, lowering his body fully to the ground, and slithered off.
... What the hell just happened? Shuule stood, mouth fully agape, as the snake left her. It was a beastman's entire purpose to find a mate, of which they could only have one their entire lives. She was told the ferals, beasts who lived in solitary with no clan or city rules, would mate the first woman they found, forcibly or otherwise, because the chances of them ever coming across another in their entire lifetime was slim. So again, she asked, what the hell just happened? A miracle, like herself, she figured. In a world with some sense of magic, but no concept of higher power, she wasn't so convinced that someone invisible wasn't watching over her. With a huff, she brushed off her skirt, and picked up the leather bag that was strewn on the ground when she had shifted and fled. In truth, there wasn't anything in it. It was an empty bag she could put her clothes into before she turned into a fox on purpose, with a strap on it that she could throw onto her shoulders even in beast form
The next month was the best time in her life. On the exception of one time when she had the sudden desire to bathe in the stream as a human, Shuule never shifted from her fox. For the first time, she felt fully independent and self sufficient, something she had longed for. She stalked down and caught wild prey to the point she felt like a glutton, and the season also allowed for the foraging of berries and fruits, which fox also consumed as omnivores. She swam in the stream, just to see what it was like, since she had never attempted to do such in her animal. She also caught a small silverfish, her first taste of fish ever, though it was somewhat an accident. Only once did she ever feel in danger, when a large brown bear lazily crashed through her territory. Immediately aware of him before he was her, she stopped her play by the water, and scampered up her tree, hunkering down under its thick canopy. He did take a few pauses, raising his head and snorting in the air, but eventually w
The missmatched pair traveled downstream for a fair distance, the ground so saturated with rain that the snakes smooth body created a muddy trail behind him, though the fox was still light footed enough to barely leave tracks. They reached a right slanting curve in the bank, when the black figure came to an abrupt stop, turned, and submerged himself into the water, head first, swimming out until just a few feet of his tail remained on the shore. He brought his great head back out and looked behind him. Shuule tilted her head, thinking she would much prefer to swim herself, as it wasn't that far, but she also had her bag with her, that was waterproof enough that her clothing was probably still dry, but not if she submerged it. The fox gritted her teeth, and climbed onto the snakes' tail, ready to leap off if attempting to drown her or something was part of his plan. Nothing of the sort happened however, and when they reached the other side, there was just a very swift walk that broug
--- Shuule woke up the next day, in the dark as the candles had been blown out in the night, with just the sunlight coming in through the rock opening. Her eyes quickly adjusted, looking around for her roommate. Set was a large snake, curled up to sleep in the opposite corner, motionless. The hair on the back of Shuule's neck stood up a bit at the fact that she had shared a den with a snake overnight, but he had kept his distance. After settling in the afternoon before, she decided to cut the awkward silence with a nap, and ended up sleeping like the dead for twelve hours straight, not realizing how much she missed a soft place to lay and four walls to keep her safe. She stretched her arms over her body as she got out of bed, quietly walking to the opening to peek out. Even just putting her head outside into the open let the air hit her like a brick. It was hot, the humidity oppressive. Usually the dry season was hot, but the unusual rain had made the air so heavy you could drink it
It was far too humid to do much of anything, it was decided. Sure, like the men, Shuule was capable of forging through the weather, but with no reason to, bachelor males would even take a day like this to conserve themselves and not overheat.Set had shifted back into his full snake, and was entirely submerged into the water, his head elevated just enough that he could breathe, dozing off. Shuule had decided that she was going to stay human for now, sitting on the edge of the water, legs submerged up to her knees. With her almond skin, getting sun burnt wasn't much of a worry, but she was already regretting the decision. After four weeks of playing fox, she actually just wanted to test out being somewhat normal around a male, but she also was considering leaping out of her clothes so she could burrow under something shady.When she sighed, the snake opened up one of his eyes slightly, rolling it back to look at the girl sitting on the rock. The water rippled as his massive black body
Though Set decidedly did not care at all how Shuule ate her food, as it was clear she was uncomfortable with this one particular aspect- eating uncooked dead prey, as a woman, in front of others; They did not do it again. Snakes didn't need to eat every day anyway, and as the time went on and it was clear to Set that Shuule was, pleasantly, sticking around, he didn't even leave the cave every day. Some days he would lazily slither down to the stream to sun himself, Shuule tagging along. Other times Shuule would shift into her fox and go hunting for the smaller prey she was used to, like rabbit, mice, and birds, but would never bring it home. She would often come back with some token of whatever she had captured, though. One day, she came home with a neatly stacked and washed handful of bright green bird feathers, which reminded her of a peacocks but were significantly shorter. Delighted with them, she showed Set, who that night while she slept, carved out a little wooden vase with hi
Set reached out and grabbed both of Shuule's hands like he had the first time she showed him her beast fingernails, but this time it was with desperation, and taken by surprise, she didn't retract her claws. As she was still sitting, he had to lean over her, his long red streaked hair falling down in front of his wildly wide eyes. "I've wanted to be your mate since the first day I met you." Shuule furrowed her brow in disbelief. "You tried to EAT me Set -" And as she went to argue her point about their first encounter, for the third or fourth time since they had been living together, she squeaked as Set pulled her up from the ground into his chest, wrapping his arms around her small body as her own limbs hung to her sides, her toes barely touching the ground. It was in that moment that Shuule became truly aware of how much strength laid in this man, and how little he had not only not used against her, but not even shown her. Meanwhile, he didn't know if he should tell her the tru
After she had calmed down, Set brought Shuule back into the cave, even helping her undress and dry off before she laid down for a nap. By the time she woke up, the sun was beginning to die, and he had to push back intrusive thoughts that her outburst was because she was upset that her first spouse was a serpent. He knew, he was sure, it was bottled up emotions, but to then need to sleep for so long during the day felt like a mourning process. Unnerved, he hadn't woken her, but rather slithered up the outside of the caves' rocks to settle on the top to watch the sunset, alone in his thoughts. It was flat up there, and a good place to pass the time if you weren't afraid of being seen, but with it being the peak of the dry season, he hadn't thought to show Shuule as it could be incredibly hot during the day. "Set?" She called out quietly, hoping he would hear her, tugging on the very end of his tail, which he let hang over the doorway so she wouldn't wake up and think she was alone. I