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Tale of Her Tails

For Anya_Arctic

By Draconicon

Living in a dreary little apartment wasn't ideal for anyone, let alone a fox that had much better ambitions for herself, but it was better than the alternative of living on the street. She hadn't thought that it mattered that much, but after finding herself without running water, heat, and a roof over her head for a week...well, suffice to say that Anya valued her little apartment far more than she used to.

She rolled over on the dingy little couch that served as a bed, rubbing her back with a groan as she felt her spine popping repeatedly. Her white tail flicked behind her, stretching out after a long night of having it curled against her side like a body pillow. It popped and cracked nearly as bad as her spine, and she could already tell that it was going to be stiff for a few hours.

Lovely.

Grumbling, she sat up, smacking her lips and staring across her living room. One table, cracked. One TV, hooked up to the electric system illegally. Two empty pizza boxes and a sushi box that needed washing. Nothing good, and nothing for breakfast, either.

You were the one that left the clan instead of getting married to that asshole, she reminded herself. Still worth it?

Yes, but barely. If her suitor had been better, even by a token gesture, she might have been tempted to go home, to allow the ceremony to take place, to allow him to claim her. If that deal was still on the table, at least. She doubted that it was, considering how she'd run off without a word.

But at least she had her freedom, including the freedom to walk around in nothing but her panties.

Anya chuckled, shaking her head as she got to her feet. She had to tiptoe through the trash on her floor, her clawed toes finding little spaces of carpet to hook into as she took long, stretching steps from the couch to the far side of the room. There was a dangerous moment when she nearly tumbled into a bunch of old red solo cups, but she avoided it with a piruouette that swung her into the wall.

"Ow..."

Shaking her head, she walked down the hall to the bathroom. Judging from the heat behind the wall, the building's hot water heater hadn't been drained by anyone else this morning, so she might be able to get a hot shower in before the rest of the building woke up. It was a rare treat, and she planned to enjoy it.

The vixen was halfway to the bathroom when she heard a peck-peck at her window. She stiffened, slowly turning her head to glance at the glass.

It was a raven. Not a crow, but a raven, and not a normal raven, either, not with a necklace of gold and silver around its neck, and not with that sapphire suspended in the shiny metal. It looked at her with eyes that held her reflection, and she knew that he was demanding to be let in.

"...Shit..."

Running was useless if they had already sent a messenger. If she tried, it would only make things worse for her in the long run.

Wincing, Anya walked down the hall to the window, pulling it open at the latch. Only a couple of inches, but it was enough for the bird to hop through. It leaped to the carpeted floor, and she had to resist the urge to kick it.

"What are you doing here?"

"What am I doing here?" the bird asked, looking up at her and cawing in disapproval. "I should ask you that. What the hell is a woman from the Winter Clan doing in a place like this?"

"Normal people don't take shiny baubles for payment," she said, shutting the window. "So what the hell are you doing here?"

"Official business, I'm afraid. Message from the Clan, exile, all that sort of thing."

"You mean I wasn't already?"

"I was surprised, too, but your aunt was holding out hope that you'd come back home and get married. She convinced everyone else to hold off on the official declaration," the raven explained, hopping down the hall and making her follow him.

"Explains why I didn't hear anything..."

She crossed her arms under her breasts as they returned to the living room, narrowing her eyes at the bird. There was no way that this was the only bit of news that he'd come to tell her. The Onyx Flock were expensive, not given to idle messages, even ones that were as traditional as this.

As the raven hopped onto one of the old pizza boxes, Anya couldn't help but fear the worst. She did her best to keep it off her face, leaning against the wall.

"What's the rest of it?"

"Besides the official declaration of exile from your clan, I was sent to tell you - oh, a bit of cheese, lovely - I was told to tell you that the Hunters have been loosed."

"What?!"

"Yesterday, I believe. It took me a while to find you, so I guess the news is a little late now."

"You think?!"

The vixen was already flying across the room, grabbing her clothes from wherever she'd scattered them. She didn't bother with a bra; she could probably steal one later, and it wasn't necessary.

The Hunters were another clan, held restrained by a series of treaties to not chase after the foxes or other people on the other side without permission. They were more often used as a way of bringing in criminals, tracking and hunting kidnappers and worse. Even then, they were restrained from going all out.

If they were let loose now, told to go after her however they liked, there'd be blood. Lots of it. And she would be fooling herself if she thought that any of it would be theirs.

After getting a serviceable shirt on, she ran for the window. The raven followed, hopping along down the hallway as she jammed her legs down her pants.

"Where are you going?"

"Away."

"Where away?"

"Anywhere but here."

Anya pushed the window open -

CRACK!

Only for a crossbow bolt, of all things, to shatter the glass. The white-furred vixen leaped back, barely avoiding the glass shattering all over the floor. She didn't stop, running for the front door of her little squat.

"Did I mention that they followed me?" the raven asked.

"No, you could have mentioned that! Fuck!"

She yanked her door open before darting into the hallway. The raven didn't follow as she slammed the door in his face, hard. Might have bent his beak a little, too, which wouldn't have disappointed her in the slightest.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, she thought, darting around the corner to the stairwell. Two flights to get to down to ground level, hopefully before the Hunters closed off the streets. If they were already in the building, she was doomed, but if she could get out, get to the car that she'd hotwired yesterday -

It wouldn't make her safe, but she'd be able to buy herself some time. That was all she needed now.

Anya slid down the railing, hissing as her threadbare jeans threatened to come apart in the process. She rounded the end, curved down the next flight. Someone shouted from upstairs, probably one of the Hunters.

Good. It meant that they were trying to catch up with her from the wrong direction. There might not be many on street level.

Round one more bend, then she leaped for the door. She caught it, twisted it open -

"Hello, runaway."

And found herself staring up at one of the biggest males that she had seen in a while. The Hunter's muscles pushed through his disguise, making him look like a block of marble wrapped in flesh and fur, and his grin showed fangs beneath the flatter teeth that he was supposed to have.

Anya froze, which was the worst thing she could have done. The Hunter grabbed her by the neck, smirking.

"Night-night."

He twisted his hand to the side and she was out. The last thought she had was a curse for the raven.

She woke up being dragged by her ankle, and her first thought was to kick the asshole that was pulling her along. Then the vision of the Hunter's teeth returned, and she thought better of it. She'd rather like to keep her leg, after all.

Thankfully, her hands were free, which meant that they thought that they didn't have to keep an eye on her. If it were anyone else but Hunters, she would have already been pulling some sort of escape attempt. With Hunters...

Well, better to wait until they were paid and sent off. They'd been gentle so far, if one didn't count the choking out, at least. If she pushed their buttons, they'd get rougher, and she didn't want to see rougher.

Still, they could at least let me walk. She crossed her arms, feeling both her tail and her hair dragging out over her head, making it less and less comfortable for her as they continued down the stone hallway. She didn't know where they were, had no idea what was going on, but she doubted it was anything good.

Eventually, the Hunters reached something else. Something shadowy, with less substance than she was used to seeing. She tried to make them out, but every time she looked at them directly, they seemed to disappear. They were only visible as things seen out of the corner of her eye, and even then, only as strange shadows that didn't quite look real, their shapes shifting and changing at their whim.

Release her.

The voice was silent, beyond the range of hearing for most people, but it rumbled through the ground with all the force of thunder and an earthquake combined. Anya shuddered as she felt the words in her bones, and knew that she'd been brought somewhere bad.

The Hunters let her loose, their skinsuits ripping in places from the vibration of the voice. They fell back as she stood up, rubbing the back of her head. She could feel bruises, scrapes from being dragged around, and she groaned as she realized just how sore she was.

And how damaged her clothes were. How far had they dragged her to leave rips in her pants and her shirt? She swore her boobs were going to take forever to stop aching from how they'd been thrown around without the support of a bra. They hurt, they sagged, they were flopped around, and they just didn't feel good. The vixen let herself focus on that instead of wherever she'd been taken to. At least that she could control.

As she reached under her shirt, pulling at her breasts until they felt vaguely better and properly situated, she saw the shadows pulling to the walls of the room. Flickers of white could be seen just behind them, and she wondered just where she was. It looked like marble back there, but that would mean being somewhere particularly -

Anya of the Northern Winter Clan. Exiled. Alone. Do you know why you are here? the voice rumbled at her again.

Just hearing that voice made her feel like her bones were being rattled right out of her skin, and it took everything she had to stay calm and still while it talked. The vibrations were so strong that, if it hadn't been painful, she might have laughed at the tickling feeling that it left behind. Anya shook her head.

"I don't. But...I'm guessing you don't want me dead."

No. We - I - do not.

"Who are you?" she asked, looking through the shadows. "Or...where are you, at least?"

I am here.

"Yeah, but where?"

Here.

The vixen jumped back as the darkness rose out of the ground beneath her, suddenly forming a silhouette too tall to be a normal person. Without more light, there were no details, but she could make out that it had two arms, two legs, that it had wings, and that it had a horn on its forehead. The darkness clung to it tightly, and she realized that it was the source of the dimness in the room.

More than that, she knew what it was. The vixen took a step back, shaking her head.

"A night stallion..."

THE Night Stallion, he spoke through the shadows, making her legs ache again. Do you know why you are here, now?

"...No," she admitted.

This is not a nightmare of yours.

"Well, it's not a dream come true, either," she muttered.

Nightmares were common enough. They pranced through the night, carrying what they believed was punishment to different people in the world. Sometimes their punishments went awry, but she'd met a few and knew that they weren't that bad. Stern, austere, and definitely a little up themselves, but the Nightmares were good people.

Night Stallions, on the other hand, were the ones that ran the different herds of Nightmares, the ones that dealt out the serious punishments. They were ghostly things, even more so than the Nightmares, and could only manifest with great effort.

So, why the hell did one of them want her?

The figure stepped forward, the soft clop, clop of hooves filling her ears. Not a real sound, but the ghostly memory of a sound, but no less scary for that.

"What do you want?"

I want...substance...

The Night Stallion reached for her, his hand passing through her shoulder to grab her tail. Then, and only then, did Anya scream.

"No, not my tail! Let go. Let go!"

Flailing as best she could, the vixen managed to take a step back, but her tail was still in the herd master's grip. She tried to yank it free, but somehow, his ephemeral grip only tightened further.

Anya's panic grew as she felt him pulling on it, feeling the discomfort that was rapidly turning into pain. Her clan was more than just a bunch of foxes that happened to be attached to the supernatural world. They were more physical, more real, and most importantly -

Crack.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"

Anya screamed at the top of her lungs as she felt the first splintering of the bones at the base of her tail. It was agony, and her stomach twisted up as she looked down to see her tail twisted in a way that it never should have been.

However, it wasn't removed. She still had a chance. Anya leaned in, pressing her hand against the shadow's chest.

"Please...just...what do you want? What do you want? Please, just tell me. Don't do this. Please...Please..."

He looked at her, his eyes taking form and glowing with a red so dark that it almost looked demonic. The Night Stallion shook his head, tightened his grip on her tail, and pulled.

The wrenching feeling of her tail being ripped free left her screaming. Anya tumbled to the floor, crying at the top of her lungs until blood loss and shock sent her into the world of dreams, the world of her new master.

She woke hours later, and she immediately knew her trauma was no nightmare. There was no tail swishing as she woke, no weight against her leg or back or pressed against her side. No tail, and without it, no freedom.

Anya opened her eyes, looking at her wrists. Smoky bands of near-invisible darkness wrapped around them, holding her hands together. She tried to spread them, but they refused to go more than a foot apart, strands of smoke and shadow pulling tight before dragging them back together. She was shackled.

No. She was enslaved, and she would be as long as he held her tail.

The vixen pulled her hands to her chest, fighting the shakes that were coming. She was already shivering despite the heat in her tiny cell, and she knew that if it got out of hand, she'd have a complete breakdown.

There was no point planning an escape. He'd taken her tail, and anybody that managed to take the tail of one of her clan effectively owned that fox. Foxes were one of the species on the halfway point between the magical and the 'real' world, capable of traversing both. That, and...another thing...were part of their magic.

Did the Night Stallion want the 'other thing' too? She didn't know, but he mentioned 'substance,' and that would be a way to get it.

Think about it later...think about it...oh god it hurts...oh god, it hurts so much...

The tears were coming, and she knew that if she looked down at where her tail had been, they'd keep coming. The vixen rubbed her eyes, wrapping her arms around her stomach as she rocked back and forth.

Eventually, someone opened the door to the cell. She looked up, half-surprised, half-not to see a Nightmare on the other side. The female was just as insubstantial as the Stallion had been, but she, at least, looked vaguely sympathetic. The smoke and shadow mare stepped through the door, her eyes yellow and glowing in the dark.

"You're awake," she said.

"Mmph...I can tell...it hurts..."

"We can get you something for the pain."

"I..."

Dignity had a price, and right then, the price of pain was more than what she was willing to pay. Anya nodded.

"Please."

"Later. Can you stand?"

The vixen doubted it. Her legs shook just thinking about getting to her feet, and with her tail gone -

The thought nearly cracked her again, the first tear leaving her eye and running down her cheek. She rubbed it away before it could go far, but she knew that there was no way that the Nightmare hadn't seen it. She shook her head.

"No. No, I can't."

"Alright. We'll bring you some later." The Nightmare nodded, an insubstantial hand pressing against the vixen's own. "If it helps, he doesn't want you forever. Just for a few months. Maybe half a year."

"That's too long."

"You have to."

It wasn't even a persuading argument, but rather a statement of fact. Those who managed to take a fox's tail owned the fox. She'd be forced to follow any command that the Night Stallion gave, and she'd be helpless to deny anything that he asked of her. Without her tail, she'd never be able to have her life back.

Her people offered their tails as a gift, a binding between themselves and the one that they chose to serve (or, in some cases, the one that they chose to mate with). It was an ancient tradition, a curse of sorts that was leveled on her ancestors when their trickster nature had been the bane of any number of carefully laid plans. It forced them to go through with their promises, with the orders they were given. It made them perfect servants.

She'd avoided giving her tail to the one that she'd been promised to. Now, another had taken it.

"What does he want?" she muttered, looking down at her hands.

"What do you think?"

"Please..." She looked up. "Just tell me, please."

"...He wants an agent."

"..."

That was not so bad, in the grand scheme of things. The Night Stallion could not easily touch the world, and if he wanted something physical, then he needed someone of substance. That...that could be doable.

"And he wants a physical heir."

"...Fuck."

"He'll do that, too. Is it true that foxes can -"

"Nnngh."

"Sorry. I honestly don't know, I thought..."

The Nightmare's smoky face turned, looking away. If it had any more detail, Anya might have thought that it looked embarrassed for asking the question, but she didn't let herself dwell on that.

An heir. That meant that he would come to her for breeding. More than once, if the first time didn't take.

Being an agent of the less physical supernatural creatures wouldn't have been that bad, depending on what the Night Stallion wanted done. Others in her clan had made deals like that before, gone through with different tasks in order to make a living in this day and age. Depending on what he wanted, she might have been willing to do the same.

Bearing a child, on the other hand, and without a choice in the matter...The vixen shuddered, imagining what would happen when he came to her for that. The shackles on her wrists proved that she would be forced to do what he said, that he would be able to touch her and use her now that he held her tail. What else could he do?

Worse. What else would he make her do?

The thought and the mystery behind it was enough to break through what control she had left. Anya leaned forward, her head in her hands.

"Don't...don't look at me..." she managed to choke out.

"I won't."

She got the feeling that the Nightmare turned away as her tears flowed. She couldn't be sure, of course, as there was no way that she was seeing anything with how wet her eyes became, but she hoped that it was so. There had to be someone good in this place. Someone that understood.

As ever, the crying hurt. Her chest ached, her eyes stung, and she could barely breathe through the snot that came afterward. Anya fought to keep the crying to a minimum, and had some success with that. By the time the tears stopped, she had only been rocking back and forth for a minute. Maybe two. Remarkably good success for a breakdown.

She managed to take her hands from her eyes, sniffing until she felt like she wasn't dripping snot everywhere. The smoky bands around her wrists squeezed, reminding her that they were there, and...

And they pulled at her.

"He wants you," the Nightmare muttered. "We shouldn't keep him waiting."

"Probably not..." She forced a weak smile. "Then again, what's he going to do? I don't have another tail for him to cut off."

"Not yet."

That...was true. The one she'd lost would eventually grow back, and if she ever managed to escape, she'd be able to re-attach the one that the Night Stallion had stolen. She'd be a two-tailed vixen, then.

Not that it mattered. He could take the one that grew back, too, but it wouldn't give him any extra power over her. It'd just be more pain and humiliation, and he had more ways to do that than by cutting off more limbs.

Still...probably better not to keep her master waiting, particularly as she could feel him tugging through the bands again. Both her ankles and her wrists tried to pull her off the bed, and she groaned as she pulled herself to her feet. The lack of tail made it very hard for her to stand up, and it was even harder to walk without it there to balance her.

The Nightmare helped her, the smoky, insubstantial woman blowing like wind given form to keep her on her feet. It wasn't much, but it was enough.

Anya walked down the hall with a wince and an occasional hiss. Every time that she tried to twitch her missing tail, the muscles at the base of her spine ached, and her bones felt like she had slammed them against something unforgivingly hard. The vixen whimpered at the tenth step, and couldn't stop as she kept being pulled along.

Eventually, they reached the end of the tunnel. It came to a sudden stop with a sudden drop, one that Anya didn't want to risk. The Nightmare slid down, turning into a dark mist before reforming on the landing five feet down. She held out her arms, and Anya delicately stepped into them.

She wished that the rest of it was so easy. Ahead of her was nothing but darkness, blackness that swelled and shifted within the room ahead. From what she remembered of the Night Stallion, it was the only way that he could step out of the dream for longer than a few minutes at a time. In total darkness, in the place between worlds, where reality and dream mixed, he could take form.

And there, she had no doubt, he would take what he wanted...all that he wanted.

She looked back at the Nightmare, and the misty mare shook her head. It was up to Anya to go in alone. The arctic fox winced, but made herself take the first step.

Darkness surrounded her, pressing in like it had taken on physical form, like it had weight. It wasn't like normal darkness. It was like...

Not that meme!

The sudden stupidity and hilarity of her own thoughts shocked her out of her growing terror, and Anya managed to smile. Even when it felt like a giant hand had her its grip, she managed to put a small grin on her face.

However, the smile didn't last long. The Night Stallion loomed out of the darkness, his long face and red eyes killing any happiness that the stupid joke had managed to give her. Anya stopped, crossing her arms as best as her restraints would allow her, and fixed her eyes on her new owner.

"Yes?" she said with as much annoyance as she could muster.

You speak as if you would defy me.

"If I had the choice, I would."

You do not.

He lifted one hand, and the white fur of her severed tail came with it. A hint of blood clung to the base of it, a bit of bone showing through the flesh and fur, and she gagged in the back of her throat at the sight of it.

That, however, was nothing compared to the feeling that ran through her as she clenched his fist around it. She went ramrod straight, her eyes widening as if she had his hand around her heart. It squeezed again, and the air was pulled straight from her lungs, leaving her hiss and wheezing in a desperate attempt to breathe.

You belong to me now, vixen. Remember that. You will not receive another light warning.

The pressure in her chest almost knocked her out, and when she was finally released, Anya fell to all fours, barely breathing. She coughed, spitting out everything in her mouth and throat before she could pull some oxygen down her throat.

Stand.

Spoken word or not, the sound echoed through her aching body, and it compelled her to rise. She groaned as she was forced to stand up again, her eyes drifting up to his. The Night Stallion continued to hold her tail, looking her over.

Another command filled her mind, the shackles around her wrists loosening as she was made to stand with her arms up, her hands behind her head, and her legs spread. The white vixen did as she was told, submitting to his gaze as she exposed her entire body. All too conscious of the weight of her breasts and the cold air against her sex, she tried to focus on the task at hand.

He wants a kid, and he wants an agent. If he just wants one...

It was a horrible thought, but one kid would only take nine months. Maybe less, if the Night Stallion's cycle was...swift. Then it was down to whether she would -

Stop thinking.

"...You can hear me?"

I am the keeper of dreams. I know the workings of the mind...

"Then you -"

I know what you fled...and I know what you dream of.

"Oh god..."

Even gods would be baffled at the depths of your...imagination.

"Oh, oh, you're kinkshaming me now?"

Hardly. After all...

Suddenly, the weight of the Night Stallion pushed her back, and Anya yelped as she was knocked off her feet, pushed to the stone floor. She landed on her hip rather than on her tail, miraculously avoiding that broken bone. Anya groaned under her breath, struggling to get back to her feet, only for the smoky head of the Night Stallion to shove her back down.

"What - oh..."

After all. I may be the bringer of bad dreams...but I would prefer you to do this...eagerly.

The stallion of darkness and smoke was sporting an erection already...and a large one, at that. It hung low, a bestial thing that was meant for one sort of rutting and one alone. The vixen stared at it, then back at him.

What he wanted was obvious, but it was her choice whether she'd make him force her or whether she'd go to him willingly, and she knew that her choice would shape the rest of her captivity. She had to make the right choice...but which?

The End