Dream of the Unliely Princess

They talked for hours, when she wasn't kissing him, and had something of a surprising meal for an early dinner. Oksana helped, but it came to her as a surprise that he was a fantastic cook on top of everything else. By then, however, Oksana was nearing the last of her reserves and was growing more and more tired. She was almost afraid to go to sleep, fearing that all of this had perhaps been a dream. She was feeling a little afraid that she would wake up alone in her cold apartment back in Kiev and she said so to him, but he became a little stern in his kind way.

"Go to sleep, my princess. I will not disappear. Not now. If you can't find me, I am around here somewhere. But there is no sense to you staying awake until you fall over from stumbling."

"Will you stay with me a while, Yevgeny? I really want to do more than sleep, but even I know that you are right. Still, I want to be in your arms, if I could."

He put his arm around her, "Of course, Oksana." He guided her to the stairs.

He had only intended to show her the way, but she pulled him farther into the room. He stared wide-eyed as her clothes came off. He'd never seen a human woman quite like her without clothes on. Besides being completely smitten, he couldn't tear his eyes from her small breasts, and it made her laugh a little nervously.

"Um, Yegeny? You look a little odd here. I know that I'm not the right kind for you, though if I had my wish right now, I certainly would be. You are staring, and ... it makes me wonder if I do not have the right number of these for you or something."

"Not at all," he whispered, "You are so very close to what you wish to be. I have just ..." He stepped closer, "I have never seen such beauty. Please, never say to me that you are only pretty, Oksana, because you are perfect."

She chuckled, "Then you have no idea how pleased I am to hear that. Do you mean it as a personal, ah, taste for you, or am I close to what you remember that the females were like?"

He grinned with more than a little shyness. "Please forgive my staring. The answer is both, Oksana. The only things that are different are that you lack teeth like mine, eyes like mine, and fur, when I am as I was created. But these things do not matter at all. Only, please, get into the bed, before it all overcomes me."

She chuckled as she turned to draw back the covers, "I almost wish so much for that, Yevgeny." She looked back at his small gasp. "What now? Am I lacking a tail or something?"

"Well, yes," he said with a smile, "but that doesn't matter either. I very much like the view, that's all."

"Then come here and hold me, before your words make me find new energy and I do something which I have never engaged in out of my own want, rather than my need for money to buy food with. I have only been with young men, Yevgeny, out of curiosity at first, and out of wanting to separate them from their money later on. It always felt a little nice, but they were finished almost as fast as they went in. I always felt as though I was only borrowing them and could never explore and do what I wished to. I want to do that with you more than anything."

He turned off the light, and there was only a little moonlight in the room with them. She didn't even see him do it, but she felt him in the bed behind her suddenly, and felt his arm go around her as he pulled himself close to her. He kissed her cheek, and she turned her head to get a better one for herself, before he moved up a little and she felt herself being as completely enveloped by his long body as he could manage.

Her head was under his chin, but she didn't care. She'd never felt anything like it before, this obvious sense of loving protection that she felt.

"Is this how you sleep together, your kind?" Her question came to him as a soft and sighing whisper in the darkness.

"Yes," he answered quietly. "We sleep like this most often, holding our females like this. It is to give protection, warmth, and a safe place in which to have their dreams. The females always have such powerful dreams, and they need to be held then."

She smiled, "Then I think that I am going to like being your female for you, Yevgeny. Quite a lot, I can tell you now."

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She woke up alone much later in the night and wondered why. Listening, she heard nothing at first, and thought that maybe he hadn't gotten the same comfort from her as she'd gotten from his embrace. She remembered that he'd said that he would be here somewhere. But as she lay there, she could hear something from somewhere else in the large house. It was soft moaning now and then, and ... possibly quiet sobs. She threw the covers off and reached for her glasses as she sat up.

She had little trouble navigating in the darkness there and found herself in front of the heavy door before very long. With a whispered curse, she went back to the kitchen for the card he had given her and then let herself into the garden. She closed the door quietly and just as she was taking her hand from the handle, she felt the magnetic lock come on. She laid the card on the workbench and then followed the sad sounds.

It took her quite a while as she walked along the little path by the small amount of moonlight coming in from the sliver of a moon. Oksana hardly dared to breathe. Her heart went out to him if he was sad in any way, but she also felt a little excited to think that she might have a chance to see him as he really was. She realized suddenly that he was not on the path as she found the sounds to be slightly beside her then.

Stopping, she turned and crept forward on her hands and knees into the vegetation, careful not to rustle anything. She had to creep very slowly.

At last, she caught a glimpse of him. It was all that she could do to hold back the gasp that she'd have made otherwise.

He lay on his side, facing away from her. She watched his breathing and saw it when he sobbed. In between them, she heard his quiet crying. Now and then he moaned quietly and it broke her heart to hear it. She stared at the leanness and the obvious power in the muscles that she could make out. He was very light, mostly, though there were what looked like some stripes there down his side. She'd only ever seen his long hair in a pony tail, but now she could see that it was really a mane. It didn't even stop at the back of his skull, from what she could see, rather, it continued in a long stripe for most of the way down his spine. That couldn't be the hair on his head, she realized, since he was lying down. He had a long tail as well, or rather, a short tail with long hair attached to it.

Her eye was drawn to his ear. She stared at the tip of it as she crept forward. She didn't know why he didn't appear to be aware of her presence, but she knew that if he did suddenly know that he wasn't alone, that would be where she would likely get the first sign of it.

As she came into the small space there, she stood up and crept around him.

She'd been right all along. She knew it now as she saw him. He was the most beautiful creature that she'd ever laid eyes on. She saw his strength and power everywhere on him, and noticed that his arms were longer like this. But there was something very wrong here. As she knelt down, she was certain that he'd know it and she tried to prepare herself to jump backwards if he reacted badly, though she knew full well that if it happened, it would likely be her last instant on earth.

The face there was still somewhat human, though there was the hint of a short snout, and the long teeth that she'd seen that night in the alley in Kiev. Now there was more fur to it, though not very much that she could see under his long hair. His eyes were closed, and there was a trail there along the snout from his tears as they glistened in what little moonlight came through the leaves. She wondered if he was even conscious. But he had to be, she thought. He was crying. He had to be either awake or asleep to cry, she thought, but not unconscious.

She couldn't stop her quiet little gasp when she saw his ear flick forward and she tensed.

"Oksana," he sighed, with a little sob catching in his throat. "Why have you come? I thought you understood what we discussed."

She leaned down to move his hair and she kissed his soft cheek and then began to whisper to him very softly. "I woke up alone, Yevgeny. I understood what you said, but you said that you come here to feel like you are back there. You didn't tell me that you come here to cry, and ... I love you, Yevgeny. I may not be the right kind of female for you, but I am a female. We can't help these things if we love someone. I've never felt anything like I feel for you, and you hurt, I swear that I feel it."

She lay down next to him on the soft moss. "Can you lift your beautiful head only a little for me?"

When he did as she asked, she positioned herself so that her leg was over his ribs a little and she carefully slid her arm under his head and pulled him to her breast. She kissed the top of his head and held him as he cried.

After a many minutes, he seemed to settle down a bit and then she felt his lips on her. She sighed and pulled him a little closer. "I want to make it better for you," she said, "but I have no idea where to begin."

He didn't answer for perhaps ten minutes as his breathing settled a little, and she enjoyed this tenderness, but finally, he sighed with a shudder, and then released her nipple to turn his head a little.

"You are helping me. You have made it better. I usually cry at least a little bit when I come here. Tonight, it is different. I... I came here with the first hope that I have had for myself in so long, and ... " he shuddered again, "I came to ... I came to say goodbye."

Oksana's eyes flew open as his words sunk in, and in that instant, she knew that he was grieving. She spoke to him quietly in whispers, telling him how she loved him, and that she was so sorry that she had disturbed him, but he shook his head a little after a while and kissed her breasts. "It has passed, Oksana. Thank you so much for this."

He looked up at her a little weakly. "Well? Am I still what you want for yourself, my princess?" He sounded tired.

She looked down at him and smiled, and then she moved herself lower to get her face near to his. She looked at the very short fur there; those eyes with their slits open most of the way in the darkness here and those teeth. She kissed him for the first time when he was like this and it was amazing to her. After a minute, she just said, "What do you think? Of course you are. Are you a little better now?"

He nodded, "Yes. I think it would do me some good to tell you things, that is, if you think that you wish to hear them."

"I would like to hear anything that you have to tell me, my friend, anything. I don't care if it takes all night until the morning, and if it takes a week of nights like this from dusk to dawn."

He frowned, "I don't think that my life, as long as it is, has enough in it to entertain you for that long."

She kissed him again, and ran her fingers through his hair, "Well, tell me what you can."

He pushed her onto her back gently and rose up to lean on his elbows, looking down at her, promising to do his best. He stroked her cheek while she toyed with his hair and then he began.

"Where I come from, there were four kinds of creatures at the top of the structure, just as you are at the top of yours on this world. When I was born, there were only three left. We differ in some ways, but there is one important one. My kind is like you, like almost every creature on this world. We have sexes, male and female. All that is left of two of the kinds is us, those of my kind, like you, males and females. The other two types call us lower than they are, as though they are better somehow. We call them our word for slugs, since there are kinds of worms and slugs like them -- each one carries both sexes. Even here, I have seen snails mating and both are impregnated at the same time. They look something like us, but that is our name for them."

We are all the same in some ways -- we all stand on two legs, mostly, and we can be vicious, some more than others. My kind can run on two legs or four, if need be. Of the other two kinds, they are similar to each other, but one is larger and stronger physically. They are the weaker ones. I have fought as many as six of them at the same time. For them, it was a desperate battle, but for me it was sport. Other than scrapes and bruises, I have never harmed that kind. It is only a challenge, though they never see it that way. If one like me appears before them, they want only to kill. But when we have enough or it looks as though we must kill them, it is easy to turn their minds, and they stumble off, or fight each other."

"It is the other ones who are the most dangerous, for they have powerful minds, just as we do, and they are cruel. They killed off the other type like us to eat, and then turned to us because they hate my kind and kill us for food, if they can. We are ancient and bitter enemies."

"Our young are very small compared to yours. They look something like kittens, and that is our name for them as well since we have animals which are very similar to the cats here. I see that you compare me to a cat in your mind, but you know that it is not accurate. I think the closest creature here would be something like a hyena crossed with an ape mixed with a cat and a dog, a little like both cat and dog, but even that is not correct, is it?"

"When I was little, maybe as tall as your knee and not far from a baby myself, my parents were killed by ten of our enemies or maybe more. My mother hid me. I was so frightened as I watched them die. But they killed five between them and ripped up the rest badly, and another two of my kind came and butchered those ones. They heard me crying as I hid, and they took me to raise as their own. They were royal among us, but my father was king while he lived."

He smiled as a thought came to him. "Now you know why I call you princess."

"At first, when we are very young, we ride along hiding in the hair of our parents until we are too large. As kittens grow larger, they hang onto their parent's manes. Parents always know when to let the little ones down to scratch in the sand if they need to. If they live long enough to grow more, by then they are large enough to run alongside, and they can always climb up if more speed is required or when they grow tired."

Oksana grinned, trying to imagine him as a little kitten. "You must have been so sweet."

He smiled, "Perhaps I was once, for a little while. One day, the female gave birth to their own kitten. I think that the birth was worrisome enough for the male, but I was there too, and I must have made it even worse for everyone with my constant questions. I couldn't stay still. The only thing that could silence me was when they showed me their kitten. I had seen newborn kittens before, but not one such as her. I just sat down and stared at her and all of the adults laughed."

"I was allowed to hold her sometimes. I think that we are different from you in this way as well. If a child with no parents is taken to be raised by other adults, and they have their own children, they are considered to be as brothers or sisters. It is not this way with us. They raised me as their own, but she and I were not considered to be siblings, especially because of who we were. It is not our way. I was a prince, but under the care of her parents. She was royal enough to be a princess, and we would have been considered as a possible match when we grew up. But she changed everything."

He chuckled with a soft smile, "She always changed everything."

"Not long after, her eyes opened, and her parents were pleased. But when she saw me and I saw her..."

Oksana watched as his eyes filled again for a moment, but then he had it in hand again.

"She would not be still and struggled until she could be in my arms. She only had to touch me and then she was still and happy. She would shriek and howl the whole night and never stop unless she could sleep with me, not her parents. She was not afraid of being alone or in the dark, she was not afraid of anything then, she was angry. It hurt me to hear it. I wanted to be with her too and I stopped eating because of it. The parents watched this and showed others. The elders said that there was nothing to be done, that one or the other would likely die if we were parted then. They gave up after weeks of it and after that, we always slept together and at least there was peace in the home."

"As a kitten, she would nurse, but her eyes were always on me if she could see me, and then she would run to be in my arms, or only against me. She only tolerated being carried in her mother's hair if she knew that I was tired and then always asked if I felt better so that she might be with me again. Otherwise she hung onto my hair, sitting on my shoulder and speaking silliness into my ears. I was little too and I always laughed to hear her. If I spoke to her, she would listen and stare. But if I stopped, she would begin all over again."

"When she was too large to be in my hair, she walked beside me, holding onto my tail or my hand or insisting that I hold her tail. This is what we do as lovers. We were far from that, being only small, but she didn't care. She said that we would be paired one day and saw no reason not to show it. She refused to accept any other possibility and that was all there was to it."

"She rode on my back if we had to travel far, hanging onto my mane as I walked on four legs, so we looked like an adult couple and the adults thought that we were nice to look at like that and talked quietly of the prince and the princess already such a young pair. But it caused us many troubles from the others all the way until we were almost young adults. I had enough problems already because many young males thought to try to beat me because I was an unprotected royal."

"If a bigger young male started a fight with me, she would turn into a little ball of fury before I could blink. She had no fear of anyone. What could I do then? I would laugh, and pull her off so that I could finish what had been started. She always watched behind me, as I did for her when a young female wanted a fight, thinking that she was an easy victim. It happened though seldom that she fought another female. None of them ever tried it twice. Then we would judge each other's scrapes and cuts and we would laugh at each other. But if anyone hurt her, it would take at least one large adult male to pull me off, because I wouldn't stop until they'd stopped moving."

"Later on if she had been bad, they only had to tell her that she would sleep alone and she would turn well-mannered in an instant because we needed each other and she would not be parted from me. We both knew that to punish one would be punishment for both, so we behaved."

"We did everything together, went everywhere together, and we could sit silent for hours and talk with our minds. We could talk like this as we hunted, coming from different directions, we never went hungry and what couldn't be eaten by her family was given to others who needed it. We choose our mates for ourselves, as you do. It was said that we had chosen our mates in each other at such a young age, and no one doubted it who had seen us together. I was always large for my age, and I am large for my kind. She was always small for a female. You would be the right size for most females, but she was smaller."

"It happened only once that other young ones tried to keep us apart to laugh at us. We were almost old enough to mate then but still very young. She almost blinded those who held her back, leaving scars to last a lifetime, and though I was only a little more than half my size now, I left three young, almost-grown males unconscious and bleeding behind me to get to her. In another minute, we were the only ones still standing there uninjured."