Avery the stable boy is convinced that few women can resist his charm, but has little to show for it. One evening at the tavern, his drinking partners goad him into putting his charm to the test on a lone woman; one that just so happens to be a colossal minotaur, packing something unexpected.
This story is a commission. There is no sex in this first chapter, but there will be two more.
The tavern was as rowdy as ever around Avery and his two superiors. Drunken peasants cheered and sang after a long day’s hard labor, barmaids carried foam-topped tankards of ale to customers in every corner, and fires danced in braziers and hearths, casting their cozy, orange glow upon the humble wooden interior. The sun was setting outside, and the three were only a couple of drinks into their typical Saturday night routine. Avery was well prepared for the night, having meticulously washed off the stink of the stables and dressed up in his fanciest attire. A puffy, white linen shirt, half covered by his green shoulder cloak that was fastened with a golden brooch. His brown leggings sat annoyingly tight around his hips, but that’s how it always was for Avery whenever he wanted something remotely form-fitting.
The two knights, whose horses Avery looked after, were far more casual in appearance. There was Bernard, a stout, fair-skinned man nearing forty, his blond hair trimmed short. Joseph was tall and gaunt, his skin tan and his hair black, and at thirty he was a couple of years older than Avery. They had stripped away their armor, but neither had thought to change out of their gambesons.
“Every week it’s something new,” Bernard said, then took a swig of ale. “You’d think there’d be a limit to what we’re expected to put up with in the name of diplomacy.”
Joseph chuckled. “You’ll have to bring it up with the duke the next time he comes by. Good luck changing his mind, though.”
“Indeed. I’m probably better off confronting that… thing directly.”
Avery sat quietly, sipping on his sweet wine, just barely listening to the older men’s conversation. As always, nearly everyone in the tavern was human, but not all. That said, the men definitely weren’t talking about the elven barmaid hurrying to quench the thirst of the customers, nearly tripping on her long skirt. Nor were they talking about the amazon mercenary in deep conversation with a woman whose husband sat quietly sidelined, clearly worrying that his physical attributes couldn’t quite compete with the seven-foot warrior.
What the men were talking about was far more egregious. A hulking beast, sitting alone in the far corner of the tavern, facing away from everyone else. From behind she looked like little more than a giant mass of muscle, her mid-back bulging out to the sides in thick lumps, and her shoulders as wide as the round, six-seat table she was sitting by. All of it was covered in short, scruffy dark-brown fur. But she was no mere animal, despite her cloven hooves, curved horns, and tufted tail hanging limp through the gap of her chair. She was a minotaur.
The city of Galana sat near the western border of the human empire, and had originally been established as a stronghold against the southern population of lycanthropes, much like how the eastern city of Tiafora served as the primary military base in the war against the orcs. But over time, the city had become something more. It was of utmost importance to keep the lycanthropes at bay while also maintaining good relations with other races to receive their aid; thus, Galana had become a hub that welcomed any race not at war with humanity. Among them were the minotaurs, from the far west.
“What do you think, Avery?”
Having missed the last bit of the conversation, Avery turned to Bernard, lowering his cup of wine. “About what?”
“About the furry beauty in the corner, sitting all by her lonesome. Does her presence bother you?”
Avery sat up straight and tall, but still shorter than the two slouched men beside him. “Well, I wouldn’t mind an elvish maiden, but a minotaur? I’d prefer to have her join your ranks as a mercenary so you could keep her in the barracks at all times.”
“There’s an idea,” Bernard said. “What is a pack of wolves to a bull like her? We could drink all day if she handled the fighting.”
“I think the stables would serve better as her living quarters, though,” Joseph added. “Avery would have his work cut out for him.”
“Very funny,” Avery said, turning up his nose. “The horses are enough work, thank you very much.”
Bernard smirked. “But she would need maintenance to fight for us, would she not? Who better to look after her than someone who’s used to handling big beasts? Besides…”
“Besides?”
“We have yet to see the great Avery’s charm in action. A new woman every week, right? But somehow we always miss it.”
Avery blushed. “W-well, it’s not my fault you two always end up too drunk to witness it.”
“Fair,” said Bernard. “So show us now.”
“Try the elf if you’d prefer her instead,” Joseph said.
Avery watched the elven barmaid at work for a moment. She was beautiful, that much was certain, but in a slightly alien way that added a lot of character. Her skin was as white as alabaster and her hair silvery-gray, with a total absence of any warm hues, unlike human skin and hair. Her eyes were the most striking part. Icy-blue irises, surrounded by blackness where you would expect white in humans.
But beautiful as she may have been, she didn’t exactly look available. Avery saw her set a pair of ale tankards in front of two drunken men, then turned around and left as quickly as she had approached them, dodging one of the men’s hands that ended up groping at emtpy air. A moment later she was behind the counter, quickly working the taps of the giant barrels to fill up new vessels for the unending stream of customers.
Avery scratched the back of his head. “I don’t know… She looks… busy.”
“Well then the furry one it is,” Bernard said insistently.
“Why would I even want her?”
“I didn’t say you want her. We just want to see you do your thing for once. You don’t have to take her home.”
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Just have a few drinks with her. But finish your cup of juice first.”
Avery frowned at the older man. “It’s wine.”
“Same thing. So will you do it?”
“Or are these countless women you’ve been with actually just ghosts?” Joseph chimed in.
Avery rolled his eyes, gulped down his last bit of wine and stood up. “Fine. Watch me.” With forced confidence in his stride, he left his superiors behind as they erupted in cheers. He walked along the tavern wall, purposefully avoiding the central aisle, just like he always did ever since that one time some drunken man smacked his behind as he passed. The shame still haunted him. He didn’t even know whether the man realized that Avery was male. So what if he liked to dress properly and pretty himself up a bit? He wanted to look like a beautiful prince, not some scruffy, brutish man’s man. High-quality women preferred that, right? Just because some near-sighted drunk mistook him for a girl, that didn’t mean that he couldn’t charm the ladies as well.
As he approached the minotaur from behind, their size difference became more and more apparent. Avery was short, much to his dismay, but he realized that even the tallest human male would have looked tiny next to the minotaur, even in her seated position. Once he was just a few feet behind her, his steps had nearly come to a complete halt. He cast a glance over his shoulder to see the two men staring at him with expectant smiles. Then, with a deep breath, he stepped up beside the minotaur.
“G-good evening, my lady,” he stammered. “I couldn’t help but notice you were selfing here all by your sit… I-I mean, sitting here all by yourself.” You idiot, he thought.
The minotaur slowly turned to look at Avery, surprise and confusion apparent in her tired face. Avery had seen very few minotaurs in his life, and always at a distance, thus he hadn’t really known what to expect to see in this instance. And while the various aspects that made up this minotaur’s facial features made perfect sense combined with the rest of her body, in the sense that they were bovine in humanoid form, Avery was taken aback by the sheer bulk of her head and face.
Her mouth and nose were in the form of a snout, and although it was much flatter than that of a cow, the bone structure was ridiculously thick and powerful. No fur grew on her face, and her skin was an ever-so-slightly lighter shade of brown. Shoulder-length hair framed her face, its texture just as shaggy as her fur. But her eyes were by far the most striking feature. Brown irises were stretched thin around her huge, pitch-black pupils, and given the size of her eyes as a whole, that made for a stare that seemed to suck Avery’s very soul out.
“What of it?” the minotaur growled, her voice startlingly deep and bassy, yet with a feminine roundness to it. “Got a problem with me sitting here?”
Avery gulped hard, suddenly realizing that he knew nothing about minotaur mannerisms or temperaments. “N-not at all! On the contrary, I came to ask if one could perhaps join the company of such a… lovely woman.”
The minotaur eyed him up and down, then shrugged. “Have a seat, then.”
“With pleasure!” Avery said, nailing the delivery, only to ruin it by missing the chair beside him with half his butt as he sat down. He quickly adjusted himself before he tipped over onto the floor, trying to keep a straight face as the minotaur stared at him in silence. Once sitting up straight, he cleared his throat. “So, uh… What brings a fair minotaur maiden like you to human territory, miss…?
She smiled, the corners of her mouth stretching far back on her face on either side of her snout. “Tashána,” she said and offered her hand. “I’m just a… traveler, here to learn about human culture. What’s your name?”
“A-Avery,” he replied, staring in disbelief as his entire hand and wrist got enveloped by Tashána’s palm. Her skin felt tougher and thicker than the most exquisite leather armor, and roasting hot against Avery’s smooth human skin. He traced her massive, furry arm with his eyes, nearly pissing his pants as he realized that it was thicker than his entire torso. Her torso, on the other hand, was an entirely different matter; half of it was made up of the impossibly wide frame of bulging muscles he had taken notice of from behind, and the other half rested in her lap in the form of two enormous udders, straining against Tashána’s crude leather top adorned with metal studs, the same style as the knee-length skirt she wore. Just like her face, there was no fur on them, which was easy to see given her extreme cleavage. Her top only framed the very edges of her tits, leaving the upper skin fully exposed, and Avery thought he could just barely see a hint of her dark areolas above the leather. She may have been a beast, but those things were certainly… eye-catching.
“Avery. Pretty name. Tell me, Avery, what is a boy like you doing in a place like this? You seem out of place among all the drunks.”
Avery’s face twitched slightly upon being called a boy, but he shrugged it off. “Oh, I just… come by every now and then to have a drink. Alone. Looking for someone who might join me… Among people of all races, of course! E-even minotaurs. Especially minotaurs, actually.” He managed a proud little smile from having thought of that line on the spot. Surely a simple minotaur would be impressed?
A low chuckle rumbled in the minotaur’s throat. “Is that so? And how many minotaurs have you successfully charmed?”
“W-well, none, I suppose. But that’s only because there are so few of them. Of you.”
“And now you’ve found one. Couldn’t miss this opportunity, huh?”
“That’s right!” Avery saw the elven barmaid approach an adjacent table and knew that it was the perfect opportunity to show some initiative. He raised his hand and mentally prepared an order for two cups of wine… But he was too slow.
“Two more of these,” Tashána’s voice boomed as she held her wooden cup up toward the barmaid. “All the way to the top.”
The barmaid looked stunned for a moment, staring at Tashána as if the order had physically hit her in the face, then nodded and headed for the bar.
Tashána turned back to Avery. “Hope you don’t mind,” she said and gulped down the last bit of liquor in her cup.
“N-not at all!” Avery replied with a forced smile. Of course, he did mind. Mostly because he wanted to at least play the part of the gentleman, but also because he highly suspected that Tashána’s cup had been filled with something other than wine. “What, uh… What are you drinking, exactly?”
“‘Brandy’ I believe you humans call it. It’s not bad, I suppose. Takes a lot of it to get truly drunk, though.”
Avery gulped. Brandy? The strongest liquor the establishment offered, and that’s what Tashána thought of it? Avery had never even tasted it before. He had smelled it, and that was enough. The worst part was that he knew that it was made by distilling wine. What was the point? Why ruin something deliciously sweet and fruity by removing the deliciously sweet and fruity aspects? In Avery’s mind, it seemed like nothing more than something for men to drink to show off and appear tough rather than to actually enjoy. It was brutish, pathetic and embarrassing in every sense of the word. Not at all how a fine, self-respecting man should conduct himself. A bottle of wine shared in peace and quiet with a fair lady — now that was something to strive for. A few weeks ago he had actually achieved just that. Well, except it was a rowdy Saturday night in this very same tavern. And just a cup each for Avery and the woman he had been talking to that time, rather than a whole bottle. And he had only paid for his own. But still, it was a similar enough situation. Too bad the woman had revealed that she had a husband waiting at home. There was always something getting in Avery’s way of bedding the women he approached.
“Something the matter?”
Even such a tame inquiry came out frighteningly booming in Tashána’s voice, but Avery still managed to smile. “Oh, no, no, no! I love brandy!” And in the corner of his eye he saw the barmaid return with a cup in each hand. She hurriedly set them down on the table, then left without a word. The fumes filled Avery’s nostrils immediately, damn near singeing his nose hairs. Was it even safe to drink?
Tashána raised her cup. “Cheers then, little human.”
Avery’s hand quivered as he raised his cup to hers. “Cheers…” The wood clacked together, and Avery slowly brought the cup to his lips as Tashána threw her head back for a big gulp. Avery took his first sip, and sure enough, the taste was just as bad as the smell — actually, significantly worse. It burned in his mouth in his struggle to swallow, and he could have sworn he felt blisters forming on his tongue. When he finally managed to get it down, it was as if his internal organs turned inside out. He twitched in his seat, the taste and sensation lingering, and he tried not to grimace too badly. Especially because he realized that Tashána was watching him closely. He sat the cup back down and feigned a confident expression.
“Did you even drink any?” Tashána asked, smirking slightly. “Your cup still looks just as full.”
“O-of course I drank! I just want to enjoy it longer.”
“Don’t worry about that. I’ll pay for as many as you want. Already had eleven myself.”
Avery was caught between shock at the amount and frustration that his excuse had been shot down immediately. He considered refusing and ordering in some wine instead. It’s not like Tashána could force him to drink brandy. But would she take offense? Would she leave, forever casting doubt on Avery’s charm in the eyes of Bernard and Joseph? Perhaps it wasn’t so bad to just endure it, and getting drunk faster could, in turn, help him endure Tashána’s company. And then he could be the one to place the next order for wine, thus introducing her to his more sophisticated, human ways.
Tashána raised her cup again. “Come on. One more. A real swig this time.”
“Fine…” Avery said and brought the drink to his lips. He took a deep breath and held it, at the very least eliminating the smell factor. Tashána’s gulps were more controlled this time, and she held eye contact with Avery as he tilted the cup into his mouth. He knew he had to do it for real this time. Thus he decided to get it over with quickly. He mimicked Tashána from before, throwing his head back and literally pouring the brandy past his lips. His mouth filled up in an instant, and he swallowed trying not to think about the horrid taste and burning sensation. But it was hard not to think about it when it literally felt like his insides were dissolving. He turned away from Tashána to hide his grimacing face and watery eyes.
“There ya go,” Tashána said, a giggle in her voice. “That’s how we minotaurs drink. No need to act all prim and proper around me.”
Avery faced her with a proud little smirk, trying to hold back his tears. “Minotaurs and… men alike!” he said. It wasn’t unlikely that minotaur women valued tough males, and Avery figured he’d play the part to some extent at least. He wasn’t sure how he would follow up his feigned toughness with an order for wine instead, but he’d figure it out.
“‘Men’, you say? Like you?” It sounded like a genuine question rather than an insult.
“W-well, obviously! What else would I be?”
Tashána shrugged her mountainous shoulders, her enormous breasts jiggling in their leather confines. “Man, male, boy… Human terms confuse me. But I’ve never met a ‘man’ as pretty as you.”
Avery froze as Tashána reached out and rubbed his cheek with a thumb as thick as a rolling pin, her tail swaying hypnotically in the air behind her. His mind raced with conflicting thoughts as he felt her warmth through her thick skin, and the animalistic musk emanating off her. On one hand she seemed interested already, and it seemed unlikely that something would get in Avery’s way this time around. On the other hand, was she maybe proving too much to handle? Were minotaur females always this assertive? It certainly made it easier for Avery, but it wasn’t exactly what he was used to. That said… Being called ‘pretty’ did make him feel oddly warm inside…
He awkwardly tried to lean away from the minotaur’s invasive touch without making it too obvious. “W-why thank you, my lady,” he said, reaching for his cup with a shaky hand. He took as big a swig as he could muster, swallowing it immediately. His whole body twitched with revulsion, but it really seemed like he would need more alcohol in his blood. “Tell me… What is it that you find pretty about me?”
“Your eyes, for starters,” Tashána said, her tone seductively hushed. Coming from her it almost sounded like a deep growl. “Never seen a minotaur with green eyes like yours. Nor one with golden hair. Goes well with your cloak and brooch.” Her touch traveled higher, taking one of Avery’s golden locks between her fingers and roughly rubbing it. Her eyes, meanwhile, went lower. “And your body… There’s no shortage of petite little humans, but the goddesses were extra generous with you…”
Avery felt his face blush harder than ever before as Tashána’s stare lingered on his wide, soft hips. The one part of his appearance that he hated most. The one that did nothing to help him captivate young maidens; in fact, it probably hindered him in that regard. But Tashána clearly thought differently from human women. Was Avery supposed to be happy about that? Did he really want his fat ass to be the tool with which to charm Tashána? It certainly seemed effective. He could see her cavernous nostrils flare out with each heavy breath as her big, brown eyes stared at him…
“I could keep going. Your smooth, pretty face, your lips, your—”
“Alright, alright!” Avery piped up. “Th-thank you… Now what do you say we drink some more?” He raised his cup.
Tashána’s massive snout split open in a booming laugh, her surprisingly white, cow-like teeth visible. “Now you’re talking. Well, bottom’s up, then!” She gave Avery’s face a couple of light slaps, no doubt meant to be playful, seemingly not noticing how the force of her meaty hand made his head wobble back and forth.
He mustered his willpower, then matched Tashána’s intense gulping. The taste was still horrid, making his eyes water, but it was getting better each time. After bracing himself and swallowing the mouthful, he realized that he had nearly finished the cup, and decided to get it over with immediately. He swallowed the rest, then sat the cup down on the table. It was then that he realized how much trouble he was in. The tavern had turned to a blur, and a sudden dizziness filled his head. Maybe his brain hadn’t quite settled after Tashána’s slaps, or maybe brandy was a bit too much for him to handle after all.
“Six more!”
Horrified, he turned to see Tashána grinning at him as she handed their empty cups to the elven barmaid passing by. “S-six?” he said, sinking down in his seat.
“Relax. We share ‘em, of course.”
“R-right…” Avery glanced toward the table from which he came. The other two men seemed in jolly conversation with each other, until Bernard took notice of Avery. He smiled and raised his ale tankard at him.
Tashána leaned on her elbow against the table, her messy hair hanging sideways and her fat tits nearly spilling out. “While we wait… Tell me more about yourself, boy.”
Avery cleared his throat. “Well, I work as a stab—... I-I mean, I assist the city cavalry.”
“Oh…” Tashána purred. “You mean you tend to the horses?”
“Yes, but… for the military. War horses. Proud steeds.”
“I see. And how did that come to be?”
“Well, I… I helped take care of my parents’ horses as a kid. Then my parents died, and I inherited the estate along with the horses. Then they died as well. And since I always wanted to become a knight, I found work with the city cavalry. And I’ve… had the same position for six years now… But one day I’ll be a knight!” Avery noticed his words becoming more and more slurred throughout his little speech, yet it didn’t bother him. He smiled proudly at Tashána, who smiled back. He hadn’t noticed it before, but… She was actually pretty sexy. Blurrier by the second, but sexy. And not just because she had tits bigger than Avery’s whole body. A pair of thick, brown lips protruded off her snout, and judging by their appearance alone, there was absolutely no way a kiss from Tashána didn’t feel amazing. And her big eyes still had that soul-sucking stare, but now they were seductively half-lidded in a way that didn’t look beast-like at all. It was hard not to see her as a beast, considering the fact that she was probably nine feet tall and over a thousand pounds of furry brawn, horned on top and hooved at the bottom. But regardless, she was a woman. And Avery seemed close to finally scoring.
“I can see why you approached me,” Tashána said. “You’re used to working with beasts, after all.”
Avery blushed, remembering how Bernard had said the same thing. “Y-you’re no beast, my lady! You’re a fine woman!”
Tashána chuckled ominously. “Damn right, I’m a fine woman. But make no mistake. I am most certainly a beast. And the way the evening’s going, I don’t think you’ll need to become a knight to ride one.”
Avery sat stunned as he watched a massive tongue slip out between Tashána’s lips to wet them. He didn’t know what to say, but thankfully the barmaid finally returned with their refills, taking the attention away from him. The barmaid set the six cups on the table, then left.
Tashána grabbed a cup. “Still thirsty, I hope?”
With a sigh, Avery shared another toast with the minotaur.
----------
Something was wrong. Avery thought he knew where he was based on the feeling of soft silk around his body, but there was a strange musk in the air that he did not normally notice upon waking up. And a warmth. And, as he slowly opened his eyes… An enormous pair of tits in his face, stacked on top of each other on the mattress, their combined height absolutely ridiculous. Their nipples looked nearly as thick as his wrists, and the surrounding areolas nearly as wide as his torso, the dark-brown skin raised and bumpy. Avery’s cock throbbed immediately.
And then he remembered. Drinking. A lot. With her. And now they were sharing a bed. He had done it. He had scored! With a minotaur, granted… Still, he had scored! But as he took a glance around the room, he realized that they weren’t in the tavern anymore. They were… in his bedroom.
“Good morning.”
Avery looked up to see Tashána peeking over her udders, her sideways position making one horn dig into her pillow — or rather, his pillow. Her hair was a sprawling mess, and her expression was one of utter satisfaction. It was unclear to Avery why she had come home with him, but at least it seemed like he had shown her a good time.
“Your bed’s a bit small, but damn, is it softer than what I’m used to,” Tashána said. “Doesn’t hurt to wake up next to a pretty little thing like you either.”
“Th-thanks…” Avery mumbled, forcing a smile. “Can you just, uh, remind me what happened yesterday?”
“You saved me, that’s what happened.”
“Saved you?”
“Oh, yeah. Got my heart broken for the millionth time, so I left minotaur society behind and ended up here somehow. Didn’t really think any human would ever like me, and I fully intended to drink myself half dead. Then you showed up, and… I had a great time. I didn’t even mind having you pass out on me.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Avery said. “I passed out? Did we have… you know?”
“Not yet, pretty boy. Trust me, you would know if we did.”
“Oh…” Although disappointed, Avery was more concerned with Tashána’s ominous wording. Would he have woken up with a broken pelvis if they actually did it? Also… ‘Not yet’? What was that supposed to mean?
“Wouldn’t have been right with you being so drunk. Sure, it would have been the perfect way to end a wedding night, but I’m happy to wait.”
Avery gave her a confused glance. “W-wedding? Whose wedding?”
“Ours, you silly boy,” Tashána said and cupped his cheek, her hand nearly eclipsing his entire head. “You don’t even remember us getting married? Some wife you are.”
“M-married? Wait… Wife?!”
“Yes, my love,” the minotaur purred, smirking.
Avery shot up in the bed, just barely managing to fling Tashána’s heavy arm off him. He tried to piece together his faint memories of the night, but could remember nothing beyond downing a second cup of brandy. What the hell had happened after their chat in the tavern? Why was she talking about being married? Was she still drunk?
Tashána’s hand came down on Avery’s thigh over the cover. “Relax, love,” she said, her rumbling voice reduced to a soft murmur. “There is nothing more to be taken care of. Just stay in bed with me for a while.”
A shudder rocked Avery’s body from Tashána’s powerful squeeze. “I-I have to go!” he said and clumsily rolled out of bed.
“Go where? You don’t work on Sundays, do you?”
“No, but I… I have to run some errands!” He grabbed the same clothes from last night off the floor and went out the door. He moved frantically down the stairs, trying his best to slide his clothes over his undergarments without stopping for a second. There was no time to waste. If what Tashána was saying was true — which in Avery’s mind it couldn’t possibly be — then there was only one explanation for it.
As he headed for the front door, Avery quickly scanned the surrounding rooms to look for any damage done by the intruding minotaur. Thankfully his home seemed to be intact. His round ceramic pots sat untouched on the shelves in the kitchen, as did the cauldron in the hearth. All of his wooden cooking utensils hung where they should, and what little food he had stored in the kitchen rather than the pantry — a few sacks of grains in the corners, some hanging bundles of herbs, and some onions and carrots in a basket on the table — had not been touched. The long table and chairs of the great hall looked as unused as ever, and all the insignias and tapestries remained on the surrounding walls.
Avery knew well that he was leaving an entire minotaur alone in his home as he left. But what was he supposed to do? Kick her out? No way. He had to go to the root of the problem. And that root was no doubt the local chapel not too far from his home. The duke himself had seen to it that the clergy allowed humans to marry non-humans. In fact, Avery had witnessed plenty of such couples leaving the chapel hand in hand, even the occasional orc or lycanthrope among them, who presumably were defectors. He couldn’t help but wonder if Tashána had come to the city for that very reason…
Rushing through the open gates of the old stone building, Avery looked around and saw a man dressed in white robes walking the aisle to the left. “Hey, you!” Avery called out and approached him.
“Oh, the young lad from last night,” the cleric said. “How can I help you?”
Avery shuddered with dread. “No… Please tell me it’s not true!”
“What? Your marriage? It’s true indeed.”
“How? What happened?”
“Well, you came in with that… woman. Loud and cheerful, both of you. Especially you. And… Well, you both requested to be wed. And so you were.”
“That can’t be!” Avery nearly shouted, his voice echoing in the stone building. “It was all her! It must have been! She forced me!”
The cleric sighed. “We prepare written contracts for cases exactly like this. You signed your own copy and one for the chapel archive.”
“No… No! I didn’t! I wouldn’t!”
“Do you wish to see it for yourself?”
“Yes, show me!”
The cleric led Avery down a set of stairs near the chapel entrance, to an archive where rows of stacked papers and scrolls sat on large wooden shelves. He rifled through a stack on a table near the doorway, presumably made up of papers that hadn’t been sorted yet. It took only a moment for him to find the correct one to hand Avery.
Avery read the unnecessarily wordy contract as carefully as he could. There was an introductory part stating the contract’s nature as a marriage agreement, followed by a set of marriage terms, and then signatures at the bottom. The marriage terms stated, among other things, that the husband would be the sole owner of the couple’s combined properties, monetary wealth, and personal belongings. A cold feeling of dread washed over Avery as he realized from the handwriting that his signature was indeed written at the bottom. And there was something else. Something that hinted at two possibilities, filling him with an uncertain mix of relief and horror.
“Aha!” Avery said and pointed at the bottom of the contract. “There’s clearly been a mistake. See? I’m listed as the wife. I don’t care what happened yesterday. This contract is null and void.”
“No, that is your official status,” the cleric said plainly.
“W-what? No… Why would I be the wife? I’m the man!”
The cleric went quiet for a moment, scratching the back of his head. “I’m not sure whether I could explain it properly. I’d advise you to ask your… husband about it.”
The contract fell out of Avery’s limp hands. He stood there, quivering, giving the cleric a pleading look, hoping that he would reveal the whole thing to be a sick joke. But no such thing happened.
Avery bolted back up the stairs, out of the chapel and back to his home. Her home… No. It couldn’t be. The thought made him want to throw up. It was his home! A noble’s house of grand architecture, passed down through countless generations! Two whole floors, a garden, a pond… It couldn’t belong to some… beast!
Slamming the door open, Avery rushed inside to find Tashána out of bed. In his kitchen. Sitting on a much-too-small stool by a wooden counter, where she had made a mess of chopped onions, carrots, potatoes and who knew what else. The hearth was lit, and a stew appeared to be simmering in the cauldron.
“Welcome back, dear wife,” Tashána said, her tail swaying with obvious excitement. She was dressed in the same leather skirt and top from yesterday. “I won’t get upset about it, but in the future I expect you to handle the cooking.”
“How…” Avery said, breathing heavily. “How could this happen? Why did we get married? Why are you… the husband?”
“Why? Well, look at you and then look at me. What else would I be?”
“But you’re not even male!”
Tashána laughed with what sounded like a mocking undertone. “Of course not, silly boy. There are no male minotaurs. There are females… and there are my kind.”
“What do you mean…? You’re female, are you not?”
“Not quite,” she said with an ominous grin. “A woman, perhaps, as you humans say, but not female.”
Avery turned pale as his mind slowly pieced it together. “No… You can’t mean that you… have a…”
“Have a what?” Tashána said and stood up, towering over Avery by nearly double his height, nearly scraping the ceiling with her horns. She slowly approached him, her massive hooves clacking loudly against the stone floor, and her hips pushed forward. “You’ll have to speak more clearly. I am just a beast, remember?”
The sight nearly took Avery’s consciousness right then and there. So big was their difference in size that Tashána’s crotch was almost perfectly in line with his face. And in the leather covering said crotch was a much too familiar imprint, although significantly larger than what Avery saw almost daily in the stables. Two spheres the size of human heads tightly pressed against one another, hanging past Tashána’s mid-thighs… And above them, a large ring that was undoubtedly a sheath, from which something downright monstrous would surely sprout… Something that might have split Avery’s body in half if he had actually achieved his goal the night before.
Tashána stopped a foot from the frozen Avery. “And tonight…” she began, leaning forward until her face was mere inches from Avery’s. She gave a loud snort, blowing Avery’s golden hair back slightly. “Tonight we consummate our marriage.”