Coming Together: Strange Shifters

By Lynn Townsend

Coming Together: Strange Shifters is a collection of shifter erotica edited by Lynn Townsend. Sales proceeds benefit the Bat World Sanctuary.
Werewolves get all the glory and attention. What about the shy were-deer or the aggressive were-badger? Where are their stories? Calling all skin-changers. There's nothing sexier than a lover who isn't afraid to let their inner animal out!

CONTENTS: Water and Fire (Jaap Boekestein); The Dive (Lukas Scott); Snowbound (Lisabet Sarai); Small Change (Adrik Kemp); A Reindeer by Any Other Name (Delilah Night); A Hand Outstretched (Elizabeth L. Brooks); Mine (Emma Whitehall); Gator Tail (Leigh Ellwood); Mouse Games (Lynn Townsend); Bored in Heaven (Daniel Burnell); Moonlight Ride (Marie Piper); Circus (Nickie Jamison); Valkyrie (Nickie Jamison); Tar Pit Triage (Lily Malone); Storyteller (T.G. Haynes); Rezoned (T.B. Bond); Champ (Margot McGuire)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Coming Together
• Release date: Oct 31, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310155772

Lynn Townsend

Described as a social tornado, Lynn Townsend is a geek, a dreamer and an inveterate punster. When not reading, writing, or editing, she can usually be found drinking coffee or killing video game villains. Lynn's interests include filk music, romance novels, octopuses, and movies with more FX than plot. For more information, please visit paidbytheweird.blogspot.com.

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Coming Together

Strange Shifters

Lynn Townsend

editor

Coming Together: Strange Shifters

© 2015 by Lynn Townsend, editor

This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Cover art © 2015 by Alessia Brio & Lynn Townsend

A Coming Together Publication

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Table of Contents

Introduction: The Animal Inside

Bored in Heaven © Daniel Burnell

A Hand Outstretched © Elizabeth L. Brooks

Gator Tail © Leigh Ellwood

Mine © Emma Whitehall

Small Change © Adrik Kemp

Moonlight Ride © Marie Piper

Water & Fire © Jaap Boekestein

Circus © Nickie Jamison

The Storyteller © T.G. Haynes

The Dive © Lukas Scott

A Reindeer by Any Other Name © Delilah Night

Tar Pit Triage © Lily Malone

Valkyrie © Nickie Jamison

Champ © Margot McGuire

Woman without a Shadow © Bruce Meyer

Rezoned © T.B. Bond

Mouse Games © Lynn Townsend

Snowbound © Lisabet Sarai

About Coming Together

Introduction: The Animal Inside

Werewolves are sexy. That’s what we’ve been told, and quite a lot, recently. Maybe it’s all that hair, on chests that have become more and more waxed in modern fairy tales. Maybe it’s the whole idea of being eaten up like Red Riding Hood. Wolves are either loners or leaders. The Alpha male is the ideal man that most romance or erotica novels are based upon. Broody. Misunderstood. The ultimate warrior. Romantic.

They kinda hog the spotlight.

Two years ago, I read the most adorable story about a were-chinchilla. Definitely not an Alpha Male. Chinchillas are fluffy, fat, bouncy, timid little fuzzballs, and they chew on everything. And yet, that story was one of the best, most romantic, cute, and weirdly realistic shape-shifter story I’ve read in a long time.

Why should werewolves get all the attention? Surely there were other shape-shifters out there that didn’t become the penultimate predator. (Wolves are second only to humans in their hunting abilities). What about were-lions? Were-sharks? Did shape-shifters even have to be predators at all? Were shape-shifting dolphins possible? What about a were-ferret? Were-bunny?

I put together the call for stories about these misunderstood and shy were-creatures, hoping to see something new and unique. What characteristics would a person have, one who could change into a tiger? Or a mouse? What would they be like as a person? With a lover?

Contained in these pages, I have a menagerie of animals for you--from the stunningly beautiful were-panther to a naughty were-tiger, to a wizard with a tendency to breathe fire, to a story-telling werebear, and even a bit of cat and mouse bondage.

Each story, each creature captures a bit of what’s inside all of us… the animal. The lust of the predator. The thrill of the prey. The fierce mating instinct.

Of course, here at Coming Together, all of our anthologies are smut for charity, so selecting the proper organization, and more so, one that would be particularly appropriate for this collection, is part of the process.

Bat World Sanctuary (batworld.org) is one of the leading organizations for the rehabilitation and care of bats, a commonly misunderstood and demonized creature. Bats provide a number of ecological functions, including eating millions and millions of bugs. If you look close, these adorable flying foxes--bats are not related to rats--are actually pretty cute. Bat World volunteers help care for abused and injured bats and provide shelter for ones that cannot be rehabilitated back into the wild.

Bored in Heaven

© Daniel Burnell

Zeus, ruler of the Gods, wielder of the mighty thunderbolt, lover, shape-shifter, throne potato, was profoundly bored on Mount Olympus. His wife, the goddess Hera, was beautiful and sexy, sure, but she was also demanding and complicated and smarter than him, a real turn off, especially when all Zeus wanted was a quick, bodacious romp. In order for Zeus to even bed his own wife, Hera had to be bathed and anointed, her body toned and her spirit cleansed, the stars aligned, libations poured and incense lit and they had to practice what she called ‘mindfulness,’ a mild state of non-judgmental attention to and contemplation of their godly natures, looking into each other’s eyes and other such nonsense. In order to get Hera to give him a freaking blowjob, once every eon or so, she had to be assured that all he wanted was a little variety and that he wasn’t just using her in a fantasy of divine domination. As for letting the other Gods watch to enhance Zeus’ feeling of domination, fugetaboutit. So the ascendancy the ruler of the gods felt he deserved was denied him and the quick romps and throat fucking he craved denied him, and the other mindless fantasies he dreamed up denied him.

When she did consent, the sex was absolutely heavenly since Hera was created of magnificent godflesh, moonglow, sushi and sweet apricots woven through with silk, dark chocolate and jazz, and she knew how to turn his body into a quivering mass of pleasure and to cause his genitals to shoot white-hot torrents of godly cum and his head to explode with galaxies unforetold at the speed of light. Zeus would then forget why he was so upset with Hera in the first place. He would walk around satisfied and stupid in love for half of infinity.

But when the spell wore off finally, it galled Zeus no end that Hera, who could do this to him, also knew how to fend him off until she was good and ready to do it to him again. It also galled him no end (for there is no end in heaven) that Hera would take her roaring, blinding, quaking orgasms for granted and refuse to become his abject sexual slave. Zeus was a god who wanted to be worshipped utterly, insanely, eternally, and such.

So Zeus was frustrated and bored in heaven and began to watch what was happening on Earth and to desire the human women he saw living down there.

Human women presented several advantages for Zeus. First, they weren’t on Mount Olympus where one of the other gods, especially wise and just Athena, might rat him out to Hera. Second, by some ridiculous accident, unlike any other animals, human women were made in the image of the gods. Human women had wanton mouths and sculpted cheekbones, round breasts and magnificent backsides, shapely legs to die for and plunge-worthy genitals covered with fine hair in which Zeus wanted to stick his face and eat until he was as drunk as an Earl in the hay. Third, human women were very gullible and didn’t know much about sex yet. Fourth, human women were unaware of the gods and so Zeus could garner the worship he craved, once he revealed himself to them in all his phallic glory, if he played his cards right.

For his first foray on the Earth, Zeus chose a region of Russia known in later years for turning out toned and tawny tennis players and sullen, lanky runway models. These human women were lithe and athletic, with great bone structure, shapely breasts and tidy snatches, and they burned with a smoldering sexuality they themselves didn’t understand.

How could these human women not understand their own sexuality? Because they were inexperienced. Because their sexuality was nascent and unformed, budding but never blossoming. Because their human men were only interested in four things; riding horses, looting, making war and fermenting every fruit and vegetable into alcohol. Often gone for long road trips on horseback, marauding through sleepy villages, the human men would return to drink around the camp fire until they got roaring drunk and fell into sentimental sobbing about their fondest bloody battles and such, after which they would drop off to sleep on top of each other like so many newborn puppies. Sex for a human man meant pushing a human woman down on all fours, shoving into her from behind without ceremony and then humping her furiously until he was done, the sooner the better, like the men saw their best horses do.

Hiding behind some bushes, Zeus spied two beautiful, young women, Anna and Olga, dangling their feet in a sun-dappled stream as they sat shoulder to lovely shoulder, naked and unashamed, their bodies vibrant, luminous, and quivering with untapped erotic energy. Already, Zeus had a mighty, pulsing, white hot rod on his hands. He could have stirred the sea of stars with it like a great oar. He could have laid waste to forests with it like Paul Bunyan’s axe. He could have beaten mountains down with it like Ares’ war-hammer. The girls’ innocence really turned him on and he had to practice great restraint not to reveal himself and have his way with them too fast and too soon. This was to be a seduction like no other. Innocence must be led step by slow step to ultimate, godly ravishment.

So, for the time being, Zeus must forget about his oar, his axe, his war-hammer, and slowly prepare the girls. He turned himself into a cute, little songbird in a tree nearby and sang songs that suggested thoughts into their minds.

Zeus sang and Anna, obedient to the song, dipped a hand into the stream and poured water over Olga’s breast. Olga laughed and shivered from the stinging cold. Zeus sang and the two women watched Olga’s nipple change texture and shape. The women’s eyes widened with wonder as the skin, an apple blossom pink, pruned and hardened in the cooling air, magnetic with desire.

Zeus sang and Olga felt an unfamiliar yearning, an aching like a hunger of the skin.

Touch it, she said to Anna.

Zeus sang and Anna lifted Olga’s breast gently from underneath as if it was a small animal sleeping in her hand. She circled her thumb slowly over the puckering skin of her nipple. Zeus wanted to turn back into his regular guise immediately, wield his mighty rod and penetrate the girls everywhere, very slowly and for a very long time but no, patience, godly patience, he told himself.

Wow, Olga, it’s so hard and so soft, so rough and so smooth, at the same time.

Zeus sang.

Do like an infant does, Olga said, obedient to the song.

Anna took her friend’s breast into her mouth and suckled like an infant does. Kissing was unknown at the time, the girls were just now discovering it. Horses didn’t do it, so human men didn’t either.

Oh, Anna, your mouth is like a hot laughing fire.

It is?

Zeus sang.

Bite it, Anna.

Why?

I don’t know.

Anna took her friend’s nipple between her teeth and clamped down a bit.

Harder.

Anna bit down harder.

Doesn’t it hurt?

It hurts but it feels good, too.

That is really, really weird.

Anna bit Olga harder. Olga took Anna’s head in her hands and crushed it to her chest. Zeus sang and Anna sucked and bit her friend’s breasts as if she was going to devour them and Olga, in a swoon, felt like she wanted to be devoured, to feel her body become part of her friend’s body bite by bite. What was this strange feeling that made her body laugh so? It was pleasure but Olga didn’t know that yet. She looked up at the clouds in the sky and thought, Now I understand clouds.

Zeus sang and Anna too felt an unfamiliar yearning, an aching hunger in the mouth, a hunger that grew hungrier the more she devoured her friend’s breasts, the skin exquisitely soft, the nipple electrically erect. She looked down at herself.

Look, the same thing is happening to my breasts without the cold water, Anna said.

What could it mean?

I don’t know.

I don’t know either, but I want to do to your breasts what you just did to mine. I want to devour your breasts so you can feel what I just felt. Please, may I? asked Olga, a polite, considerate little wench, thought Zeus.

Zeus, the little songbird, didn’t have to sing suggestively anymore.

The women switched positions. Zeus watched Olga bite and suck Anna’s delectable breasts. He wanted to be that mouth, those breasts, and to be right where they met and clung with exquisite magnetic yearning. The girls’ breathing sounded like the heaving oceans, their syncopated heartbeats like a drumming in the Earth. Anna fell back on the ground, swooning with pleasure, her legs spread as open as could be. Zeus wanted to sip and drink her delicious, glistening sexual dew exposed to his sight now, to get drunk on it like sweet wine. Her cunt was so beautiful, Zeus right then came up with the ideas for creating roses, sunsets and filet mignon, which still exist to this day. He wanted to plunge into her and shake her with orgasms only known to the gods. His erection was huge and thrust toward the sky like a golden rocket about to be launched. Such naiveté, such potential. Anna and Olga. Olga and Anna. Such ripeness ready to be plucked and conquered. The girls smoldered, yet remained ignorant of how to burst into flames. He would show them.

Zeus knew it wasn’t time to reveal himself yet in his divine phallic magnificence. Too much of a shock, they might not survive it. So he took the form of a great lizard and slithered out of the shadows of the bushes. The sunlight warmed his cold lizard blood. His eyes clouded over with the rising mists of the primordial swamp. He became stupid with new heat, drunk on it, and had to struggle to remember who he was, the ruler of the universe, out for divine pleasure and conquest, not a mammal-devouring reptile.

Zeus’ long flicking lizard tongue speared molecules of fragrant female smell on its prongs as he neared the entwined girls. The smell sent the reptilian beast into a state of savage hunger. He wore his hunger like chain mail on his skin. It pulled him forward like a cold rope of desire. The lizard wanted nothing but to suck the heat and life out of whatever was around for no other reason but that it could. If things died senselessly, it was of no matter to this monster. When the lizard pulled his body forward, it sounded like heavy chains dragging along the ground. His flinty lizard teeth ground together and sent off sparks as he came forward like some terrible, sparking electric machine you wind up with a key from the back. His voice made the awful sound of rocks cracking open.

The girls stopped what they were doing and looked up in wonder at the terrible beast. They clutched each other but didn’t try to flee because the lizard was so beautiful; his bejeweled, glittering body edged in soft green flame, his cold purple eyes aglow in his head, his mouth sparking with lightning.

In order to ravage them better later on, Zeus wanted to teach the human women their ultimate vulnerability, not only pleasure but the pain that made pleasure what it was, for without pain everything is pleasure and without pleasure everything is pain. The lizard lashed his razor-sharp tongue along the inside of Anna’s thighs, a thin whip, a master nerve bringing her other nerves to life. The tongue slashed her flesh open, blood seeped from her skin in a thin line before the cut magically healed as if it had never happened. The lizard flicked his tongue at Olga’s breasts, cutting and then healing them in the same way. At each flick of the razor tongue, the girls’ bodies flashed with sensation, pleasure and pain, and they wanted more, more, more sensation, never stopping until they were completely ravaged by the terrible beast. They were mortal. Life was hot just like they were. Death was cold like the lizard was and they wanted the lizard to fuck them to death, to enter their bodies and tear them open in order to feel all they could feel in this life. They would live and they would die in an alternation of pain and pleasure. The girls motioned the lizard forward but he stayed crouched and unmoving, staring at them with glowing purple eyes, radiating the magnificent sparks of a godly indifference. What did it