barbed penis.
Eventually we ended up back in the clearing where I collapsed in an exhausted heap, ready to sleep. “Rest now, Maya...” Balam gently washed my face with his tongue, like a mother cat with her kitten, soothing me to sleep in a cocoon of total security. “Remember ... I’ll be back for you.”
Chapter Seven
Reality and wakefulness did not come easily. I felt sunlight on my eyelids trying to urge me to join the world, but I felt such a wonderful languor from my dreams that I didn’t want to wake up. Then something started buzzing around my face, landing on my nose. I lazily swatted at it, then stretched out the full length of my body from head to ... to tail.
My eyes flew open.
Iron bars in front of me. Cement floor beneath me. Paws instead of hands.
I opened my mouth to scream, but the only thing that came out was the guttural cough of a jaguar.
I was a jaguar, it was broad daylight and I was locked in the quarantine cage at FPC.
I looked outside at the patch of grass. There was no sign of my sleeping bag.
This had to be a dream!
But—what if it wasn’t?
When Balaam had first appeared in his human guise, he’d asked for the little figurine I’d found. He’d said that without it he remained trapped. The thing obviously held a secret magic. Something strong enough to imprison a man in jaguar form? What if this man used it—used me— to free himself, trapping me in his place?
Bastard.
I started pacing back and forth along the length of the cage, tail lashing in outrage, bellowing roars of rage and abandonment with each circuit I made. No jaguar at FPC had ever made the fuss I was making now. I would wake up the entire compound until someone came to—
To what?
Who would know who and what I really was?
This realization only set up an entire new round of barking roars, accompanied by frantic leaps up on the den box and back down, running around the perimeter of the cage, only to repeat the pattern again and again.
Footsteps approached, but I paid them no heed, too caught up in my cycle of misery and betrayal.
“Maya!”
I stopped mid-leap as I recognized Balam’s voice. Running to the front of the cage, I leapt up, front paws against the bars as he strode towards me. My Aztec warrior was now dressed in jeans and a crisp white cotton shirt. He was followed closely by Jeri and Patrick.
Balam leapt over the protective fence before Jeri or Patrick could stop him.
“Senior Cadejo, I wouldn’t—” Patrick stopped and shook his head as Balam pressed his hands against my paws, putting his face up to the bars next to mine. I licked him frantically through the bars, ecstatic he hadn’t abandoned me. Then I remembered what he’d done to me and growled.
“Maya,” he whispered. “It is going to be fine. I’ve come to take you home.” With a quick sleight of hand, he pulled the figurine seemingly out of the air and held it in front of me. “I’ll take care of you, I promise.” Another gesture and the figurine vanished.
“How the hell did your people send us the wrong damn cat?” Jeri came up beside him, understandably pissed off and confused. No way she was gonna fall for this story.
Balam shrugged. “I was out of the country and one of my keepers is new and didn’t bother to check the gender of the jaguar sent to you. He is no longer in my employ.”
“So you’re saying this one isn’t even male?” This was Patrick, as pissed off as Jeri.
“Most definitely not. This is Maya, a female whom I myself raised from birth.”
Patrick shook his head. “That’s just bullshit. The cat in this cage was male. No way to miss that set of cajones.”
“Perhaps you saw what you expected to see?” I waited for Patrick and/or Jeri to take Balam’s head off for even vaguely inferring they didn’t know the difference between a male and a female cat. Instead they exchanged a glance as if confused. He had to be working some sort of glamour on them. “You can see she knows
Eventually we ended up back in the clearing where I collapsed in an exhausted heap, ready to sleep. “Rest now, Maya...” Balam gently washed my face with his tongue, like a mother cat with her kitten, soothing me to sleep in a cocoon of total security. “Remember ... I’ll be back for you.”
Chapter Seven
Reality and wakefulness did not come easily. I felt sunlight on my eyelids trying to urge me to join the world, but I felt such a wonderful languor from my dreams that I didn’t want to wake up. Then something started buzzing around my face, landing on my nose. I lazily swatted at it, then stretched out the full length of my body from head to ... to tail.
My eyes flew open.
Iron bars in front of me. Cement floor beneath me. Paws instead of hands.
I opened my mouth to scream, but the only thing that came out was the guttural cough of a jaguar.
I was a jaguar, it was broad daylight and I was locked in the quarantine cage at FPC.
I looked outside at the patch of grass. There was no sign of my sleeping bag.
This had to be a dream!
But—what if it wasn’t?
When Balaam had first appeared in his human guise, he’d asked for the little figurine I’d found. He’d said that without it he remained trapped. The thing obviously held a secret magic. Something strong enough to imprison a man in jaguar form? What if this man used it—used me— to free himself, trapping me in his place?
Bastard.
I started pacing back and forth along the length of the cage, tail lashing in outrage, bellowing roars of rage and abandonment with each circuit I made. No jaguar at FPC had ever made the fuss I was making now. I would wake up the entire compound until someone came to—
To what?
Who would know who and what I really was?
This realization only set up an entire new round of barking roars, accompanied by frantic leaps up on the den box and back down, running around the perimeter of the cage, only to repeat the pattern again and again.
Footsteps approached, but I paid them no heed, too caught up in my cycle of misery and betrayal.
“Maya!”
I stopped mid-leap as I recognized Balam’s voice. Running to the front of the cage, I leapt up, front paws against the bars as he strode towards me. My Aztec warrior was now dressed in jeans and a crisp white cotton shirt. He was followed closely by Jeri and Patrick.
Balam leapt over the protective fence before Jeri or Patrick could stop him.
“Senior Cadejo, I wouldn’t—” Patrick stopped and shook his head as Balam pressed his hands against my paws, putting his face up to the bars next to mine. I licked him frantically through the bars, ecstatic he hadn’t abandoned me. Then I remembered what he’d done to me and growled.
“Maya,” he whispered. “It is going to be fine. I’ve come to take you home.” With a quick sleight of hand, he pulled the figurine seemingly out of the air and held it in front of me. “I’ll take care of you, I promise.” Another gesture and the figurine vanished.
“How the hell did your people send us the wrong damn cat?” Jeri came up beside him, understandably pissed off and confused. No way she was gonna fall for this story.
Balam shrugged. “I was out of the country and one of my keepers is new and didn’t bother to check the gender of the jaguar sent to you. He is no longer in my employ.”
“So you’re saying this one isn’t even male?” This was Patrick, as pissed off as Jeri.
“Most definitely not. This is Maya, a female whom I myself raised from birth.”
Patrick shook his head. “That’s just bullshit. The cat in this cage was male. No way to miss that set of cajones.”
“Perhaps you saw what you expected to see?” I waited for Patrick and/or Jeri to take Balam’s head off for even vaguely inferring they didn’t know the difference between a male and a female cat. Instead they exchanged a glance as if confused. He had to be working some sort of glamour on them. “You can see she knows
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