THEY ALWAYS COME BACK
 
by Bitter
 
 
It was mid-afternoon in the elven village of Ururolak. Ururolak, the town, was situated just beneath the crowns of the mammoth redwoods that comprised the forest of Ururolak-- which, to the elves, was as much their home as their village, and thus received the same name. In fact, in their language "ururolak" meant both "forest" and "home", depending the inflection. The forest was the only world they knew, and their buildings were, in their estimation, more of a nest than a proper landmark. Built from and maintained with wood from trees felled at the very edge of the forest, the sheer altitude of their tree-houses kept them safe from harm. But this was not the only way the forest gave them life. The elves of Ururolak sustained themselves with whatever food the forest could provide: berries, herbs, and the flesh of the beasts that roamed the forest floor. These latter staples of the elven diet were also why the elves chose to live so high up: though many creatures were easy prey for elves, so too could an elf become some mightier creature's supper. Those that chose to descend to the surface and search for food were a rare and celebrated few known as "Woodsrunners", and those who would venture to the Inner Forest, where the rewards were great and the risks greater still, were very few indeed.
 
Larus, however, was not among the ranks of the Woodsrunners. He had no stomach for the hunt, neither to slay nor be slain. The scent of valor held no sway over him; he was quite content simply to be a grocer. After all, no Woodsrunner had the time to distribute all the game they could catch; someone had to take on the task of seeing that those in need (and willing to pay) had their desires tended to. As it was both necessary and safe, the task of managing other people's wares appealed to Larus, and so he maintained a stall in the market quarter, selling anything that the Woodsrunners brought in in exchange for a cut of the profits. It was an unexciting but peaceful existence, but one which was not fated to remain so.
 
It all began on that sunny afternoon in the market quarter, at Larus's stall, same as it had always been. It was a slow hour-- sales usually picked up just before the major mealtimes at noon and dusk-- and Larus was redoing his braid. It is important for a salesman, whatever the product, to maintain an attractive appearance so as to draw in customers; thus, Larus conscientiously observed all the latest styles. His hair, when untied, drooped all the way down to his knees-- it was a symbol of status for an elf to be able to wear their hair long, as it meant that they had no fear of catching it on the jagged boughs of the lower forest. Larus kept his deep red tresses in a braid so as to make it easier to keep it out of the food and make it more visually engaging-- a train of loops catches the eyes more than a simple flat plain does, after all. His body was enclosed in a fold-over robe, an import from the humans that lived outside the forest: made of wool and bleached white, with a clasp at the sternum and a length of ribbon around the waist to keep it from falling open. Beneath these he wore a pair of wool pants of a matching color. Lower still, he wore a pair of leather moccasins on his feet.
 
As Larus was placing the final knots in his braid and tying it off with a bit of twine, he saw that he had a mid-afternoon customer. As rare and welcome a fortune that this would be already, it was someone he knew well: a Woodsrunner named Kraena. She was one of his best suppliers, a Woodsrunner of the highest caliber. But they shared a bond deeper and more personal than that: though the elves of Ururolak did not mate for life, Larus and Kraena had shared a bed (and various, less accommodating surfaces) with each other far more often than they had with anyone else, and had even had a child together (though their daughter was quickly given over to a surrogate, as was the custom). So to see the woman who had been such a blessing to him in so many ways standing at his stall once again was cause for celebration, as it always was.
 
"What can I do for you, my love?" said Larus. As he looked into her eyes-- twin fireballs of bright magenta, a perfect contrast to his own green-- he caught a tinge of red in her cheeks. His curiosity piqued by this discovery, Larus glanced over the rest of her body. Her deep blue hair was frazzled and not entirely controlled by the bit of cloth that was supposed to hold it in her omnipresent ponytail. Her belly-- such gorgeous muscles!--, bare to the air, had that same flushedness to it as her cheeks. But most tellingly, the cotton strap that tied in the front of her chest had little pointed displacements in it, one for each breast. The reason for her heavy breathing was clear. Before she could gather up her response, Larus said, "Ah, you've been abed, have you?" There was no jealousy in his voice; he and Kraena were extensions of one another, thus her pleasure was his pleasure-- perhaps literally, as Kraena had occasionally put in a good word for Larus to her lovers (not always men).
 
"Mmhmm," Kraena grunted, nodding.
 
Detecting a hint, the barest aftertaste of guilt in her voice, Larus nonetheless jovially inquired, "Whom did you take?"
 
Aware of the need to display some flippantness, Kraena replied, "A young lady named Kraena. I believe the two of you have met before."
 
Larus raised his eyebrows. "Keeping to yourself, my love? How selfish!" But he laughed nonetheless. Every so often, a little tete-a-tete between one and oneself was healthy. "But ah, you've not come to boast of conquering yourself. Let me offer you everything that your heart desires! And let me give you what of that I actually have."
 
Kraena nodded, and began to order: a wide variety of the local fruits and meats (all dried so as to keep near indefinitely-- Larus's best friends were the Woodsrunners, and so they were also his best customers) and a few arrows.
 
Larus could not help but comment. "That's quite a bit of food! You're not planning to eat it all at once, I hope?"
 
Kraena shook her head. "No, it's--" she choked on a word. Regaining her footing, she said, "It needs to last me a while."
 
"It looks to be quite a journey," said Larus. "You're not leaving the forest, are you?" This he said with gravest concern.
 
Kraena stumbled over her response. As Larus opened his mouth to protest, she interrupted him, saying, "No, I'm not leaving the forest. I am going on a long Run."
 
"You'll need a fair deal more arrows if you're to match the rations," Larus commented.
 
"I've an abundance of arrows already," said Kraena.
 
Larus turned his palms up. "I shall trust your judgment," he said. "When shall I see you again? I'll keep something in my change-purse to welcome you with."
 
Again Kraena faltered before answering. "Three days. I'll return in three days."
 
"Very well," Larus said. "Best of luck to you!" Kraena nodded, took what she had purchased, and walked away.
 
Larus's concern had hardly been placated. Kraena was an honest type: the law of the Inner Forest was that strength prevailed. Some trickery and deception might earn a meal, but only those with power survived consistently. And Kraena, great Woodsrunner that she was, had a noble strength within her that allowed her to venture into the Inner Forest and return time and again. Larus had no fear of losing her to some beast's savage hunger; she would always bring back a bountiful catch-- and her own tension. Larus was momentarily distracted by fond memories of her athletic, muscular body pressed against his, sometimes she the glorious conqueror taking he, her prize, and sometimes he the feral predator delighting in her submission as prey. But memories these times would remain, Larus thought, if he did not act. For all her power, Kraena was honest, and her lies were transparent as such to Larus's merchant's ear. She was not preparing for a Run, though neither was she preparing to leave the forest-- that much, at least, was true. Something had come over her, making her act unlike herself. And to one that loved her as much as he did, such a thing was an enemy.
 
So Larus resolved to follow Kraena. If it meant going to the forest floor, so be it. Some calamity was about to befall his lover and what meager power he possessed would be fully employed in preventing it. So, quick as he was able, Larus packed up a bag of supplies similar to the one that he'd just made up for Kraena, though he took a small utility knife with him rather than any arrows. When all of his preparations were made, he followed Kraena's path until he caught up with her enough to see her, then matched her pace. She was more than a bit fitter than he, so he had to strain to keep up. She was moving with purpose, Larus noted, walking hurriedly wherever she went and never sparing a glance backward-- which worked to his advantage. Their path carried them onto the main walkway, and from there to the elevators: a series of wooden platforms rigged up on pulleys, to allow elves to easily move from the treetops to the forest floor. Larus waited behind the trunk of a redwood and waited for the elevator to begin its descent before getting onto the line for next one. Assuming Kraena didn't take off at a run as soon as she hit the ground, it would be easy enough to catch up with her. As the platform rose to the trees, Larus watched the tiny blue speck that was Kraena moving along the ground. She was headed toward the Inner Forest. The platform arrived and Larus stepped on, waving away the operator's protesting glance. He had business on the surface and he would be taken there.
 
As the platform clattered against the earth, Larus hopped off, gained his bearings, and set out at a deep stride to follow Kraena. He heard the operator say something about the Inner Forest, and again waved his acknowledgment. He was quite well aware of what he was doing. It was not long before Kraena's swishing blue ponytail once again came into view, and Larus slowed his pace. It occurred to him that he was perhaps in more danger from Kraena than from anything in the Inner Forest; he was not stealthy, and Kraena was armed with a bow and three arrows. One wrong step and he might be pinned to a tree. But something occurred to Larus: he could only see three arrows in her quiver, the feathers on the end colored blue and red-- the ones he had sold her. She had only brought the three. What could she possibly be planning, he wondered?
 
The answer, it seemed, would be a long time coming. An hour passed, then another, Kraena never breaking her pace. She ate on the run, constantly drawing bits of the rations that she'd bought from her traveling pack. Larus followed her lead, unable to stop for fear of losing her trail, but took half the food that she did-- she seemed ravenous. The light faded as the overgrowth thickened, and with a start Larus realized that they had entered the Inner Forest. The elf began to question his decision-- as tight a bottom as Kraena had, and amusing as it was to see it flex and bulge out her hunting skirt, there was only so long that such a display could keep him amused. Another hour passed, and still another, and the world turned orange in the sunset. It struck Larus how quiet it was. He had always imagined the Inner Forest to be overrun with life, but he had seen nothing at all the entire time. In many ways that was worse. Kraena soldiered on as if drawn by some invisible leash.
 
The world turned darker again, but not on account of the passage of time. Larus felt a pang of true dread. They had crossed into the Dark Forest, the very core of Ururolak. Nobody had ever returned from the Dark Forest, nobody knew what was in it. Larus wanted desperately to turn back and save himself while there was still time. But he also knew that whatever power was protecting Kraena was protecting him as well, however unwittingly. To flee now would make him a lone helpless elf in the Inner Forest, and there was no way to return before nightfall-- the horrors of the Inner Forest at night were quite enough to convince him that moving forward was still the better option. Better an unknown horror than a known one. Kraena, for her part, seemed unaffected, pulling a lantern from from her travel pack and lighting it without even stopping. Encompassed in a dim orange glow, the elf and her lover continued.
 
Now that the world had gone dark, Kraena was the only thing left for Larus to focus on. He followed her exactly, lest some nameless monster rise up from the darkness and devour him. But in doing so, he noticed that Kraena was not walking entirely on-balance. With the hand that wasn't holding the lantern, she was tugging at her top and the hem of her skirt as if they were too snug. Something was disrupting her concentration.
 
Suddenly, she stopped.
 
Larus stopped along with her, a scant five feet away. She did not appear to notice his footfalls. Larus looked ahead of her, trying to figure out what had so mercifully halted her march.
 
The forest opened up into a lake, a wellspring at the heart of Ururolak. Opened thusly, the scenery was well-lit by the nearly-full moon. The night was clear and the stars were out. There was a strange scent in the air-- almost like potpourri, exotic and flowery and spicy, with a hint of sex-- of men's and women's essences combined. But it was not the lake that had stopped Kraena: that in and of itself might simply have turned her aside. What had stopped them was the creature sitting, if that was the word, upon a rock at the lake's edge.
 
It was like nothing that Larus had ever seen before. It had a reptilian snout, reminiscent of an eastern dragon's. But the facial features were remarkably humanoid, especially its eyes, which glittered with intelligence. At the ends of its lips-- how strange for a lizard to have lips, Larus thought-- were two long, hairlike strands, giving it the impression of a mustache that trailed all the way down to its waist. Just behind the eyes, where ears would be, were two structures akin to fish's fins. In most other ways it appeared to be structured like a human, if covered in scales and seven feet tall-- with visible pectoral muscles, rippling muscular arms, and, Larus noted with some bemusement, an enormous red member jutting out from its pelvis. But at this point it became more beast than man: a snake's tail ran for a good twenty feet past his waist, bedecked on the outer side with turquoise scales and on the belly side with large yellow plates. The word "naga" flitted through Larus's mind as if written on parchment carried by the breeze.
 
That word, "naga" connected to a deep, instinctive fear within Larus. Nagas were creatures of shadow-- not evil, necessarily, but deeply hidden and not meant to be found. Yet this naga languished on his rock as if waiting. Could it possibly be that...?
 
Larus's suspicions were confirmed as Kraena began moving. Shrugging one shoulder, she let her pack drop to the ground with a hollow slap-- the food was all gone. Trading the lantern to her other hand, she similarly dispatched her quiver and bow. Blowing out the lantern and setting it down, she looped a finger under her skirt, tugged it loose, and let it ride the curve of her ass to freedom, where it dropped around her feet. Stunned into silence and inaction, Larus could see the dip of her mound in silhouette, glistening in the moonlight. Kraena was already aroused, which seemed to please the beast before her, who was idly stroking his cock. A single deft pull at the knot in her top freed Kraena's breasts and from there all it took was a step out of her sandals to complete her return to a state of nature. As if the world were tipping forward, she stumbled toward the naga, wrapping her arms around his belly.
 
The naga took her hips in his hands and twisted gently, slowly repositioning the elf so that she faced outward, Larus realized too late. Kraena looked at him through lidded eyes. "Larus?" she said in a stupor. Her face was flushed redder than Larus had ever seen it, her tummy tensing in involuntary waves. Moaning, she said, "No, Larus, you can't be here," as if she were inviting him to bed. The naga clasped her by the stomach, pushing her head down gently-- guiding her, never forcing her. Kraena's body was all too willing to be molded; her legs gently spread around the serpent's body until she was straddling him. "Larus, he's going to eat me," as if she were using the more colloquial definition of the word "eat". The reptile's penis nudged into the cleft of her vagina, threatening pleasure. "Larus! He'll eat you toooooo," Kraena groaned. "Ruh-uh-uhn," she stammered as the creature began to undulate beneath her, slowly filling her with his shaft. And with that she was no longer in any condition to use words, each drive into her eliciting a gasped "Aaaoh!"
 
Larus found himself unable to do anything, say anything. He should long since have gathered his wits, but his mind was in a fog. Another word came to him on the wind: "pheromones". The nagas had pheromones, mysterious vapors with the power to control body and mind. That was the sweet scent, and he had fallen under its sway, Larus thought, hearing the words in his head but not feeling the appropriate response. The naga, evidently, had noticed this, giving the little male elf a satisfied smirk as he humped at the girl elf who was more fully under his power. Slowly, the naga uncurled himself until he lay flat against the rock, eyes turned to Larus to watch his reactions. Kraena was still perpendicular to the naga, but now she stood straight up, her palms pressed against what would be the naga's hips. No longer strictly passive, she ground up and down along the naga's length, drawing rasping dragon-breaths from the beast beneath her. Her breasts jounced with every motion, the toned muscles beneath them snapping them back to attention every time they were disturbed. Kraena's groans slurred together into a single needful moan that crested at each thrust. All the while, the naga seemed content simply to push out his hips every so often, giving the ecstatic Woodsrunner no more attention than light reading.
 
Larus desperately wanted to do something, anything to help Kraena. He knew the situation was dangerous, but it was only a thought, a grammatically valid sentence entirely divorced from his feelings. He was overcome by the elemental eroticism of what was playing out. Kraena was lost in uncontrollable pleasure, her entire body bucking and squeezing at the member within her-- so large that it was visible as a bulge underneath her skin! She was howling her delight. And her lover, this scaly beast of a man, was entirely nonchalant. His detachment lent it all an intimacy greater even than if he were as frenzied as Kraena. To take that which gave life's utmost pleasure and treat it as mundane! It gave the creature an aura of hedonism like none Larus had ever encountered. He drowned in it, awed that anything so wonderful could exist. At last Larus understood what lay in the naga's inscrutable gaze: an invitation. Kraena was a living example of the endless ecstasy the creature had to offer, if only he would accept it.
 
Regardless of his mind, his body assented immediately. A fire kindled in Larus's belly, brightening his entire body with its warmth. The resistance, the warning was still there, but it was only a distant impression, an idea of no real consequence. In the here and now, Larus was only concerned with the straining bulge in his pants as his body assumed a new shape, incompatible with his clothing. The tenseness in the cloth was a torture already; Larus tore at the end of the ribbon and untied the bow, swept open his robe and tugged the hem down enough for his manhood to stand unfettered. This was enough to sate Larus; he wrapped a hand around his member and began to stroke it, already leaking precome in maddened arousal. The naga smiled at this display, and his affirmation warmed Larus's heart. Larus began to thrust his hips in time with the naga's, as if making love to Kraena by proxy. The naga joined him in this game, twitching and thrusting in odd rhythms to see if Larus could match him and simply to make Kraena squeal.
 
The naga began to shift again, curling upward and rising to Kraena's level once more. With his powerful, clawed hands he took a grip on each breast, kneading them forcefully with his fingertips. Kraena quivered under this new sensation, and Larus felt a surge in his groin as he realized what was about to happen. The naga's squeezes circled inward, whirlpooling to Kraena's hardened nipples until the naga was pinching them and pulling them out. With a shiver, her milk began to flow, tracing thin white trails down her breasts and onto her stomach. The naga's snout leaned over her shoulder, his long reptilian tongue snaking out and lapping at this offering from her body. Kraena had once confessed to Larus a fascination with her own breasts: she loved to provide, and that her own body should give of itself to sustain another was her own secret, naughty pleasure. Naturally, Larus had suckled from her whenever she would allow him-- or rather, allow herself. But the naga had gone directly to it, as if smelling her hidden passions. And Kraena was bare and penetrated, unable and unwilling to conceal anything from him. Kraena flowed freely from her breasts and pussy, carried away in this primal act of giving. Her moans deepened, her hips thrust ever faster. And the naga, perhaps following her, perhaps guiding her, matched her pace, his member pistoning into her sodden flower with thick squelches. At last they came, her juices overflowing into a pool between their bodies, his sweet nectar pouring into her until her belly distended with its volume, her howl and his hiss intermingling into a single hot cry of delight.
 
But Larus did not join them in their pleasure. His was still building, his hand working at his shaft feverishly. He wanted desperately to join Kraena and the naga in climaxing, but could not. The naga glanced at Larus dismissively before returning his attention to Kraena, who was hardly slowed by her orgasm. His head rose above her now, his snout pressed against the top of her head. There was a click, just a faint little noise at the corner of Larus's hearing. Then the naga's mouth opened and sank over Kraena's head, stealing her smiling, contented face from Larus forever. From the far corner of Larus's mind, the protest rang out: she's being eaten! But the majority replied: it is good for bodies to join together. There was nothing more beautiful in all the world to Larus than to see Kraena being devoured. In fact, as the back of the creature's jaw ran up against her shoulders, he was honestly concerned that they wouldn't fit inside. Indeed, the naga had stopped for the moment. But Larus saw that this was only a temporary rest: saliva burbled out from all around the spot where Kraena met the mouth, catching the moonlight and shining. It oozed over Kraena from the top down, leaving no part of her circumference uncovered. A gentle pressure from the naga's hands compressed Kraena's shoulders (incidentally pressing her breasts together, making them look fuller and cleavagey) so that they would slip into the naga's broadening, snake-like mouth. A thin trail of spittle emerged from the cleft between Kraena's breasts; she jerked ticklishly as it streaked toward her belly-button and made to wipe it away. This struggle the naga subdued by lurching backward, pulling Kraena off his member with a thick shlurp and a slap as Kraena's suddenly-vacated pussy-lips fell together. Kraena found a new use for her hands as the naga chewed his way over her breasts, giving her insatiable womanhood something to suckle on in her fingers. Her pleasure restored, she squirmed and writhed, inadvertently aiding the naga in swallowing her. His snout inched ever downward, slowly transforming the bottom of her breasts and her abdomen into a bulge in the naga's neck. As the edge of the naga's nose reached the beginning of Kraena's mound, he paused again, allowing his saliva to roll over the elf's body, accentuating her every curve and crevasse.
 
And then the naga shifted. He leveled with the ground, pulling Kraena along with him until she was lying flat. Turning slightly, the naga caught Larus's gaze with his own. Larus was startled to feel himself perceived again, but nothing could stop his fevered arousal. That small conscious part of him continued to watch helplessly as his body bucked and humped in pheromone-soaked bliss. His penis was slick with his own precome, feeling thicker than Larus ever remembered it being and throbbing, quivering like a freshly-struck arrow with tension. The naga saw all this and turned until he was facing Larus, Kraena's legs hanging loosely in front of his snout. Reaching forward with his arms, the naga looped over her legs and drew them apart, exposing Kraena's frenzied masturbation to Larus. He then ever so gently took Kraena's hands by the wrists and pulled, overcoming her resistance, until her arms were trapped at the sides of her legs. Indignant at this denial, Kraena humped futilely at the air, even that little friction of wind against her small patch of fur a comfort. Larus at last saw the naga's intent. The naga was offering Kraena to him, giving him the opportunity to bid her farewell, spill himself within her one last time. Larus was sorely tempted; his moccasin twitched as his feet strained to move of their own accord, to take him to reunite with his lover. But there was just enough hesitance left within Larus to stop him, just enough suspicion of the naga's motives to give him pause. He would not approach. The naga, indifferent to this refusal, simply curled his tongue through the cleft of Kraena's ass and into her pussy. She jerked as if struck by lightning, a torrent of her juices pouring out from her. Taking advantage of her orgasmic thrashing, the naga took several heaving swallows, wrapping around her hips and squeezing down her ass. Larus ached with desire as he saw Kraena's most delicious part sucked away into the darkness of the naga's throat, the seething honey-pot that had so often made a meal of his member itself becoming food in a single horrible, delightful instant. It was dreadful, it was wonderful, it was final, and the sight of it drove Larus into an orgasm the likes of which he had never experienced before. His come flew out from him like a bird taking wing, more of it pouring out of him than he ever thought he could contain. He was so drained that he slumped to his knees, unable to muster the strength to stand.
 
The naga tipped upward, allowing gravity to carry Kraena down into his body. He didn't even need to swallow; she was so slick that she simply fell in. Thighs, knees, calves, heels, and toes-- every bit of her consumed. With a click, the naga reconnected his jaws, sealing her to her fate. The naga straightened out where necessary to allow the giant elliptical bulge in his length to continue unimpeded until it came to rest about halfway down his length, several feet below where the snake part began. A loud squelch announced the end of her descent, and a protracted series of smaller squishes and churns similarly announced the beginning of her digestion. The naga gave Kraena's bulge a gentle, reassuring pat, and then his attention turned to Larus. Seemingly unimpeded by the weight in his belly, the naga was slithering toward Larus, slowly and seductively. Larus realized with a jolt that the naga wanted to make that bulge even bigger and squirmier, using the elf to do so. And something within him wanted it.
 
But something else within him did not want it. That tiny bit of him that denied the pheromones, perhaps stronger in that time when a man's manhood is at its weakest, at last shouted a protest so ferocious that it could not be swept aside. Kraena had been eaten! Her body was being digested! She was being melted away to strengthen this beast's body! If Larus submitted, he too would be gone forever! No! the voice shouted. No! No! No! NO! NO! NO! Larus closed his eyes and tilted his head down, scrabbling backward in the hopes that physical distance would create mental distance. He tugged his pants back to where they were supposed to be, and upon colliding with a tree pushed himself up it until he was standing. Not daring to open his eyes yet, Larus rolled around the trunk and ran for his life. Panicked, Larus's legs carried him faster than he'd ever gone before through the all-shadowing blackness of the Dark Forest. It was a miracle that he never collided with a tree; instinct navigated for him. He never slowed, not for one moment, as he fled back to Ururolak. Time blurred; terror helped him forget his weakness. He could think of nothing to say to the night watch by way of explanation, and he shrugged off all help. Some of the guards laughed scornfully: thus the fate of merchants who think themselves Woodsrunners!
 
Larus stumbled into his home, his body suddenly remembering its limitations. He had no energy left with which to think, to ponder all that he had seen; he had only enough to peel the sweat-soaked robe from his clothes and fall onto his bed before he fell further into the darkness of slumber.
 
---
 
That night, Larus had a dream. In it, he and Kraena were locked in an embrace, she kneeling and he swaddled in her arms. Her breast was at his mouth, and he suckled at her like a babe. Larus looked up into her eyes and she smiled down at him, inviting him to drink his fill. He accepted her invitation with gusto, taking strong, hungry pulls at her nipple, pausing only for breath. With a dreamer's eye he could see her arching with pleasure, piling her flesh around his mouth. Larus felt a hunger stronger than ever before; he felt bottomless, insatiable. But Kraena was equal to his need; her milk came in squirts, then mouthfuls. Suddenly, Larus felt a change in Kraena. Again seeing outside himself, Larus saw Kraena deflating. Her body was caving in, going thin from the extremities inward as everything was sucked in toward her breast. Omniscient in the nocturnal hallucination, Larus knew that he was drinking her, all of her, her whole body turning sweet and creamy. Even knowing this, he could not help himself: she was so warm and so delicious! Kraena's face bore a beatific expression as her legs flattened beneath her; she too was lost in this bizarre form of love-making, drunken with being drunk. Her arms and head succumbed next, and then even her chest emptied out, taking with it the breast that was not feeding Larus. Kraena's vacated skin was slowly gathered up until nothing was left of her but the one disembodied breast, and then even that cannibalized itself and was gulped down. At last, the nipple transformed into a sweet taste on the edge of Larus's lips that he lapped up, leaving him with a huge, warm, sloshing belly and still no satisfaction.
 
---
 
Larus awoke with a start. The solid world of flesh was an unwelcome departure from the ethereal realm of dreams, and the elf groaned his objection to being forced back into it. Piece by piece he regained his consciousness until fully awake. He lay naked upon his bed, half of one leg dangling over the edge and the sheets uselessly flung at the bed's foot. Flickers of his dream persisted, eventually burning out into memories of the night before. That great snake-beast had taken Kraena, made love to her and then swallowed her. And all the while Larus had watched and done nothing. No, worse than nothing! He had joined them as a voyeur, pleasuring himself to the sight of Kraena's writhing body. And then he'd run-- refused to take his place beside her, come back to safety... somehow. He remembered only that he'd run; the journey itself was nothing but a blur. So here he lay, a bundle of confusion and need. It was too much to bear.
 
Larus coped in the only way he could, which was to treat the day as if it were the same as any other. Who would believe him if he said that the naga, creatures of myth, were real? Who would believe that he, a mere merchant, one whose feet had never before touched the forest floor, had gone to the heart of the Dark Forest and returned? The only one who could lend credence to his story was a thick slurry at the bottom of the creature's stomach, if that. There was no other option. By rote, Larus swung off the bed and went to his dresser, withdrawing a robe in the same style as his old one-- this one a light blue-- and an unspoiled pair of pants, these ones purple. These he drew on without gusto, and from there he robotically exited his house as though not entirely understanding the concept.
 
It was late in the morning-- Larus had overslept. But it seemed inconsequential to him: he was not the only vendor in Ururolak. He could have a short absence and not be missed. But that calmness became a curse of its own, for with nothing else to occupy Larus's thoughts, they turned back to Kraena. The scene replayed in his mind's eye endlessly: her low, primal moans as the naga filled and emptied her, the milk dribbling from her nipples, that agonizing moment when her toes-- the very last bit of her to touch the moonlight-- gave a wiggle and succumbed. Larus tried to banish these phantoms: after all, he was to be manning a stand, not pitching a tent! But they always returned, sometimes accompanied by visions of things Larus could not have seen: the thick red flesh squeezing and surrounding Kraena, pleasing and tickling her whole body all at once as it moved her further into the naga's body. An unwilling slave of his own imagination, Larus heard her groans of ecstasy intermingling with the squelches and glorps of the beast's stomach and the fluids within it. A sudden, small wetness at his crotch reminded Larus of the need to be discreet. Desperately, he thought of his inventory, tried to assign a number to each product. The exercise carried him to his stall.
 
There, Larus had real work to do: he checked to see that his memories matched the reality of his inventory, counted and re-counted everything he had. It was the middle of the pre-lunch hour at this point, and the satisfaction of customers kept him from succumbing from any other form of satisfaction. Every so often Larus caught himself sizing up his customers, undressing them with his eyes and judging how well they would slide into a naga's throat, but the customer would usually mercifully break the spell by asking a question. But this relief from idleness could not last forever. The preparatory hours waned, giving way to lunchtime, and soon there were few left to serve. Larus took a seat behind the counter and tried to find something, anything to think of that did not involve last night.
 
Last night, when he had refused the naga's invitation. Again Larus lost contact with reality, seeing the naga's gentle and smiling face. Reptilian though it was, its friendliness and kindness were obvious. This despite the churning bulge in its length that signified Kraena's progressing digestion! It seemed all too obvious now what the correct response was. The naga only asked his body of him, in return for such bedazzling pleasure as was never known in all the world, Ururolak and beyond! Larus shook his head at this. Nothing is worth your life, he insisted. It's a killer!
 
Unbidden, a memory came to Larus, of one of the many nights that he and Kraena had shared a bed. She had been ferocious-- no other word was appropriate-- yet she lay on the bottom, drawing Larus into her with abandon, a bizarre combination of predator and prey. Larus had drawn on his every ounce of strength to keep the pace with her. When Kraena was at last satisfied-- Larus, for his part, was exhausted-- Larus asked, partly out of curiosity and simply to make conversation, what had driven her to such madness. She told him that they had lost a Woodsrunner that day. Kraena and two others were working as a group, hunting within the deeper reaches of the Inner Forest. They had encountered a Nectar-Bloom: a species of landborn flower, colored white and orange, just thinner than leaping distance, with a stalk that hung upward and a bright orange fruit on the end. The fruit was an elven delicacy, made rare by the difficulty of extracting it-- so rare that Larus had never sold it. One of her fellow Woodsrunners had decided to attempt the jump, to snare the fruit in midair. She took the fruit, but landed short of the mark, her feet pressing down into the petals. Instantly, the petals curled upward, and the unfortunate elf-maiden slid in toward the center, where a maw of sorts awaited. In only a second, she was gone, stored comfortably in the plant's digestive chamber. The petals closed upon each other, denying all attack. Like that, her friend had become one with the forest.
 
Larus mourned the loss of Kraena's friend, but Kraena insisted that it be cause for celebration. At Larus's confusion, she explained: every Woodsrunner lives with the idea that they may be eaten. No creature of the forest kills for sport, she said, only to feed themselves. So too do the elves. A Woodsrunner, Kraena said, is only a part of the forest: a creature like any other, seeking food and one day becoming food itself. Everyone is hunter and hunted, Kraena said. When we eat well, we celebrate. When we are eaten, we celebrate. When one of us falls, it serves as a reminder to make the most of every moment we have-- it could even be tomorrow that we are called to give up our flesh. With that, she put Larus under herself and made prey of him one more time, in honor of her fallen comrade.
 
At this, Larus was afflicted with a pang of regret. He felt as though he'd made the wrong decision. As the naga had slinked toward him, he should have drawn forward to meet it. Larus's eyes lulled shut and a painstakingly real fantasy rendered itself across the darkness of his eyelids: he stood naked before the naga, arms at his sides, cock stiff. Casually, the naga encircled Larus in the length of his body, pressing Kraena's gurgling bulge against his spine. Immediately, the naga lifted Larus up and began to swallow him from the feet up, sensing his need to be devoured. Huge, heaving gulps took him in by feet at a time, leaving only his crimson braid outside. The naga pursed its lips and sucked Larus's hair up, and then down he went, a second bulge to join the first. Suddenly he was in the stomach, holding Kraena, thrusting into her with a vigor born of the knowledge that their next orgasm would be their last. Larus could feel Kraena's lips sticking to his own, her breasts flowing into his liquefying chest, their sexes conjoining into a single muddled and pulsating pleasure-organ connected to the both of them. It was all too agonizingly real.
 
Which is why you have to stop, Larus shouted to himself internally. You can't keep thinking like this, it's poison! It was true, and Larus knew it was true. These fantasies weren't his own, they'd been placed in his mind by the naga's pheromones. They were designed to make him give himself up. It was true, it was all true... then why, Larus wondered, did the part of him that was thinking rightly, thinking sensibly, feel like a stiff, constraining shell around the deeper and truer self? He felt as though he were a swelling mass of new flesh imprisoned by his old beliefs, rendered solid and inert by death. These awakened feelings, these wonderful, fresh sensations squirmed and jostled, eternally imprisoned by the elder self. But ever outward they grew, the pressure building until Larus felt he would burst.
 
New images played across Larus's mindscape. Gone were Kraena and the naga, replaced by a new phantasm: a different naga. With a dreamer's certainty, Larus knew that it was a different naga, His naga. He had only the vaguest notion of her appearance, and in the world of fantasy it bore no significance. Yes, the naga was female, this he knew. She was waiting for him, sitting on a stone by the lake just as Kraena's had waited for her. Disembodied by his imagination, Larus saw himself approach her, falling more than stepping, his clothes melting away like fog in the sunlight. The naga left her perch and slithered toward him, holding her humanoid half erect. As they met, she swirled around him, weaving a cocoon of scales that enclosed his entire body. Trapped, unable and unwilling to escape, Larus watched as her dislocated jaws descended from above and took hold of him at the shoulders. The naga began swallowing, not walking over him like a snake but simply sucking his body up and into her own. Larus felt his feet depart from the ground as though he were ascending to the heavens. In a way, he was; the naga was taking him away from the mortal earth, upward toward another purpose than his own insignificant existence. How distant it all seemed in the face of this feeling of completeness! Yes, he and his naga completed one another, she taking his body to fill and nourish her own, and giving him in return this utter satisfaction in serving her greatest desire.
 
The sound of a fingernail tapping on wood intruded into Larus's erotic fantasy like a nail driving wood asunder. Startled, Larus shook his head as if to throw off the hazy, pleasant thoughts his mind had swaddled itself in. He had a customer, he realized, someone he recognized. Her name was Beah, and she was a frequent partner in business and other things. Though a Woodsrunner like Kraena, she was less of one, in Larus's estimation; Kraena was-- indeed, was, stressing the past tense-- a quintessential athlete, a shining example of her kind. Beah was more relaxed, having found a niche in which she was content. The difference in attitude showed through in their bodies: where Kraena's love of excellence had stripped all the fat from her frame, Beah's relative reticence had left her with a bit more flesh in spots. Granted, she was still a Woodsrunner, and more than capable of preserving herself from any beast's advances, but that feat was made all the more impressive by the added weight she carried. A good bit of this added baggage rested in her front, currently held aloft and squeezed together by a bit of terrycloth. As Larus's eyes came to rest on these greatest of Beah's assets-- be it known, unintentionally-- he was reminded of how well her breasts served as a pillow, once her body had been appropriately warmed and his own sufficiently exhausted. Beah lacked Kraena's vigor, but her body was practically built for enjoying that endorphin-besotted time when lovers have nothing to do but wait for their depleted energies to recover.
 
A thought pricked at Larus's mind: wouldn't Beah look even lovelier encased in a naga, her mounds visible as twin rippling distentions in a sea of aquamarine, her plump and full body writhing in gooey, melting pleasure as it fattened the naga's own?
 
"Laaaa-rus," Beah singsonged. Even her voice sounded rich and buttery, Larus mused. "Hey, Larus!" Beah said, stronger this time. "You can ogle my titties" here she gave the boobs in question a gentle nudge, causing them to wobble, "all you like this evening if you'll handle my business now."
 
Larus knocked himself in the side of the head with a palm, trying to beat his empowered lecherous instincts into submission. "Yes! Yes milady, absolutely. Business! Let's tend to business." With that, Larus finally managed to establish eye contact with Beah's eyes rather than her nipples.
 
Beah laughed, a syruppy sound. "Larus, Larus!" she sang. "What's gotten into you today?"
 
"Kraena," Larus blurted out, before his savvier instincts could concoct a less disastrous response.
 
"Oooooh?" Beah cooed. "Why, I knew she was making a woman of you, but for you to make a man of her is quite a feat!"
 
Larus shook his head frantically, and continued to blunder by attempting to change his story. "Ah, no, my apologies, I haven't been getting much sleep lately."
 
Beah whooped. "Well, I think I see why not!" she said. "What a whirlwind she is. Leaves you dizzy when she's through of you. And such a hunter! I pity the beast that tries to make a meal of her. Oh, we should have her with us tonight, Larus! Let her run amock with us until she's drunk every drop. Have you seen her lately?"
 
"Not since last evening." This Larus could say truthfully; the last he'd seen of Kraena was her shifting, squelching outline.
 
Beah gave off a low hoot. "Oo, Larus, you cad. Left her with naught but your seed in her belly to remember you by, did you? Naughty fellow! Well, I'll find her and let her know our intentions before nightfall. And before that, business," she said, mercifully turning the conversation to something that wouldn't tease Larus's poor swollen manhood any further with lustful fantasies. Beah had a basketful of berries to sell, of a kind easily found but tiresome to acquire in large quantities. Larus sold them for a reasonable price at a good margin for the Woodsrunners, and Beah was a consistent supplier. Larus transferred the berries to one of his own baskets and handed over several jewel-inlaid wooden coins that the elves of Ururolak used as currency. Beah dropped them into her basket, winked to Larus, and went on her way.
 
The conversation with Beah had harmed more than it helped. He'd have welcomed the interruption before it had actually occurred, but now that it had Larus realized that no such distraction would cure him of his ailment. All Beah's presence did was color his fantasies: for the moment, it was her, and not him, being devoured by the naga. Larus could feel everything that Beah felt as the dream-naga's stomach worked at her body: her skin tingling in an alien pleasure, her insides all hot and soft, her breasts melting like butter in a pan and being absorbed greedily by the stomach walls. She wriggled and squirmed as the naga's blood drank her up, easily and sensually vanishing into the naga's body and giggling all the while.
 
Larus shook his head violently. The nerve! The gall! To presume to offer someone else's body! Kraena had given her own, and Larus could give his own, but nobody else's body was his to give. And yet, as Larus heaved a sigh and cast his gaze out into the market in search of something else to think about, he found himself considering the other elves as prey. He saw the young woman in the stall across from his, the one who always dressed so conservatively, and swam in images of her tearing away her dress and shamelessly riding a serpentine lover's member before the naga just as arduously gulped her down. Larus tore himself from this and looked out into the street; he saw a male Woodsrunner, garbed in just a loincloth and the day's glistening sweat, heavy-laden with the day's spoils. In an instant, the Woodsrunner was naked, kneeling before a naga that gently stroked the elf's member with its lithe, forked tongue until he came, turning the warrior's hardened and muscular body into a limp and compliant pile of satisfied flesh. Then, the naga gently sheathed the Woodsrunner's conquered body with his own. Despairing of ever finding peace, Larus looked away again and saw another elf-- a woman, a noble that Larus had had the good fortune of making some significant sales to, but never taken to bed: she could only take pleasure from other women. Larus's prophecy for her was to lick at a naga's clitoris like a lap-cat at a bowl of milk, burying her face ever deeper in that titanic womanhood until the naga's orgasm ensnared her and dragged her inward to replace the come she had teased out. With utmost clarity, Larus saw the noblewoman's pussy sinking into the naga's in some bizarre worship of the female sex. Assailed by these images, Larus shut his eyes, but even this offered no escape: his own naga loomed in the darkness, smiling, waiting, inviting, her stomach rumbling with anticipation.
 
Larus buried his face in his hands in a vain attempt to shut the naga out. But no wall, no matter how high, may block out an invader who is already within the gates. Larus thought to himself, what have I become? This question he did not answer. Instead, he changed the question: what am I? At first, he wanted to call himself "coward" or "traitor", as he had fled his fate only to envision that same fate befalling any of his kind he laid eyes on. But an answer sprang to mind that, as happens at times, solved everything. The answer was "food for a naga". Naturally, the right-thinking part of his mind rebelled at the notion, but this, Larus realized, was part of why the answer was so correct. Had he not felt that it was the deepest, most internal part of himself that was constrained by the mandates of his more rational side? This feeling in his center wasn't a disease, not something injected into him from without. It had always been there, asleep. And on that night-- was it really only yesterday?-- it had awakened. There was not enough room within him for two minds-- and the old part that had served him so well was being displaced. But it resisted, it survived, as it had done for so long. Yet so long as Larus existed in two halves, he would never have peace. The new part of him, the naga-touched part of him, might well grow forever-- and if Larus did nothing, it would forever strain against all that he had learned prior. A simple solution presented itself.
 
Larus would return to the lake.
 
It was a solution elegant in its simplicity and dreadful in its finality. I will return to the lake, Larus thought to himself, and again, I will return to the lake! It became a mantra, a chant that narrowed his focus down to a single needle's point. It was inevitable, Larus realized. His inner self, his truer self, could only grow. The tug would become ever more insistent as time wore on, the resistant forces ever weaker by comparison. Sooner or later, Larus's feet would carry him to that lake, to the naga who awaited him. Why suffer? Why resist was was destined to happen? For the first time since he'd awakened that day, Larus smiled. His way was clear. He would return to the lake.
 
Carried by inspiration, Larus immediately began making preparations for the trip. Was this how Kraena felt, Larus wondered? Was her heart fluttering like his was now? Larus thought back to her odd behavior yesterday, the flushed cheeks, the stammered words. She had been then exactly as he had been now: sex-crazed and naga-mad, separated from the loving caress of the naga's throat only by time. Time! Such an inconsequential thing, and yet what power it holds over us! Just like Kraena before him, he was already swallowed, already digested, already a boon of flesh swelling the naga's hide. He had only to pass through the intervening time to that single terminal point.
 
Larus felt a basket press against his side. It was full to the top with various foodstuffs, a pile of favorites. He'd been completely unaware of his own work, so absorbed was he in contemplating his own absorption. Now working consciously, Larus decided on the same equipment that Kraena had taken with her: a lantern to chase away the darkness and a pocket-knife to chase away what lay within it. Larus knew from experience that no harm would come to him, but it was best not to tempt fate by not preparing. Now he had all that he needed to make his way to the Dark Forest and the lake that lay within. With blood in his cheeks and a smile on his face, Larus left his merchant stall for the last time. He left no indication of his intent; there was no need. In time, his absence would be discovered and the appropriate measures taken. It was none of his concern.
 
The crowds passed in a fog as Larus made his way to the elevators. The fantasies of other elves being swallowed were gone; now that Larus had accepted his role, the idea of another elf succumbing to the naga's charms seemed ridiculous. Today, he was food. As for what came tomorrow, that was for others to tend to. Of course, the conservative side of Larus's mind howled protests: think of the money, think of the people, think of yourself. But each one failed before the simple rebuttal that was "fate". Fate does not care for human concerns, and Larus now felt himself a willing passenger of fate's carriage. Against this enemy, rationality could not stand.
 
Larus smiled at the elevator operators, letting their merciless gibes regarding his return home last night pass by him like water. They were blunted, weightless weapons, arrows launched at the wrong target altogether. Without even acknowledging the operators' comments (they took this as a sign of success on their part), Larus stepped off the platform and set out into the forest without sparing Ururolak a glance. His feet worked automatically, carrying him to a destination both known and unknown. Larus was content to trust in the strange power of the naga and the forest to guide him; now, he felt that he could even give up his flesh to a tiger and be content. From time to time his hand strayed to the basket, plucking a berry or a bit of jerky from it and placing it in his mouth. Larus's march was a parade of flavors and warm memories; he recalled the time that he and Kraena had shared a plate of blueberries together soon after they had first met, and the time when he had nursed her back to health from a grievous wound inflicted by some feral beast. The rising fullness in Larus's stomach mirrored a fullness in his heart, a contentment with the experiences of his life. He felt swollen with life's goodness, a fattened sacrifice on its way to its god. The forest grew dark as the sun fell below the tree-lines, and Larus lit his lantern. Crimson and orange gave way to speckled blackness, and Larus knew it would not be long. At last, the time was drawing close. Larus's heart began to race in anticipation. Just when Larus thought he could bear it no more, when he considered breaking into a run just to bring the waiting to an end, he saw glittering, rippling surface of the lake. Larus stepped out from the tree-line and into the moonlight.
 
There, perched on a gray stone, just as Larus had imagined, was a naga. His naga.
 
She was alike the naga that had swallowed Kraena in many ways, though as might be expected her sex lent her a few subtle differences in appearance. She did not possess the mustache-like strands from the end of the mouth, nor, as one might expect, the throbbing red member. Her scales, too, were of a different color, bluer but still with a hint of green. Her face bore a more feminine curvature, accentuated by a stream of golden-blond hair-- strange as it was to see on a reptile-- cascading down from between her fins to well below her shoulders. Improbably, she bore a pair of mammaries to shame any living elf, covered over with yellowish belly-scales and capped by a highly visible red nipple. She was thinner than Kraena's naga, Larus noticed-- worryingly thin, in fact. Well, thought Larus, I've got just the thing to take care of that.
 
The naga focused her gaze on Larus, staring down her nose with bemusement at this intruder. Who are you? was the silent question.
 
Larus answered her inquiry with equal silence. He snuffed out the lantern, its flame rendered unnecessary by the light of the full moon, and laid it down gently; there was no sense in wasting good glass by breaking it. Hollow, the basket clacked to the ground. Larus took a step forward, pulling gently at the ribbon holding his robe together. It fell away in a white trail, taking with it the dagger and its sheath. Another step, and Larus shrugged away his robe, letting it become a ring of blue on the forest floor. A quick tug at Larus's belt released his oversized pants, and they fell about his heels. Now Larus had to stop and steady himself as he slid off first one moccasin, then the other, and finally he drew off his undergarment, baring his member, limp but twitching, to the cool night air. Naked but not yet bare, Larus continued forward, until the spicy-sweet scent of the naga's pheromones filled his nose. Larus took deep, gasping breaths, welcoming the spirit of eroticism into his body. Immediately warmth flooded through Larus, filling his every extremity with tingling pleasure, especially the rapidly-growing one between his legs. Almost immediately Larus's penis stood fully erect, squeezing out glistening drops of his internal sweetness that fell into a crystalline trail as he continued forward. As Larus stopped before the naga, he took off the very last false part of himself: that part which still had reservations, which looked at the naga and trembled with fear. It slid away, scrabbling for purchase and finding none, falling into the blackness that consumes all dead thought. Naked, panting, horny, moonlit, Larus stood and looked up into the naga's eyes, and gave his response. I am food.
 
The naga moved. She slithered on her snake half, not toward Larus but to the side. She looked at him sidelong, as if sizing him up. Larus dared not move. He had made his offer and he would not back away from it. His soft face with the smile that could convince the most reluctant of customers to buy was hers, if she wanted it. His slightly rounded tummy, sign of the wealth that Kraena sometimes confessed an envy of, would gladly surrender its stored energy to her, if only she'd claim it. His manhood, font of life and source of sweetness, would happily ejaculate its very essence into her belly, if only she'd take it. Larus felt the naga's gaze observing these and more. No part of him escaped her inspection; his braid, his spine, his ass, his calves, and his heels were each taken in in turn. The naga swung around him, leaving a trail of scales behind her. Larus felt her looking at his shoulders, his arms, even his fingernails. Resolutely, he stood straight up, his gaze never wavering. But nothing could hide his true feelings, betrayed by his quickened breath and little internal muscular twitches: he wanted so desperately to be taken, to be gobbled and gurgled!
 
The naga's loop completed, and now she rested in front of Larus once again. He was surrounded by a lariat of snake-skin, staring into the eyes of this sacred beast. The end of the naga's tail drew back behind her; the lasso tightened and tightened until it just barely scraped the skin of Larus's legs. Gentle gesture though it was, the meaning was clear: I accept. The naga had accepted him as food. Larus erupted with delight, his naga-touched psyche ecstatic in the fulfillment of its purpose. Larus gasped as an electric shock raced up from his groin; his insides churned and his belly heaved as his cock began to squirt. It was far too late, but Larus tried to stop himself by force of will, yet it was like standing in a riverbed and trying to stop a flood with only his hands. Fresh semen poured out of him in waves until he drowned in the pleasure, his entire mind reduced to a fireball of delight. An embarrassed flush joined the erotic one in his cheeks. To lose control so quickly! But the naga only smiled at this display of virility, basking in the warmth of his sperm on her scales as she slowly eased the coil she'd established up to Larus's knees and rolled another one around the elf's arms, trapping them at his sides. As Larus's orgasm subsided-- it had been so much longer than usual, Larus thought-- and his body succumbed to post-ejaculatory reverie, Larus felt himself completely trapped. Not only had the naga snared him, but he was a prisoner of his own body, a limp and powerless thing that gave up all its energy of its own will. He was in a perfect position to become a meal. Larus tilted his head upward, expecting to see the naga's jaws descending on him.
 
But they did not. The naga was looking at him sidelong, down from above him. She still smiled, but there was something other than pleasure in that curve of her lips. Larus flashed back to the very first time he had made love. He was young, full to bursting with energy, and she was older-- certainly not elderly, but of an age where women sometimes seek younger lovers as proof that they can at least still charm the most willing of men. In true virgin fashion, Larus was midway through his second thrust when his balls boiled over, spilling his seed into his first lover's womanhood long before his work was done. She had worn the same expression as the naga did now: a good-humored derision, knowing how easy an error it was to make, expecting it and forgiving it. Even through the thick veil of time, her words rang in Larus's ears: "Eager, are we?" It stung like a slap, and Larus had buried his face in her shoulder as his manhood withered inside her, as if such a puny gesture could hide his failure from her. But she had taken his cheek in her hand, lifted him up and kissed him, and then taught him that there were many ways to please a woman indeed. Larus now sensed that same feeling within the naga. No harm had been done.
 
Larus felt his body moving under the naga's power, held aloft and carried by her coils. She leaned on her arms, tilting her head upward and rolling her shoulders back. As Larus rose still further, the naga's intent became clear. Her breasts were clearly presented, jutting from her chest like ripened fruit ready to be taken. Larus's suspicions were confirmed as the naga rolled him forward, pressing his lips to her nipple with uncanny precision. Larus needed no further explanation nor prompting. The elf gently kissed the naga's areola before beginning to suckle. Reptiles don't lactate, some bookish part of Larus pointed out-- not facetiously, merely by point of fact-- and the rest of him simply took what was offered gladly. What flowed onto Larus's tongue was indeed not milk-- it tasted like honey mixed with a woman's juices, and ran nearly as viscously. Larus could feel it oozing down his throat with agonizing slowness, deliciously hot. The naga let out a hissing chitter, evidently pleased. Larus released himself from his drinking to take a breath, inhaling only a short while, desperate to take more of this mysterious fluid into himself. It began to pool in his stomach, slowly swelling that sack until Larus felt heavy and bloated with it. His belly shifted, and Larus suddenly felt the slimy warmth squirming deeper into his insides, into his intestines, which dutifully began absorbing it and pushing it into his blood. All throughout his body, Larus felt little embers of pleasure kindling into flames of passion. His heart raced and his member swelled afresh. Still suckling, Larus groaned into the naga's breast, making his readiness known through the vibration.
 
Slowly, the naga shifted, carrying Larus's body with her. She released her hands from their perches, unrolling her spine until she lay with her back flat on the rock. Larus went with her, controlled by her coils. With her freed arms, the naga took hold of Larus's body, pinching his side with one hand and holding his bare ass in the other. After a small adjustment, she pressed down on his hips, and Larus suddenly felt the familiar but never unwelcome touch of a woman's folds over his member. Larus gasped, but this time he held back his pleasure. As a merchant, he hated to have debts, and he owed the naga an orgasm with interest. So he blocked all thoughts of pleasure from his mind as the naga's pussy clenched around him, sucking hungrily at his cock as if to devour it. Her clitoris, nearly a penis's length itself, danced with his member, each stroking and electrifying the other, but Larus tried to pay it no mind. Larus heard the naga panting as she drove him in and out of her vagina. He felt like nothing but an elaborate toy, his whole body conscripted to the task of satisfying her immense womanhood. Her entire body squeezed him, her coils tightening in time with her thrusts in an ever-heightening tempo. Larus could feel the honey in his stomach sloshing and squishing as the hand at his side squeezed and rubbed. Her pussy overflowed with nectar, sinking Larus's balls in the most powerful of all aphrodisiacs. Just as Larus felt his strength giving way, just as he felt himself go over the brink, the naga let out an orgasmic roar and soaked him with a torrent of come. Her coils squeezed until Larus thought his bones would shatter, but the fear of death no longer had any power over him; his balls leaped and his cock erupted, sending his own syrup to commingle with the naga's honey. Choking, Larus let out a wheezing cry as the naga's own hisses calmed, her coils slackening as her orgasm subsided. Shortly thereafter Larus twitched out a final spurt and let out an inordinately long groan of satisfaction, then let his head fall between his lover's breasts, content to let the rolling spasms of her afterglow rock his limp body.
 
The naga's head rose up from where it lay. Larus craned his neck to follow her. They shifted again; the naga moving and Larus helpless to resist her. The naga drew Larus away from her human half and sat up, and then Larus had the strange sensation of the naga's snake half rolling around his body without actually changing position within it. In this way he shifted until it was the end of her tail that held him, like a single finger tied around his body. Prepared for any wonder that might befall him, Larus saw that now he would receive that which he had so powerfully desired. The naga curled her tail upward, holding Larus above her in the two powerful coils made from the end of her tail. Detachedly, Larus felt the naga's juices running down his legs. The naga's mouth, unhinged and gaping, was of far more importance now. Larus couldn't watch; it was too wonderful to bear. The elf shut his eyes and let his head rest in its natural position. A sudden humidity about his toes informed Larus that his consumption had finally begun. The naga's breath, tangible even from this far away, was saturated with its pheromones; the hazy, warm pleasure that Larus had felt since the encounter began intensified. His body was too exhausted for eroticism-- now the pleasure became a sense of fulfillment and love. Everything was right with the world. The naga released the coil on his knees as she gulped them down, licking at the bits of her own honey that had dribbled down. Now thoroughly slickened by her saliva, Larus's body began to flow of its own accord, gently directed by the naga's upper coil. The naga made no attempt to excite Larus as his genitals passed her tongue-- overstimulation wounds a man-- but gave his ass a playful gnaw, teasing the slightly over-generous flesh with her teeth and eliciting a wiggle from the elf before squeezing it into her esophagus. His belly pudge slightly opened the naga's throat as it passed in, and then she swallowed her way up his arms and chest, saliva running out of her mouth. Larus shrugged his shoulders inward to allow the naga's mouth to subsume them more easily, and thus they too disappeared into her slurping maw. Having cleared this last obstacle, the rest of Larus was no trouble at all. His neck and face dutifully followed the rest of him, and then a little pressure on Larus's head with the tip of her tail and a swallow and the elf was no more than a delicious distention. All but his braid, that is: this the naga pursed her lips around and sucked at like a noodle, feeling its texture as it followed its master down.
 
Larus felt the naga's flesh close over his scalp. He was free-flowing now, directed by her internal muscles down the tube to his final destination. He was covered head to toe in various slimes, all of it sweet-smelling like the naga's pheromones. For a moment Larus thought he might like to stay in that state forever, to be carried ever onward in a sheath of flesh. But all things must end, and Larus soon felt his toes bump into a tight ring of flesh. It opened around him, tracing the silhouette of his body until the top of his head squelched through. Larus tugged his braid in with him, but otherwise no longer moved; he was contained in a tight bag of muscle-- the naga's stomach, he realized with a little trepidation. He had become just like Kraena, a bulge in the naga's side that would soon squish and gurgle... and shrink. I'm ready, Larus thought to himself. Suddenly, the stomach walls tightened around him and a vibration shook the chamber. A belch, Larus realized. The naga had taken away most of the air. But Larus scarcely had time to think of this before the stomach squeezed around him. One contraction pressed into his belly, then its mirror arched his back. A layer of fluid took form between him and the stomach walls, the very same honey-like substance that he had drunk from the naga's breasts. Whatever reservations Larus had were erased when he realized that his digestion had begun long ago, when he'd so eagerly welcomed the very substance that was now surrounding him into his body. Little tingles of pleasure poked at Larus's skin all over. Nothing in all of Larus's fantasies had prepared him for the real, live sensation of dissolving in the naga's belly. The stomach worked at him from every angle with incredible gentleness-- Larus had experienced the naga's strength firsthand, having been so nearly crushed in the throes of her passion, so he knew that her stomach could easily smash his body into paste, but instead it massaged him, teasing his body apart with delicate, intimate rubs. Larus swallowed some of the honey around him, wanting its taste on its tongue and delighting in the feeling of having that hot gooiness at his center. His body was heating up, not just from the naga's internal warmth but from inside, passion stirring up within him one last time. Larus's penis was pressed flat against his chest in the tightness of his stomach, but it hardly mattered. The elf put a hand around it and rubbed, both hand and member slurring together as they melted. Larus's felt the pleasure diffusing throughout his entire body, as if he were nothing but a giant cock filling with hot wetness, tensing, readying to spurt its juices over and within everything that would accept them. In the naga's stomach he thrashed, every nerve burning with unimaginable ecstasy. At last he could bear no more. Fluid welled up from within him, his every muscle pressing and squeezing and squishing and churning. Larus felt all of himself burning with bliss, utterly consumed by the heavenly sensation. He was so lost within his own delight that he hardly noticed that he had become a pool of honey in the naga's insides.
 
For so he was. The transformation was complete, Larus's entire body pervaded and liquefied by the naga's internal juices. Larus found himself robbed of all his old senses, having received in exchange only a dim awareness of his own existence. He sloshed within the naga as her stomach continued to knead by rote, stirring up the insides of Larus's mass-- it no longer seemed appropriate to think of it as a "body". Simply to move was a pleasure; the slightest contact, even between two parts of his own fluid self, gave him a shivery thrill. Larus had only a moment to consider his new form and take in its extent before a new sensation took the fore. His entire outside was covered in tiny pinpricks. Larus suddenly had the utterly confounding experience of being in many places at once; little droplets of himself were being pulled away and carried off. Each one fed Larus a different story at the same time, unique but all alike: a swirl of motion, a sudden stop, the elemental joy of being consumed, and then nothing, they were lost to Larus. Understanding dawned upon Larus: he was experiencing the final fate of all food, absorption into the devourer. This was the last and greatest submission, his whole self dispersed and subverted. Thinking that, knowing that, Larus felt a deep, total peace. As he shrank more and more, Larus saw the naga taking shape, a silhouette formed of the stolen pieces of his flesh. Parts of him flowed down and into her tail, turning into that gloriously powerful muscle that had held his old self so tightly. Some trickled into her heart, joining the loping beat as incarnated rhythm. Some lucky bits embedded in her womanhood, sending brief flashes of her second hunger back into Larus's mind. And as his bulge diminished until the naga's flesh no longer strained to contain it, Larus felt the naga's mind enclosing around his own, enveloping it and seeping into it. The bizarre sense of multiplicity returned, but it was no longer a sense of division among himself, but division between himself and the naga. Simultaneously, he was both the stomach and the chyme, the naga and elf. As Larus coursed through the naga's blood, he felt her pleasure, the delight of satiety and renewed vigor. It affirmed everything that Larus had ever doubted, that it was his destiny to rejuvenate this magnificent creature's body. His thoughts momentarily drifted to Kraena, becoming one with her in a whole new way: Larus was certain that this was how she had felt, that she had partaken of this very same bliss in her own naga's belly. He was not alone, this Larus knew, and it warmed him. The naga drank him until there was but a single droplet left, all that remained of Larus the elf. With a thought like a sigh, Larus let even this be taken up and toured about the naga's body until at last he alighted within a breast, his very last sensation a little smiling tingle of pleasure as he condensed into womanly fat.
 
The naga let out a sigh of satisfaction, patting her human belly. It was a meaningless gesture given her anatomy, but one well-understood to indicate satiety. And she had cause to put this on display: it had been nearly a year and a quarter since the last time an elf had replenished her-- about the time when a naga's body truly begins to ache to be refilled, and the threat of harm becomes grave. And this one had been her favorite kind: willing and fatty (at least, as fatty as elves ever got, being slender by nature). Her poor grumbling body had already restored itself, safely fed for another year. But of course, the naga thought to herself, why let starvation draw any closer than necessary? She looked out into the forest, staring directly into the eyes of the elf who had been there all along.
 
Beah gasped, horrified that she'd been spotted. A Woodsrunner's greatest power was stealth; no creature can slay that which it cannot find. She was several trees deep into the forest, only as close as necessary to watch the events by the lakeside transpire. But this, it seemed, was sufficient for the naga to see her as well, evidenced by the fact that they now shared a mutual gaze. All of Beah's skills failed her. She stood rooted like a rabbit caught miles from its warren. Beah watched helplessly as the naga began to slink down from her perch, working her way toward the panicking elf. Echoes of thoughts filled Beah's mind, until she wasn't certain which were truly hers. Your breasts look so heavy, my darling, shall I lighten them for you? The naga licked her lips meaningfully. It was true, it was undeniable, Beah had long since let her top fall away and taken to rolling the flesh beneath between her fingers. Even now she worked at them, unthinkingly pleasing herself even in the face of this peril. Oh dear, your pussy is dripping, came another thought; hers or the naga's, Beah couldn't tell. Her skimpy bottom was soaked through, a glistening trail of musk winding its way down her thighs. Her hips slid forward as if pulled by a magnet, grinding in vain. She had seen the entire thing, watched, paralyzed, as the naga seduced and devoured Larus. It had been a trial to contain her voice; she had wanted to cry out, not to save Larus but to scream in exultation. Watching Larus's body drawn down and into the naga's, seeing the bulge he made quiver and shrink as the naga's own swelled set her body aflame. And now the naga was bearing down on her, surely meaning to do the same to her. Beah knew, in her deepest heart, that she wanted the naga to take her, wrap her up and melt her into a churning puddle of bliss just as she had to Larus.
 
But the deepest heart is not the only one. Beah, lover of dalliance though she was, was a Woodsrunner still. Her instincts had only faltered, not fallen, and a jolt like a splash icy water struck her. Everything tore away from her but one thought: a predator wants to eat you, run! And so she did, simple as that; she swiveled on a heel and fled, her terry-cloth strip forgotten, clutching her breasts as if they were precious treasures and the naga a thief. Her footsteps scratched away into the darkness, faded, and were gone.
 
The naga halted and frowned in annoyance. Sneering, she circled back to her rock and laid down, contenting herself with the sight of the moon. Oh, certainly, she could overtake the elf if she wanted. And indeed she wanted to; Larus had restored her, but another elf on top that, especially one with such rich, fatty flesh on her-- the naga salivated at the thought-- would really have plumped her up, made her irresistible to the local naga men. However, an old bit of naga lore had stayed her. Prey must be willing. If an elf flees, do not give chase; let them go, and do not count it a loss. For should an elf see another of their kind consumed, their fate is sealed. That elf will return to the lake someday, seeking a naga to make a meal of them. Whenever the time, whomever the naga, whatever the way, they always come back.
 
***
 
 
AUTHOR'S COMMENTS:
 
Much thanks to EveAra for lending me the use of her nagas. They're wonderful predators.
 
A motive that might not have been clear: Kraena bought and carried the three arrows only for self-defense. If anything had gotten between her and her naga, she'd have shot it. But she wasn't hunting, so she only needed a few. She did not consider that Larus would notice-- nobody naga-touched can think entirely clearly.
 
"Inadvertently aiding the naga in swallowing her". God, that's such a cliche. If we had vore tropes, I'm sure that would be one of them: prey squirms, helps pred.
 
"Abdomen" strikes me as a sexy word. Maybe I'm just weird like that.
 
Originally, I thought Larus was going to decide to go back to the lake as a sort of "saving the other elves from himself" scheme. That struck me as too negative for the themes that I wanted to portray, but I didn't know how I was going to turn it around. So I just kept writing until I hit that spot, and all of a sudden the story hiccuped and you get Larus's realization just before his departure. Funny how things work out sometimes.
 
Larus's fantasies are short and abrupt to indicate their status as fantasies. When we write, we can't possibly supply every detail, so some stuff gets omitted. Since Larus is "writing" within a written work, that means even more information gets left out.
 
Eating an apendage "like a noodle"? Another cliche demerit for me over that one.
 
06/27/09: fixed a few pronoun errors (referring to Kraena's naga as "it" after the sex had been indicated), changed the Nectar-Bloom to be a feasible object to jump over, fixed a capitalization error.
 
07/11/09: destroyed a stray "it".