Presents and kittens

When you get back to the stables you once again use your powers to restore the muscles in your legs. A silent prayer follows that your skills lay strongly in the life domain. Mages of other stripes have a lot more trouble with moving quickly, something that often proves decisive when involved in mass combat.

Pausing only long enough to collect three small wooden boxes you head for the bedroom. Each of those boxes are the product of weeks of work over the winter months. Long, careful hours spent while the others were asleep. You had many uses in mind, but your marriage to Lessia and your catgirls has given you the perfect opportunity to hand these out. Before you make it back to the bedroom you hear a pained grunt in the distance.

Down the stairs you go, following the sounds until you come to one of the small guest rooms on the first basement level. There you find Doe, Renee, Lessia and Bethany all helping a very pregnant catgirl named Vania as she pushes out her fourth and final kitten.

Renee spots you first and smiles, waving you over. "Here, she's bleeding quite a bit but I think everything is okay. Please make sure everything is okay!" she manages to get out in a burst of worried words. Lessia looks worried, but is actually managing to keep a tight rein on her emotions, possibly for Bethany's benefit. Doe is sitting by the bedside, holding a fuzzy gray kitten in one arm and gently stroking Vania's arm with her other hand.

The new mother, plainly feeling the effects of the medicated wooden dowel in her mouth, is grinning happily and looking at Doe like your wife has hypnotized her.

You make some quick checks and tell your worried wives that the bleeding is, indeed, quite normal and Vania will be fine after a little rest. Vania takes your hand and surprises you by placing it against her breast. "Mmmm I still predy?" she asks through the **** and tiredness.

"All new mothers have a certain glow" you tell her. "Don't worry, you're going to be just fine. And I'm sure there are four little girls here who will remind you every day why this much pain was worth it."

She smiles and says "Arredy wurth et." Then she looks around at your wives, spits out the dowel and says "Thank you all... so much" before curling up against her babies, one of whom has already figured out what nipples are for.

"We'll stay with her" says Doe.

Almost like they are acting with one mind Lessia takes your hand and says "This way". She and Bethany lead you to the room where Doe and Renee gave birth, where you find Helena sitting beside another catgirl named Savine. She's got a pair of golden furred kittens gorging themselves on her breasts. Savine looks tired, but is quite awake and lucid.

"In case anything went wrong, we kept a catgirl with each of them. And we made sure Savine and Marina stayed awake in case they felt something... go wrong."

"And Marina? Good grief, talk about a bad day to be away."

"Yeah, there's something in the air" says Yvonne, carrying in some plates of food and drink.

"Are you trying to be the fourth to go into labor today?!?" asks Lessia. "I told you carrying things is bad news once you're this far along."

"Bah, they'll come when they come" says Yvonne. Knowing her she's probably been determined to help more than anyone else. "Besides, I don't feel them kicking right now. My babes are staying nice and quiet for their mother."

One quick inspection later you can tell that like gray furred Vania both Savine, your very first golden kitten, and Marina, a slender and athletic black cat, have gone through labor without any nasty side effects. Marina was apparently the first to pop and she refused the herb soaked dowel, preferring to chomp on some rolled up fabric so she could experience giving birth the way it was meant to be.

Everyone has trouble believing she did it, but she did. The tiny catgirl is five foot nothing, thin as a rail apart from her baby bump and a tight bum. But she's apparently tough enough to take labor head on. You know Yvonne is going to do the same - she's never going to let someone beat her at pure stubbornness.

So all in all that adds four gray, two golden and two black furred kittens, all girls, to your little extended family. Other people may think that's just an expression, but of course these little cuties are all your daughters. It was bound to happen sooner or later. Every catgirl you impregnated after Helena is starting to come due. You're a little surprised that the girls carrying four haven't given birth already, but Vania is the only one so far.

Just as you're settling down you get hugged from behind by Alice, still in her wedding dress. "I was planning to be a little mad that you left me in the lurch, but I can't be mad after seeing you taking care of all my friends."

You give her a kiss and apologize for having to go out on the business of the kingdom.

"It is a sad fact that sometimes you will be away from us" says Lessia. "But I would rather have a good man I miss than a man I am glad to see gone."

"Why the hell would you put up with someone like that?" asks Yvonne as she works her way through a platter of eel meat.

"As a princess you cannot always..."

"You can shove a bastard like that out a window. Or stab him in the balls. Or drown him in the bath. You don't put up with that."

Lessia's jaw drops and she can't respond thanks to a nervous giggle that seems to overtake her whole body.

You have to laugh at the contrast between one of your more proper wives and Yvonne, who was probably a dream come true for some training sergeant in her country's army.

The laughter seems to draw your other wives back to you. With your all clear the new mothers are being allowed to rest and a dozen other catgirls have offered to take care of them. Some are just smitten with how cute the kittens are. Others are heavily pregnant and are perhaps making sure everyone knows they are willing to help in exchange for help in their own turn.

In all the conversation and hugs that follow you almost miss Helena asking "Oh, what are these?" She's holding one of the little wooden boxes. You left them on a side table the moment you went to investigate Vania's cries and they've been sitting there forgotten since then.

You give her a kiss and whisper "I'll tell you in a bit, could you just bring them up to the bedroom?" She clutches the three boxes and smiles to herself. Helena looks so proud to be the one who's in on a secret that her ears perk up and her tail starts sweeping side to side.

The catgirls caring for the new mothers want to know everything is alright and that the little ones just need the same care as Doe and Renee's babies. Once you've confirmed that the three new mothers and their children are hale and healthy they practically shoo you back to your bedroom with your wives. Apparently word of honeymoons has spread among your catgirls and they've all decided that on their special day they want a man to themselves. Not all of them know about your harem, but even the ones who only know that you married Lessia want you to make these next few days special for her.

In the bedroom, as soon as the doors close and lock, Helena hands you the three small boxes.

"I'm sorry there are only three, I had hoped to make more, and I will later, but I think you'll all enjoy them."

"They're presents?" asks Helena, tail snapping back and forth with excitement.

"Yes..."

That's all you get out before you're mobbed by all your wives and just about smothered.

"Hang on, you haven't even seen them yet."

"You said that you made them" says Lessia. "Does that mean they are magical?"

You give her a smile and just wiggle your eyebrows. "That's for me to know and you to find out. So, who's going to try them on?"

The girls are so excited that they barely argue. Helena, Renee and Alice decide to act as the guinea pigs. With a "three, two, one!" they open the boxes. Inside each is a necklace. They are each reasonably nice necklaces, but each looks different. They have different stones and anyone without knowledge of their enchantment would value each necklace quite differently from the others.

The three catgirls look at the necklaces like they are coiled snakes, moving their heads and observing from several angles.

"Do you think I'm going to play a trick on you? Try them on."

"Oh, I will, I'm just so excited!" says Helena. She runs her fingers along the silver and jet of her necklace. "It doesn't feel magical."

"It doesn't look magical either" says Alice, holding hers, a simple leather cord with a large worked jade pendant, atop her palm. "But that doesn't mean much, at least according to the little I've heard of magic."

Renee is busy running the string of pearls between her fingers. She doesn't say anything, entranced by the sparkling spheres and their contrast with her soft, black fur.

"Okay, okay, again!" says Helena. "Three, two, one!"

All three slip the necklaces over their heads. Everyone in the room except you gasps. Before you stand three women, looking quite naked and quite human.

Alice pats herself all over. "I can still feel my fur" she says, the usual laziness in her voice completely absent. "It makes me look like a human woman," she says, spinning around in place. Then she bounds across the room to a full length mirror to study herself.

Helena's reaction is to blush head to toe and then take the necklace back off. "I... wow, I want to do that again, but next time clothes. Wow. So amazing."

Renee, still bare naked gives Helena a hug. "Come on, it's fun. It's not the real you." A few kisses and Helena's fur goes back down.

"So, have you always wondered what we'd look like as human girls?" asks Renee.

From in front of the mirror Alice, mid-way through a stretch says "I think I make a really hot human girl. Do you like me this way, John?"

"Yes, but I like you as a catgirl too. I didn't make these necklaces because I want you all to change into humans. No, this is so that you can go out and see what the world is like as humans and for humans. As catgirls you will draw attention wherever you go, but as humans..."

"Mmmm, we can blend in and see how people act." says Bethany.

"And there's one more thing" you say, "the necklaces work the other way too."

Lessia starts crying. "So if I want to go unnoticed I can be a catgirl."

"Isn't that good?" asks Helena.

"It's wonderful!" says Lessia, crying so many tears of joy that she's sniffling and barely able to speak. Helena comes over and puts her necklace over Lessia's head. Instantly, Lessia's pale skin is covered with fine black fur as dark as the raven locks on her head. With help from both Doe and Alice she makes it to the mirror, where your dark furred princess just cries and sniffs, unable to do anything more.

You stand behind her and put your hands on her hips. When she finally can speak she says "Oh, I will enjoy this so much. I... I can walk the streets of my city without drawing crowds. I can be just another catgirl."

"Just another gorgeous catgirl" says Renee, poking her in the ribs.

With everyone distracted you decide to give Lessia a different present. Inside her ovary you seek out an egg. You nurture it and draw it down from her ovary and into her womb. Much of your seed from a last night has died off, but from the sturdy survivors you choose a champion. In about five months everyone will know that you and Lessia consummated your marriage quickly. In nine months you will welcome your very first human heir.