Puella Monstrum Madoka Moecha – Chapter 4 – Tart’s Not Quite Heretical Adventures

Riz is elegant, agile, experienced, deadly—

“Tart! Move!”

… And slightly domineering.

Not that I dislike that.

“Tart!”

Ah! Yes! The phantom!

I throw myself to the right, dodging the slow blow by rolling on the grassy knoll of this sparse forest (oh, chestnut trees! I love chestnuts; I should treat Riz to some when autumn comes… do they eat chestnuts in Italy?), and… Wait, what was I…

Ah! Yes! The phantom!

... It’s ugly.

I mean, it’s not like we have seen too many pretty phantoms since we set out on our journey. Most of them are born of a hundred-year-long hatred and fear of both the English and the traitors, so disfiguration and mutilation are almost par for the course.

But… This thing…

“Just stab it!” Riz yells, possibly gleaning some insight into my dilemma.

And so, I plant my feet, put my sword in front of me, and face…

The giant toad.

Why?!

“Tart? You aren’t stabbing the phantom, Tart,” Riz says as she carefully circles to its back, readying her twirling knives beneath her black, ragged cloak and only sparing a brief, exasperated look at me.

“It’s… it’s a toad. It’s disgusting! I don’t want to get my blade dirty!”

“I gave you that blade! It’s meant to—”

“Precisely! I don’t want anything of Riz’s to be sullied!”

For some unfathomable reason, Riz, the deadly, agile, acrobaticfighter, stumbles at that.

“Would you two stop flirting and kill the monster already?” Miss Angel says from behind me in that tone that means she’s burying her face in her palm.

For an angel of the Lord, she’s quite rude at times.

Ah! That’s heresy! Or blasphemy! One of those two!

“Tart!” Riz yells as she jumps away from the lashing tongue of the toad that—

What?!

“It shattered the tree! It has a real body! Why?!” I ask Miss Angel as I rush to Riz’s side, her blade by my side to ward off the next attack.

“I told you this was an ancient phantom! It’s been gathering power for decades, maybe since the start of the war!” the angel yells at me.

Which… she usually doesn’t.

Ah. Miss Angel is worried.

… Oh. Maybe I should take this seriously.

I exchange a look with Riz, who sinks into her shadow and emerges between the branches of a tree standing to my left. So I hold my blade with my right hand and point it at the toad, baiting it into coming near me and batting its tongue aside when it tries to attack without crossing the distance.

The second time it tries, I let the holy light of my soul fill the blade and cut at the disgusting beast, the severed tip of its tongue briefly worming beneath me before going still.

And the toad roars. In pain, anger, and defiance.

Then it leaps at me.

Good.

Quick, retreating steps take me away from it, almost managing to keep my distance without having to jump myself. It’s one of Riz’s most repeated lessons: the swift movements of the scherma she taught me, the way to fight with a two-handed blade, without armor nor shield, using the weapon both to attack and defend.

Riz’s blade is a shield to me. I can never not smile when I think that.

So the toad lands just where I was and is already turning to whip its revolting, bloodied tongue at me, and—

And Riz drops on top of it, her knives sinking into the warty skin of its neck just as I rush forward, closing the distance as swiftly as I tried to keep it, and my glowing blade sinks up to the hilt beneath the grotesque jaw of the monster.

Its blood showers me, the stench almost enough to make me gag despite all my experience in too many battlefields, but…

But it’s not an issue. It will fade away as soon as this creature is killed. As soon as this phantom is dealt with.

I wish the English were this considerate.

The monster lifts its right paw, and its claws (because of course it has claws) glint before thrusting toward me—

I slash my blade in an arc through the soft flesh it was sunken into as I step to the right, away from the attack, just as Riz drops at the side of the beast, knives flicking aside before she thrusts them up into the unguarded belly, prompting me to turn on my right heel, making my retreat into a lunge as I cut deeply into the slamming paw that just tried to crush me.

Or stab me. One of those.

“I can’t reach deep enough, Tart. It’s up to you,” Riz’s deep voice tells me as she runs around the toad, slashing and stabbing at it so it can’t focus on attacking me.

I breathe.

Gather my light.

And cut up.

The wind roars, the sky brightens, and the biggest phantom shard I’ve ever seen drops on the flattened grass that moments ago held a powerful monster of legend.

Or, well, I hope there’s a legend about it. That would be far more impressive than just killing something nobody has ever heard of.

***

“I have never heard anything about a giant toad,” the older woman who told us about the mysterious disappearances of the other villagers says with a confused frown.

“Ah,” I answer, trying not to blush.

I would like to say it’s because of the embarrassment about my most fearsome foe yet not being even a local rumor, but…

I… Have somewhat of a problem with my power.

Mostly, that I keep using too much of it.

“It doesn’t matter, Madame,” Riz tells her with that elegant and composed voice that isn’t helping my aching need at all! “We slew the beast. Your village can now rest easy.”

“I…” the woman hesitates, looking both at Riz and me, but not at the angel, because nobody sees her but us. “I’m not quite sure what it is that you—”

“Nothing. It doesn’t matter. Really,” I tell her with a shaky, yet I hope polite, smile as I keep leaning on Riz’s tall body, holding her arm against my chest, feeling the smooth fabric of her white blouse sliding against my rough, brown dress.

Her hair always smells amazing.

And my demon keeps reminding me about it…

“Be that as it may… you look quite flushed. If you would like to rest, hospitality is the least I can offer you for looking into—”

“No! Truly, we are very grateful for the offer, you’re too kind, it’s wonderful to meet such a nice person, I’m glad to see French hospitality is alive and well—”

“Tart…” Riz tries to interrupt me before I can asphyxiate; except I won’t, because that would mean not smelling the wonderful scent of her sun-kissed skin mingled with a one day’s travel sweat and the hint of chestnut trees still clinging to her hair from when she hid in the branches, and—

… I’m pretty sure I used not to try and catch her smell at every chance I got when I first met her.

So much time wasted…

“Is she… all right?” the woman asks Riz with a hint of apprehension.

And Riz rolls her eyes as she grabs my hand and starts pulling me away, something that I pretend to resist just because of how much I enjoy the sudden, possessive tug as she tightens her hold on me.

“She will be,” she tells the other woman before looking at me with that soft smile and those amber eyes of hers that…

…

I think I may be feeling something for Riz that isn’t strictly friendship. How weird.

I should ask Miss Angel what the scripture says.

***

“Sure. Go ahead,” Miss Angel says.

What?

She must read the confusion in my eyes because she rolls hers and, once again, pinches the bridge of her nose.

We’re sitting on a fallen log in front of a hastily lit campfire, waiting for Riz to come back from scouting the perimeter, and I’m feeling kind of self-conscious as I look at Miss Angel’s immaculate (of course) appearance. At the pristine white nun’s habit that matches the argent sheen of her hair, at the red trim on the hems and seams that mirrors the color of her eyes…

…

She’s pretty.

Not as pretty as Riz, though.

“Tart… do you really think I care whether you two are girls or not at this point?”

“I mean… The… The purification kind of… you know, when Riz grows a… a thing…”

“You can also grow one.”

“Never! My body is meant to service Riz, and not the other way around!”

Miss Angel raises a very unimpressed eyebrow, and I flush even redder as I try very hard not to bury my face in my palms.

It’s a struggle.

And I don’t think it quite appropriate to call for the help of the Lord in overcoming it.

“Tart, if you’re suddenly feeling this conflicted about things and want some time to think…” The angel looks at me, as if hesitating to continue before nervously fiddling with the top of her right ear beneath her veil. The foxlike one, not the one that grows from it—Miss Angel is weird. “I could purify your soul with the phantom shard—”

“But that would interfere with your holy mission! I can’t abide that!”

“I mean… It would waste a bit of energy, but it’s not such a big deal.”

“No! You already explained how important it is for you to… uh… you know. Do… what you do.”

Miss Angel, for some reason that most assuredly doesn’t have anything to do with me yet again forgetting the details of her lessons, closes her eyes and mutters something in what I’m pretty sure is an unkind tone that only her animal ears can hear.

She’s so rude. Blasphemously so.

“Tart… For the last time: phantom shards contain most of the energy the phantom gathered through its existence. When I process them, I’m able to gather it for the fulfillment of my mission to prolong the lifespan of the universe.”

“That the whole world’s existence would be shortened by even a single day just to save me some embarrassment is inadmissible! Miss Angel, you must not offer such a thing to me!”

“My mission is ongoing. There will always be more phantoms to slay, more shards to recover—”

“That you would struggle in an endless journey for a single day more than you have to just for my sake is unthinkable! Miss Angel—”

Miss Angel smacks me over the head.

Ouch.

So rude.

“Stop trying to convince me not to be kind to you,” she says, her eyes narrowed in that glare she has when I do something she deems illogical.

… I fear I don’t understand the logic of the Heavens, but… the divine plan is meant to be ineffable. I’m truly blessed to get so much insight into it as I’ve already had.

“Kindness must be repaid, Miss Angel. My debt to you is already too high for me to accrue more of it,” I try to explain with a soft smile.

And Miss Angel… blushes.

… What?

“You’re too adorable for this world, Tart…” she says before closing her eyes with a sigh and leaning back, keeping herself upright with her hands resting on the bark behind her. Then she opens those red eyes of hers and looks at the dark sky above. “I… I never dreamed of this when I first stepped on this Earth. But then I guess I messed up, and… And here I am. A girl, just like you, trying to make sense of a world that will never be sensible.”

I look at her. She’s really beautiful.

Still not as much as Riz.

So I poke her side and make her squeal before she bats my hand away in flustered embarrassment.

“You’re not really an angel, are you?” I ask her, the smile on my face and gentleness in my tone taking away the accusation from the question.

She looks at me, unnaturally still.

“I never said I was.”

“No. You just said I could call you that if I wanted to.”

Red eyes stare into me, the breeze between the sparse trees making her veil sway, her silver hair glinting in the flames of our campfire.

“My name’s Kyuubey, Tart,” she says.

“Nice to meet you, Kyuubey,” I tell her with a wide grin before I hug her.

She freezes before weakly protesting, but I don’t let go.

Because… she tricked me, yes.

But also, when my sister lay dead in front of me, stabbed from behind by traitorous soldiers…

‘You can bring her back, Tart. Just… wish for it. Wish for the strength to undo tragedies.’

I still owe her for that.

“This looks safe. I haven’t seen any signs of bandits or soldiers around, so we should—” Riz starts to say as she enters the clearing from the other side of the fire, the golden flames dancing with the shadows of her hair and traveler’s cape.

And then she gets unduly and rudely interrupted by an unforeseen event.

That is: me jumping right over the flames, transforming mid-leap into my armored self, and tackling her to the ground littered with fallen, yellow leaves.

“Tart, wha—”

“I need you,” I tell her, looking down at wide eyes and flushed cheeks.

She stares up at me, in that frozen moment of surprise she always has when I show anything… improper toward her.

Then her hands rest on my cheeks, and she whispers:

“And I need you.”

And, as her shadows engulf us and bring us down into a world where only darkness and the two of us exist, the warmth her words kindle in my belly roars.

That’s the last thing I need. The last thing I can stand before my demon stops being held at bay by my fraying will and my white, pure armor falls apart, metal plates sliding and shifting into an indecent version of it, the chest plate turned into two triangles held in front of my nipples by leather straps, the armor skirt shrinking into a single band of gleaming metal that barely covers my mons and sinks between the cheeks of my rounder derriere.

My gauntlets shift, letting my pink, glowing claws slide out from slits crafted into the fingertips of something more delicate and elegant than my regular armor. The shape is rounder, and inset with pink, oval crystals that gleam over my knuckles, the back of my hand, and the outside of my arm. They always look like phantom shards, and Miss An—Kyuubey told me that it is because magical girls are part phantom. That when we adopt our monstrous shapes, we take in the same power the shards gather, and when we turn back, we release it tenfold. And that is the reason Riz and I should purify one another rather than waste shards to do it.

But… What she never told me is why, of all things, I turn into a succubus.

My skin pales, becoming almost pearlescent as my wings grow out of my back, briefly surrounding both Riz and I between the pulsing, pink membranes that stretch between what look like white, scaly fingers, and I feel a brief surge of agonic pleasure run down my spine as my tail elongates from it, covered in the same scales as my wings around its base, but made of flexible, soft, pliant flesh as it nears the heart-shaped tip that gleams with its own collection of round, pink crystals.

But the most damning change of all, even more than the gleaming swirls of pink light curling around my thighs and arms, even more than the sigil lighting up the space between my mons and Riz… are my crystal horns.

Short. Stubby. Almost not there.

And still so, so very damning…

My wings reluctantly let go of Riz’s body, both of us drifting alone in this darkness of hers that’s so much more welcoming than the one behind my eyelids, and she reaches up to me, caressing my cheek, smiling with reassurance.

“It doesn’t mean anything, Tart. You’re far holier than I am.”

She lies so easily, so beautifully…

And then her traveling cloak fades away as her dark mantle surrounds her, only for her to take a breath in, to run her fingers through my short hair, look into my eyes with growing hunger, and have the ragged cloth unfurl into wide, black wings that somehow still stand out in the darkness around us, each feather a glimmering star of bright shadow.

I remember the first time I saw them, her wings. She had just defeated a group of roaming bandits, deserters that had decided to get their next meal out of my village.

Riz sent them to Hell.

And then she was exhausted, kneeling on the ground, surrounded by corpses of evil men and a mantle of dark feathers limply deprived of its majesty.

I approached her, knelt in front of her, thanked her.

And she looked up at me with starving, amber, lupine eyes that…

That I didn’t shy away from.

It was the day I first… touched her. Made her finish with my hand, over and over again, as she hugged me, begged me for forgiveness while I tried to pretend I wasn’t thrilling at each and every one of her shuddering moans as my fingers ran up and down her length, exploring her body, drinking her moans, delighting at her quivering pleasure.

The angel had told me it was necessary. That it would help Riz avoid a cruel fate.

Riz told me it wasn’t. That she could get relief in other ways.

I pretended not to believe her.

But now… Now I know Kyuubey isn’t an angel.

And so, I can no longer pretend.

I just… I just stare. At Riz’s body as her remaining clothes dissolve into the shadows surrounding us, a white tunic that’s indecently short taking their place, her waist cinched by a belt made of a dark chain.

A chain that holds her sheathed sword. The one that she can’t take out. The one that’s waiting for a chosen wielder. The one that came with her wish to bring forth a hero.

I… I don’t believe it. I think the wish broke, that it failed, because Riz is a hero. And I can’t think of anyone who could ever be worthier of wielding her blade.

Her eyes open, and she looks at me, her cheeks a pale pink that only stands out with her pale skin. I thought Italians were supposed to be tan, darker than me. Maybe it’s because of her English grandfather, but Riz isn’t. Her skin is… flawless, like that of a noble who has never worked the fields, and her dark tresses floating around her only highlight it, only make me notice more and more of her almost bare shape in front of me, of the thighs that are almost uncovered by her tunic, the delicate, shapely shoulders, the shadowed line of her cleavage, the slender neck…

I feel the heat grow, the demon whisper, telling me how I could take her. Make her mine.

But I don’t want to.

I want her to take me. I want to be hers.

And I’m finally letting myself understand what that really means.

“Tart…” Riz’s deep voice caresses me as it forces me to look back into her amber eyes, into the only light I would ever need in this darkness of hers. And then she cups my cheek again, and I press her hand against me, closing my eyes just to feel her, just to have this be the only thing in the world. In our world. “Tart… I… I need you so much…”

She lies so beautifully…

“No,” I tell her, my eyes still closed because I’m a coward that doesn’t dare look at fate when it unfolds. “You don’t. You never did. And I… When I say I need you… I mean that I love you.”

She stills. Doesn’t answer.

But doesn’t take her hand away.

And so, I dare hope.

“Riz…?” I start to ask, looking at—

Her lips meet mine. For the first time. For the first time since I saw her, riding atop a noble horse, the sun casting a halo around her.

Coming into my life.

For the first time since all those years with her by my side, Riz kisses me.

“I love you,” she whispers, the words burning my soul as much as her breath sears my wet lips.

And I kiss her.

Her mouth opens in a silent moan that mirrors my own as my tongue peeks in, the body of a succubus gifting me with strength, length, and… adroitness. So I trace the insides of her mouth, the sensitive spot on the palate, right behind her teeth, the inner part of her cheeks, the entrance to her throat…

Riz’s arms surround me, and then her wings close around me, wrapping my sensitive wings with the sinful softness of her feathers.

And so, only the pulsing, pink light of my crystals and spiraling markings cast any light inside this cocoon just for the two of us.

“Tart… I never meant… I’m sorry I made you feel like—”

“No. Never be sorry. Not to me. Please.”

She stares at me, and I see the sides of her neck redden in that way they do when she’s about to lose control, when she’s exhausted all her magic and is about to run rampant with lust and desire. Except that Riz hasn’t used that much magic, and…

And…

She’s… feeling this because of me.

I remember my guilty times of pretending I didn’t take any pleasure in relieving her. The first time I knelt between her legs, her back to a tree barely outside the village’s bounds, and I made an excuse about that being faster before I licked at her member, kissing the tip as tenderly as I could while I stared right into Riz’s eyes, her hands trembling by the side of my head as she hesitated to take me, to hold me in place and ravage my mouth.

I remember the first time she took me. The first time her member spread me open right after I took my demonic guise, my light glowing out of control and enticing her beyond the point she could restrain herself. I remember the ecstasy, the burning need finally being fulfilled as Riz came in and out of my body, our wings dancing with one another, taking us into a shared flight as I became drunk on Riz, on her body, her desire, her desperate need of me that only echoed my own for her.

I remember the first time she brought me to ecstasy, the flood of liquid fire filling my womb.

I remember falling.

We held onto one another, clung with desperation even as our wings receded, as our humanity returned to us, and then we crashed to the land below after having flown too close to the sun, after having reached beyond the grasp of Babel.

I remember thinking we were being punished. I remember Riz’s apology that stabbed deep in my heart even as I smiled and laughed it off. Because we were friends, helping one another with an unfortunately needed ritual that we just had to perform to preserve our jeweled souls.

I remember donning the mask. The smiling, cheerful Tart, the one that always grins and pushes forward, no matter what happens. Because I was given the power to undo tragedies, but that just means that I have to witness them.

And… And I called Riz friend. My closest friend. My beloved friend.

It was true. It brought me happiness like I had never known.

But also, at night, when we slept close to one another in our bedrolls, when I was too tired to keep up my mask…

Amber eyes look at me like I always wished they would, and I…

“I know you think it’s wrong,” I tell her, hugging her to me, my breasts shifting beneath the mockery of proper armor. “And so I do. I know it is. I know it’s a… a sin. But I don’t care.”

“You can’t say that,” she answers even as her fingers run over my spine, even as she dips her head to murmur at the side of my neck. “You are… the Holy Maiden. I can’t take that away from you.”

For a brief, bizarre moment, I have the disorienting experience of feeling angry at Riz.

And then I chuckle.

“You already did,” I darkly whisper as my hand glides up the inside of her thighs and firmly grasps the stiff member her tunic never hides from me.

Riz’s fingers tighten on my back, pulling at my skin, and I lick her neck as my thumb plays with her tip, spreading the drop of tastyfluid I first swallowed more than a year ago.

I think about it. About climbing down her body, licking at her exposed cleavage before pulling her tunic up and taking her between my lips, forcing Riz to, this time, grab my head and move me up and down her member until I can’t breathe, until Riz’s is the only thing driving past my throat, blocking even the very air from occupying anything that belongs to her.

But she’s already groaning, her breasts already flushed, and I know this is when Riz—

“Ah!” I yelp as her hands on my hips pull me up, and she tears off the obscene piece of white and pink metal covering my mons like the most enticing chastity belt ever crafted.

“Tart…” she growls, amber eyes narrowing at me as I hurry to rip off the piece of tunic that would poorly attempt to cover the member I’m holding, playing with.

“Take me. Make me yours. Forever,” I tell her, feeling my own cheeks burn. With excitement, and lust, and desire.

And… with the other thing. The one that I’m still afraid to name even after confessing to her.

Even after her answer.

She grasps the base of my tail, a spark of pleasure that borders on sheer agony running through me as she uses it to maneuver my body in this weightless place, and I spread my legs, feeling my sex pulse with sheer need as she nears me, as she takes me closer and closer to her member, to the one I gave my virginity to.

Or… to the one my magic demanded she claim me. To the one my lustful light brought to the brink of madness.

It should’ve been me, the one begging for forgiveness. Because Riz tore through my maidenhood, bringing me to ecstasy with what should’ve been pain, but it was me who had desired for it through too many lonely nights as I tried not to pray to the Lord for it to happen, for Riz to take me, to make me hers, to make me feel as good as my hand and mouth made Riz feel.

I… I don’t know if that sullied my wish. If it twisted it, turning me from hero to demon.

And, to my shame, whenever Riz looks at me with those lupine eyes of hers, whenever I feel like a fretful doe about to be devoured… I don’t care.

For blissful, guilt-free moments, I just… I just relish in being wanted.

By her.

By Riz.

By the woman I love.

And so my legs surround her waist, and I bring my hips down so that my wetness meets her hardness, so that my heat taunts her.

And then I smile at her in that way I know to be impish, even if I’ve never seen myself do it, because I can only smile like this when doing it for Riz.

“Take me,” I whisper. “Go into the woman you deflowered.”

She roars.

And thrusts up.

I throw my head back, exposing my throat to her, and she bites down on it, her pointy canines digging into tender spots that spark with overwhelming pleasure even as she moves, even as she drives herself deeper and deeper into a body that stretches unnaturally to take all of her with not a trace of discomfort, as if it was made just for her member, her sex, her cock.

I remember the day I made my wish. My first fight, clumsily wielding the blade she gave me when she started training me, even as my power overflew and tore the attacking traitors apart right before the lack of magic drove me to lose control, and it made me force Riz to lose hers.

I remember being just far enough from the village when that happened, when the last of the retreating soldiers fell, that no one was witness to our rutting, to Riz taking me from behind, my hands and knees on the road as I nearly passed out at each thrust of her cock inside me, as I kept begging her for her seed, the words barely able to make it through the haze clouding my mind with thoughts of Riz, Riz, Riz!

“Yes! Yes! More! Give me everything! I want all of you!” I scream, beg, plead!

Riz’s jaw clamps down on me, and I go instinctively still. Just as I did on that day when we first flew together, and Riz finally spilled herself inside me, filling me with a warmth I’ve longed for since then.

And… Yes. I think my wish was warped. Twisted. Impure.

Because it really feels like this body was made just for Riz. Just for her pleasure and my own.

And I… I’ll pray. I’ll beg for forgiveness; do any penance it takes.

But I won’t ever regret it.

So I guess that’s why I’m a sinner in a demon’s body. Why draconic wings futilely flap behind me at each of Riz’s thrusts, why my reptilian tail curls in pleasure when she tightens her grip on my base, why my horns glow with the same tainted light as the sigil over my womb.

There can be no forgiveness without sincere repentance.

And I… I don’t want to believe the Lord would be so cruel as to want me to regret loving Riz.

“I… I love you so much, Riz. So much…” I manage to tell her before she takes my breath away with a deeper thrust, one that has her grind on the small button on top of my sex, that makes me spasm between her arms.

“I love you,” she says, letting go of her bite and licking at the tender flesh of my neck. “I love you, and you are mine,” she adds.

And my heart roars.

Louder than the need, the desire, and the lust. Louder than thoughts of prayer and guilt. Louder than any other love I’ve ever felt, even the one that should be above everything else.

“Yes! Yours! Always yours!” I tell her, or ask her, or beg her.

And then I clench around her, because my body wants her as much as my heart and soul do, and so I move, my hips swaying, circling around her as I force her to pull on my tail before I have it tie her wrist to me, to have her never let go.

She answers me. In the most perfect way I could ever imagine.

Tendrils of shadow snake out from between her feathers, crawling over my body with soothing coolness, wrapping over my breasts before snapping the leather straps off, freeing me from the remains of my armor before engulfing them in tightening spirals that lift them up, that point my engorged nipples at her hungry eyes as I see the wolf in Riz growing fiercer.

She bites them. Both of them, at once.

And I scream in what should be agony but cannot be further from it.

My legs tighten around her hips, pulling her closer to me, demanding she goes harder, that she takes me as thoroughly as she’s able, and her free hand takes the base of my right wing as a handhold to rail against me, to wrack my body with waves of overwhelming pleasure, to drive all thoughts out of me save the one that keeps repeating her name over and over, that keeps begging for more of Riz, Riz, Riz!

Her shadows spread, and she grasps all of me until I can do nothing but yearn, but clench around her member each time she drives herself fully inside me.

Her tongue swirls around my nipples, and I wish I could give her the milk of a mother, that Riz’s son would grow inside my belly.

And then, with one last thrust… I wish no more.

Because she fills me. Entirely. With the pleasure that devours my mind, with the embrace that covers my pearly skin, with the hungry pull on my breasts, and, most of all, with the rushing jets of Rizfilling up my womb, spurting out of me with every renewed thrust, with every new burst of her seed.

Riz fills me. Entirely. Thoroughly.

And I empty myself of everything else.

***

I awake like so many other times before, with Riz cradling my head in her lap, her fingers tenderly caressing my hair, her face leaning over me.

This time, I reach back.

My fingers run through the long, silky black hair I’ve always admired, and my eyes lock onto the gentle, tender, amber ones of a wolf whose hunger has been sated.

“I am sorry,” I tell her with a sad smile.

“For what?” she says, her fingers never faltering as she traces calming lines over my scalp.

“For… For dragging you down with me. For having you love me back.”

She leans down, her lips meeting mine for a third time. One without hunger, without the lust of the demon. Just… love.

“Don’t. I loved you before you loved me,” she says, her upside-down eyes right in front of mine.

“That is a lie. I loved you since the beginning,” I answer, pouting… just a tiny bit. Just the right amount, I would say.

She chuckles in that way she has of making my heart skip a beat, and this time I don’t have to pretend otherwise.

“You didn’t. You liked me, sure, but you like everyone, Tart. Love… Love takes time.”

Her smile is a thing of beauty, and I couldn’t pray for anything greater.

“Then… Then I still loved you before you did. I loved your courage, your kindness, your wisdom. I loved your patience as you taught Catherine how to move with a blade. I loved your bravery as you saved us again and again. I loved your tenderness as you tried not to have me relieve you. I loved your hunger when you finally gave in—”

“Stop, or this is going to turn into a second round of—don’t look at me like that. We need to rest.”

“But I love you…” I whine, shifting my still bare body beneath her gaze and delighting in how her eyes drift from mine to my swaying breasts.

“I know,” she answers, looking straight back at me and making me freeze as my heart pounds harder than I thought it could without Riz inside of me.

“I…” I don’t find the words. Not beneath those eyes.

“And I still loved you first. I loved your bright smile, your enthusiasm, your cheerfulness. I loved your care, your compassion, your tenderness. I even loved that mischievous spark in your eyes you tried to hide every time you pushed to do something new to me with transparent excuses—”

“You knew?!”

The hungry, lupine eyes narrow into unamused lines.

“Tart… If there’s one thing I don’t love about you, it’s your subtlety. Because you have none.”

My cheeks burn once again. Given that I’m naked, my head resting on the bare lap of my… my lover, and that her seed is still dripping out of me, it’s unfair that what makes me blush is a slanderous comment that no one would ever agree with.

“Yes, Tart, everybody agrees. The angel keeps complaining.”

“Ah… she’s not an angel. She told me earlier. Her name’s Kyuubey.”

Riz blinks.

Then looks at her dark, majestic wings.

And grumbles.

“Well, that certainly explains a few things…”

“She’s still a good person! She’s devoted to spending eternity preserving the world!”

“I… I’ll reserve my judgment until I’ve had a longtalk with her.”

“But… Surely, she can’t be bad. She brings about miracles, Riz.”

“I…” she’s about to argue, I know. But I also see the moment she looks at me and remembers Catherine’s limp, dead body lying at my feet before the light brought her back. And… This may be yet more blasphemy, but only a scarce few have ever brought the dead back, and none of them were demons.

Riz sighs, her eyes closing.

“See? When you talk with her, remember that—”

“My wish,” she says.

“What?”

“My wish. If she… If she didn’t lie, if the wishes she grants are true…”

She looks at the sword sealed in the scabbard hanging from the chain around her waist. And then closes her eyes and moves her lips in what I have always thought was silent prayer.

When she opens them, Riz takes my hand, and… pulls it up. To wrap around the grip.

“Pull, Tart. Make my wish come true.”

I stare at her, my mouth hanging open.

“I… I can’t. I’m a demon, Riz. I’m not worthy of—”

“Pull,” her eyes are hard, burning, and the wolf is back. “Please. For me,” she adds, barely softer.

I don’t want to.

I don’t want to fail, to disappoint her.

But…

But she asked me. Riz.

And I can’t deny her.

So I close my eyes, tighten my hold, and pray.

Then I pull.

The blade slides out of its scabbard.

And Riz, victorious, joyous, howls.

***

Homura—What

I look at the motes of light that fade away around me as Kyuubey’s displayed memory finishes.

I process the idea of Jeanne d’Arc being a monstergirl in a lesbian relationship.

I try to come to grips with it.

And, finally…

“What,” I state with what I feel is a perfectly reasonable delivery.

“It is important to learn about a lover’s friends and family, Homura Akemi,” the girl lying on top of my chest says with a tone so even it’s hard to find the mockery I’m certain must be hidden in it.

“Lovers?!” I ask for clarification in an entirely polite and sensible manner.

Kyuubey has the nerve to grumble as she twists her head between my breasts to look up at me.

“I also thought you could benefit from seeing a good example of someone performing aftercare after a rough session of lovemaking.”

I blink down at the… the alien.

And, with what I feel is the only reaction I will be able to live with when I look at myself in the mirror, I cling to my stubbornly retreating monstrous strength, grab her, and throw her off me before launching myself off the edge of the hospital’s roof.

Then, as I spread my new wings, feeling the eerily familiar sensation of wind rushing beneath my feathers, I hear Kyuubey yell her parting words at me.

“That is not proper aftercare, Homura Akemi!”

… At least she didn’t say anything about calling her tomorrow.

‘I’ve got telepathy, Homura Akemi. Phones will be unnecessary.’

Yet again, with what I feel is more calm and composure than most would show in my circumstances, I scream myself hoarse.