A Fox's War

by Brandon Varnell

  “Is that part of a magical girl cosplay?” Lilian asked.

  Lindsay hid the object behind her. “N-no, this is…”

  “Ah! I didn’t know you were into cosplay, Lindsay!” Lilian’s eyes gained several levels of vibrancy. “This is great! Instead of dressing in pajamas, we should dress in costumes!”

  “This isn’t a—”

  “Oh, this is going to be so much fun! I’ve got several dozen costumes that we can try out!”

  “I said this isn’t a—”

  “Hold on while I go and grab them!”

  “Listen to me!” Lindsay’s despairing wail went unheard as Lilian rushed into her bedroom.

  Kevin had gone over to Alex and Andrew’s place earlier that day.

  Much of the time at his friends’ apartment was spent playing video games and watching anime—and watching his two friends bicker and fight. They had also invited Eric over, but for some reason, their perverted best friend had declined. Kevin assumed he was caught up playing an eroge or something.

  “We should watch One Piece.”

  “One Piece? You mean Crap Piece! No one wants to watch that stupid rubber man. Fairy Tail is where it’s at!”

  “Fairy Tail is a shit anime that ripped off its characters from One Piece and Natsumo Shinobi.”

  “You take that back! Fairy Tail is awesome!”

  “Fairy Tail is the biggest piece of shit ever!”

  “Why you!!!”

  Kevin sighed helplessly as Alex and Andrew began rolling around on the floor, pulling each other’s hair and biting each other. They looked like a pair of cats duking it out. Knowing that these two could fight for hours if he let them, Kevin grabbed the nearest objects he could find, a pair of game controllers, and chucked them at the two. The loud thunk of the controllers bouncing off their heads was followed by the two falling away from each other.

  “Ouch!”

  “What the hell was that for?!”

  “Stop fighting, you two. If you can’t decide what to watch without arguing, then I’ll decide for you.”

  After saying this, Kevin decided to put on one of the newer anime—a series about a hikikomori, a person who shunned society and human contact, and a goddess traveling to a fantasy world with MMORPG elements. It was a comedy series that looked interesting. He’d planned to watch this series with Lilian, but he figured it wouldn’t matter if he rewatched it with her, especially if it was good.

  Having been essentially brow beaten, Alex and Andrew were left with no choice but to moodily sit down on the floor and watch what Kevin had selected. However, as the series started and the first episode played, the fraternal twins occasionally looked back at him. It didn’t take a genius to figure out what they wanted.

  “If you want to ask, then go ahead,” Kevin said tiredly. “You want to know about what happened on my last mission, don’t you?”

  The two nodded. Since Kevin wasn’t under any obligation to remain silent, he decided that he might as well let them know about what had happened during his week-long mission. So while the anime played in the background, Kevin regaled the two with a story that sounded like it was straight out of a shonen manga. As he finished his tale, the two leaned back. They wore suitably impressed looks.

  “That sounds so cool,” Alex said.

  “Man, I’m so jealous,” Andrew added. “It’s not fair that you get to go on all of these awesome adventures.”

  Kevin smiled weakly at their comments, knowing that they were made out of ignorance. His friends didn’t understand. The missions that he went on weren’t pleasant. If he could, he would never go on another mission again. He wasn’t some shonen manga super hero, nor did he want to be one.

  He fought only because he wanted his normal life back. He wanted to wake up in the morning with Lilian and Iris and not worry about anything beyond whether he’d finished his homework. He wanted to enjoy his school life. He wanted to go out and have fun and watch anime and play video games. He wanted to be normal—or as normal as a person who was dating two kitsune could be.

  He wondered if his life could ever be normal again after everything that he had seen and done.

  Probably not, he thought with a mirthless smile.

  After all, for someone whose life had been overrun with yokai, terms like “normal” no longer existed.

  Lilian hadn’t had this much fun in a long time.

  She, Iris, Christine, and Lindsay had spent the night enjoying each other’s company. They sang karaoke, partook in pillow fights, and listened to the latest gossip from Lindsay about what they’d missed this past week. They looked through magazines and picked out their favorite clothes, and Iris proudly gave a shocked and embarrassed Lindsay and Christine the raunchiest details of her latest sexcapades with Lilian and Kevin—which resulted in her being beaten down by one embarrassed yuki-onna. Lilian also told Lindsay about what had happened during their mission.

  “Wow… so you guys really did all that exciting stuff, huh?” Lindsay said.

  The blond girl was lying on her back on her sleeping bag, staring up at the ceiling. She was wearing one of Lilian’s more modest pajama sets: dark pink bottoms and a baggy white T-shirt. Lilian wondered what her friend would think if she realized that the T-shirt had once belonged to Kevin.

  I don’t think she’d flip, but I don’t know if she would want to wear it anymore.

  The thought amused her for some reason.

  Resting beside the girl was her stick, which Lindsay had adamantly stated was not a magical girl wand. Iris had made fun of her for having it anyway.

  “It’s not as exciting as it sounds,” Lilian said. “I think it was more terrifying than exciting myself.”

  Unlike Lindsay, she was already inside of her sleeping bag, lying on her stomach, with a manga sitting on the ground in front of her. The manga was one of her favorites. It was a story about aliens invading from another dimension, and a group of strong women partnering up with males to combat them. It had a healthy helping of fan service, but it also had a deeper story and a lot of epic battles.

  My favorite combination.

  “I second that.” Iris waved her hand. “I don’t think I’ve ever been more terrified of anything in my life.”

  Lilian noticed the way Lindsay was staring at her sister, at the glazed-over eyes, flushed cheeks, and… was that blood leaking from her nose?

  Turning her head, Lilian saw why Lindsay was reacting in such a way. Like her tomboyish friend, Iris was not inside of her sleeping bag. She lay on her side, wearing nothing but panties and a spaghetti strap shirt, the strings of which slid off her slender shoulders. Her long legs and shapely figure were revealed in all their splendor. Lilian found herself mesmerized by the swaying of her sister’s bosoms.

  I don’t know whether I should be turned on or envious.

  Like all kitsune, Lilian was drawn towards beauty. While she thought Kevin was dashingly handsome, and he was still the most important person in her life, it didn’t change the fact that Iris was the most gorgeous person she’d ever met. If there was such a thing as perfection, then the vixen lying regally sprawled before her most definitely embodied it.

  Shaking her head, Lilian dispelled those thoughts and went back to her manga. She didn’t want Iris to know that she’d been looking at her. The vixen might decide to give her some extra loving, and while Lilian didn’t normally have a problem with that, she knew that Lindsay and Christine would.

  “Third,” Christine murmured.

  “By the way…” Iris started with a grin, “your nose is bleeding.”

  Lindsay’s cheeks looked like volcanoes as she leapt up and ran into the kitchen, where she grabbed a tissue to wipe away the blood. She came back, her face stained with embarrassment, which Iris delighted in teasing the girl about.

  They spoke for several more hours. Conversation flowed and topics changed at random. There was no real uniformity to what they spoke of, and Lilian was just happy that they could talk like this. It had
been so long since she’d had a normal conversation about normal things.

  Kotohime eventually came in and told them that it was time for lights out. They turned off the lights and crawled into their sleeping bags, which had been arranged in a circle where the fronts were nearly touching. Lilian lay on her back. Her sleeping bag felt a little empty, but she dismissed the feeling, knowing that tomorrow Kevin would be back in bed with her.

  “Hey, Lilian,” Lindsay whispered. “Are you still awake?”

  “Yes,” she whispered back. “Did you need something?”

  There was some fabric rustling outside of her vision. Though she couldn’t see it, she imagined that Lindsay was shaking her head.

  “No, nothing’s wrong. I just wanted to let you know that… I’m glad you’re back.”

  Lilian smiled as she closed her eyes. “Me too.”

  Three

  More Christmas Shopping

  Lilian woke up to the feeling of someone kissing her. Since this happened quite often, as Kevin had become fond of waking her up with a kiss (and sometimes more), she didn’t think much of it and kissed back. However, despite enjoying the talents of the person kissing her, she realized very quickly that this person was not her mate. The lips were too soft, too feminine. The kisser in question was also more skilled than Kevin.

  Opening her eyes, Lilian was met with long eyelashes, dark hair, and a face that could’ve turned straight women gay.

  “I-Iris,” Lilian mumbled—only to gasp when one of Iris’s fingers slipped underneath her pajamas and into her panties.

  “Shh,” Iris whispered, and Lilian shivered at the hunger in her voice. “You’re going to wake the others if you’re not quiet.”

  “T-the others?” Lilian bit her lower lip as Iris caressed her like a gardener gently touching the petals of a flower. The moan that wanted to escape from her mouth was stifled, but only just.

  “Mm, Christine and Lindsay are still asleep,” Iris confirmed as she teased Lilian’s entrance with her fingers.

  “W-wait,” Lilian gasped. “N-not when others are around.”

  Despite saying that, Lilian’s body hummed at the pleasurable acts that Iris committed on her, and when she slipped a finger inside of her, Lilian was barely able to stifle her cry.

  “Come on, Sis,” Iris chided, rubbing her thumb against Lilian in ways that made the redhead’s body feel like it had been plugged into an electric socket. “You know the idea of having some wholesome fun while our friends are sleeping just a few feet away turns you on. There’s no point in denying it.”

  As if in response to Iris’s words, Lilian’s entire body flushed the same red as her hair. The idea of doing something naughty like this while Christine and Lindsay slept naught two feet from them was embarrassing. Iris might have an exhibitionist streak a mile wide, but she did not.

  “N-no,” she whimpered as her hips involuntarily bucked into Iris’s hand. “That’s not it… I…”

  “You what?”

  Iris leaned down and licked Lilian’s neck, slowly trailing her tongue all the way up to Lilian’s ear, which she proceeded to nibble on. Lilian felt her entire body shudder. No matter how much she denied it, Iris’s ministrations felt good.

  O-oh, no, Lilian thought as her mind became clouded with lust. I can’t… hold on…

  “I need… Iris…”

  “Yes?”

  Iris continued licking her way along Lilian’s neck. She could feel her sister’s tongue deftly moving along her skin, licking up the sweat that formed there. Lilian struggled to maintain coherent thoughts, as she couldn’t allow herself to be taken right now. Not when her friends were so close. However, it was difficult. Oh, so difficult.

  “I want you…”

  “You want me?”

  “I want you to stop.”

  Iris paused in her licking. Slowly moving her face away from Lilian, the dark-haired vixen frowned at her, and then slowly pulled her fingers from Lilian’s panties. This action caused her to sigh in relief.

  “You really know how to ruin a girl’s fun,” Iris said with a sigh.

  “I’m all for having fun… but not when others are around.”

  “Ugh…”

  Seeing Iris look so depressed, with her slumped shoulders, made Lilian smile. She leaned up and placed a kiss on the succubus lily’s mouth. It was slow and languid. There was no passion involved. However, that seemed to satisfy Iris, who stopped pouting and began kissing back. Iris did try to deepen the kiss at least once, but Lilian put a stop to that. Fortunately, Iris had already sworn to never do anything that Lilian said she couldn’t do.

  “That’s disgusting,” a voice said to her left.

  Lilian felt like she’d been doused with cold water. She pried her mouth from Iris’s and pushed the vixen away. Looking toward the source of the voice, Lilian saw that both Christine and Lindsay were wide awake. While Christine wore an expression that epitomized revulsion, Lindsay looked like she’d just discovered heaven. Her nose was bleeding.

  “Ah…” Lilian released a strangled gasp before, without warning, she smacked Iris across the face with her two tails.

  “Buwa!”

  Iris flew away from her, and Lilian used that chance to escape, scrambling out of her sleeping bag and rushing out of the room. She grabbed her towel, a duffel bag, and a change of clothes, then snuck out through the window so she wouldn’t have to see Iris again.

  She needed to take a cold shower. A really cold shower.

  As she watched Lilian run out of the room, Iris had never felt more dissatisfied in her life.

  She turned to the two girls who’d interrupted her sisterly bonding time. While the expressions they wore would have normally amused her, at the moment, all she felt was intense irritation. She clicked her tongue.

  “Tch! Way to ruin my fun, you two. I was this close to getting some.”

  “I don’t care how close you were to getting some,” Christine said, wrinkling her nose. “I can’t believe you two would do that while we’re here. I’m still in shock that you two are even in that kind of relationship.”

  “Do you have a problem with that?” asked Iris.

  “Of course I have a problem with that,” Christine’s voice was biting. “Incest is disgusting and wrong.”

  “You’ve been living too long in the human world,” Iris told her. “Don’t judge our relationship by human standards.”

  “I’m judging your relationship by everyone’s standards!”

  Iris didn’t bother responding to Christine. Much as she loved the girl, it was clear that trying to convince her that she was wrong wouldn’t work right now. She was too indoctrinated by human society.

  I’ll make her understand eventually, Iris promised herself. It would have to happen sooner or later. If Christine really did want to be with the stud, then she would have to accept their relationship in its entirety—not just the one that she and Lilian had with the stud, but also the one that she and Lilian shared.

  Looking at the other occupant in the room, Iris actually did chuckle when she saw the way Lindsay was staring at her. “Your nose is bleeding again, Sporty.”

  “Wha—oh, crap!”

  Iris chuckled as Lindsay shot out of her sleeping bag and ran into the kitchen. No doubt the girl was going to come back with pieces of napkin or something shoved up her nose.

  “I don’t understand how you can have a relationship with your own sister,” Christine murmured, half in disgust and half in morbid curiosity.

  “Like I said, that’s because you’ve spent way too much time around humans.” Iris fell onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. “I don’t blame you, of course. You’ve lived your whole life among humans. You were judged by their standards, lived by the rules of their society, and acted in accordance to the social norms that humans have set down. Naturally, anything deemed wrong by human society is something that you would also feel is wrong.”

  Christine was silent for a long time. Iris used that time to
think about Lilian. She was probably taking an ice-cold shower right now. Her sister hated cold showers, but she took them occasionally, when she needed to cool off.

  “Is… yokai society really that different?” Christine asked eventually, her voice soft and uncertain.

  Turning over so that she was lying on her side, Iris propped her cheek against the palm of her hand and faced Christine. “Of course, it is. Yokai don’t have the same sense of morality that humans do. We don’t have their ethics, or their taboos, and we certainly don’t follow the same laws and rules. We’re just too different.”

  Christine’s cheeks flushed blue as she squirmed in place. “So, then… you and Lilian… in yokai society…”

  “Are you asking if incest is accepted in yokai society?” Iris asked, grinning when Christine’s cheeks went from pale blue to an icier shade. “Of course it is accepted. Not only is incest perfectly acceptable, but several kitsune clans practice it to keep their bloodlines pure.”

  Growing tired of keeping her head up, Iris laid her arm down and rested her head on a pillow.

  “Basically, it comes down to procreation.” A mirthless chuckle. “Lilian and I are both female, which means that we can’t produce a child together. If I were a man, or if Lilian were a man, and our matriarch thought that having us make a baby would be good for the clan, then she’d force us to screw each other’s brains out in a heartbeat.”

  Of course, even if she or Lilian had been born male, there was little chance of their matriarch having them mate. This was not due to their matriarch having issues with incest, but because of their powers. Iris was a Void Kitsune. Lilian was a Celestial. Their powers were contradictory, polar opposites, and combining the two almost always led to catastrophic results. Her mother was the perfect example of what happened when these two powers mixed.