Beastess

FORTUNE RAZORS THE GOLD—CASINO OWNER ROBBED OF HIS JEWELS, FAMILY AND OTHERWISE.

The headline on the front page of The Abraxas Times, when she first saw it over the weekend, had made Lexi’s chest swell with pride as much as it sent an icy chill down her spine. It was surreal, in the middle of the following week, to still see copies of it scattered around Abraxas Paladin Academy’s campus.

The article below the headline detailed how Lady Luck Casino owner and local real estate magnate Pluto Sebastian was found unconscious and castrated in his penthouse office. A substantial amount of valuables and gold jewelry was robbed from his private vault as well. What the article didn’t say, but Lexi knew, was how the Pack of Abraxas West, with some help from Alpha Lea, quickly sold the stolen goods through their network of fences in order to launder the cash. This cash was added to a special trust fund specifically set up by Alpha for PAW’s beneficiaries, allies, and charitable activities—with a significant share of it going to Jasper and Jade. It wouldn’t undo the damage Pluto Sebastian had done to their family, but at least they wouldn’t have to worry about their financial security for the foreseeable future.

Lexi will never forget the tears of gratitude on Jasper and Jade’s faces when she and Syd delivered the cash in-person to them in Shadow Town earlier that week. That alone was better reward than anything she could have accomplished as a paladin.

The Abraxas Paladin Department, luckily, had no leads on who did it, beyond eyewitness testimony that it was likely perpetrated by an anonymous group of beastesses in disguise. This was thanks to how well Audrey and Meg disabled the security system and surveillance camera footage. However, the press had gotten some footage, albeit of a very different kind. Audrey told Lexi what Syd already knew going into the heist—the vixen hacker had already broken into his personal computer and downloaded all of his private files. After looking through them briefly, it was clear that Jade was not Pluto’s first victim—and judging by the file names, Pluto kept these files around for his own twisted masturbatory fantasies.

They could have just leaked it to the press initially, sure … but why settle for something so simple? Something that might not make the front page like this, when they could be a little dramatic instead, and send a message to all of the abusers of Abraxas? A big fuckin’ message, on the front page of The Abraxas Times, saying that there are women, wild women, who will find any fucker who thinks their power insulates them from consequences … and hunt them down.

Lexi did that to him. She took away the weapon he used to hurt others. Lexi fuckin’ Hunter lived up to her name, and hunted down that asshole! She did that! And now her actions, and those of her pack-mates, were broadcast for the whole megacity to see!

Thank the Goddess no one knew it was her. Even without the need to keep her beastess nature a secret, the last thing she needed was a target on her back. Lexi Hunter preferred to do her good deeds in the shadows, thank you very much.

Speaking of staying hidden, it was a miracle no one at the academy had noticed the changes to Lexi’s body yet.

Today was Thursday, which meant that it had been just two weeks—two weeks!—since Syd had bitten her in the ceremony that had turned her into a beastess. Hell, as of this coming Saturday, her first transformation will have been a fortnight ago as well. If one week into her new life as a beastess felt like a lifetime ago, two weeks felt like … well, aeons. If she didn’t have to disguise herself as ‘Cadet Alexander Carpenter’ every weekday, she would hardly remember what it was ever like to be him. She had risen from the ashes of her old self like a phoenix, blossoming like a flower that had survived a harsh winter of discontent and dysphoria, just waiting for spring to finally arrive.

And what a beautiful flower she had become! What lovely petals, what vibrant greenery, what sharp thorns!

With some practice and coaching from her pack-mates, Lexi had started to figure out how to control her shifting, and every half-shift was getting easier and easier to perform. Her progress had astounded even Alpha Lea.

Syd had a theory about it that made sense to the coyote girl. Because Lexi had such a strong desire to be a beastess, she was more fully able to embrace her inner beast. Most other beastesses were born that way, and had to learn to become acquainted with their changing bodies after their first transformation. Some new beastesses suppressed it, some lost control over it. Some embraced it quickly, but often they didn’t know how to handle such a wild beast inside until they met other beastesses who could guide them.

Lexi fell into the latter group. She wanted to be a beastess, even if she was in denial about it at first. Her first step, before she was even bitten, was accepting herself and what she wanted to be.

Just like Syd had done.

And that was what allowed her to integrate her wild side so fast.

Despite her doubts at first, her coyote side (or whatever she called it) came as naturally to her as her newfound femininity. Her enhanced senses presented the world to her perception in all its wonderful colors, smells, and sounds—a perception which before was more like watching the world pass her by, through a black-and-white television screen. If she focused and channeled her wild magic, just as her pack-mates had taught her, she could manifest her claws at will, change her skin to fur, and even alter her physical stature and strength on the fly.

The shock and pain of her body changing outside of her control during her first transformation was subsiding every time she practiced and reclaimed herself. Fang by fang, claw by claw, and shift by shift, Lexi was replacing her shame with pride. Nowadays, when she wasn’t in disguise at the APA as ‘Alex’, she walked through the world with a swagger in her hips, an ear to the wind, and a throbbing vitality in her huntress heart.

She wasn’t taming her beast. No, far from it.

She was finally letting it off the leash.

And Goddess above, her curves! Her muscles! The triple whammy of wild magic, hormones from her ovary implant, and weekly nanobot injections were molding her human form’s anatomy at an incredible rate. She could see her changing body being shaped by an invisible sculptor into … well, a work of art. Her mornings lately consisted of running her delicate fingers over the striations of newly grown muscle on her body as she flexed and posed for herself in the mirror like a bodybuilder. Probably only a few of the biggest guys on campus had muscles bigger than hers now—and, judging by the progression of her workout routines with Syd lately, she could probably out-lift and out-run almost all of them too, all while hardly breaking a sweat.

Her body fat was settling in the right places as well. She had basically doubled her food intake lately, and she could see where every single calorie was going. It was hard not to blush every time she took off her chest binder at the end of a weekday and felt her new budding breasts jiggle—and hard not to wince whenever her wider hips banged into the corner of a table.

As for her genitals … well, that can be fixed later. Syd’s promise that they would help her get a vulva of her own gave Lexi peace of mind to deal with it, for now.

Her face no longer grew any beard hair or stubble, thank Goddess, and even her jawline seemed slightly less angular than she remembered. Even with her short brown hair, her overall visage was smoother, rounder, and more—dare she say?—feminine.

Every single night before bed, she spoke in her mind two words of silent prayer to the Goddess of the Hunt:

[Thank you.]

Lexi had definitely gotten taller as well. She was just about six feet tall now, which meant her growth spurt had given her a whole half-foot in just two weeks! It was like walking in platform heels, but with far more stability. She might give Sophie a run for her money soon, and Sophie was already way taller than average at six-foot-two.

In fact, to avoid suspicion, Lexi had specifically avoided meeting with Sophie too much over the past week, feigning illness and excessive schoolwork as her excuses. Lexi felt bad, but she knew her best friend would be the first to notice her changes—no matter how much Lexi hunched her back, tightened her chest binder, or wore baggy uniforms. Lexi was invisible to most people on campus, but Sophie had, quite literally, sniffed out that something was different about Lexi when they met last week at the coffee shop.

Besides … Lexi didn’t want Sophie getting mixed up in her espionage anyway. Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that Sophie didn’t believe her, when Lexi told her that there was a beastess hiding in the templars. Lexi figured from that point onwards that it was best to keep Sophie out of this, for her own protection. Lexi could discover who this beastess templar was on her own, and what exactly they had done with Mac after they kidnapped her.

No need to get Sophie in any more danger. No need to involve Sophie in something beastess-related when she clearly hated them. Like … really hated them.

“Beastesses. Cannot. Be. Trusted.”

Sophie’s words from their last meeting.

Why did Lexi never notice before how, how—ugh, what’s the right word?—prejudiced Sophie was against beastesses? Whenever the two of them had talked about beastesses before, it was always in a purely academic, abstract sense. No hint of malice really. More just curiosity, or pity, or optimism that beastesses could be saved and absolved of their ‘sinful’ ways.

But nowadays? Any time Lexi fielded the idea of being friendly to beastesses, or even pretending to be friendly with them, Sophie would become … cold. Just like the persona she projects to everyone else. The warmth between them, something that felt unique to their friendship, would seemingly disappear in a puff of smoke.

Lexi didn’t want to lose that warmth. Sophie was the first one to stand by Lexi when she first arrived at the academy, the first best friend she’s had since …

… Well, since Rosie.

Huh. Wow.

That was an old memory out of nowhere.

But it made sense. Just like Rosie had done when Lexi was a kid—and still called Alex—Sophie had taken Lexi under her wing. The difference was that Rosie disappeared, while Sophie was still here. There was still a chance to salvage this friendship, this time around.

Lexi just wished that Sophie could see what she saw in beastesses. But there was no fuckin’ way to tell her without blowing her cover!

Fucking hell! Lying to her best friend sucked!

The coyote girl’s frustration manifested as a snarl on her lips as she quickened her pace across the APA campus. She hiked up the collar of her jacket in the chilly evening air and made a beeline past the Academy Cathedral towards the classroom building on the northern wall.

She scanned her student ID on the magitech sensor, entered the side entrance, and walked down the corridor towards Presbyter Talbot’s research lab.

Bishop Ironside had said to Lexi, when relaying the day & time of tonight’s arranged meeting, that the presbyter preferred to hold his office hours in his lab, a converted classroom, and rarely if ever made use of his official office in the western administrative building.

As soon as Lexi walked in, she was hit with the acrid smell of various chemicals, a smell so pungent that she instinctively grabbed her nose to plug it, pretending that she was holding in a sneeze as she acclimated to the strong scent of the lab. It didn’t help that the overhead fluorescent lighting buzzed and whined in her head like a swarm of mosquitos. Lexi forced herself to tune out the noise. Sometimes having strong senses was a disadvantage, she reminded herself.

The lab itself consisted of multiple rows of desks separated by a central aisle, each with shelving atop them, but with only one swivel chair in each row pushed to the side. Evidently Presbyter Talbot liked to stand while he worked. Every square inch of every shelf, desktop, and even some of the floor space was covered in fancy-looking yet well-used research equipment—ranging from commonplace lab items like alchemical beakers and test tubes, to more complex devices like microscopes and CRT computer screens, to large mysterious black boxes of magitech covered in dials, buttons, and runic circuitry.

At the far end of the lab, Lexi could see a slightly less crowded area that at first glance looked like it didn’t belong in a scientific research lab at all. It looked more like a mechanic’s workshop than a laboratory. Cabinets on wheels with multiple drawers were pushed to the periphery of the room, with some open to reveal intricate tools inside. Larger tools like metal tongs, chisels, and hammers hung up against a wall, as well as an anvil in the middle of the floor and a large tub of water off to one side. The centerpiece of the far wall was a huge industrial furnace, currently turned off. The shelving on the far-most row of desks obscured the rest of the workshop area of the lab from view, but Lexi could see cyan and green sparks flying out from behind some of the far shelves.

She walked to the back of the lab and spotted the presbyter hunched over a flat metal table, with the sparks flying to either side of him. He was wearing a welding mask over his face and had magitech gloves on that occasionally shimmered cyan blue.

Lexi cleared her throat and said, “Presbyter Talbot, sir?”

The man stopped his work and snapped, “What is it? I’m very busy right now.” His voice was muffled by the welding mask.

“It’s, uh, me—Cadet Carpenter, sir. For the meeting Bishop Ironside set up?”

Sabrina and Lexi had been voice training off and on the past couple of weeks—in between make-up lessons, at Sabrina’s insistence—and it felt like whiplash when she had to use her old lower vocal register like this.

Presbyter Talbot turned around and pulled up his welding mask to reveal his smiling face.

“Ah, yes, you must be Alexander! Saul told me all about you! Please, call me John.”

“Just ‘Alex’ is fine, sir—erm, John.”

Presbyter Talbot took off his welding mask as well as one glove so he could run his hand through his ghostly white hair as he adjusted his round glasses. The presbyter looked precisely like how Lexi imagined the APA’s expert magitech engineer would—bespectacled, much older than her, quite lanky, and dressed in white robes.

“Come, walk and talk with me,” the presbyter said. “We’ll keep this meeting quick.” As he put his glove back on again, Presbyter Talbot picked up the small flat piece of metal he had been working on and waved Lexi along to follow him as he walked down the narrow aisle in the middle of the room to another desk.

There was an efficiency to his every movement, as if the tall man were made of clockwork gears and machinery. His strides were deliberate, his gestures precise, and his words carefully chosen but precisely enunciated.

“Saul told me that you have quite the interest in pagan studies.” The presbyter pulled out a microscope from underneath the desk and hoisted it onto the table.

“Yes,” Lexi replied, “I do. Been studying them ever since I started attending APA.”

“A shame you haven’t had any classes with me then.” Presbyter Talbot placed the piece of metal he was holding onto the viewing platform. “Although I primarily work with magitech, I have a special interest in wild magic as well.”

Bashfully, Lexi said, “Well, my grades aren’t good enough to get into higher level classes, like the ones you teach.”

The presbyter gave a sideways glance at Lexi.

“A young man such as yourself ought to apply himself more to his studies, if he wishes to excel as a paladin.” He looked her up and down before turning back to the microscope. “Maybe spend a little less time in the gym and more time hitting the books.”

Shit, were her muscles more noticeable under her clothes than she thought? The shock of it was enough to override her disgust at the presbyter calling her a ‘young man’.

Not knowing how to respond, Lexi simply shrugged and laughed it off. “Templar Ryder trains me well, I guess!”

The presbyter froze for a split second, before resuming his adjustment of the viewing platform.

“Ah, yes,” he said slowly, “Templar Ryder. I have heard she can be quite … cold with other paladins.”

“Not with me,” Lexi said. “We’re good friends.”

“Hmm. ‘Friends.’ I see.” The presbyter looked through the binoculars of the microscope at the magitech plate.

After an uncomfortable few seconds, Lexi said, “What do you mean by that?”

“Do you practice combat training with other boys, cadet?”

Lexi raised an eyebrow. “… No, only with Sophie. Why?”

“Ah, I see! Everything makes sense now.”

“What makes sense?”

Just what was he insinuating? Lexi felt like she was under that microscope.

“It makes sense that you enjoy the company of strong women. That must be why you consort with pagans like Sydney Beaumont.”

Lexi bumped into the desk behind her, nearly knocking a beaker off of the shelf.

“Wh—how—who told you?”

Lexi was caught completely off guard. Was her cover blown?!

“Saul told me everything about your secret mission.” Presbyter Talbot looked up from his microscope and jotted down something on a nearby notepad. “He gave me special clearance and told me all about it. Including why you wanted to come see me tonight.”

“Oh. Right. Yes.” Lexi took a second to compose herself.

They all still think she’s pretending to befriend beastesses. All of these lies were becoming harder and harder to keep track of.

Turning around and staring at Lexi intently, Presbyter Talbot said, “The Pack of Abraxas West, from what you’ve told Saul, is researching how to use wild magic to create even more beastesses. Correct?”

“Yes. I—”

“Is that all you’ve gathered so far?”

Lexi nodded. “Yes. They haven’t told me anything else. Which is why—”

“You came to me for help.” Presbyter Talbot smiled. A bit too broadly for Lexi’s liking. As if he didn’t smile often, and was out of practice.

“… Yes,” she said, frowning. She wished he would stop interrupting her like that. Like a fuckin’ know-it-all.

But unfortunately for Lexi, ‘Alex’ was a pushover. Play the role, she told herself. Put your claws away, Lexi. It’s only for a little while longer.

Remember, Lexi, that you’re doing all of this—the disguise, the lies, the secrets—to help the pack and save Mac. To save Syd’s beta. To save Syd’s pack-mate.

To save your pack-mate.

Because it’s the right thing to do. Because it’s the hard thing to do. And because, Lexi, you’re strong enough to choose it, regardless.

“Tell me, Alexander,” Presbyter Talbot said, ignoring Lexi’s requested name from earlier, “exactly how interested in beastesses are you? I can’t think of a single other paladin in the academy who would willingly befriend one, even undercover, so I’m just … curious.”

“Well,” Lexi said, “they’ve fascinated me ever since I was young.”

“What is it about them that fascinates you, exactly?”

Lexi paused. This was getting weird. Was this some sort of test? This was giving her flashbacks to two weeks ago at the abandoned train station. At least she wasn’t naked and chained to a table this time.

Answering slowly, Lexi said, “I know they’re sinful pagans—” it felt so strange saying that, as a newly-made sinful pagan herself, “—but beastesses are a biological anomaly. No magitech on earth has come even close to replicating their transformation capabilities. They’re—”

“My thoughts precisely!” Presbyter Talbot interrupted. “Beastesses are—”

“Let me finish.” Lexi growled. So much for acting the role of a pushover.

Presbyter Talbot, taken aback by Lexi’s shift in tone, said, “My apologies. Continue.”

Figures. Apparently the arrogant presbyter wasn’t used to cadets asserting themselves in his presence. Lexi wondered if Presbyter Talbot had only listened because she looked like a man right now.

“… They’re big, strong, powerful women,” Lexi continued, choosing her words carefully, “and I think they’re beautiful, in their own special way. If I could just figure out what makes beastesses tick, I could help harness that power to do the Lord’s work, rather than in service of false gods. That’s why I’ve been getting so close with Sydney Beaumont and her pack. An opportunity to study beastesses this closely out in the wild is the next best thing to having …”

How did Alpha Lea say the archbishop had phrased it to her? Over that fancy dinner?

“… To having a lab rat of my own to experiment on.”

The trap was set. Now to see if the presbyter would take the bait.

“Well,” Presbyter Talbot said after a moment of contemplation, “fortunately for you, I have made some recent discoveries in my own research into wild magic. If those heathens are researching the same things I am, it’s only a matter of time before they come to the same conclusions.”

“What did you find?”

The presbyter smiled, even wider than before.

“Promise to keep this a secret? Man to man?”

Lexi nearly gagged as she faked a smile back.

“I promise, John. Man to man.”

Presbyter Talbot leaned in close and dropped his voice to a softer volume.

“I have been conducting wild magic research with a beastess of my very own. Research on her … anatomy … up close and personally. And, between you and me? As someone else who also appreciates a powerful woman?” He looked around, theatrically, to emphasize the secrecy of this ‘man to man’ conversation, before returning his gaze to Lexi. “She is quite the specimen … if you catch my drift.” He traced an hourglass figure in the air with his gloved fingers, elbowed Lexi in the ribs, and chuckled a dry, wheezing laugh.

Ah.

This guy’s not just annoying. He’s a creep, too.

And Lexi has to play along.

Great.

Lexi half-heartedly laughed along with the presbyter, and said, “You sly dog! How did you convince a beastess to let you do, ahem, ‘research’ on her, without her knowing you’re a presbyter? Are you on a secret classified mission as well?”

“Oh, God above, no, I didn’t find her. No, the bitch was brought to me.”

Lexi gritted her teeth. The lecherous bastard!

“And … do you bring her here to study her wild magic? To the lab, I mean?”

Presbyter Talbot smirked. “That eager to see her, are you, Alexander?”

“Yes, I would love to study a beastess up close,” Lexi said. “Perhaps you, John, can explain to me what you’ve learned about their wild magic. I have so much to learn, and I know we haven’t had any classes together, but I’d be honored for you to teach me!”

She was flattering the presbyter as much as she could, but within her jacket sleeves her fists told a different story. They were clenched so hard that her knuckles were turning white. She was withholding every urge in her body—every instinct that told her to shift right there, and tear this perverted fucker’s throat out for daring to use her pack-mate like some kind of fuckin’ lab rat for Goddess knows what reasons!

Presbyter Talbot placed a gloved hand on Lexi’s shoulder, and she almost shrugged it off in disgust before catching herself. His grip was surprisingly strong for such a thin man.

“I hate to wrap this up, but I am very busy. But I see you’re a man of good taste, Alexander. You have a real hunger for knowledge, and as a fellow scholar, I shall do my best to help it grow. I don’t do this with just any of my students, you know … but then again, I can’t think of another cadet on campus who shares my deep fascination with beastesses. Think of this as an exclusive tutoring session. Come by my lab again tomorrow, and we can arrange a time for you to visit my … other lab.”

“Y-your other lab?”

“Yes. You need special clearance to be granted access, but I’ll speed up the paperwork for you. It should only take a few days. Anything to help a budding paladin-in-training, especially one who shares a passion for such interesting women.”

Lexi wondered how many rows of shelving she could throw the presbyter through like a javelin before they would start to slow his body down. Her best guess was four.

“Thank you, John! I really appreciate it.” She shook his gloved hand vigorously.

“My pleasure,” he replied with a nod. “Good night, cadet.”

Presbyter Talbot escorted Lexi out of his lab, turned out the lights, locked the door, and waved goodbye before striding down the hall, his shoes clacking like a metronome on the linoleum floor.

Lexi waited until he was down the stairs and out of the building for sure, before leaning against a wall and breathing a sigh of relief. She turned and walked in the opposite direction down the hall, a skip in her step.

YES! One step closer to finding Mac!

She couldn’t believe her luck. He thought he was helping a student—and a fellow pervert, apparently—but in the end, he’s practically handed over Mac on a silver platter. All she needs is that security clearance, and she’ll be able to see Mac in-person, report back to her pack, and come up with a plan.

And what a rush it was, to pull the wool over that man’s eyes. All she had to do was pretend to be part of the ‘good old boys’ club, mix in a little flattery, and he trusted her, like, immediately and implicitly! Somehow it was easier to pretend to be a boy when she knew she was faking it. Probably because she didn’t have to force herself to actually believe any of the gross toxic shit she heard men say, thinking that there were no women around to hear it.

Ha! She was getting really good at being a spy.

And no one has caught her yet—

SLAM.

It happened so fast.

Lexi was pulled to the side with a sudden yank, and her world went blurry, then dark.

The pull was strong.

Very strong.

Stronger than Lexi could resist.

Her body tensed up instinctively—panicked memories stirred, her nervous system reminding her of when she was whisked away by Ripley into that alley in Shadow Town.

Still conscious, she looked around the darkness in a panic.

Click-click.

A single bare lightbulb dimly illuminated a small, cramped janitor’s closet, filled with cleaning supplies and cardboard boxes on layers of metal shelving.

As she held Lexi by the shoulders in front of her with a death grip, Sophie glared at Lexi with fire in her eyes.