My stylus flew across the tablet, the piece slowly taking form as I refined the brush strokes, the character seeming to spring to life before my eyes. It was finished, one drawing down, only several hundred more to go...
	It was late at night, the pale glow of my computer monitors the only thing that illuminated the room, discarded food containers and soda cans littering the desk upon which they were perched. I had been at it for hours, the sun had still been shining through my windows when I had begun, but now all that I could see through the panes was the night sky and a few solitary flakes of snow as they drifted lazily towards the ground.
	My hand was starting to cramp, perhaps it was time for a break. I bade farewell to my viewers in the stream chat, then shut off the feed, rising out of my chair and stretching my arms above my head. I tried to suppress a yawn unsuccessfully, then turned and made my way to the door. I was feeling a little hungry, maybe I'd get a snack before bed. 
	The staircase creaked under my feet as I descended to the ground floor, rubbing my eyes as I debated making a pot of coffee and staying up for a few more hours rather than getting the rest that I so obviously needed. I had a lot of work still to do. I had taken to streaming my artwork lately, but it had ended up being more of a distraction than the boost to my productivity that I had hoped for. I spent too much time messing around, interacting with the viewers and doing silly requests, rather than working on more serious projects. It was a lot of fun, but I really should try to get some real work done.
	The kitchen was dark too, lit only by the far-off glow of a street lamp that was bleeding in through the window, giving the room a yellow tint. I crouched in front of the fridge and swung the door open, rummaging inside for something to snack on. A half eaten turkey sandwich, it would do in a pinch...
	Munching on my newfound midnight snack, I made my way over to the counter and turned on the coffee machine. I figured that I might as well stay up another hour or two, if only to finish off that one piece of background scenery that had been giving me trouble. The next version of the game was supposed to release soon, if I wasn't careful I'd have to scramble to get it all done at the last minute.
	As the machine whirred loudly, I noticed a strange smell wafting on the air. It was acrid, stinging my nose, and as I struggled to focus my eyes in the darkness I saw a trail of grey smoke rising from the counter a few feet away.
	Curious, I inched closer, leaning in to see what it was. It was a cigarette, it looked like it had been carelessly put out on the wood, and my first instinct was to pick it up between my thumb and forefinger and drop it into the sink. I wet the sleeve of my worn sweater with my tongue, and tried to rub away the burn mark. It quickly dawned on me that someone else must be in the house with me. I certainly didn't smoke, and I lived alone, where had the cigarette come from?
	Suppressing my panic, I marched over to the near wall and hit the light switch, illuminating the kitchen. My eyes snapped shut as my vision adapted to the glare, and when they opened again, 'she' was standing there.
	“Oh...it's you,” I muttered. “I should have known. Could you not put out your cigarettes on my counter top?”
	Her black lips spread into a wide, toothy grin, another cigarette hanging from her mouth as she peered down at me with her cyan eyes. They reflected the light from the ceiling lamp, shining like a pair of emeralds, her reptilian pupils examining me in a way that seemed cold and calculating.
	Her head very nearly touched the ceiling, she was well above six feet, probably skirting seven. I had never dared to pick up a tape measure and check. Her hairless head had somewhat of a snout, her defined cheekbones casting dark shadows down her face, her reptilian skin a shade of deep blue. She wore a form-fitting, purple jumpsuit made from no material that I couldn't name, the tight garment doing little to conceal her generous bust and her muscular form. 
	Exampla might have been mistaken for a normal woman, if one had only seen her torso, her more jarring features contrasting with her humanoid figure. She had round thighs, her digitigrade legs ending in three-toed feet, each tipped with a claw. I could hear the sound of her long, powerful tail as it dragged back and forth on the tiled floor, it sounded like a wet towel. For all intents and purposes she looked very much like one would imagine a bipedal lizard, or a dinosaur that had evolved to sentience.
	I wasn't sure where Exampla had come from. She had just inserted herself into my brain, like an intrusive thought, or a catchy tune that one finds himself humming out of the blue months later and entirely out of context. She was my muse in a sense, an embodiment of my xenophilic tendencies. It was hard to say whether she was a figment of my imagination, some kind of supernatural entity that seemed able to defy the laws of physics and logic, or whether she was simply evidence of a very real psychological problem that should probably be medicated.
	Either way, she appeared from time to time, doling out harsh criticism of my work and tormenting me with her odd humor. Whatever her motivations were, she seemed intent on having me finish my project, at times she even seemed more invested in it than I was...
	She raised a pair of clawed fingers to her mouth, retrieving the cigarette and blowing a cloud of acrid smoke in my direction. She chuckled at me as I coughed and sputtered, waving my arm to clear the air, my eyes watering as she loomed over me.
	“It's late,” she said in her husky contralto, flicking her cigarette and depositing ash on my floor. “You should get some sleep, or you'll be useless tomorrow. You 'have' been working on the project tonight, right?”
	“Uh...yeah, the project,” I replied sheepishly. I had been procrastinating all day, fooling around in the stream. “I didn't get as much done as I'd like, I was thinking of maybe...staying up a couple more hours?”
	I was unsure as to why I had phrased that statement as a question. It was my choice, not hers, and yet going against Exampla's wishes never ended well for me.
	She shot me an icy glare, turning her nose up at me as she took another draw from her cigarette. I watched as she exhaled through her nose, the smoke leaving her nostrils to make her look like an angry dragon.
	“Show me,” she said, and my heart sank. It was a lie of course, and I was about to be found out. Who could say what she might do to me when she discovered that I had tried to mislead her. I led her back up the staircase and into my bedroom, the giant woman ducking through my door frame and coming to stand behind me as I sat down at my desk. I rolled closer on my wheeled office chair, intending to quickly tab out of the window that I had left open with the stream, but I felt the weight of her clawed hand as she leaned over my shoulder to stay my mouse.
	“What is 'that'?” she asked disdainfully, her breath carrying the smell of her cigarettes.
	“I was doing a stream,” I replied, my voice wavering.
	She moved my hand, her grip like iron, mousing over to the scroll bar on the stream chat. She rolled the mouse wheel, her cyan eyes scanning back and forth as she read through the exchanges between me and my viewers.
	“Chatanon,” she read, her black lips curling into a sneer. “Please draw some Exampla nudes.”
	“He was just requesting them,” I stammered, trying to bullshit my way out of the hole that I had dug. “I know how you feel about those, I didn't actually draw any.”
	Exampla continued to read, her eyes narrowing. She had already seen through my deception, now she was just rubbing salt in the wound, enjoying watching me squirm as I tried desperately to justify myself.
	“Paperface said: holy shit, I love her big blue lizard cans.”
	“He's just...I don't know why he'd say that. It wasn't related to anything that I was doing at the time.”
	“And the next person seems to be replying to him. Proventus says that you should be careful, or you'll 'piss off your imaginary waifu'. Well this one has more sense than you do, at least. 'Xenopill' seems to agree with him...”
	She planted a hand on my head, large enough to encompass my skull entirely, her pointed claws hanging dangerously close to my face. She stroked my scalp like one would pet a beloved cat, the act outwardly affectionate, but I knew that it was designed to intimidate me. She could flay my flesh from my bones with her wicked claws, or crush my head like a ripe grape, and she wanted me to know it.
	“You know how it makes me feel when you let people deny that I exist,” she said with an exaggerated pout. Her lips were so black and shiny, somehow making her pearly teeth look even more menacing when she forced an exaggerated smile. “Because I'm not imaginary, am I?”
	I shook my head, but she gripped me more tightly and held it still.
	“Say it,” she hissed.
	“Y-You're not imaginary.”
	“There's a good boy. Because an imaginary creature couldn't hurt you, could she? She couldn't for example, burn you with her lit cigarette?” 
	I tensed as she plucked her cigarette from her black lips and held it between her fingers, lowering it down towards my neck. It hovered there, an inch from my exposed skin, I could feel the heat that radiated from it.
	“Now tell me the truth,” she chimed sweetly. “Have you been doing your work today, or have you been drawing unflattering pictures of me for your friends and admirers?”
	“I...I didn't do my work,” I admitted. I gritted my teeth, bracing for the sting of pain, but it never came. Exampla kept the cigarette close, seeming to enjoy how nervous she was making me.
	“And..? What have you been drawing instead?”
	“P-Pictures of you.”
	She leaned down and pursed her lips, planting a kiss in the nape of my neck. It was soft and tender, contrasting with her cruel demeanor. I flinched all the same, not knowing whether I should expect leniency or retribution. I never knew what was going through her head, she was unpredictable, downright crazy at times. She moved her lips to my ear, and I could feel her warm breath as she whispered quietly.
	“You're such a good boy for telling me the truth.”
	The moment that she felt me relax a little, she pressed the glowing cigarette into my skin. I let out a yelp and flinched away from her, covering my neck with my hand as I danced out of my chair and scurried across the room.
	“Fuck! What was that for?”
	“That's your reward for telling the truth,” she explained as she stood there with her hands on her wide hips, the cigarette now returned to her mouth.
	“How is being burned a reward?”
	“The reward is that I didn't do worse to you,” she added. “Now go get your coffee, and let me read through some more of this chat log.”
	My face went pale, and her eyes narrowed.
	“Read through more?” I asked. “You already found me out, so what say I just get some coffee in me, and you let me get on with my work?”
	“Unless you want to take that coffee as an enema, you'd better do as I tell you,” she snapped. She pointed to the door, and I bowed my head, knowing better than to antagonize her further. As I hurried down the stairs, I considered opening the door and bolting into the snow. Sleeping on a bus stop bench might be preferable to facing Exampla when she got done reading those chat logs. Not only had I been making Exampla a mascot for my stream, but my viewers and I had been brainstorming a short story in which she did some...unsavory things. If she didn't like being a mascot for my streams, and she liked me drawing porn of her even less, then what would she think of a dirty story that was being written about her?
	My hands shaking, I poured a cup of coffee, watching the steam rise to the ceiling in a lazy plume. I took a moment to run a dish cloth under the cold faucet, then held it against the burn mark on my neck, wincing as it stung me. This wasn't unusual behavior for her, sometimes I forgot to fear her and she felt that a harsh reminder was in order.
	Once my burn had been appropriately soothed, I made for the stairs, hesitating at the first step as I took a sip from my cup. Perhaps I should finish it all before I returned to the bedroom, it didn't make sense to give her even more potential weapons to use against me.
	Fuck it, she would no doubt have read everything by now, I might as well just take whatever punishment she had in mind and get it over with. Who knew, maybe she would like the idea of being featured in a story? Stranger things had happened.
	I mounted the steps slowly and emerged into my room, eyeing Example warily as she leaned over my desk, squinting at the monitor as it bathed her blue face in its pale light. She heard my shoes scuff the carpet, turning her head slowly to stare at me, ice water running through my veins as I averted my eyes and walked over to the edge of my bed. I sat, taking another drink from the coffee cup, cradling it in my hands as I watched her tail wave back and forth in irritation. She was like a cat in that sense, she always seemed to express her emotions with the long, tapered appendage. 
	“Would you care to explain what 'this' is?” she asked, and I leaned to look past her. As I had expected, she had the text file open, the beginnings of her story visible on the monitor. She had the stream chat open too, and I could make out two users discussing some of the less savory passages. I swallowed conspicuously, then steeled myself.
	“It's...a story.”
	“A story about me?” she prompted.
	“Yes,” I replied, unable to conceal my hesitation. “Now, before you blow a gasket, let me explain.”
	“Oh, I would just 'love' to hear you try to explain your way out of this,” she said as she turned to face me. She crossed her arms over her chest, glaring down at me. She somehow seemed even larger from my sitting position, I had to crane my neck to look up at her.
	“My fans really like you, and I've been reading a lot of these stories lately. I thought that maybe they'd like it if-”
	“You know how I feel about you making me into a clown for your audience,” she snapped, cutting me off as her cyan eyes flashed with anger. “What makes you think that I would enjoy being made the object of some...depraved sexual fantasy? Just look at this stuff,” she said as she turned to gesture at the monitor. “Is this what you're into now? You like 'femdom'? Or have I just punished you so many times that you're starting to enjoy it, like some kind of twisted Stockholm syndrome?”
	I saw a glint in her eye that scared me, a sinister smile curling her black lips.
	“Would you like a taste of the real thing?” she hissed.
	I never knew whether she was joking or not, her sense of humor was so twisted and alien. I recognized that expression however. Her eyes were wide and predatory, staring at me with an intensity that made me want to cower and hide. Her shiny lips were pulled back to expose her sharp, carnivore teeth in a smile that was as cold as a corpse, designed only to intimidate. She was being serious, and I felt my gut begin to swim with a blend of fear and arousal. Was she right? Had I started to enjoy the ways that she hurt me?
	“Now hold on a second,” I said as I raised my hands, setting the coffee down on the floor and sliding off the bed. I began to back away slowly, but she had that crazy look in her eyes, her ample bosom rising and falling conspicuously beneath her purple jumpsuit as her breathing grew heavier. Her black tongue snaked out of her mouth to wet her lips, like she was salivating over a delicious meal that she was about to eat.
	“So what is it that you like?” Exampla hissed, her toothy grin stopping my heart in my chest. “Whips? Chains? Do you imagine me dressed from head to toe in black leather, studs on my boots and a paddle in my hand?”
	“N-No!” I stammered, “it's nothing like that!” 
	I felt my butt hit the windowsill, and I realized that she had backed me up against the wall. She was still coming, her unblinking gaze fixed on me, her head skirting the ceiling as she loomed over me like a monster. She kicked over the coffee cup with one of her three-toed feet, the contents spilling over the carpet, and she didn't even seem to notice. 
	“Do you fantasize about me overpowering you and doing terrible things to you? Blurring the lines between pleasure and pain? And here I thought that we had a more professional relationship than that...”
	“Listen,” I pleaded, moving to my right as she closed in and hopping over my bed to put a barrier between us. She kept her eyes fixed on me, beginning to circle around the obstruction in order to reach me. “It was just a thought! The viewers really like you, why is that such a bad thing? Why do you hate that so much?”
	“Because I'm here for you, my little sugar dumpling,” she cooed. It was saccharine, insincere, the nickname intended to mock rather than to endear. “I'm your muse, and nobody else's. I don't want to be shared, I only want to be adored by one person, feared by one person...”
	“I understand! I won't draw you in the streams anymore, I won't let people write stories about you ever again!”
	“I don't think you do,” she said, “I think you need to be reminded why you should fear me. Perhaps I've been too lenient, maybe the soft touch isn't working out.”
	She cornered me, and I sank to the floor, covering my head with hands as she boxed me in and leaned down close to me. I could feel her breath on my skin, her tall body casting me in a dark shadow. “I'm going to have to hurt you now, sugar pie. Believe me when I say that this hurts me more than it hurts you, but this is what you drive me to with your chronic misbehavior.”
	She explained it as if it should be self-evident, her tone condescending, like she was talking to a child. I felt her fingers close around my wrists, pulling them away, and then she reached down and took a handful of my hair. I liked to grow it long, and it reached the small of my back, giving Exampla more than he enough to get a tight hold on me. She wrapped it around her hand like a rope, pulling me to my feet, and I grimaced as it stung my scalp.
	She released her hold on me, and I tried to rush past her. She let me get a few feet, allowing me a glimmer of hope, but only so that she could dash it moments later. I felt her arm hook around my neck, her bicep bulging against my cheek as she locked me in a choke hold. I gagged and sputtered, her tight grip closing off my windpipe, my cheeks turning red as she lifted me so that only the tips of my toes could reach the floor.
	Exampla leaned in, those black lips an inch away from my ear as she whispered to me. Her voice was low and menacing, but there was a hint of what almost sounded like affection, and that scared me even more...
	“You think you can get away from me? I'm always here, I'm in your head, I'm a part of you.”
	I patted her forearm in a silent plea, the muscle beneath her blue skin as hard as stone, and I started to panic as my empty lungs sucked at nothing. She watched me intently as my lips began to turn the same shade of blue as her hide, my eyes watering as the corners of my vision darkened. When I was on the cusp of unconsciousness, she finally relented, releasing me to fall to my knees.
	I clutched at my throat, coughing as I nursed the red welt that she had left, and then I flinched as I felt her fingers close around the back of my neck. Like scruffing an unruly kitten, she pulled me to my feet again, her sharp claws pressing into my skin just deep enough to leave a mark without making me bleed. They brushed my jugular, a spark of primal fear coursing through me. She could have taken my head off with those things, all it would have taken is one flinch and I'd be spilling arterial blood all over the carpet.
	Her grip was like iron, and she caught one of my wrists in her other hand, wrenching it back and pushing me forward so that my torso was parallel to the ground. My long hair fell over my face, and I winced as she forced my arm into an unnatural angle. It was some kind of martial arts move, like she was putting me in a stress position, threatening to wrench my limb out of its socket as she applied more pressure. It didn't hurt enough to make me cry out in pain, but it was extremely uncomfortable and she had complete control over me.
	“You can't run,” she cooed, “there's nowhere you can go that I can't find you.”
	She was frighteningly strong. Her toned muscles weren't just for show, they were functional, and I got the impression that she was only leveraging a fraction of her strength to hold me completely helpless.
	“What say you and me spend a little quality time together? We can talk about these issues that you've been having, a little heart to heart...”
	She was so strong, impossible to fight off, and she led me over to the bed like she was holding me by a leash. When I got close enough to the edge of the mattress, she curled her tail around my feet, letting go of me and tripping me in an almost comical fashion so that I fell forward onto the bed.
	I landed on my face, bouncing on the mattress as I heard her chuckle from somewhere behind me. When I managed to right myself, rubbing my sore arm, I turned to see her holding a bundle of chains. They were long, made from heavy, black metal links that clanked together as they spilled from her hands. They had appeared from nowhere, as if by magic.
	“Where the hell did those come from?” I sputtered, unable to conceal my surprise.
	“The same place I got this stogie,” she said, removing a long cigar from her mouth and blowing a smoke ring in my direction. “This is what you wanted, right?” Her lips were still curled into that wild grin, and she was breathing heavily through her nose like an angry bull that was preparing to charge. “This is what you fantasized about it, isn't it? This is what you imagined me doing to you in the depths of night, when you thought that you were alone and your thoughts were private? Is this what those degenerates that you call your 'fans' wanted to see?”
	“I said that I was sorry,” I pleaded, “I promised never to do it again. What more do you want from me? Just tell me, and I'll do it.”
	“I want you to learn,” she said, the chains scraping along the floor as she inched towards me.
	She climbed onto the bed and pinned me beneath her immense weight, the chains seeming to move under their own power, almost like metal snakes. They wrapped around my wrists, digging into my flesh uncomfortably, rendering my arms immobile as she straddled me.
	Her thighs were as hard as the steel that comprised those chains, squeezing my hips in a vice grip, firm muscle bulging from beneath the subtle layer of fat that gave her such a comely figure. She could probably have crushed a bowling ball to dust between them.
	Her musculature was suddenly so visible beneath the glow of the naked light bulb that lay just above her head, as if I was noticing it for the first time. Her purple jumpsuit was at tight as latex, like it had been painted onto her skin, the contours of her body easily visible beneath the unidentifiable fabric. The light cast dark shadows that accentuated her abs, twin rows of bunched muscle that protruded from her otherwise flat belly to such an extent that they cast their own shadows. They were so defined, as if they had been chiseled from marble by a sculptor, flexing and shifting gently as her body moved. I could make out the bones of her wide hips, the indent of her navel, the subtle mound between her legs...
	“See something you like?” Exampla asked, peering down at me with those cyan eyes, glittering like emeralds as she exhaled a puff from her cigar. I blushed, unable to formulate a reply, and she shot me a toothy grin.
	Above those washboard abs were a pair of heavy breasts, suspended by the fabric with no bra visible beneath it. The clothing was so tight that it strained to contain them, the two massive globes wobbling gently as she shifted her weight. They looked like they were one step away from bursting out of her jumpsuit, each one of them larger than my own head. Why did a reptile need breasts? The question lingered in my mind, even as I watched them sway, blood beginning to flow to somewhere that it shouldn't.
	She reached down with a curved claw and pressed it gently against my throat, the pointed tip digging in my skin. I froze, not even daring to breathe, and then she began to move down. She sliced open the collar of my worn sweater, along with the t-shirt that I was wearing underneath it, cutting the fabric like a hot knife through butter. She wasn't even applying much pressure, which said a lot more about the sharpness of her talons than it did about the quality of my attire.
	She seemed to know exactly how deep to go to avoid filleting me like a freshly caught trout, yet she wanted me to feel it, leaving a stinging trail down to my belt line as she split the garments cleanly in half. She opened the two halves like a jacket, leaving my naked torso exposed, and a throb of fear shot through me. Exampla was unpredictable on the best of days, for all I knew she was about to perform a live vivisection.
	I winced as she brought both hands down to my chest, pricking me with her claws. She was breathing heavily now, and I saw something that almost resembled hunger in her pitiless stare. I felt her fingers begin to drag down my torso, not applying enough pressure to break the skin and to draw blood, but just enough that her claws left burning welts. It was like she was painting and my skin was her canvass, my reptilian assailant making shapes and patterns, leaving stinging scratches in her wake. I knew that she was enjoying my squirming, her thighs tightening around me to hold me still as I strained against my bonds, the metal links clattering together. It was futile, I could not escape, all I could do was endure the pain as she made me her plaything. 
	She grew tired of it before long, pulling her hands away, and when I opened my eyes I saw her slip one of her fingers into her mouth to suck away a droplet of crimson blood that was clinging to her claw. I glanced down at myself, catching my breath. It looked like I had been attacked by a group of angry cats. My pale skin was criss-crossed with sore scratches, and I shivered as I saw that she had written her name on my belly. There she had broken the skin, a hint of blood visible, but it was nothing that could have been described as an injury.
	“Pain is the most efficient teacher,” she whispered, withdrawing her finger from her mouth and making slow circles with it on my stomach. Her touch was light, and it tickled, making my muscles spasm beneath it as if they were trying to recoil from her. “Sometimes telling a child that the stove is hot doesn't get the message across, sometimes you need to let them get burned. Not only will they learn their lesson, but they'll start listening better too. You need to learn to listen better, sugar pie. The question is, what will serve as our hot stove?”
	She pulled her cigar from her mouth and tapped the end of, dropping a few particles of hot ash onto my belly. I squirmed as they burned me, glaring up at her.
	“You look angry,” she whispered, reaching down to brush my red cheek with her knuckles. It was an oddly gentle gesture, contrasting strangely with her cruelty. “Be as angry as you want, fight me all you want, it won't make a lick of difference...”
	She leaned down towards my face, opening her jaws and exposing her rows of sharp, carnivore teeth. Her long tongue snaked forth, the length of tapered muscle glistening with her saliva, and she dragged it across my cheek. It was slimy, her flesh smooth and warm.
	“You taste like fear,” she said, her eyelids fluttering as if sampling my flavor was akin to snorting a line of coke. I felt her steely thighs shiver as she wet her black lips, peering down at me covetously. Whether she wanted to make love to me, or eat me, I had no idea. Her expression didn't reveal anything that I didn't already know, mostly that she was not of sound mind.
	Suddenly she reached her hands down towards my neck. She did slowly, watching me with a smile far warmer than her cold intent, wanting me to anticipate what she was going to do to me next. As they neared my throat, poised to throttle me, I desperately tried to free my arms so that I might ward her off. The metal links clanked together, and I bucked and writhed beneath her, struggling against the tight bonds. If anything my fighting only seemed to please her more. She was like a little girl pulling the legs off a spider, toying with it, almost innocent in the way that she gleaned entertainment from the act of cruelty.
	Finally the cool skin of her fingers brushed my throat, and I felt her digits wrap gently around my neck. She applied so little force at first, like she was cradling me, my heart pounding in my chest and my senses seeming to heighten as those wicked claws pricked my most vulnerable anatomy. She just waited, watching me react, feeling the blood pumping through my jugular veins and the flexing of my windpipe as I sucked in panicked gulps of air.
	“So warm, so alive,” she mused as her cyan eyes met mine. “But you could so easily not be. I would just have to squeeze, like so...” I felt her grip begin to tighten, not enough to choke me, but enough that it made me cease my squirming and lie still. “...then you'd be cold and silent. It would be so easy, you're such a helpless creature...”
	Her fingers tightened again, this time cutting off my air supply. I tried to remain calm, to stay still so as to deny her the satisfaction of watching my reaction. She squeezed, her bosom bobbing as her chest rose and fell, her own breathing hastening as her excitement mounted. I held my breath for as long as I could, but after a short while my body's need for oxygen overrode my higher functions, punctuated by the jangling of my chains as I began to kick and struggle. I took in gasping breaths, sucking at nothing, my lungs burning as they made hopeless attempts to fill themselves.
	Exampla watched me the whole time, as calm and as serene as I had ever seen her, drinking down every twitch and sputter as the color began to drain from my face. Finally she saw fit to release me, coughing and rasping as she allowed me to breathe again.
	“How does it feel, being so helpless?” she asked, “knowing that I have absolute power over you? I'm not gloating, I genuinely want to know. I've never been in that situation before, I've never been someone's toy, their plaything. How does a mouse feel when at the mercy of a cat?”
	I turned my head away, refusing to reply. She plucked the cigar from her mouth with one hand, then reached down and gripped my cheeks with the other. Her expression was fierce, but as I watched it softened, and she leaned down closer to me. Her black lips pressed against mine, and I lurched as I felt her long, sinuous tongue push into my mouth. It was like a living creature in its own right, tapered and slick with her saliva, writhing and twisting as it wormed its way inside me. She licked my inner cheeks, drew shapes on the roof of my mouth, her muscular organ twirling around my own as if teasing it.
	She tasted of tobacco, smelled like it too, and as much as I disliked it I couldn't help but lean into her and return her impromptu kiss. She was so skilled, it was making my heart flutter despite my sorry situation, and my traitorous brain was beginning to associate her smoking with the unwelcome throbs of pleasure that were coursing through my body. 
 	Her contact was so slippery and smooth, the metallic flavor of her saliva pricking my taste buds, her shiny lips smacking wetly as she forced me into a lurid embrace. It was impossible not to react to it, the bruises that were forming around my throat all but forgotten as her sensuous kiss dragged on. She was so gentle, loving, cradling my face in her hands as my brain began to fizz and pop. I felt like someone was flooding my mind with static. It became so hard to think, I could only feel as she worked her magic on me.
	There was so much of it, her slimy coils piling into my mouth and bulging my cheeks, the pointed tip of her dexterous organ probing the back of my throat and threatening to choke me. It was long and thick, large even in the context of her exaggerated stature. It felt like she was painting the inside of my head with her saliva, strands of it leaking from our joined lips to dribble down my cheeks and hang from my chin in strands. She had such expert control over it, like it was more of an extra appendage than a simple tongue. Forget tying cherry stems, she could have cracked a combination lock with that thing.
	She was such an artist with her organ, the slow and measured strokes like those of a painter's brush, my taut body slowly beginning to relax as reluctance gradually morphed into a willingness that surprised even myself. How could she switch gears so quickly? It was like there were two people inhabiting her head, one of them cruel and vicious while the other was doting and kind, and I never knew which one of them I was dealing with at any given moment.
	As if to illustrate that point, she suddenly bit my tongue, pricking it with her sharp teeth and jolting me out of my state of nirvana. I felt a pang of pain and tasted the copper flavor of blood in my mouth as she drew back, wetting her lips as she looked down at me with a lurid expression.
	“What's the matter?” she asked, “cat got your tongue?”
	I grimaced, glaring at her angrily as I stuck out my tongue and ran my finger over its surface, the chains just slack enough to permit it. When I pulled my digit away, I saw only a small droplet of blood the size of a pinhead. She had not bitten me too hard, it was a love tap considering what those pointed teeth were probably capable of.
	“You can't stop drawing me, right? What is it that you like so much about me exactly? What is it that captivates you so?”
	My eyes were drawn to her belly, where she was digging her claws into her clothing. I watched, transfixed as she tore the bright purple fabric of her suit in one smooth motion, like Superman opening his jacket. She exposed the blue skin beneath, the sound of the tearing material loud in the otherwise silent room.
	Under that tight-fitting garment, her azure stomach was impressively developed. I could make out each chiseled abdominal muscle as it bulged from beneath her taut belly, her six pack flexing and rippling as she moved, Exampla tensing them for my benefit as she watched me with her pitiless eyes. It looked like it had been chiseled from a block of solid marble, as if her torso belonged on a pedestal in some Roman gallery, a monument to the ideals of beauty and strength. It was almost too perfect, almost too toned, and once again I wondered if my tormentor was not simply a figment of an imagination gone out of control. I watched as the beads of sweat that were beginning to well on her smooth body followed the channels that her abs cut in her skin, catching the light, glistening like tiny diamonds as they rolled slowly downwards towards her navel.
	“Is this what you want?” she asked, “should I sit before you in the nude and have you paint my naked body? Is that not the purpose of a muse, of a figure drawing model? Perhaps with a bowl of assorted fruits sitting on a stool at my side?”
	She shuffled up my body, her weight oppressive, kneeling atop my already chained arms and pinning me even more hopelessly. Exampla looked down on me from on high as she slipped the cigar back into her mouth and took a draw from it, the crotch of her purple garment brushing against my chin as she straddled my face. I could feel the hard muscle of her thighs as they pressed around my head, closing like a vice. 
	I watched with wide eyes as she used the wickedly sharp claw on her index finger to shred her clothes, running it through the fabric like she was pulling down a zipper, the material above it parting as she went. She made an inverted Y shape, slitting the material down her belly and along her legs, letting it fall away. She didn't seem concerned that she was destroying her own clothes, perhaps they were just as ephemeral as the chains that bound me. Besides, the suit was so tight against her skin that I couldn't imagine how she would get into it, there were no visible buttons or zippers.
	I felt the smooth skin of her inner thighs against my face, like polished stone, cooler than my red cheeks. I had a magnificent view of her abdominal muscles from this angle, the shadows cast by the naked light bulb that was now situated directly above her accentuating them, the droplets of sudor that clung to her refracting the glare. She peered down at me over the mound of her bust, still contained within her strange garment, straining against the fabric with its weight.
	Her loins were poised only an inch or two above my face, her swollen lips dripping strands of clear fluid as she sat heavily on my naked chest. Her nethers were just as black as her tongue, flushed and moist, the sheen of womanly slime that clung to them shining like an oil slick where the light touched it. She was so wet, and I could feel the heat that she radiated on my face, her feminine scent rising to my nose. Exampla was so 'ready', I had known that she enjoyed toying with me, but I never imagined that it got her off to this extent. She was downright drooling in anticipation of what was to come.
	My eyes tracked a glob of her viscous excitement as it dripped from her discolored flesh, falling onto my chest and sliding down towards my neck. I was transfixed for a moment, enraptured by her, and then I felt something brush my growing erection.
	It was her tail, limber and flexible, Exampla coiling it around my shaft through the fabric of my pants and squeezing it. It felt like an anaconda was coiling itself around my member, and I got the sense that this pressure was only a fraction of what she could bring to bear.
	“Does the sight of me excite you?” she asked as she exhaled a plume of smoke through her nostrils, already knowing the answer. Her tail squeezed tighter, and a pulse of pleasure rippled up my spine. The appendage was so muscular, and yet much like a snake, it was sheathed in a layer of cushiony fat. She waited a moment for me to reply, then squeezed again, harder this time. An unbecoming whine escaped my throat, and she seemed to enjoy that, watching me hungrily as I squirmed under her considerable weight.
	“I want to hear you say it,” she hissed, “say it...”
	“Yes,” I groaned.
	“Yes to what?”
	“Yes, you excite me...” I admitted.
	“Such a good boy,” she cooed, reaching down and running her taloned fingers through my hair. “Doesn't telling the truth to me, and to yourself, make you feel better?”
	She rewarded me with another squeeze of her powerful tail, a gasp interrupting me as I attempted to answer her.
	“Y-Yes.”
	She seemed to have calmed down a little, but just when I started to let my guard down, her grip on my hair tightened. She took a handful, yanking me closer, my cheek slapping against the wet skin of her belly. Her body smelled divine, like wet leather, and I could feel her abs pushing against me through her velvet skin.
	She held me there, peering down at me with those emerald eyes, waiting. She knew me too well, perhaps as well as I knew myself if she was indeed a figment of my imagination as I sometimes suspected, the flexing of her firm muscles against my cheek and the gentle squeezing of her tail sapping my will to fight her.
	I opened my lips and mouthed softly, tasting the salt of her sweat on my tongue as I traced the contours of her six pack. My resolve broke, the feminine scent of her body, her warmth and her taste overpowering me. She was so alive for a creature that might well be a hallucination, her alien skin as smooth as silk and slippery with moisture, my tongue gliding across it as her belly tightened at my touch.
	“That's right,” Exampla hissed, maintaining her firm grip on my long hair. “Be honest with yourself...” She tugged at it, stabs of dull pain muddling my senses as she stung my scalp, guiding me along. I kissed and licked, suddenly overcome with a desire that made me feel drunk. Was she right? Did I enjoy her cruel treatment on some level?
	Those chiseled abs were so hard, like stones that had been smoothed by the flow of a river, and yet her body was also soft and inviting in all the right ways. Much like her tail, her toned body was sheathed in a layer of fat that begged for my touch, delicate and supple, impossible to resist. It was like she had been conjured by some evil deity for the sole purpose of tormenting me. I wanted nothing more than to reach up and sink my fingers into her pliant flesh, to slide my hands across her voluptuous figure and to feel the toned muscle beneath twitch and harden. But I was hopelessly trapped. I couldn't lift so much as a finger, my wrists burning where the metal manacles dug into my skin and her weight pinning me, making me sink into the mattress beneath us. All that I had at my disposal was my mouth, and so I made the best of it.
	When my tongue found her navel, slipping inside for a second, I felt her shudder as she loosed a uncharacteristic giggle.
	“I'm ticklish,” she whispered. “But I like this new attitude, sugar pie. Go a little further down and you'll find something far sweeter...”
	It wasn't a suggestion, Exampla yanking my hair as she forced me lower and shuffled forward a little to give me easier access to her loins. In a moment I felt her smooth thighs brushing against my cheeks, the splayed lips of her dripping sex leaking their fluids onto my face. I looked up at her, a string of her juices falling to my cheek as she poised above me, spreading herself open with two clawed fingers. She looked enough like a human down there that nothing particularly stood out as unusual, besides the jet black color of her flesh, her delicate folds reminding me of vinyl or black latex. Her scent filled my head, harsh and powerful, it almost smelled like gasoline. There was a kind of musk hiding behind it, primal and feminine, something about it making my member throb.
	“Don't make me ask for it,” she said sweetly, but despite her tone I knew that it was a threat.
	I reached up, our lips meeting in a sordid kiss, my tongue sliding out of my mouth to trace the creases of her sex. Her flavor was sour, metallic, but I found her impossible to refuse. My reptilian captor squirmed, her wide hips rocking from side to side and her meaty thighs clenching around my head as I painted her intimate anatomy with slow strokes, her excitement leaking down my chin as she ground her loins into my face.
	I did my best to keep pace, but she was ravenous, her appetite surprising me. I looked up over her smooth, hairless mound as her abs flexed and rolled. It was almost like she was dancing to a beat that only she could hear, the light and shadow mesmerizing as it accentuated her already impressive features. I could see every muscle moving beneath her azure skin, every droplet of sweat as it crawled its way slowly downwards, her breasts bobbing within the remnants of her torn clothing.
	Her vulva was fever hot, nearly enough to burn my tongue as I drew shapes on her flesh. A combination of my own saliva and her syrupy emissions made our contact slippery and wet, her taste and scent making me feel light-headed. I circled her opening, Exampla shuddering as a tremor washed through her, her grip on my hair tightening to the point that it made me wince. Her sharp claws raked my scalp, but somehow it felt good to me, encouraging me to keep up my ardent licking.
	I pushed my tongue inside her, and I felt her winking entrance grip me with surprising ferocity, attempting to drag me deeper. Her insides were just as wet and as slimy as her vulva, her flesh like satin soaked in jelly, rippling and pulsating as it molded around my organ like melting plastic. Despite her size she was incredibly tight, her pelvic floor muscles just as developed as those of her abdomen.
	I slid back out of her, only able to escape her grasp due to how slippery she had made me, resuming my mouthing and kissing. She rumbled happily in her deep voice, almost like a purring cat as she enjoyed the sensation of my lips as they crawled about her loins. I paused to plant sucking kisses on her inner thighs and her hips, feeling her shift and wriggle appreciatively. I rose to the top of her vulva and encountered a swollen nub, realizing that it was her clitoris.
	Just my breath was enough to make her shiver, and she tugged my face out from between her legs, staring down at me with a sinister smile on her black lips.
	“You'd better follow through if you're going down that road,” she said ominously, “only a fool would dare to leave me unsatisfied.”
	She slammed me back down again, squeezing my erection with her tail as she encouraged my ardent licking. I pressed my lips around her swollen clitoris, giving it a tentative flick with my tongue, feeling a tremor pass through her body. She growled, a low rumbling sound that set my teeth on edge, and I hesitated for a moment as a stab of fear made my heart skip a beat. 
	“Don't stop now, sugar pie,” she whispered in her mocking tone. “Or I'll really give you something to be frightened about.”
	I resumed my work, sucking the engorged nub of flesh into my mouth and circling it with my tongue. I drew shapes on it, teasing her with slow glances, pinching it gently between my lips as she writhed atop me. My red cheeks were coated in a sheen of her slimy juices, her oil-black flesh grinding against me, Exampla showing not one iota concern for my comfort as she fucked my face. She smelled like petrol, who knew what the chemical composition of this clear goo was, and I tried not to swallow any of it as it seeped into my mouth.
	“Maybe we should do this more often, darling” she crooned. “You seem to have a hidden talent. If you keep this up I might have to just knock you down and sit on your face whenever the mood takes me, would you like that? I bet you'd enjoy it, wouldn't you?” She said it with a spike of disdain in her voice, as if I should be ashamed of it, even as my lurid attentions made her arch her spine and twist her hips like a belly dancer.
	I could feel her getting closer, her thrusting become less measured and more erratic, and I struggled to breathe as she buried me in a prison of black velvet. She drew back for a moment, her chest heaving as she gave me a few moments to catch my breath, staring down at me with malice in her eyes as she watched a thick strand of her syrupy emissions break and fall to my cheek.
	“This is what you deserve,” she sneered, pulling my hair painfully. “This is where you belong, and there's no God that can save you if you're foolish enough to forget it again. Now say thank you.”
	“W-What?” I sputtered.
	“Say, 'thank you Exampla,' or things are going to get a whole lot worse for you.” She removed her cigar from her black lips and blew a plume of smoke down between her legs, leaving me coughing and blinking as it stung my eyes.
	“T-Thank you Exampla,” I muttered.
	“That's more like it,” she said with a sardonic smile, replacing the cigar and taking a long draw from it. “Now finish me off, you little tease.”
	She lowered herself back down, sealing her thighs around my face, and I found her tender loins with my lips once again. I licked and sucked, planting kisses and doing my best to keep pace with her mechanical thrusting, then I winced as she pulled my hair again.
	“No, my clit, moron. If you want me to get off you, then you'd better get me off, capiche?”
	I did as she asked, feeling her shiver and hearing that low, reverberating growl again. I sealed her engorged protrusion between my lips, sucking it out from beneath its protective hood of black skin, doting on it. It didn't take long to finish her off, she really seemed to be reveling in her cruel treatment of me, and I felt her lurch as a climax tore through her. Those blue, steely thighs gripped my head, the muscles bulging from beneath the soft layer of flesh. I feared for a moment that she might crush me, but she seemed able to restrain herself. She doubled over and growled, her eyes closed and her lips pulled back to bare her sharp teeth, her abdominal muscles tensing as the waves of pleasure rocked her one after the other.
	Her twitching tunnel expelled a flood of sticky fluid with the consistency of honey, splashing against my face, making her dark flesh even more slippery as she ground her hips against me. I endured it, that gasoline scent stinging my nose, until she finally slowed and her tense body started to relax. 
	Exampla pulled back, her lips linked to mine by thick, clear ropes of her womanly emissions. She peered down at me with a satisfied expression on her face as I glared back at her.
	“Yeah...yeah,” she muttered, chewing on the end of her cigar. “That look suits you, covered in my cum...” I flinched as she squeezed my cock through the fabric of my pants again. “You sure are hard for someone who looks so pissed off.”
	Her demeanor abruptly changed, and her stone cold stare became suddenly sympathetic. She cleaned some of the thick syrup away with her thumb, wiping it on the bed sheets beside her, then she released my hair from her tight hold and swung her legs off me. I bounced on the mattress as she shifted position, lying down beside me as she propped herself up on her elbow, hooking her free arm and one of her legs around my naked torso as she pulled me closer. The chains clattered, still keeping me restrained, but giving her enough slack that she could move me around. She curled her powerful tail around one of my legs, spiraling it around my limb as she drew me in.
	She thrust my head between her breasts, soft and yielding like plump pillows beneath the thin material of her torn jumpsuit, then she began to stroke my hair almost apologetically. I flinched as her claws combed my scalp, still expecting nothing but violence from her.
	“You poor dear,” she whispered, those black lips not an inch away from my ear. Her tone was motherly and saccharine, a parody of sentimentality. “I do wish that you wouldn't drive me to such...unsavory actions. If you'd only behave yourself, then I wouldn't have to resort to such extreme measures to correct you, would I?”
	Not for the first time, I wondered if she was actually insane, or perhaps I was?
	“There there,” she crooned, petting me like a dog as she exhaled smoke through her nostrils. She looked down at my pants, where my erection was tenting the fabric, her lips curling into a wry smile. “Let me make it up to you...”
	She began to crawl slowly down my body, her black lips pulling back to expose her sharp, pearly teeth as she grinned at me. There was a mischievous glint in her eye that frightened me, but as I tried to struggle, the chains once again tightened to secure me to the bed.
	“Don't struggle honey,” she whispered, “I wouldn't want to nick you by accident.”
	I didn't want those carnivore teeth anywhere near  my cock, and the chains rattled as I struggled, kicking and writhing as the springs of the mattress creaked beneath me. I could feel her weight pressing down on the bed, and I looked down to see her hovering over my groin. She reached out with a clawed finger, prodding the tip, smirking as I tried to flinch away from her.
	Her long tail appeared over her shoulder, curling around the cigar and removing it from her mouth, holding it with the dexterity of a hand as I watched her wet her black lips with her equally black tongue. I wondered what her innards looked like, were they just as black and as oily? If I cut her, would she bleed crude?
	She daintily plucked at the buttons of my fly with her claws, pulling down my zipper and then tugging my pants off. My erection strained against the fabric of my underwear, and she tugged those off too, taking her sweet time like she was opening the wrapping on a Christmas present.
	I winced as she succeeded in pulling them over the obstruction, my cock bouncing free to stand prominently in the air. She gave it a prod, looking up at me to gauge my reaction, and my heart began to pound despite myself.
	She opened her mouth wide, or rather her jaws, because what she had was more akin to the dripping maw of a monster than the mouth of a woman. The inside was as black as her loins, coated in a layer of shiny saliva that made her flesh look slippery and oily. Even her gums were the color of charcoal. Her obscenely long tongue writhed like a snake, lolling out of her mouth, dripping a long string of clear drool. My eyes were drawn to her teeth, their white color making them stand out against the surrounding flesh, pointed and sharp like the fangs of a crocodile. There were so many of them, and she seemed to take pleasure in displaying them, letting a glob of her slaver drip down to land on my belly as I watched.
	“I just want to make you happy, sugar,” she crooned. “What do you say? Shall I give you a nice, wet blowjob?”
	I shook my head vehemently, but she just laughed at me, bringing her tail to her mouth so that she could take another draw from her cigar. I was still traumatized from the cigarette burn, my heart skipping as the glowing tip neared me. She blew a smoke ring that lazily floated up towards me, grinning as I coughed and sputtered.
	“Just relax and let me do my thing,” she said, “and you'd better keep good and still unless you want a better reason for growing out you hair.”
	I couldn't take my eyes off her, transfixed as that long, onyx tongue snaked out of her mouth and lapped at my glans. It left a wet smear, and I watched as the rope of saliva that linked it to her muscle broke, a stab of pleasure shooting through me. As much as those flashing teeth terrified me, her tongue had the texture of slimy velvet, and my toes began to curl as she circled the tip of my pulsing erection with it.
	I knew that it was flexible and dexterous, she had nearly choked me with it during her probing kiss, but now I could see it as it flexed and writhed. She wound it around my shaft, long enough to encompass my length almost entirely, my eyelids fluttering as I felt its slick surface glide against my skin.
	She kept her eyes on me, watching me as I threw my head back, my spine rising from the sheets below as the incessant movement teased me. She squeezed it like a fist, massaging me, thick ropes of her slime dripping from her maw and raining down on me as she let it flow. It was like getting oral from a shark, those pointed teeth were dangerously close to my most sensitive anatomy, and yet the pleasure was too stark and powerful to ignore.
	Against my better judgment, my hips began to thrust into her mouth, Exampla coiling her tongue back into her dripping maw like a thick strand of spaghetti as she placed a hand on my thigh to stay me.
	“Careful there, stud. What did I tell you? If you want to keep it, you'd better do as you're told. Or do you need another, more lasting lesson in obedience?”
	I shook my head, willing my body to stay still, and after a moment she resumed her work. This time she used her shiny, black lips to kiss the tip of my member, a shiver crawling up my spine as I felt them press against me. They were the color and texture of black latex, wet with her saliva, so soft and puffy that I could scarcely believe that they were attached to such a fearsome creature. She slid them over my glans, sucking on it gently, my heart racing as I felt those wicked teeth graze me.
	“C-Careful!” I stammered, “you'll cut me!”
	She talked around my member, batting it with her tongue as she spoke, as if trying to keep me stimulated even as the fear threatened to make my erection recede like the head of a frightened turtle.
	“What's the matter sugar pie, don't you trust me?”
	“No, I don't!”
	“Well this little guy sure seems to,” she said, dragging her slimy organ from my base to the tip as a gasp escaped my bruised throat. “He seems to like me a great deal...”
	I lay back and tried to keep still as she slapped at my cock with her tongue, lapping and stroking in a way that no human could have approximated. She teased me with her lips, never quite taking me into her mouth, just painting my shaft in her gooey drool until there was a glaze of shiny fluid coating it that looked half an inch thick. It oozed down towards my thighs and belly, slow and warm, that familiar gasoline scent rising to my nose.
	Suddenly she opened her mouth wide, lunging forwards as if she was about to bite my dick off. I flinched, the chains that bound me clanking, but she paused with her nose brushing my belly. Her cyan eyes peered up at me, downright gleeful, and then she slowly closed her jaws around me.
	Her snout was long enough that she could easily bury my length inside her mouth, and I was plunged into what felt like a prison of damp satin. It was all around me, sopping flesh that was coated in her slaver, her warm breath blowing on me and her obscene tongue writhing like it had a mind of its own.
	“You like it wet, don't you?” she mumbled. Her voice was muffled, and the movement of her jaws was alarming. Being so frightened and so aroused at the same time was scrambling my brains. It was like fucking a bear trap, never knowing when it might spring shut.
	I gritted my teeth as I felt her wide tongue graze my balls, my member throbbing, bumping against the roof of her mouth. She couldn't seal her lips around it in order to create suction, not with those serrated teeth in the way, and so she just batted my member around with her tongue. She coated every inch of it in her saliva, her flexible muscle licking and stroking in places that no human would have been able to reach.
	She curled it around my length, wrapping me in a cocoon of warm, slimy flesh. Her rhythmic squeezing forced a gasp from my lips. Her tongue was so strong, it was gripping me like a boa constrictor. She began to stroke up and down my length, her contact made slippery by the copious amount of gooey drool that was clinging to my skin, pumping like she was giving me a handjob.
	She scoured me from the base to the tip, my toes curling whenever her slick tongue grazed my glans, rubbing against the exposed flesh and sending jolts of electrical pleasure arcing through my body. She was merciless, not giving me a moment of respite, my head spinning a she she increased her cruel pace even further.
	As her tempo rose, I felt an orgasm welling deep inside me, my muscles beginning to spasm as she drove me closer and close to the edge. She released me with a sound like someone pushing their fist into a jar of mayonnaise, letting the thick ropes of her slaver fall where they may.
	“Keep still,” she warned, wagging a clawed finger at me.
	“But...” How was I supposed to keep completely still while having an orgasm?
	“Do you have so little self-control?” Exampla asked, flashing those cyan eyes at me. “Very well...”
	More chains manifested from under the bed, animated by unknown means, crawling up the mattress like worms made from iron links. I was alarmed by their sudden appearance, but before I could utter so much as a gasp, they had wrapped around me. They secured my limbs, cuffing my ankles and wrapping around my thighs, the metal frigid against my skin. More of them sprouted from seemingly nowhere, wrapping around my waist and even pinning me by the neck. I could not longer move a muscle, whether I wanted to or not. The one choking me was just lax enough that I could breathe, but tight enough to be bothersome, which led me to believe that Exampla had done it purposefully.
	“There we go,” she cooed, “just the way you like it!”
	“I don't like-” I began, but before the words could pass my lips, she snapped her fingers and the chains tightened. The one around my neck choked off my complaint, threatening to create a new bruise for my collection as I gasped for air.
	“Yeah you do,” she spat, “you little slut. Why would you provoke me if not for this very reason? I know what goes on in that filthy little head of yours, and if you want to be abused and beaten, then that's what you'll get. I wouldn't want to let you down now, would I?”
	She hooked her tongue around my member like a chameleon snatching a fly from the air and brought it back to her mouth, once again drowning me in a blend of fear and unwelcome pleasure as she lapped and sucked. She kept her emerald eyes fixed on me the whole time, watching intently, drinking down every grimace and twitch like she was feeding on my emotions. She could be doing that very thing for all I knew, her origin and her purpose remained a steadfast mystery, along with her capabilities and her limitations.
	She paused her maddening licking, drawing back as she let a rope of her bubbling saliva fall wetly to my thigh, licking her lips with her black appendage.
	“Don't worry sugar,” she cooed, “you're not crazy.” My face whitened, and I wondered if she could read my mind. “I can't hear your thoughts,” she laughed, my horror only growing. “You're just so easy to read. You're like an open book, with 'little slut' scrawled on every page.”
	She laughed at my expression, slapping my thigh playfully.
	“Ok, enough teasing,” she said as she stood beside the bed.
	“Are you going to let me go now?” I asked, the chain that was strapped tightly around my neck bumping my throat with every word.
	“Let you go? We're just getting started, boy.” 
	She said that last word with such a sting, who was she to call me a 'boy' like that? She noticed my angry expression, covering her mouth daintily with her clawed hand as she giggled.
	“You're so cute when you're mad. Now lie down, keep still, and give momma what she wants...”
	I didn't want to find out what 'momma wanted', immediately beginning to struggle against my bonds with renewed vigor as she used one of her curved claws to shred the rest of her purple outfit. It fell to the floor in tatters, leaving her nude, and even through my struggling I couldn't help but let my eyes be drawn to her chest.
	Her breasts hung free of their restraints, massive and heavy, the delicate fat wobbling softly as they settled. They were so large, bigger than my own head, the azure globes closer in size to a bowling ball or a smaller watermelon. They actually weren't out of place on her exaggerated frame, they were proportionate to her height and build, but they would have broken the back of a normal woman.
	They were perfect, for lack of a better word, flawless. They were weighty and soft, yet pert enough that they retained that wonderful 'inverted tea-cup' shape, nipples as black as coal standing out against her blue skin. Again I found myself wondering what use a reptile had for nipples?
	She caught me looking, exposing her pearly teeth in a grin as she lifted one of them. I watched as her fingers sank deep into the pliable meat, vanishing almost up to the knuckle, the fat spilling around her hand like melting wax. How could something be so malleable and yet retain its shape? It looked like it was made from silly putty.
	When she dropped it, it bounced enticingly, springing back to its original shape.
	“Oh, has something peaked your interest? You little liar...you struggle and fight so much, but you can't hide what you really want. You can't conceal where that filthy mind of yours wanders.”
	She walked around to the end of the bed, standing there with her hands on her wide hips as I strained to raise my head, her nude body on display. Her blue skin was dripping with beads of sweat that dripped lazily towards the ground, following her feminine curves and the channels that her toned muscles cut in her skin. She watched me disdainfully, her shiny lips curled into a sneer.
	“Is this what you want?” she asked, snapping her fingers. 
	Before my eyes, clothing appeared on her. I hadn't looked away, I hadn't even blinked, and yet there were now clothes where there had been none a second ago. How did she keep pulling these items out of nowhere?
	Exampla was now wearing a French maid outfit, heavily fetishized, like something that one might buy at a sex shop. The skirt was made from black fabric, stopping just a hair short of exposing her nethers, as titillating as it was possible to make it. It was trimmed with white, ruffled material that might have been lace, and there was a white apron tied around her waist that went on top of it in the traditional style. Her midriff was exposed, her impressive musculature on display, twin rows of abdominal muscles bulging from beneath her azure skin as if they had been wrought from stone. Around her meaty, strong thighs were two decorative garter belts, black in color and trimmed with the same white lace as her skirt. Her breasts were concealed beneath an excessively decorative brassiere, adorned with lace frills and red ribbons that were tied into little bows, the mesh-like material showing plenty of blue skin beneath it. She even had matching cuffs and a hat that was perched atop her hairless head.
	As I watched in confusion, she produced a comically archaic feather duster, leaning forward to brush it lightly across my erection. I bucked, the downy feathers tickling me, a jolt of pleasure shooting up my spine.
	“Mais Monsieur, vous êtes tellement rigide!” she said in a perfect French accent. “Quel sale pute tu fais,” she added with a snide grin. I couldn't help but imagine that the second phrase had been an insult directed at me.
	She stood again, snapping her fingers, and just as quickly as it had come the uniform was now gone. In its place she now wore shiny, black leather from head to toe, decorated with chains and studs. It was a dominatrix outfit, there was no mistaking it, the tight leather clinging to her figure in ways that made it look like she had been sewn into it. It creaked when she moved, Exampla crossing her arms as she stared down at me.
	“Or maybe this is more to your liking, you filthy creature?”
	Her breasts were hanging free, her nipples studded with silver barbel piercings, and around her neck was a spiked dog collar with a ring for a leash. A leather corset was secured tightly around her torso, further exaggerating her pinched waist, laced up with red string. She had no panties on either, exposing her smooth, blue mound. The corset was connected via two garter belts to a pair of thigh-high boots that were made from the same black leather, studded with silver spikes. She was wearing elbow gloves too, she looked like she had walked straight out of an S&M club.
	I wanted to laugh, but then she produced a bullwhip, cracking it so loudly and viciously that I make the bed shake as I attempted to flinch away from her. It sounded like a fucking fighter jet breaking the sound barrier.
	“Well? Should I have you lick my boot and call me Mistress?”
	I shook my head adamantly. She snapped her fingers again, this time standing before me in a school teacher outfit, complete with a plaid skirt and a white blouse that was unbuttoned just low enough to show off her blue cleavage. She removed a pair of spectacles that had been perched on her snout, taking a large, wet bite out of a shiny red apple that she had conjured from thin air.
	“Maybe this getup would be better suited to giving you the tuition that you so desperately need? How about some private, one on one lessons?”
	I didn't know what to make of it, was I actually losing my mind? Was I just lying on my bed, completely alone while I stared at the far wall? Was Exampla trying to be funny? Intimidating? Arousing?
	She seemed to sense my confusion, rolling her eyes as she popped the rest of the apple into her mouth, crushing it between her powerful jaws like it was the skull of some unfortunate animal.
	“God, you're so dense. Fine, I'll take a more...blunt approach.”
	In a flash she leapt up onto the bed, faster and more agile than I could ever have imagined. Something that large and that heavy should never have been able to move like that. Her knees landed heavily to either side of me, the mattress squealing and the wooden frame creaking as it threatened to give out under the impact. Her sharp claws embedded themselves in the material to either side of my head like knives, fluff from the mattress kicked up into the air as she shredded it.
	She stared at me intently with her cyan eyes, wide and wild, her reptilian pupils fixing on me like I was a prey animal that was seconds away from being devoured. She pulled back her black lips and bared her fangs like an angry tiger, running her tongue across her wicked incisors. Her warm breath washed across my face, the smell of ash and gasoline stinging my nose, and I felt a glob of her saliva fall to my cheek.
	“Sit tight honey,” she snarled, her deep voice reverberating in a primal growl, “I'm going to show you what a real woman can do.” I froze up, my instincts taking measures to protect me from what appeared to be a dangerous predator. “Feel free to beg for mercy, it won't do you any good, but it might get me off a little quicker...”
	Her long, oily tongue flopped out of her maw and glanced my cheek, like she was tasting me. I tried to turn away from her, but I couldn't do much, the chains were so tight.
	“Oh, how inconsiderate of me,” she said. She snapped her fingers again, and the chains disappeared. It was suddenly like they had never been there at all, the metal links vanishing into nothing, the pressure around my limbs gone. I stared up at her in confusion, and then I seized the opportunity.
	I scrambled to escape, attempting to roll off the bed as I reached up to push her away. Exampla grinned, giving me just enough time to feel like I might have a chance, and then I felt her steely hand close around my throat. She lifted me off the mattress like I weighed nothing, slamming me back down beneath her, her grip crushing my windpipe as I clawed at her forearm and tears began to sting my eyes. I gasped as choked, writhing on the bed. I kicked her in the ribs, but she was immovable, I might as well have been kicking a tree in an attempt to knock it down.
	As I opened my mouth in a futile bid to fill my empty lungs, she filled it with her tongue, piling her black coils into my head until my cheeks bulged. It wasn't a kiss, it was a violation, rough and greedy as her snaking organ writhed inside my mouth. It was wet, intentionally sloppy, strands of her drool leaking down my chin and coating my cheeks. She licked and stroked, a parody of a loving embrace, sliding her slimy organ around as it brushed my palate and coiled around my tongue to trap it in a fleshy prison. I felt its pointed tip scrape the back of my throat, even as her fingers gripped my neck, my gag reflex absent as I had much more pressing concerns.
	Finally she released her hold on me, sliding her long organ back out of my mouth to leave me choking and gasping as I nursed my bruised throat. I looked up at her angrily, her eyes practically glowing with arousal.
	“Wouldn't be any fun if you couldn't fight back,” she hissed. “I want to feel you struggling between my thighs, fighting me all the way. You're going to love this, and you'll hate that you loved it, that's what turns me on the most.”
	She pinned my wrists against the bed, leaning her impressive weight one me, as if she was trying to demonstrate that even without the help of the chains she was perfectly capable of restraining me on her own. I lurched, feeling her dexterous tail coil around the base of my exposed member, and then she began to angle it towards her dripping loins. Her thighs locked around my hips to prevent me from wriggling free, her muscles as hard as steel beneath that soft exterior, and I soon found myself completely at her mercy.
	She watched me intently, gauging my reaction as she used her tail to slide my glans up and down her slit, gliding it against her black flesh as she coated me in her syrupy juices. She was red hot, almost enough to scald me, her excitement leaking down my shaft in fat blobs as she wet her lips with her equally dark tongue. She was practically salivating, her large breasts swaying gently with every subtle movement, hanging from her chest as she loomed over me.
	Without so much as a word she brought her wide hips down on me, thrusting my erection deep inside her, my eyes widening and my mouth opening in a gasp as I felt her passage close around me like a fist. Exampla scarcely flinched, staring at my face as she watched my reaction, finding as much enjoyment from my expression as she did from the cock that was currently twitching and throbbing inside of her.
	It felt like silk drenched in honey, slimy and wet, feverishly hot and impossibly soft. I could feel her powerful muscles moving and shifting around me, flexing and squeezing like they were consciously trying to milk me. It was so tight, almost painfully so, her walls bearing down on me as she slid me ever deeper.
	She lowered herself down onto me, swallowing me to the hilt, my entire length engulfed in her spasming tunnel. She was so heavy, it would have been uncomfortable if the mattress had not been bearing the brunt of her weight. She squeezed my wrists in her hands, grinning toothily at me as I tried to conceal the bursts of tingling pleasure that were coursing through me with every shiver.
	“How does that feel, sugar pie?” she asked sarcastically. “I hope you appreciate this, it's much more than you deserve...”
	It was exquisite, like being massaged through damp satin, my member jumping and throbbing despite me. I was being betrayed by my own body, she could no doubt feel me throbbing inside her, the way that my shaft swelled and pulsed with every beat of my racing heart.
	I glanced down to see where our bodies were joined, her deep blue skin contrasting with my own, her flushed lips parted around my member as it vanished into her dark flesh. Her clear fluid oozed around my shaft, leaking down across my belly and thighs. I felt her hot breath was over my face, and I looked back up to see her leaning down close to me. Her snout-like nose brushed my cheek, and then her black tongue slid out of her mouth to taste my skin.
	“I can smell your fear,” she snarled, “you reek of arousal too you little cunt-tease.”
	I turned my face away, but I couldn't escape her, she had total power over me in this compromising position.
	“It's leaking out of your pores like sweat,” she continued, “you should know that you can't lie to me. Time to give you 'exactly' what you want...unless you can convince me otherwise. Go on, beg. If you can convince me that you don't want this, I'll get off you right now.”
	“I-I don't want this,” I stammered.
	“Pathetic, I can feel your cock throbbing inside me. I can smell the pheromones that your filthy little body is sweating out.”
	“Get off me,” I grumbled, her insults starting to get under my skin.
	“Fight me,” she hissed, “show me how much you hate this.”
	I wanted to do as she asked, I wanted to fight and shout and throw insults, but the feeling of her narrow passage roiling around my buried member sapped my strength. It was like she was sucking my energy out of me through her loins, the pleasure of her velvet flesh making me weak and compliant. As much as I wanted to fight her, there was a part of me that was almost addicted to the mounting ecstasy, the warmth and the wetness hypnotizing me. The promise of pleasure to come was slowly overriding my shame.
	Exampla saw it in my eyes, sensed it, I couldn't hide anything from her.
	“Yeah, that's what I thought,” she chuckled. “Maybe you're finally starting to learn your place.”
	Her emerald eyes narrowed, becoming colder and more distant, and then I felt her begin to move. She slid up my length, her tunnel sucking on me with all the intensity of a greedy mouth, the sliminess of her insides the only thing stopping her from wrenching my cock off at the root. My body contorted as her wonderfully silky flesh slid against my skin, caressing me as it grazed my tender glans. The sensation was so raw and unfiltered, harsh and almost callous, like she didn't care if I went mad from the pleasure that she was forcing upon me. When she reached her apex, she paused there for a few moments, with only the tip of my erection still lodged inside of her. Her muscles were closed around it like a pair of pursed lips, my shaft glazed in a layer of her viscous lubricant that made it shine in the light.
	My spine arched off the bed as she let gravity carry her back down, our hips slamming together with enough force to leave bruises, Exampla driving my member into her most intimate reaches. I felt her flesh parting around me, writhing and twisting like it had a life of its own, the contractions of her pelvic floor muscles milking me like a dairy cow.
	“F-Fuck,” I groaned breathlessly, the impact knocking the air out of my lungs and the spark of pleasure making my head spin.
	“If you insist,” she whispered with a grin, keeping my wrists tightly clasped in her hands as she repeated the motion. She found a punishing pace, slow enough that it denied me the stimulation that I needed to get off, but heavy enough that every thrust left me twitching and dazed. It was like the measured, powerful movements of her hips were blanking out my mind, scattering my thoughts like confetti with every downward thrust. I couldn't concentrate, couldn't think about anything besides the feeling of her moving on top of me.
	“This is so intimate,” she crooned, her demeanor once again changing on a dime. She leaned closer to me and pressed her lips against my throat, leaving a sucking kiss as I flinched beneath her. “Don't worry honey,” she whispered, noticing that I was recoiling from her. “ I won't bite, at least not very hard...”
	She bared her sharp teeth and pressed them against my bruised neck, my erection jumping inside of her despite my fear as I felt her wet, heavy tongue flop against my skin. She smeared her saliva across my throat, her organ leaving wet trails as it explored me, her teeth pinching me as she mouthed and licked. It was so warm, and if I was into it or not, she was none the less stimulating a very sensitive part of my anatomy. My eyes rolled back into my head, and I loosed an embarrassing moan, Exampla pausing her teasing for a moment to chuckle at me.
	“You moan like a girl,” she whispered, “does it really feel that good?”
	Her thighs flexed around me, her loins squeezing me tightly, her lips hovering an inch from mine as she watched me shudder. Her thrusting continued, the blue creature coming down on me like a piston, driving me deep into the squealing mattress as droplets of her slaver rained down on me. Her azure skin was dripping with fresh sweat, shining as she kept me trapped in her cruel waltz, the smoldering pleasure growing more intense as she rubbed me against her like she was trying to start a fire.
	The heat and friction were intense, I could feel every crease and bump of her textured walls as they scraped against me, her muscles rippling like a throat that was trying to swallow me alive. Her insides were just as toned as her outsides, and I watched her abdominal muscles flex as she danced, her breasts bouncing enticingly in time with the rhythm.
	Her tempo grew faster, her pillowy depths pressing around me like velvet cushions. Even as she began to rut like a feral beast, bouncing me on the tattered mattress, her soft and feminine qualities contrasted with her cruelty. She released one of my hands, delving her fingers into my hair instead, taking a tight grip and tugging painfully. As I opened my mouth to curse, she filled it with her tongue again, cutting off my pained cry. Her organ slithered and coiled inside my head, artless and crude, Exampla's composure fading as she indulged her savage desires.
	I couldn't do anything to fight her off, and so I let my muscles relax, resigning myself to being thrown around like a chew toy as she ravished me. She seemed to want to coat the inside of my mouth with her bubbling drool, her flexible organ tickling me as it glanced my throat. It was like trying to swallow a live eel that was intent on escaping.
	I gagged as she forced it deep into my gullet, my eyes watering as I felt its slippery, smooth surface graze my esophagus. Sensing that she was in danger of suffocating me, she withdrew, watching me cough as I swallowed a throat-full of her saliva. I could smell her gasoline scent, taste it as it slid down into my stomach, like a snake injecting its venom into me.
	Waves of pleasure washed over me with every rock of her hips, she was shimmying and twisting violently, not merely driving me deep into her sex but scraping my erection against her walls. It felt like she was trying to reach some maddening itch, her satin flesh grinding against me at angles and in ways that I couldn't predict. I could already feel my orgasm scratching at the door, a pressure rising inside of me that threatened to rend my sanity. I was almost afraid of its arrival.
	Exampla seemed to sense it somehow, perhaps in the way that my movements were becoming erratic, maybe she could smell it on my skin. She pressed closer, and I felt her sharp teeth sink into my shoulder, the stab of pain distracting me from the ecstasy and bringing me out of my fugue. Her fangs went deep enough to draw blood, her jaws closing around me. I grunted in alarm, and then she pulled away, strands of her saliva linking her lips to my skin. She lapped at the pattern of punctures with her long tongue, and I shuddered, the pain dulling as she took my face roughly in her hand and glared into my eyes. She looked so intense, almost crazy, panting as she kept up the brutal pace of her fucking.
	“I didn't give you permission,” she explained, “you don't get to cum until I say so.” She forced her thumb into my mouth, my tongue evading the sharp point of her claw. “Suck it,” she whispered. I didn't have much choice other than to do as she ordered, closing my lips around it and playing my tongue across her digit. She seemed to enjoy that, her eyelids fluttering as she watched me, her tunnel tightening in response.
	“I could make you my personal whore,” she said, her voice low and gruff. “I could do this to you every night, fuck you ragged and leave you exhausted, what could you possibly do about it? Nothing,” she added, her eyes narrowing as she moved her thumb around in my mouth. She was careful not to cut me with her wicked talon, but the threat was enough to keep me on my toes. “You'd never get anything done though, and your work is very important to me.”
	She released my other wrist, planting both hands on my chest, her claws pricking my skin. She was resting all of her weight on me now, it was oppressive, making it harder to breath. She might have crushed the air out of my lungs if it wasn't for the battered mattress beneath me, the springs somehow holding out against the assault. I'd probably have to throw it out after tonight, both because the springs would be completely shot, and because of the lurid blend of sweat and sexual fluids that was now soaking into it.
	Exampla began to bounce on top of me, coming down even harder and faster than before, her black tongue lolling out of her mouth. She hooked her tail beneath the bed, using the leverage to pull herself down with greater force, the frame creaking ominously. She was so damned strong, pumping ruthlessly as I shivered beneath her, reduced to a damp and trembling mess. Our coupling was so intense that it almost hurt, imbuing me with a kind of deep ache, but the pleasure was undeniable. It was euphoric, my mind clouded by a thick fog of arousal, my lust for her as powerful as my indignation. 
	With a start I realized that she had been right, I was enjoying this. I loved the way that she was treating me, I was captivated by her glistening body as it moved atop me, surfing the tides of pleasure with all the agency of a tiny raft lost on a stormy ocean. I wanted more, I burned for her, and that realization scared me more than any tooth or claw.
	I felt her hook a hand behind my head, lifting me into a sitting position as she kept me locked inside her, sitting in my lap and crushing me into the bed as she thrust my face into her breasts. Her smooth skin brushed my hot cheeks, slick with her sweat, her cleavage burying my head. They were large enough to rest across my shoulders even as they engulfed my face, their weight pressing down on me. It felt like I was trying to carry two bags of fertilizer. Her scent filled my nose, and I tasted her salty sweat on my lips, her body bumping against me as she kept up her thrusting.
	“Don't you know how to pleasure a woman?” she complained, “if you thought that I was doing this for your benefit then you're sorely mistaken. This isn't one of your gay little anime shows.”
	She tugged my hair and repositioned me, sinking her hand into the meat of her breast and pressing her hard nipple against my lips. I opened them, feeling the engorged nub of flesh on my tongue, beginning to lick and suck obediently. I was too overcome to fight her now, all I could muster the will to do was obey her.
	I felt her large body shiver as I trapped her nipple between my lips and my teeth, battering it with my tongue, her grip on my hair tightening and stinging my scalp.
	“Yeah, that's better,” she whispered. She was tall enough that her opulent bosom was at head-height to me, her breath blowing in my hair as she towered above me, one hand in my hair and the other wrapped around my back to keep me close. I felt something else brush the skin of my lower back, and then I saw her blue tail coiling around me out of the corner of my eye. She wrapped it around the both of us, tying us together, the firm muscle bulging from beneath the soft fat layer. It made for quite the hug.
	I delved my fingers into the globe of her boob, her yielding flesh molding around my fingers like wet clay, spilling between them and filling my palm. It was so elastic, her skin as smooth as varnished wood, coated in a sheen of moisture that made it slippery to the touch. I kneaded and squeezed, like I was shaping fresh dough, captivated as I doted on her nipple. I drew shapes on her sensitive protrusion, sucking and chewing softly, feeling her loins bite down on me with renewed vigor as she grumbled appreciatively.
 	“Maybe you're not completely useless after all,” she whispered, making a slow figure of eight with her hips that sent sharp stabs of pleasure shooting up my spine. I couldn't take much more of it, a desperate need was rising up inside me, like a burning fire that I had to quench at any cost. I needed the release, or I felt like I might explode from the pressure and frustration.
	Exampla didn't stop me this time, the suction of her sopping passage growing stronger as we moved together, almost like it was trying to draw my emission out of me through sheer force alone. It sucked and seized around me, every contraction lighting my nerves up like a switchboard, my very skin seeming to tingle as if there was a static electricity between us.
	“Say my name,” she hissed, as much a threat as an impassioned request.
	“I don't want to,” I mumbled, my voice muffled by her cleavage. 
	“Say it,” she repeated, tugging me out from between her breasts by the hair and glaring down at me. “Say it or I'll carve it into your chest.”
	“E-Exampla,” I stammered.
	“Like you mean it...”
	I repeated her name, my voice cracking as she let herself fall down on me again, the throb of pleasure making me lose my bearings.
	“Good boy,” I heard her croon, “now let it all out for me...”
	She might have phrased it as a request, but her pitiless thrusting left me little choice, my spine arching as she whispered those lurid words in my ear. Her walls gripped me with a new ferocity, clenching so hard that it felt like she was trying to crush of my cock, spasms running from my base to the tip like a hand was stroking me through the barrier of her hot flesh.
	Her tail tightened around me, her arms trapping me against her heaving body as I moaned into her bust, my member surging inside of her as the first wave of my climax tore through me. Stars danced before my eyes, my body going limp in her embrace as I pumped a thick wad of my ejaculate into her eager passage, the ropes splashing against her walls and flooding her depths as she clung to me. My body moved on its own, thrusting desperately, fucking the mess deeper even as I shot more of it inside her. It felt like someone was pulling a knotted rope out of me through my cock, I couldn't believe how much I was producing, it just kept coming and coming.
	Every pulse was chased by a wracking ecstasy that drowned my conscious mind under a flood of raw instinct and animal passion, my fingers clawing at her soft flesh and firm muscle as I gripped her desperately, reduced to little more than a panting animal. I could feel each and every warm load as it traveled up through my body, Exampla shuddering and growling appreciatively as she felt the hot, pearly liquid coat her insides. 
	Her claws stung my back as she held onto me, lost in her own orgasm as her massive body twitched and writhed, her trembling tunnel almost seeming to drink down my fluids as they came. A blend of her clear juices and my cloudy cum leaked from our joined bodies, sliding down my thighs in obscene globs to further sully the mattress, the mysterious woman full to capacity.
	Again and again the bursts of pleasure rocked me, colors flashing before my eyes like there was a fireworks display happening in my skull, my beleaguered nerves at the mercy of her sucking loins as they extracted my essence from my body with all the greed and vigor of a leech.
	Gradually, the sharp pleasure dulled, giving way to a calming euphoria that left me feeling drunk. It was wonderful, an oddly satisfying ache and soreness permeating me to the bone, my body shivering one last time as a lingering aftershock jolted me.
	I felt Exampla relax too, sharing in the nirvana, our sweat making our bodies stick together as we slowly drifted apart. She released me from her hold and let me fall back to the bed. I winced as my still rigid erection slipped out of her, now so sensitive that the touch of her velvet insides was almost unpleasant, and I watched as a blend of our fluids sloughed out of her in a sagging web. It broke and fell to the bed between my legs, linked to her swollen lips by fat strands.
	The bed shook as she let herself fall down beside me, almost bouncing me off the mattress as her weight displaced it. She was all flowery and calm again, and I wondered if it was just her personality shifting as usual, or if I had actually managed to sate her dark urges. She ran her finger gently across my chest, teasing me with the light touch of her claw. There were scratches all over my torso, bite marks on my shoulder and bruises around my neck, I looked and felt like I had been involved in a street fight.
	“Let that be a lesson to you,” she sighed, sounding less enthusiastic now that the fun was over. To be honest, in my addled state of mind I had totally forgotten what she had been trying to teach me, what point she had been trying to make. Not that I would ever tell her that, I wanted to keep my head after all.
	I nursed my wounded shoulder, it was bleeding slightly, but fortunately her teeth hadn't gone deep enough to do me any real harm. 
	“Sorry about the bite,” she said. “But you're just so sweet, sugar pie.”
	Exhaustion overcame me, my tired body begging for rest, and I suddenly found it hard to keep my eyes open.
	“Get a good night's rest,” she whispered, “I want you working tomorrow. You have a lot to do...”
	I felt her lean in to peck my cheek, and then suddenly she was gone. My brain was so addled that I didn't even question it, closing my eyes and letting my fatigue carry me off into a dreamless sleep.

***
	
	I awoke to pain, rising to a sitting position and groaning as my muscles ached, a dozen different scratches and bruises stinging and throbbing with every breath that I took. I felt like I had been beaten with baseball bats. Sunlight was bleeding in through the curtains, I must have slept until morning. I slid out of bed and rose to my feet, rubbing my shoulder. At least the bite marks weren't bleeding any longer...
	I pulled on a pair of pants, taking a look at myself in the mirror. There was a dark bruise around my throat, roughly in the shape of a hand, and my chest was covered in claw marks. I looked down, feeling an odd blend of anger and arousal as I saw the name 'Exampla' still etched into my stomach. The red scratches were already fading, but I could still make it out. What a bitch...
	Even without her in the room, I swore that I could feel her eyes on my back, observing and waiting. Like a lurking predator, perhaps she would wait until I fucked up again before striking, manifesting to 'punish' me for my transgressions. Then again maybe she would just turn up the next time she was in the mood, finding any excuse to subject me to her cruel and sordid games. 
	Either way I had better get some work done. I made my way down to the kitchen, setting the coffee machine going as I leaned against the counter. I smelled smoke, and my gaze was drawn to where she had put out her cigarette the night before. I reached down and picked up the remnants of her cigar, still lit with an orange glow, burning a fresh hole in my wood counter top. I looked around the room suspiciously, expecting to see her hiding in the shadows somewhere nearby. She wasn't around however, I must have just missed her by a minute or two.
	I doused the cigar in the sink and then threw it into the trash, wondering if she had only conjured it to fuck with me. The message was clear enough, 'get your work done or I'll be back'. I wasn't sure if I should be afraid by the prospect, or excited.

THE END