The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

“Look, I’m awfully sorry about this,” Gavin said, “but I’m afraid I’m going to have to eat you.” The cat just stared up at him. “It’s no good giving me that look! My father is dead, my brother has disowned me, and the only thing Papa left me in the will was a cat and a pair of high-heeled boots. My stomach is howling. I’ve got to eat you, and before the week is out I’ll probably have to eat the boots as well.” Gavin would have eaten the cat already, but he wasn’t quite sure how one prepared a cat for the table. He’d asked three women how exactly one ate pussy, and had gotten slapped twice and received a rather disgusting proposition from an elderly woman down the street. Clearly, this was something he’d have to figure out for himself.

The cat wasn’t making it any easier. It didn’t mew pitifully in anticipation of its fate; it simply stared at him with a vaguely contemptuous look on its face. “I’m no happier about it than you are!” Gavin said plaintively. Then he paused. “Alright, I’m slightly happier, I suppose, if I were to be honest, but I’m definitely not thrilled. A week ago, I was living a life of comfort and ease, son of a wealthy landowner, and now look at me! Dusty, starving, and penniless. Papa must have been mad in his old age to think that my brother would take care of me. Or he must simply have been mad. Let’s face it, when your will reads, ‘I leave my youngest son the cat and the boots’, the bit at the beginning about ‘sound mind and body’ seems a trifle suspect.”

The cat blinked haughtily. Gavin sighed. It was no good, he just wasn’t the sort of person who could kill an animal, at least not while it was staring him in the face. He sat down and started absently scratching the cat behind the ears. He’d just have to try to figure out how to stomach the boots. “I suppose it could have been a cruel joke of some sort,” he said. “I always thought Papa doted on me, and certainly my brother thought so as well. But this...it’s not the sort of behavior one thinks of as ‘loving’.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said the cat. “He gave you his two greatest treasures in all the world, the tools with which he made his fortune. That sounds fairly nice to me.”

Gavin leapt back to his feet. “You can talk!” he said.

The cat sighed. “So can you,” she said, “but I don’t feel any great need to shout about that.”

Gavin blinked rapidly in astonishment. “But lots of people talk!” he said. “You’re the first talking cat I’ve ever seen!”

“Yes, well, you’ve probably led a sheltered life.” The cat got up and stretched. “Look, we’ve got rather a lot to get through, here, so can we simply take it as read that you’ve gotten used to the fact that I can talk? I’d rather not spend the next twenty minutes guiding you through the culture shock of learning about magical animals.”

“You’re magical?” Gavin said, his voice filled with wonder.

“I’ll take that as a ‘no’, then,” the cat said, sitting back down in a bit of a huff. “Yes, I’m magical. I’m an immortal, magical, talking cat that happens to be very clever to boot. Your father saved me from a pack of wild dogs, and in return, I promised him that I would make him and his children and his children’s children wealthy and prosperous.”

“But—but—I thought he kept you around the house to hunt mice!” Gavin said.

“Oh, I do that too, but that’s only because he was already wealthy and prosperous. I’d rather hoped that having gotten him a big pile of money, the children and children’s children could take care of themselves, but he decided that primogeniture was the way to go when making out his will, so I’m right back to square one. Well, square two. I had to help him get hold of the boots, originally.”

“The boots are magical too?”

“Sharp as a tack, aren’t you?” the cat said, although not too unkindly. “Yes, the boots are magical. Go ahead and stand them up, and put me into them feet first.”

Gavin reached into the cloth sack that was his brother’s only gift to him on seeing him out of the house, and pulled out a pair of high-heeled boots. They were quite tall, probably coming right up to the thigh of most women, but given that they looked dusty, old and cracked, he doubted that many women would wear them. Still, he didn’t know much about the taste of women, or of cats for that matter, and so he stood the boots up and, holding the cat up just underneath its front paws, awkwardly put its two rear paws into them.

The resultant blaze of light made Gavin squinch his eyes shut, and so instead of seeing the cat change, he merely felt its flesh twist and stretch under his fingers as it grew. Within seconds, he could no longer feel his hands touch each other around the cat’s chest. Within moments, the cat felt as big around as a human being. As the light subsided, Gavin cautiously opened his eyes.

Where he had once held a cat, his hands now wrapped around a female of a decidedly different persuasion. She still had the fur and whiskers of her former feline self, and her face had a decidedly feline cast to it, but her shape and size had become human. Very human, Gavin realized with a start as he noticed where his hands had wound up after the transformation was complete. He whipped them away with a start.

The cat pouted just a little. “I was just beginning to enjoy that!” she said. “It felt a bit like going into heat. Is that how human women feel any time someone touches their breasts?”

Gavin blushed. “How would I know?” he asked indignantly. “I’m barely eighteen, and not yet married. I don’t know how cats do these things, but among humans, we don’t even see those things until our wedding nights, let alone have casual chats about how touching them feels.”

“Oh, my,” the cat said. ‘Sheltered life’ doesn’t even begin to cover it, I see. Well, I suppose I can educate you as we go along.”

“Go along?” Gavin asked. “Go along where?”

“To make you wealthy, of course.” The cat idly looked at her hands, wiggling her newly-lengthened fingers and sheathing and unsheathing her claws a few times. “I’m bound by Deepest Magic to honor my promise to your father—you’re not the best material I’ve had to work with, but needs must, I suppose. Just try not to say or do anything too stupid. When in doubt, remain silent. You’re good-looking, well-built, and you smell nice. That’s probably your best asset. Well, that and me and the boots.”

“But—but you can’t go wandering around like that! People will think you’re a demon, or a monster or something! Besides, how are you going to make me wealthy with just a pair of old boots?” Although, he noticed, they didn’t look old anymore. On the contrary, the red leather looked shiny and new against the cat’s white fur.

“You’re absolutely right,” the cat said. “I’ll also need a stone with a hole in it, and a piece of string.”

The string didn’t take long—Gavin pulled out a lace from his own dusty boots, leaving his right shoe quite a bit looser on him, but giving Puss (for so she’d insisted on being called) the string she needed. The stone, on the other hand, took quite a bit longer. But eventually, Gavin found one that had sat under a tiny waterfall for long enough that a hole had worn right through the center of it.

“Perfect,” Puss said, taking the stone and slipping the shoelace through it. She tied a knot around the stone. “All we need to make a fortune. Come on, let’s head down to the town.”

“How will that help us make a fortune?” Gavin said as they walked. “Is it a sort of luck charm? Is it magic too? I’ve heard that stones with holes in them are supposed to bring you luck.”

“No, that’s just something people say,” Puss said. “Not everything’s magic, you know. You’ve lived eighteen years without seeing anything magic, why would you start assuming everything is just because you’ve seen two magical things in one day?”

“Because without some magic, a stone with a hole in it isn’t much good for anything other than making a necklace,” Gavin replied, a bit stung.

“The magic is in the boots,” Puss said. “They don’t just turn cats into people, you know. Well, people-ish. That’s a side effect; the boots adapted my body into something that could wear them. No, the boots amplify animal magnetism. Anyone who’s wearing them becomes a master hypnotist.”

“So that was how you made my father his fortune? You hypnotized people into giving them money?”

“No, no,” Puss said, stopping as they passed close by a farm. “I advised. He did all the hypnotizing himself.”

“He hypnotized people? Then...”

Puss hopped over the fence and headed up to the farmhouse. “I only advise, I don’t judge or morally censure. Besides, they actually looked rather good on him.” She looked around. “A-ha!”

“A-ha?” Gavin looked around too, but all he saw was a girl feeding chickens. She was a pretty young thing, far prettier than you’d expect from a farmer’s daughter, but not exactly anything to ‘a-ha!’ over. Especially not given that Puss was a...Gavin looked over at her for a moment, wishing he knew where to lay his hands on some ladies’ clothes...a female cat.

“Our first step on the way to prosperity,” Puss said. “Wait here, and don’t look in my direction or listen to anything I say.” She walked up to the girl. “Excuse me, miss? What’s your name?” she said.

“Bess,” the girl said, still feeding the chickens. Then she looked up. “Goodness,” she said, “but if you aren’t the strangest cat I’ve ever seen!”

Puss smiled ingratiatingly. “I’m a rare breed,” she said. “Felis financis, the selling cat. I’ve come here today to interest you in my line of luck trinkets.” She held up the stone, letting it dangle and swing from the shoelace. “This is a stone with a hole in it. I’m sure you’ve heard of their magical properties.”

“Well, yes,” Bess said, “but I thought that was just something people said.” She looked at the stone. “How does it work?”

“Well, you just continue to stare at it,” Puss said, her voice taking on a soft purring quality, “and soon the magic begins to do its work. It starts by attracting your eyes to it. Notice how you’re already finding it very difficult to look away from the soft, gentle swinging motion?”

Bess nodded absently. “Yes, but that doesn’t seem very...” Her voice stilled for a moment as her eyes followed the dangling stone. “Um...very magical.”

“That’s only the beginning, my lovely,” Puss said. “Just stare at the stone a little while longer, and you’ll see that it has all sorts of magical powers.” She added a little flick of her fingers to the gentle motion of her wrist, causing the stone to spin as it swung. “For example, it has the magic of affinity. You understand affinity, don’t you, my dear? The way that some things become like other things when they are near each other?”

“Um...” Bess furrowed her brow, her glassy eyes still watching the spinning, swinging stone. “I...”

“Just say ‘yes’, dear. It’s easier.”

“Yes...”

“Exactly!” Puss smiled. “The stone has the power to make you become like it. It dangles, heavy and pulled down at the end of the string. And because you are near to it, you too feel heavy, like you’re being pulled down.” The girl began to sway dangerously, and Puss spoke quickly but calmly. “But just as the stone is dangling from the string, you are dangling from my words. My words hold you upright, just as the string holds the stone.”

Bess steadied slightly, but she still looked like she wanted nothing more than to slump to the ground. “Uh-huh,” she mumbled.

“And just like the string is tied around the stone, my words are tying around you. My words are just wrapping around your mind, because your mind is becoming like the stone now as well. The stone doesn’t think; it doesn’t need to think. The stone just goes where the string directs it.” Puss raised the stone slightly as she spoke, putting it just an inch or two above the girl’s eye level, making her have to look up to see it. Her head kept drooping downwards, and her eyes rolled up slightly as she tried to keep following the motion of the stone. “Your mind just goes where my words direct it.”

“oh,” Bess said, her voice empty and her face placid.

“You can feel how powerful the stone is now, can’t you, my dear?”

“uh-huh...” she sighed out.

“So you’d definitely like to purchase it, then.” Puss didn’t even make it a question.

“uh-huh...”

“Good, good. Luckily, we’re running a special today. How old are you?”

There was a long pause while Bess tried to remember how to respond to a question that couldn’t be answered with ‘oh’ or ‘uh-huh’. “Nineteen,” she said.

“And still a virgin?”

She smiled vacantly, back on familiar ground. “uh-huh...”

“Perfect, perfect. Luckily for you, that’s the cost of the stone, the complete mindless obedience of a nineteen-year-old virgin. Once you agree to do everything I say without questioning, totally subservient to my will, the stone is yours.” Puss paused. “Do you agree?”

“uh-huh,” Bess responded, her eyes glazing over completely as she became blank and docile.

“Very good,” Puss said, letting the stone come to rest. “Here you go!” Bess held out her hand obediently, and Puss placed the stone in her palm. “Now, my dear, you know you must obey all my commands, yes?”

“uh-huh,” Bess replied.

“Good. Give me the stone.” Bess handed it right back to Puss. “Good girl. Now come along, we’ve got things to do.” She headed back down to the fence where Gavin waited, knowing that Bess followed. “One down,” Puss said, “twenty-three to go! Although I don’t think we’ll be that lucky every time.”

“You...” Gavin just stared open-mouthed at the hypnotized girl for a long moment, trying to frame a response. He knew better by now than to say, ‘You hypnotized her!’ in astonishment, but it took a while before anything else came to mind. “You don’t think it’ll work every time?” he said at last.

“I don’t think we’ll find twenty-four virgins in a row, that’s what I think,” Puss said. “God, I don’t know how human women handle it, not knowing when they’re in heat or not. At least when I was a cat I wasn’t horny every day of the month.”

Gavin didn’t quite know how to answer that. He just kept staring at the hypnotized girl, his cock stirring in a way that left him thinking that perhaps waiting for marriage wasn’t all they said it was after all. “I’m sure we’ll find plenty of virgins,” he said absently. He found himself walking towards the girl almost without conscious volition, as though led by his stiffened cock. “In fact, I was just thinking...”

“Don’t,” Puss said, holding out a hand between him and Bess and letting her claws show. “It’s not your strong suit. We need twenty-four virgins before the king and his retinue head down this road in a few days, and I don’t have the time to indulge your appetites on top of that.” She leaned up against the fence, letting her legs spread and her hindquarters show. “If you want to stick that somewhere, you can slip it into me. I won’t mind one little bit.”

“You?” Gavin said, aghast. “But you’re all...furry!”

“Only on the outside,” Puss purred. “Inside, I’m just like any other girl.” She wiggled her hips a little and twitched her tail. “Find out for yourself.”

Gavin held up a hand. “No thank you,” he said. “It’s nothing personal, you understand. I just remember you when you were less than two feet long and ate mice. It’s kind of difficult to get that out of my head.” He looked back at Bess. “Are you sure I couldn’t just...”

Puss stood up, her fur quite literally ruffled. “Quite sure,” she said. “I’m going to make you wealthy and prosperous if I have to drag you along kicking and screaming, thank you ever so much Deepest Magic. We need twenty-four virgins, and we need them fast.”

“Why twenty-four?” Gavin asked.

“Because it’s twice as impressive as twelve, and four times as impressive as six. And frankly, given that you’re a penniless boy with nothing to your name but a cat, a pair of boots, and a stone with a hole in it, you need to be as impressive as you can get in order to catch the attention of the King.”

Gavin frowned. “What king?”

“The king,” Puss said. “King Mark. He’s touring his kingdom after a long border campaign against the giants to the south, surveying the lands and making note of what’s been going on while he’s been off at the wars. Frankly, we have good timing here. He’s scarcely got any idea at all of what’s been going on in his kingdom, and passing you off as a nobleman couldn’t be easier.”

Gavin raised his eyebrows. “How do you know all this?”

“I listen.” Puss still sounded a little sulky over having her offer of sex rejected. “People don’t tend to worry if a cat is listening when they talk. Now come on, we’ve got a lot of walking to do and a lot of girls to talk to.” With that, she headed down the road, and Gavin fell into step beside her.

Bess, of course, trotted obediently behind them.

Three days, fifty miles, and twenty-three virgins later, and Gavin was beginning to feel quite put out with his ‘benefactor’. Puss had found a number of girls whose past behavior had made them quite unsuitable for her purposes, but had she let Gavin touch a single one? No, she had not. She’d set those girls to cooking them meals, cleaning their clothes, or giving them a place to sleep, but afterwards, she’d set them free without giving Gavin even a single chance to dip his wick.

Gavin could tell it was just out of jealousy. Puss didn’t even try very hard to hide it. She refused to take any clothing, leaving herself shamelessly naked save for the red boots. Every time he brought up sex, she suggested that she would make a far better bedwarmer than any of the mindless girls she’d enslaved. By this point, though, he was determined not to sleep with her as much out of obstinacy as anything else. He’d be damned if he went crawling to her now, just because his cock was like an iron bar in his trousers and his balls ached with every waking moment. There were so many pretty young human girls; why would he decide to rut with a beast?

That, of course, seemed to have made Puss as obstinate in her desire to have him as he was to avoid her, and just as irritated with him as he was with her. By the time they stopped by the far side of the river, all they’d been doing for some time was bickering about sex. So when she said, “Strip out of those clothes, Gavin,” it certainly didn’t seem unusual.

Gavin sighed heavily. “We’ve already gone over this, Puss,” he snapped. Behind them, the girls chattered amiably in the manner of servants everywhere, their minds now only loosely held in the grip of trance until such time as Puss needed them to go deeper. “I don’t wish to seem ungrateful for your services to myself and my family, but I wasn’t the one who added ‘and your children and your children’s children’ to the end of that promise, now was I? The way I see it, it’s this ‘Deepest Magic’ thing that owes you a roll in the hay, not me.”

“Believe it or not, Gavin,” Puss said, “I am able to think about more than just sex with you. My hearing’s better than a human’s, and I can hear hoofbeats approaching and the creak of carriage wheels. That means the King’s party is coming. They’re not far off, either. And since humans don’t have enough taste to like a good strong smell on their manfolk, you need to wash off a bit in the river before you’re fit to meet the king.”

“What about you?” Gavin grumbled, pulling his shirt off. “You’re almost completely naked, and the only bathing you’ve been doing is licking yourself off at night!”

“Ever hear the expression ‘A cat may look at a king’?” Puss said. “It works both ways, especially when the cat has breasts like these. He might be surprised, but he certainly won’t mind.”

Gavin finished stripping. “Alright,” he said, wading into the river as Puss followed his movements with her eyes. “But—but...” He ducked down into the cool water, hiding his body from view. “At least stop enjoying this!” he cried out.

Puss purred out, “Whatever would make you think I was enjoying this?” Then she scooped up his clothes in a single swift motion and threw them as far out into the river as she could. Within moments, the current had carried them far away from view.

Gavin stood up, practically speechless for a moment. Then he saw that Puss was staring at him like a starving man greets a banquet, and crouched back down in the water again. “What—why—Puss, I need those! If this is some prank of yours to get to see me naked, it’s in very poor taste! The King will be along any minute!”

Puss grinned, showing a mouthful of sharp teeth. “I know. That’s why I did it. I just didn’t think you’d agree if I said, ‘Excuse me, can I chuck your clothes into the river? If the King sees you wearing them, he’ll never believe you’re a nobleman.’ Plus, it gave me the chance to see your ass.”

“Oh,” Gavin said, “and I suppose he’ll be perfectly willing to believe that I’m noble if I’m naked as a jaybird?”

“Only one way to find out,” Puss said. With that, she sprinted up the riverbank to the bridge, shouting, “Help! Robbers! Thieves! Oh, won’t someone please help my master, the Marquis de Carabas!”

Just then, a party of mounted men and carriages reached the bridge and began to cross. With a commotion, two of them rode on ahead at faster speed, reaching Puss in a matter of moments. “What’s all this about a robbery?” one said. He wore chainmail armor, and the sword by his side had clearly seen a number of battles, yet had been well cared for.

“Oh, it is a terrible thing,” Puss said, wringing her hands. “My master, the Marquis de Carabas, was returning from a visit to a fellow nobleman, bringing back the four-and-twenty virgins that he had been given to try to persuade him to marry (for he is much sought after as a husband, since coming of age), and he chose to tarry a moment to bathe in the river, for he is dusty and weary from his long travels.” She spoke loudly, letting her words carry to Gavin down in the river.

“And while he bathed, and I saw to the care of the girls, a rascal leapt onto his horse and rode off into the distance with it! I could not give chase (for the Marquis de Carabas’ horse is well known in these parts as being the fastest in all the kingdom) and even though it was laden down with his clothes, his armor, his sword, and his possessions, it quickly outdistanced me. Oh, alas!” She sniffled. “Please tell me you can offer him succour and ease his worries, and not simply add to our troubles on this day.”

As she spoke, the carriages rolled up to a halt, and a man got out. He wore no elaborate robes, simply the traveling garb of a man clearly used to much harder stretches on the road. Yet the air of command he wore, and the signet ring on his finger clearly said what his clothes did not, and Puss wisely curtseyed to the King. Behind him, she could just see a glimpse of golden hair as Princess Arianna edged near to the door of the carriage to hear the conversation.

“What do we have here?” King Mark asked. “Is this a new wonder that has developed in my kingdom whilst I was gone? Do all the cats walk upright now?”

“Oh, no, sire,” Puss said meekly. “I am merely one of the wonders that my master, the Marquis de Carabas, has collected on his travels. I am Arrapata Allegra, the Marquis’ major domo and master of his household, but I humbly insist you merely call me ‘Puss’, as he does. My full name is not for my betters.”

“Wonders, you say?” The King stroked his beard, intrigued, as the knight that Puss had spoken to whispered in his ears the particulars of the situation. “I’m always up for a good wonder, how about the rest of you?” There was a general murmur of assent. “What other wonders does he have?”

“Oh, many, Your Majesty,” Puss purred silkily. “He has a pile of gold as tall as a house, and a bird that speaks every language of man, and he needs no army, for his castle is guarded by an ogre ten feet tall with a magic belt that turns aside swords! It is only two days’ ride, Your Majesty, if you would like to come and inspect it. We would be most honored and gracious for your royal hospitality.”

“Very well!” King Mark said. “As you’re no doubt aware, this journey is in no small part to find a husband for my daughter, and if your castle is as wondrous as you say, I might have a proposition for your Marquis.” He looked down at the river. Gavin looked up at him and waved, feebly. King Mark stepped back into the carriage. “Find clothes and a steed for this young Marquis de Carabas, and send word back to the footmen to escort these four-and-twenty virgins of his along with them. They can catch up behind us.”

As with most kings, his men scurried to set deeds to his words, and so it was that Gavin shared a horse with Puss holding on to his waist (and wriggling up against him quite indecently) for many a mile. Gavin ached to speak, but they rode in the midst of the King’s men and every time he started to open his mouth, Puss let her claws out of their sheathes just a little, in a place more than just a little uncomfortable.

Finally, as dusk approached, Puss spotted a good-sized house in the distance. “Excuse me,” she said to the lead knight, “but that is the Marquis de Carabas’ country house! It occurs to me that it might make a good spot for the King to stay the night, even if it is unworthy of such an august personage. May we ride on ahead and inform the servants of his impending arrival?”

The knight nodded, dropping back to inform the King. Gavin whipped up the reins, giving the horse its head and riding quickly. “Look what you’ve done!” he whispered. “You will get us both beheaded with your lies!”

“I’ve said nothing untrue,” Puss replied. “I’ve simply ridden ahead of the truth a bit, that’s all. It will catch us up apace.”

“Nothing untrue? You’ve called me the Marquis de Carabas, whatever that is! You’ve given me a country cottage, a castle, a pile of gold and my very own ogre! And that’s quite apart from the bird thing, I can’t even pretend to understand where you came up with that one. When the king finds out you’re lying, we’re both for the chop. Oh, why did you have to come up with such stories?” Gavin moaned. “Why couldn’t you just dangle your ‘lucky stone’ in front of his eyes and hypnotize him?”

“Because he’s a king,” Puss said sensibly. “The king of the land has amulets and warding stones that protect him from such things, and has for many a generation. One too many evil Grand Viziers have tried that little trick for me to get away with it now. No, the King alone is immune to the powers these boots hold, and if I’d tried it, we really would be for the chop. Trust me, this is the best way.”

Gavin pulled the reins tight, halting the horse outside a country house. “Best way? Where are you going to get a—a house, and a castle, and a pile of gold, and an ogre and a Carabas?”

Puss rolled her eyes as she knocked on the door. “This is Carabas,” she said. “We’re in Carabas. What, did your father teach you riding but not geography?” The door opened, and before the startled man inside could say a single word, Puss dangled the stone before his eyes. “Greetings, good sir,” she said rapidly. “I am an emissary of good King Mark, who approaches even this very moment, and he offers you this stone in payment for a night’s stay. Now, sir, you might think it an unfair trade, but I tell you, this stone has hypnotic powers. Just looking at it sends any man or woman into a deep, obedient hypnotic trance. Think of all the things you could do if you had a stone that was this powerful, this irresistible, this mesmerizing.”

The man had already drifted halfway into trance before he could even speak, and Gavin looked more than a little mazy himself. Puss clapped her free hand over Gavin’s eyes and continued. “Exactly, sir. The magic of the stone can turn anyone into a blank, mindless, hypnotized slave, make them believe whatever they’re told. Surely you can see that?” He simply nodded. “In fact, it would make you believe that you are but the caretaker of this house, watching it for its true owner, the Marquis de Carabas. It would make you believe that the stone is his by right, since you are but his servant, obedient to him in all things. It would even make you believe that since I hold the stone, symbol of the power of the Marquis de Carabas, you must therefore obey me in all things as well. Doesn’t that make sense?”

The man nodded vacantly. “Good. I’d like to talk to the other inhabitants of the house now, servant.”

By the time the king’s carriage arrived, the full retinue of servants (a husband, a wife, and three children) were waiting to greet him. The race to get them all properly hypnotized had quite driven Gavin’s questions out of his head—and listening to Puss brainwash five people in rapid succession hadn’t helped. But seeing the King brought them all back. “Quite nice,” His Majesty said, getting out. This time, Princess Arianna got out behind him, and Gavin’s heart leapt to see her beauty. “Beats sleeping rough, eh, daughter?”

Arianna smiled gently. “Father and I are most pleased by your hospitality,” she said. The look she gave Gavin suggested that she was far from unhappy with her latest marriage prospect.

“We’re most honored by your visit,” he stammered out, blushing wildly. “Please, step inside. I’ll have the servants fix you something to eat.” Beside him, he was aware of Puss looking at him with a little surprise on her face. Really, did she think he’d learned no etiquette at all as the son of a landowner?

But after dinner, when the king and his retinue had been settled in for the night, Gavin returned to the topic at hand. “So what do we do now?” he whispered tightly. “We certainly can’t take them to the castle tomorrow! The real Marquis de Carabas will be waiting for us, and even if you do hypnotize him, you can’t conjure up an ogre and a pile of gold!”

Puss opened the door and headed out into the night air. “The real Marquis de Carabas is dead,” she whispered back. “The ogre ate him, took over his castle, and has been waylaying travelers and stealing their valuables for two years now.” She frowned. “I really hope he didn’t decide to eat the bird,” she said. “I’m pretty sure that one will seal the deal.”

“Oh, good!” Gavin said, barely remembering to keep his voice down. “So instead of leading the king into a web of fraud and deceit, we’re going to lead him to his death at the hands of an ogre that no sword can kill! Wonderful, Puss, you’ve outdone yourself.”

Puss leapt lightly onto Gavin’s horse. “Well, I’ll admit I’ve set myself a busy night, but you’d be amazed at what you can get done over the course of a single night with the thought of beheading spurring you on.” She leaned down and licked Gavin’s cheek with her coarse tongue. “Don’t wait up,” she said, spurring the horse and riding into the night. Gavin went back into the house, trying to compose himself. Puss did have her magical hypnotic powers, he thought. Even an ogre couldn’t do anything against those.

“Do you take me for a fool?” the ogre roared. “Do you think me some sort of pox-brained, waxy-eared, empty-skulled, addle-pated, thick-headed, sore-encrusted peasant, that you can simply dangle your trinket before my eyes, tell me to stare at it, and I will? I am Harth, strongest of all the ogres that walk in the night! You might have had success with feeble humans, but if this is the best you can think of, kitten, I will feast upon your flesh, whittle your bones into toothpicks to pull out the scraps, and make your skin into a rug for my wall.”

Puss winced. She’d managed to deal with the frightened villagers that Harth had terrorized into working for him easily enough; it hadn’t even taken much supernatural charisma, merely a long-standing tradition that anyone who defeated the ogre would become the new Marquis de Carabas. (Which hadn’t stopped her from using just a little hypnosis to smooth things over and integrate their memories with the story she’d told the King.) Now all that was needed was to hypnotize the ogre...but he was being anything other than co-operative.

“Are you sure you don’t want to look at the stone?” she asked. “It’s a very pretty, soothing spinning stone, you’d feel much happier if you looked at it.”

“No, I wouldn’t!” the ogre shouted, rising to his feet from the stone bench he sat upon. His full ten feet of height loomed over Puss. “I’d feel happier grabbing my club and turning you into mashed kitling!”

He stomped over towards the massive greatclub that stood by the fireplace. “You don’t want to grab that club,” Puss said, keeping her voice low and soothing. She’d been hoping to use the stone as much as possible—an old magician’s trick to conceal the true source of one’s power—but she’d also been hoping not to have her bones smashed like dry twigs.

“Pah!” Harth’s voice boomed out in the great hall. “You’ve never met an ogre before, have you, little cat?”

Puss bristled at the thought of being called ‘little’, given that she’d gained five feet of height in the last four days, but when the ogre picked up the club and raised it over his head, almost scraping the rafters of the high, vaulted ceiling, she had to admit that she took his point. “Well,” she said, “it has been a while. Your kind generally sticks to the mountains, my kind generally sticks to barns and cozy beds. But I don’t recall hearing anything special about you. Let me see...” She held up a hand and began to count on her fingers the things she knew about ogres.

“You’re big...” She looked up at him as he stepped closer to her, his footsteps booming on the stone floor. “Check. Ill-tempered...” Harth roared, and Puss leapt out of the way as the club crashed down not an inch from where she’d stood, cracking the flagstones where it hit. “Check! Strong...” She looked over at the fractured stone. “We’ll just take that one as read. Stubborn...of course!” she cried out, dodging another blow from the club. “That’s what’s going on here, isn’t it?” She’d actually figured out not just what was going on, but what to do about it; her new plan required a bit of ready wit, though, and it couldn’t hurt to hide her light under a bushel just a bit.

“Indeed!” Harth cried out. “We ogres are well known as the most stubborn, most obstinate, most contrary creatures in all existence! Why, in a race between an ogre and a mule, the mule will reach the finish line before the ogre’s even set off! None of your whimpering, pleading little ‘hypnotic suggestions’ will work on me, and if that’s the only plan you have, girl, you’d best make peace with your ancestors, for I will be wiping my feet upon your back soon enough.”

“So that’s why I can’t hypnotize you,” Puss said, backing up. “Because you couldn’t be hypnotized if you tried! Well, then I’m definitely going to need to think of a different plan, because some people are just talented subjects and some aren’t, and you don’t have what it takes.”

The ogre roared again, swiping the club in a flat arc that forced Puss to dive to the ground. “More of your simpering trickery?” Harth shouted. “Come up with all the plans you like, my strength of arm and strength of will can best them all! Oh, I grow so damnably sick of humans, thinking they’re better than ogres!”

Puss rolled out of the way of another booming strike from the club. “I’m not human!” she cried out. “Notice the fur? And anyway, humans are better than ogres! I’ve walked up and down this land for the past four days now, and I haven’t met a single human that didn’t know how to go into a trance! But when I showed you my spinning stone, you didn’t even know what it was for!”

Harth’s face contorted in fury. “I knew what it was for!” he shouted. “I just didn’t want to be hypnotized by some slip of a girl!”

“Oh, of course,” Puss said, getting to her feet and putting a hand on her hip in a mocking pose. “You certainly can be hypnotized, you just ‘don’t want to’. Why didn’t I see it before? It has nothing to do with the fact that the simplest of human children can sink into a deep, obedient trance, and Harth, mightiest of the ogres, can’t do it. You just ‘didn’t want to’.”

Harth slammed the club into the ground, leaning on it. “Are you doubting my word?” he boomed. “Are you suggesting for even one trifling moment that I couldn’t be hypnotized if I let myself?”

“Suggesting, no. Openly stating, yes.” Puss threw her hands up in surrender. “You were right all along. Clearly, I’ve made a terrible mistake, trusting my survival to a plan to hypnotize a creature that is absolutely incapable of going into even the lightest trance. You might as well go ahead and pulp me with that club of yours, because if the alternative is getting Harth of the ogres to go into a trance, I’m sunk.” She sighed. “You just can’t hold up your end of things, I’m afraid.”

“Oh, yes I can!” Harth shouted.

“Oh, no you can’t!” Puss replied.

“Oh, yes I can!” Harth shouted.

“Oh, no you can’t!” Puss replied again. Puss hoped she could wrap this up soon, she was starting to feel like a pantomime character.

“Oh, yes—look, I’ll prove it to you!” the ogre said, sitting down on the floor. “You show me that little rock of yours, and I’ll sink into a trance so fast it’ll make your pretty little head spin!”

“Well,” Puss said, letting the stone unwrap from around her wrist again and dangling it in the air, “I’ll show it to you, but it’s not going to do one little bit of good. I certainly doubt that you’ll be able to follow it with your eyes, for example. You just don’t have the skill to keep them utterly locked onto the motion of the swaying stone no matter where I swing it.”

“Oh, yeah?” Harth said, his anger now replaced by smug confidence. “Just you watch, I’ll focus on it perfectly!”

“Yes,” Puss said, in a somewhat mollified tone, “it does appear that you’re following the motion of the stone pretty well. But that’s only the first part of hypnosis. I know that you can’t listen to everything I say and let it sink into your mind, for example. You can’t become sleepy, and I highly doubt that your limbs are managing to become heavy and relaxed.”

Harth rested his chin on his knees, following the motion of the stone perfectly. “Yes I can,” he said softly, his tone losing its inflections and becoming smooth and neutral. “I’m becoming very sleepy, now. Very, very sleepy.”

“Well...alright, I’ll admit that you’ve managed to master most of the elements of hypnosis. But there’s one trick you’ll never manage, no matter how hard you try. It’s just not in your nature. You’ll never be able to become perfectly obedient to my will, sinking so deep into trance that you must obey my every command, now and forever. Humans can manage it, but you...” She sighed. “I just don’t think you can do it.”

“Oh, yes I can,” Harth said.

“Oh, no you can’t!” Puss replied.

“oh, yes i can...” Harth sighed out softly.

“Oh, no you can’t!” Puss replied.

“oh! yes, i can,” the ogre said in astonishment.

“Oh, yes you can,” Puss said with a smirk. “Now, Harth, I’d like to talk to you about your Master, the Marquis de Carabas...”

And so it was that the King entered the castle of the Marquis de Carabas the next morning, with the Marquis himself (and his unaccountably tired major domo) by his side. He was most taken with the mighty ogre that guarded the gates, yet spoke with courtly etiquette, and with the spontaneous and raucous celebrations the peastants were throwing that day. He saw for himself the pile of gold more than twice the height of a man, and even chatted in the southern tongue with the bird (which looked a little bedraggled, but spoke quite prettily.) Before the day was out, the arrival feast had become a wedding feast, and Gavin took oaths with Princess Arianna in the eyes of the local priest. He spent the evening with his new father-in-law and the knights (as was the custom, in those days), and returned home in a fine state of happiness. He bounded up the stairs to his bedchamber three at a time, thinking of nothing but the moment when he and Arianna would lie together as man and wife...

And so it came as a bit of a surprise when he opened the door and saw Arianna sitting on their bed, completely nude, her jaw slack and her eyes sleepy and blank, staring at a dangling stone with a hole in it. And of course, the hand that held the stone’s belonged to Puss.

“What are you doing?” he cried out, suddenly possessed of a rage. He slammed the door and stalked over to the bed. As he drew closer, he saw that Puss had slipped two fingers into his new bride’s tender pussy, and that Arianna had reciprocated the favor.

“I’m...ooh...I’m learning,” Puss said, sliding herself forward into Arianna’s delicate touch. “I’d really just intended to come up here to wait for you, but...oh, that’s nice...but once Arianna and I got to talking, she described some of the customs of the court, and...” Puss lay back and spread her legs. “Go ahead and use your tongue, dear,” she purred out, and Arianna knelt forward between her thighs and began to lick.

“You seduced my wife on our wedding night?” Gavin shouted.

“She seduced me,” Puss said, her fingers curling through Arianna’s golden tresses. “I really only put her under so that she’d be out of the way while you and I fucked, but I got a bit curious, asked if she was a virgin, and when she answered, ‘Yes and no,’ well, I had to find out more.” Her eyes rolled up a little in her head and she yowled a tiny bit. “Really glad I did, too...oh fuck, yes...”

“Really, now, Puss, this has gone too far!” Gavin stood over them, wishing that his cock wasn’t quite so stiff at the sight of the gorgeous girl’s head pressed to Puss’ cunt. “You can hypnotize the servants all you want, I don’t mind that, but this is my wife!”

“Wife, cat toy, what’s the difference?” Puss said lightly. “Really, it’s not as though I don’t plan on sharing her or anything.”

“The difference is that I’m in charge here! You’re bound by—by Deepest Magic, whatever that is, to do what I say!”

“Not exactly,” Puss said, holding up the stone with her free hand. Her other hand continued to press Arianna’s head against her snatch. “I’m bound to make you wealthy and prosperous. Technically speaking, you can be a wealthy, prosperous hypnotized slave to a cat-girl who has been absolutely gagging for it for about a week now.”

“Look, Puss, you’d best not try that with me, or I’ll...I’ll...” Gavin couldn’t quite think of what he would do. Tell the King? He’d behead him as an imposter. Tell the villagers? They were all under Puss’ hypnotic spell. Fight her? That would mean looking away from the stone, and it was dangling so sweetly, so prettily, so easy to watch...

“You’ll sink quickly into a deep, obedient trance?” Puss asked.

“yes,” Gavin said, not quite sure what he was agreeing to, but knowing that Puss’ voice was so sweet and soft in his ears.

“This is why your father wore the boots himself, Gavin,” Puss said. “I probably should have mentioned that earlier, shouldn’t I?” Gavin just stared blankly ahead, not sure how to respond. A rapidly dwindling part of him wanted to shout ‘yes’, but the part of him that had already sunk deeply into Puss’ spell was nothing but thrilled that she had made him hers. “Go ahead and take off your clothes, Gavin,” she said.

He stripped naked quickly, and Puss wriggled over to the edge of the bed long enough to take a deep whiff of the scent of pre-cum wafting off of his hard, slightly slick cock. “Oh, that’s nice, Gavin. I told you I liked the way you smelled. Handsome, good-smelling, and easily led, everything I look for in a man.” She looked down at the girl between her thighs. “Arianna, come up here and sit on my face for a bit, I want to try this ‘courtly love’ you’re enjoying so much. Gavin, slip that dick of yours into my cunt, will you?”

“yes, puss,” he said, climbing up onto the bed to take Arianna’s place. Arianna, in turn, rested her snatch against Puss’ rough tongue, and moaned so prettily as the nubs scraped gently against her clit that Puss felt quite overcome with delight. Of course, that might also have had something to do with the fact that Gavin was filling her up completely with a cock that she’d been impressed with ever since she saw him strip naked by the river. It might also relate to the way he thrust into her again and again, waiting to cum until he heard her command him...and that might not be for a bit. Puss had trouble talking with her mouth full.

Puss pinched her own nipples as she fucked and licked, the pleasure coursing through her body as she felt another orgasm crash into her. It felt like being in heat, but even better, because there was no end to it. She just let the night pass until Arianna’s moans took on the desperate quality of exhaustion, and Gavin’s grunting thrusts became the torturous exertions of a man whose balls ached to spend their load. Only then, when she was fully satisfied, did she let Arianna slump off of her to fall upon the bed and sleep, and say to Gavin, “You may cum now.” And he did, thrusting one final time deep within her to spend his seed.

And from that night forth, Puss became a great lady, and never chased virgins again, save only for her diversion.