Merchant & Monster Girls Ch. 08 Pt. 01

"Feel free to pass any of this to your friend, though she probably knows most of it. Now let me get back to work."

Devin took a seat. Not knowing what else to do, he decided to practice more with his glyph.

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Chitchat was usually more on her game when playing the poor, needy ratgirl, but it'd been a significant period since she'd eaten, and it was starting to affect her charisma.'Thought I'd blown it with that clueless merchant. Can't believe he actually came back. Now, if I can just find those girls. Pretty sure I saw him give that Whitehorn some money. If I play my cards right, I can get paid and pick their pockets. That should feed me for maybe a few months!'

Her nails gripped the cobblestone, expertly weaving and dodging through the forest of legs in the streets and alleys. Standing barely five feet on tiptoes, she decided to jump up on a barrel to search the many heads and ears for her quarry.

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"Reina! How do I look?" Azalea turned around to show off the hairpins holding together twin-tails.

Before Reina could comment, "What's that smell? Roast corn! "Azalea dropped the hairpins in the bemused merchant's hands and zipped off toward a stall with a grill.

"I wonder what spices they use! Trade secret? Understandable. So much delicious-looking food! Sweets I've never seen, fruits I've never tasted! Oh, what are those over there? They are what? Snowglobes? How do you get the snow in them? Are they edible? Speak up! I can't hear you!"

Reina was feeling a bit overwhelmed. Aside from being in a new place, she was doomed to act as fairy herder for the day.'How does such a small body have so much energy? She can't seem to focus on anything for more than thirty seconds.' She was happy to see her friend thoroughly enjoying herself but was afraid the endless distractions would delay them from their responsibilities.

"Mmmphthigsgood!"

"Azalea, swallow first, and where did you get that food?"

"That nice man over there was selling some bread filled with jam. Said I was cute and gave me one. Try some!"

Azalea bit off a generous portion with jam, pressed her petite lips to Reina's, and used her tongue to push the morsel in. Normally, Reina wouldn't have minded, but they were in public. She blushed as the few passersby failed to hide smiles.

"You're so adorable when you're embarrassed," Azalea teased.

Feeling a little indignant at her own awkwardness, she swallowed, scooped the hyperactive fae close, and licked some jam off her cheek. "Careful! I might end up eating you instead."

Azalea face lit up. "Once, Life-mate put me in his mouth when I was covered in his cum, to clean me. I was pretty out of it when it happened. I wouldn't mind experiencing it again when I'm more lucid. Or maybe I should smear some jam in a very particular place that's more fun to lick," she whispered.

"But for now, here, you can have the rest. I wanna go look at other food stall." She stuffed the rest of the pastry into Reina's mouth and flew off.

Reina was about to follow when she felt something on her foreleg.

"Finally found you!" squeaked a small girl gasping for breath. "Why are there so many more people than usual today?"

"Is this an unusual amount? I'm new to this city."

"I know. Where'd your fairy friend go?"

"Um, she was looking at candles, but now where'd she go? Oh, there she is. Do we know you?"

"Hey, it's you!" exclaimed a returning Azalea, nibbling on a piece of honeycomb.

"You know her?"

"No, but remember I mentioned someone watching us. Same eyes."

"You were watching us?"

"I.. er..." the ratgirl stammered.

"Did you need our help with something?"

"Help? Help, yes... yes, I came to offer my services. Your friend hired me to guide you around till he got back."

"Herd-mate did? He didn't mention that earlier." Reina glanced at Azalea.

"He thought of it after he left. Here's proof!" She held out Devin's handkerchief.

Reina took the handkerchief and sniffed it. "Smells like him."

"Oh, I want to smell, too! I miss him already!" Azalea declared as she dived into the handkerchief in Reina's hand.

"He's only been gone twenty minutes, Azalea, and try not to get it sticky."

Turning back to the ratgirl, " We are glad to have your guidance, Miss...?"

"Chitchat."

"That's an interesting name," commented Azalea as she licked her fingers clean.

"It's my working name."

"Nice to meetcha. This is Reina, and you already heard my name. We were just wandering around looking for a seamstress."

"One of us was. The other was stuffing her face," Reina teased.

"It's not good to shop on an empty stomach," Azalea shot back.

"That only applies to grocery shopping!" Reina countered.

Chitchat put a hand to her chin. "Seamstress, eh? I know one nearby."

"Oh good! We are quite ready, aren't we?" urged Reina, cupping Azalea in her hands and hugging her to her chest so she wouldn't fly off again.

Chitchat took the lead. "Then off we go!"

"Have you lived in this city all your life, Miss Chitchat?" asked Reina.

"Yep, all nineteen years of it. When my parents died, I spent the rest of my childhood in an orphanage. When I turned eighteen, I decided I had enough of being told what to do, so I left." Chitchat continued to rattle on about the city and her many observations about its inhabitants and peculiarities.

Azalea was content to be held between Reina's soft breasts until she spotted a fenced-off street entrance. Wiggling out of her pillowy cocoon, she poked her head over Reina's shoulder. "Why's that street blocked off? And why is it pink?"

Chitchat looked where Azalea pointed. A tall, wooden fence, engraved with a depiction of naked shoppers covered with strategically placed leaves, separated the two roads.

"Have you noticed the edges of some streets have colored cobble?"

"No..."

"Probably because someone was too enamored with window shopping," Reina jested.

"It's a decency indicator. Numerous demi-humans have different feelings toward modesty. As a compromise with the more prudish nature of humans, the city council implemented a color system to indicate which sections of the city you're allowed to expose which parts of your body. Green, you have to be fully clothed. Yellow is for topless regions, mostly centered around the milking quarters. Pink allows full nudity, and red areas allow public sex but are strictly regulated to the nightworker parts of the city. Independent businesses may have a separate set of rules, so they'll have an indication by the door."

"Can we go take a look, Reina? Pleeeeaase!?! Then we can go straight to the seamstress."

Chitchat didn't say anything. She didn't visit these adult areas unless she was in haste for a shortcut, and even then, she didn't linger.

"You know it's tough to say no when you give such pleading puppy-dog-girl eyes." Reina opened the pedestrian gate and passed through. The landscape on the opposite side was exactly as the other, except the leaves were removed.

"Where are all the people?" wondered Azalea

"These neighborhoods tend to cater to very specific merchandise and customers. Also, it's winter. Not too many people are gonna take their clothes off when it's cold."

"Well, there might be one..." Azalea shimmered out her dress and handed it to Reina. She floated a few feet forward, her breasts heaving with nervousness. "This is more embarrassing than I thought it'd be."

Reina folded the dress away. "I never imagined I'd hear you say that, considering you fly around without undergarments."

"Of course, I get embarrassed, but have you noticed I fly under eye level all the time when we are not alone? Sneak peeks are only for you and life-mate."

"And me, I suppose," observed Chitchat, trying not to look too closely.

Uncharacteristically for her, Azalea made an attempt to cover herself. "Sorry, Miss Chitchat. I've been a little brazen today.

"Now look who's adorable when she's embarrassed!" chuckled Reina, offering her dress back.

Azalea waved her hands to decline.

"It's alright. I don't personally visit these kinds of places, but a job is a job. I have to wonder, though. Your dress doesn't look especially warm. Aren't you cold?"

"A little," Azalea admitted and lowered her arms. "My nipples are most certainly stiff, but if I get too cold, I'll just hug my little Whitehorn for warmth." She winked. "I feel so...exposed. Is this what Jyora felt like?"

"You seem to be getting a thrill out of it all the same."

Azalea rubbed her thighs together to highlight her dripping. "Maybe it is a little exciting."

Azalea, feeling bolder, picked up the pace, peering into different storefronts. She was about to move on from a brick-lined building when the door caught her eye.

"Let me guess... you want to go in there?" discerned Chitchat.

Azalea nodded. "This is definitely an interesting shop! Just look how amazing this handle is!"

"I am looking. Any place with a door handle shaped like a centaur penis, paired with a centaur mare vulva lock... Public nudity aside, I have a hard time imagining it as a place you'd like to investigate," Chitchat stated with slight embarrassment.

Azalea floated up to Chitchat and put a hand on her shoulder. "I cannot leave an establishment with such eclectic taste unexplored, can I? Surely, this is the work of a forward thinker! Besides, it's good to have a healthy curiosity."

"I think you've gone well beyond sexual curiosity into connoisseur territory." Reina grasped the shaft, surprised at the feel of realism, and pulled. Out billowed the acrid smell of metal and coal.

Azalea grabbed the hand of a surprised Chitchat and flew in.

"Sorry for the smoke. I'll be done in a second," boomed voice from somewhere in the building.

"Look at this place! It's..."

"Organized chaos?" Reina suggested.

"Amazing! I never dreamed that a big city sold these kinds of things!!!"

Floor-to-ceiling shelves, stuffed with sex toys, lined the walls. Some toys were familiar, others incomprehensible. Azalea's eyes sparkled as she darted here and there, taking in all the merchandise.

"Reina, there are so many dildos! Even more than at Grandpa Gylan's farm!" Azalea had swiped her dress back and put it back on. She was gleefully looking over the display table. "Centaur, wolfman, I think this is a bunny boy's, and this is a catboy's?"

She pulled a screw-shaped dildo from a drawer. "This one reminds me of mom's husband's, very porcine shaped." She pushed it through her circled fingers. "Momma said the thickness is mediocre, but the way the tip pokes at her cervix really turns her on, especially when it pushes it in."

"Oh! Look what we have here, Reina! Recognize this?" Azalea picked up a skinny black toy and held it up. "A Whitehorn! " She rubbed it against Reina's cheek. "I bet you'd like to try it."

"You're sweet, dear, but I should probably tell you. Male whitehorns don't provide much stimulation. Mating is a very quick affair."

"Ah, that's too bad," she said before returning the toy.

"It is what it is. That's why herd-mate's fis... ministrations felt so good."

Azalea held up some colored glass beads connected by a string, turning them over in her hands. "What are these for?"

Chitchat peeked around Reina. "How do you not know what anal beads are?"

"So you put them in your butt? I bet that feels interesting. Why are there whips and ropes here?"

"Some people like being tied up and given a little pain."

"Really? Huh... interesting."

From somewhere in the back, beyond the haze of smoke, a sudden clink of metal, followed by a sharp sizzle, interrupted them. They could just make out the store's proprietor against the billowy flames of a forge.

A light-green woman, with black hair haphazardly tied out of the way, squinted through a pair of magnifiers. Her strong arms vigorously polished a human shaped dildo.

She got up from her work stool, leaving a glistening dildo where she had been sitting. Wearing only a front-facing smith's apron, she turned around, and a garnet-colored, heart-shaped buttplug peeked out from between her butt cheeks. She stood on tiptoes and twisted a knob on the chimney, opening a flue to dissipate the smoke.

Previously hidden within the haze, a bundle hanging from the ceiling was revealed. The goblin smith stepped over, rotated the bundle, and stuffed the dildo in one end, causing the bundle to moan.

"How's that feel? I smoothed out the rough spots next to the vein."

"Mphhfmmg!"

"So it's good?"

"Mhmmp."

"Excellent! Another prototype finished. Now, let's see who our guests are." She pushed back an ear that had flopped over her shoulder, pulled the bandana off her head, and wiped her brow. "Looks like we got some rare customers! Welcome to Forging Pleasure. Sorry for da smoke. Sometimes the flue gets clogged. I'm de owner of dis here shop. Eitri Tehdä's ma name, and dis is ma toy tester and cousin, Avu."

"Mmmppshh."

The bundle called Avu had a gag stuffed into her mouth. She was suspended from the ceiling in a harness that held her torso. Her arms and legs were tied behind her back, cutouts allowed access between her legs, and her ample chest could hang freely.

"What can I help you girls with? Let me guess... looking for something to spice up a threesome. I've been working on a three-sided dildo if ya feeling adventurous. No, wait, before you say anything, I forgot ma spiel." She cleared her throat. "Feeling a bit overwhelmed and in need of some de-stressing? Have an emptiness that needs satiating or a deep itch that needs scratching? Filling holes is our goal!"

Azalea clapped her hands. "What a wonderful motto! My holes were definitely made to be filled! We are new, just arrived today, and were out shopping. I noticed your door and was intrigued."

"Liked that, didja? Copied and replicated from a centaur couple who visited us last year. We pride ourselves on makin' 'em as realistic as possible. Well, as real as we can using metal or wood anyway."

"You made a copy of them?"

"Aye! Saves a lot of time, instead of craftin' by hand. Supposedly, there is a soft, springy substance hidden away in the southern country, that feels more like the real thing, but so far, we haven't been able to get our mits on any of the stuff."

"They definitely felt life-like enough already. I noticed all the bumps and veins," commented Reina.

"We always look for new and different for a wide variety of shapes and sizes. We pay 'em. They get one free copy, and the rest go on the shelves. Don't tell anyone, but I think they also secretly get a thrill out of imagining a stranger using 'em for personal time."

Azalea pointed to the display table in the middle of the room. "So all these are from someone in town?"

"Most of 'em. If you're secretly looking for someone in particular, we have many of the more notable folks."

"Do you make girls, too?"

"You mean vulvas? They are a lot trickier, so very rarely. Mostly decorative pieces."

"I wish I could watch you make one," Azalea expressed.

"Well, we should have a customer coming in any minute now. It's not as exciting as you might think. Takes about an hour."

A small bell rang above Avu.

"Punctual as usual. If you really want to watch, I just need to read you a disclaimer." She placed a parchment on the table, pointing to the first paragraph. "Do you consent to seeing real depictions of sexual imagery for the purpose of education and/or mercantile exchange? If you do, please sign here."

"Most definitely!" Azalea signed her name with flare and an unnecessary winky face.

"I'll sign, but I'm going to peruse the shelves some more." said Reina.

"I guess I will. Just to expand my knowledge about such things, you understand, but... I don't know how to write," Chitchat mumbled.

"I can help you! Just give me your hand, and we can do it together. C-h-i-t-c-h-a-t." She handed the scroll back to Eitri.

"Everything looks in order. This way, please." Eitri led Chitchat and Azalea behind the front counter to the nook where Avu hung, pulling a curtain closed behind them.

Azalea regarded the suspended goblin. "Miss Eitri, I was wondering why Avu is all tied up."

"Cause it was her idea, as was toy testin'. Says it gets her creative juices flowin'.

"Not just her creativity it looks like." Observed Chitchat, noticing a pile of damp straw beneath her.

"Normally, she's tied up with ropes, but today she's demonstrating a new idea: The Shortstuff Carry-all! It's still a working name. We were thinking of manufacturing them for portability purposes."

"Why would anyone want to carry a goblin around?"

"It's not just for goblins. It can be used for any smaller demi-human race. Like most of her ideas, she gets 'em when she's horny. This time, it stemmed from her imagining being treated like a cock-warmer, ready for use, so she built it for herself, but then we started thinking of more practical consequences. Like, they can't just be used anywhere in the city because of the modesty laws. Though, I suppose it depends on how the user is dressed. Maybe during journeys, short legs can't walk or run as fast or as far as longer-legged people. At least, I can't. Or perhaps at certain festivals or gatherings."

"I can somewhat understand that," asserted Azalea. "Fulfilling your partner's random bouts of horniness by being stuffed is the most fulfilling feeling for me! Or it will be when I can stretch wide enough."

Eitri rapped on the wall near where four waist-high holes of differing sizes lined the wall. Out of the far-left one popped a penis.

"A wolfman!" exclaimed Azalea.

"That he is. He's a young man, very polite. Been a regular for a number of years. I asked if he wanted to be one of our models. The first attempt had a few errors, so today is a redo."

"Why don't you make it with them in the same room?"

"Some customers like to remain anonymous. Others get a bit shy if they see someone watch 'em. A few like the thrill of not knowing who's doing what to them."

"I've never seen a canine demi-human up close. He sure is red."

"His kind can be both difficult and easier to make a mold for. Their knot keeps them fixed in place nicely, but they usually start pre-cumming right away, which can make the plaster take longer to dry. Fortunately, we have a simple solution."

Azalea cocked her head. "A metal tube?"

"Aye! First, we put a little linseed oil on it and carefully insert it into the tip, not far, mind you, just long enough so we can get the casing around the glans.

"Now we gotta swell 'em up. Normally, Avu does this part; tis why I 'ung her over 'ere, but I don't mind demonstrating today. I like working my way from the head toward the back." With stubby fingers, she encircled his glans. "Then we add a little more oil to get him all slick and start jerkin'."

"How cute! He's humping your hand."

"He's quite a horny boy. See his knot starting to swell?"

"Can I touch it?"

"I doubt he'd mind."

Azalea wrapped her tiny hands around the small bulge. "Warm and squishy. I thought it'd be bigger and harder."

"Oh, it will. Grab his shaft and push back on it. Keep up a constant pressure. Try to make it feel like he's prodding a tight pussy. Yes, like that. Do it a few times and then squish it through."

Azalea squeezed and pushed back hard, popping it through her encircled hands. "Oh wow, he's swelling so fast! Here's the size I was expecting. It's as big as an apple!"

"You can let go now. It'll be about thirty minutes before he deflates enough to pull out."

A spurt of liquid splashed her hand. "Oh, is he coming already? Can I drink it?" Before Eitri could answer, Azalea's lips were already around the metal tube.

Eitri raised an eyebrow. "Uh, well, ok, go ahead, I guess, and no, the first watery bit will be pre-cum. When you notice a thicker, coppery taste, then you'll know when he's cummin' proper. You also might get a bit more clear, watery fluid at the end."