The Beast of Darkwood Hall

It was getting time, thought Claudia, for Mortimer to get his first real pet. He'd proven himself responsible enough with the tarantula, the lizard, and those weird fish things whose name she could never remember. Animals like that are well enough, but Mortimer needed a companion, something to keep him company on the lonely grounds of the mansion, when he wasn't at school.

When Mr. Darkwood had been alive, he and Claudia had talked about having a second child, but it was too late for that now. In a sense, his death had left them both alone. Mr. Darkwood had been tall and handsome, broad-shouldered and well-endowed enough to keep their marriage bearable, occasionally very enjoyable, despite its foundation on convenience, rather than love. Being a young widow suited Claudia fine in many ways. She didn't miss Hugo's cold manner, dull mind, and condescending attitude toward her, but she did miss the feeling of his cock inside her. It had been one of the few things he was good for.

True, she was still beautiful, tall and slender, tresses of black hair elegantly styled around sharp cheekbones, darkly-shadowed eyes, and a small, but expressive mouth, and while some men found her height intimidating, many more were up to the challenge, and she had her fair share of trysts during the social season in Manhattan. She recalled with much fondness her night with the British ambassador and his wife; that had been a revelatory evening. She still got a laugh thinking of the witless Texas oil baron and would-be lothario who had tried so hard to impress her in the hotel restaurant, only for her to satisfy herself by making a man of his young son instead. And she'd been unable to sit down for a week after letting that French Canadian boxer thoroughly sodomize her.

But she had to be careful in these matters. A hint of scandal would attract the newspapermen like sharks to a feeding frenzy, and even as careful as she was, for the rest of the year she was completely alone, except for those instances where she wasn't too good for a gigolo. It had been months since her last cock. She had heard stories of lonely women in her position fucking the servants, but those stories never ended well.

She supposed to could try to get engaged again - the gossip that came along with that was generally harmless, from what she had seen - but fortune-hunters were everywhere. Besides, she wanted a lover, not a husband. She liked her independence, liked having the entire estate to manage herself, liked having no one to answer to.

She realized the extent to which she had allowed her mind to wander. Getting Mortimer a new pet. Of course. She promised herself a long evening with a dirty novel and her favourite toys, which was the best she could get, lately, and pushed the issue from her mind.

She put down the magazine she had idly been flipping through and walked into the library, where she found Mortimer poring over a comic book with some manner of ghoul on the cover.

"Mortimer," she said, "I've been thinking that maybe it's time to get you a proper pet. What do you think?"

"I'd like that very much, mother," he said, looking up from the comic book.

"What would you like? A dog? A cat?"

"Actually," said Mortimer, flipping through the pages, "there's a form in this comic where you can send away for a Sumatran giant lemur. Could I have one of those, mother?" He showed her the form, sandwiched between ads for X-ray specs and a 'real life shrunken head'.

The first thing she saw was a grainy photograph, cheaply printed on the pulpy comic book paper, of the lemur's snub-nosed face. She thought it looked a little like a bat, with long, pointed ears and big staring eyes.

The Sumatran giant lemur makes a loyal pet, a tough bodyguard, and above all, he's smart smart SMART! Almost as smart as you! He'll start small but grow very fast, almost to the size of a pony. Kids can even ride him! He likes most of the same food as you - especially fruit and meat, but his favourite treat is honey. Gentle and affectionate with friends and family, but he'll have no problem guarding the house against burglars.

Live delivery guaranteed. Price includes free cage, free leather collar and leash, free care handbook. Loads of fun and amusement.

And then there was the mailing information.

Within 6-8 weeks, a big truck pulled into the gates from the courier service. A man got out of the cab and knocked on the door, a clipboard in his other hand.

"Is this Darkwood Hall?" he asked, when a servant answered.

Claudia signed the forms, and before long, the lemur was loaded off the truck in a small cage. Claudia remembered, as a girl, getting a pet tortoise delivered in a similar cage. Mortimer squealed with delight as he opened it, and the curious lemur leapt out, immediately clinging to his arm.

It was about the size of a cat, but its babyish proportions marked it as clearly having some growth to do before reaching full size. Its eyes darted back and forth at the courier, Mortimer, and Claudia, with an expression of polite attention.

"Oh, he's so cute!" cried Mortimer. "I think I'll name him Towser. Your name is Towser now, okay, little buddy?" He had brought a spoonful of honey down from the larder, in preparation for the thing's arrival, and he offered it to the creature, who gratefully and immediately began to lick the honey from the spoon with a long, nimble tongue.

As the animal moved, Claudia's eye was uncomfortably drawn to between its legs. It was... hard to miss.

"He's got a really big willie, mother," laughed Mortimer, who had apparently noticed it too.

Over the next year, Towser the Sumatran giant lemur grew at an astounding pace, quickly living up to the name of his species. His limbs quickly outpaced his ringed, prehensile, tail in terms of length; according to the book, he would rely less and less on his tail to climb as he got bigger. His method of climbing changed to reflect this, becoming less like a squirrel, monkey, or, well, lemur, and increasingly starting to resemble the confident movement of a bear or ape, climbing trees hand over hand with long muscular limbs.

The ad had not lied about Towser's intelligence, either. He was an extremely fast learner when it came to verbal commands, from basic instructions to advanced tricks, and Claudia could have sworn that he was more intelligent than many people she had known, her late husband included. He didn't simply learn commands the way a dog did, recognizing that certain words meant basic concepts. He seemed able to understand complex concepts, the relations between ideas, nuances and context clues.

And he loved the attention that came with showing off, whether or not he received a spoonful of honey as a treat, and his love for people was genuine, despite his rather alarming appearance and size.

As a friend for Mortimer, he was all Claudia could have hoped for. Towser positively adored the boy's company, cheerfully submitting to being led around on a leash, giving horsey rides, even taking Mortimer's small hand in his own great clawed one. And when Mortimer had school friends over, they were much in awe of his astounding pet.

One night, Claudia was woken from sleep by a loud, howling screech, followed by a scream of pain. She pulled herself out of bed, quickly, running downstairs in her nightgown, to find a grisly sight in the main hall.

The first thing she noticed was a strong draft. A window had been broken. As her eyes moved downward, she saw the body of a man she didn't recognize, lying prostrate on the rug in a puddle of a liquid that appeared black in the low light, but she knew must be blood. From his dark clothes and the gunny sack that lay beside him, she guessed him to be a burglar.

But the most terrible thing of all was the massive form of Towser standing over the man, pinning him to the floor and snarling ferociously, his muzzle and teeth covered in the man's blood. She had never seen this side of him; he had always been so gentle and affectionate. But now he was defending his home.

In a moment, Igor, the butler, appeared in the hallway, in a robe, holding a torch and with a nightcap still on his head. "Are you quite alright, madam?" he asked.

"Y-yes," stammered Claudia. "Towser's... caught a burglar, I think."

Igor gulped and nodded. "I'll telephone the police, madam."

"We think he came in through this window," explained the detective, who introduced himself as Inspector Clarke. "He did it with a hammer and pillow, which is why you didn't hear it shatter. He was very good, took his time. Of course, he didn't plan on your... pet here."

He gestured to Towser, who was now sitting quietly in the corner. His coat was still stained with the burglar's blood, an uncomfortable reminder of what had, presumably, always been lurking beneath the lemur's gentle exterior.

"Thank you, Inspector. Will I need to worry about an injury lawsuit?"

The inspector stroked his square jaw. "It's possible. Bit of a legal grey area, honestly. If you get a good lawyer, you should be fine.

"I actually should thank you. We've been investigating a whole string of break-ins in this area for months now. I have a pretty good feeling we'll be able to tie this guy to a few of them."

As he left, it occurred to Claudia that Clarke was rather handsome. Under other circumstances, she might have tried to seduce him, but right now, she was too shaken. She wondered how much of it was because of the burglar and how much of it was because of what had been brought out in her pet. And as Towser sat, with an almost apologetic look on his weird bat-wolf-lemur face, in the corner, her eyes couldn't help but be drawn once again between his legs.

Towser was fully erect.

Claudia couldn't sleep. She tossed and turned in bed. Mortimer, luckily, seemed to have slept through the entire business. His room was fairly far from the hall, so perhaps he simply hadn't heard it.

The fact was that Towser was not just a cute animal, a loyal friend to her son. He was a large, dangerous creature, of near-human intelligence. He had claws and fangs and muscular arms, and she didn't know what to do. She picked up the book that had come with him in the initial delivery and began to read, at an almost panicked pace.

The Sumatran giant lemur is well-named. Fully grown, it can reach up to ten feet in length and five feet in height at the shoulder. Despite its alarming appearance at this size, if properly raised, it should remain gentle and loving toward your family and any friends. It will only turn aggressive if it feels that it or its family are in danger.

However, at about three years of age, it will start to reach sexual maturity, which can lead to increased territorial behaviour in males. Please note that your pet was likely a year old or older when first delivered, and already in early adolescence. You will know it is reaching this phase when it starts to develop raccoon-like rings around its eyes. At this stage, we encourage you to at least consider having the lemur spayed or neutered.

That night, she could hardly get the subject out of her mind. The rings around his eyes had been fully formed for some time; if the book was right, he should have been neutered almost a full year ago by now. What if Towser unexpectedly misinterpreted the innocent actions of some well-meaning stranger and turned violent? No, that was ridiculous. Towser was intelligent, guided by far more than mere instinct. The idea itself seemed insulting to a noble, dignified beast, as ridiculous as the idea of gelding him.

Towser slept outside that night, still stained with blood. In the morning, Igor offered to have one of the other servants clean "the animal", but Claudia chose to do it herself. She led him to the bathroom opposite the master bedroom, where - she realized - he had never been allowed before. There was something oddly vulnerable about taking this huge, clawed beast - by now the size of a large Great Dane - through her bedroom, a place of white lace and black silk. But of all the washrooms in the house, this was the only one whose bath would fit Towser.

He was extremely cooperative, allowing himself to be soaped and rinsed. He seemed irritated by the now-dried blood in his coat, and grateful to have it gone. But as Claudia ran her fingers along the lemur's massive shoulders, her eyes once again traveled downwards, to Towser's penis, which looked to be almost a foot long, fully engorged as it now was, and where her eyes roamed, her curious fingers followed.

It wasn't wholly dissimilar from a human penis. The skin was dark, purplish, and one of the few places on his body not to be coated in thick grey fur. The most remarkable thing about it was the head, which was broad and mushroom-like, and its unusual stiffness in her hand. It felt as though there were bone inside it.

"You don't want to be neutered, do you, Towser? Let all this go to waste?"

She told herself she was only taking a hold of it to examine it, considering whether or not to take him to the vet. But the minute she laid a slim hand, delicately, on his shaft, and cupped his tennis ball-sized, low-hanging testicles in the other, the entire moment changed. Towser became extremely still, as though suddenly nervous, aware. Had she looked up, she might have noticed him trying to make eye contact with her, but Claudia's eyes were pointed firmly down at the entrancing member in front of her.

And she realized, now, what the name was for the shocked feeling she felt upon seeing Towser suddenly become aggressive against the burglar: arousal.

Over the next few days, she couldn't get Towser's penis and balls out of her mind. When she remembered, she assured herself that she was simply deliberating having him neutered. She told herself that he wasn't even human. But he's smarter than many people you've known, said a little voice in her mind. You said so yourself.

Telephone conversations with her lawyer exacerbated the problem. She was forced by circumstances to defend Towser as an intelligent, affectionate member of the family who had simply been defending his home.

Whenever her path happened to cross the creature's, even when Towser was playing with Mortimer in the afternoons, she couldn't help but steal a lustful glance between the lemur's legs. She could have sworn he noticed, and presented as many such views as possible.

"Show off," she murmured to herself, smiling.

She began to obsessively read and reread the handbook's chapter on the breeding habits of the Sumatran giant lemur:

They are matriarchal, with a group - called a 'conspiracy' - typically lead by a dominant female. Below her in the hierarchy are her harem, consisting of both male and, often, female lemurs, and below them, the unfavoured and infirm adults, the pups, and outskirters. Dominant females often manifest more testosterone than males, and may even develop a pseudo-penis, a common phenomenon among the lesser lemurs as well. Females kept as pets are very unlikely to manifest these traits, however, or the hormones associated therewith, and they are unlikely to consider themselves dominant - that title will be reserved for the human master.

She breezed, uncomfortably, past the unspoken implications of that line - in Towser's mind, the dominant female was Claudia. No wonder he seemed so receptive to... no. She couldn't finish that sentence, even in her head.

When two conspiracies meet, as a gesture of peace, the two dominant females will mate with one or more members of the other's harem. Sexual possessiveness and territorialism are rare, but can result in inter-conspiracy warfare. Individuals displaying these characteristics will often be driven from the group to prevent such conflict.

"We could probably learn a thing or two from them," she said out loud.

In order to ensure their own bloodlines are carried on, the males are in something of an arms race between each other for sperm potency. Like many primates, he possesses a baculum, or penis bone, which aids in sexual reproduction by maintaining a constant stiffness.

So she was right about the bone. And she wondered what it would feel like.

One morning, she realized she couldn't go on like this anymore. She needed to make a decision about Towser. And there was only one way to make it.

First, she found tasks for the household servants, things to get them out of the house until evening. She waited until Mortimer had gone to school, and then, still in her housecoat, but makeup perfectly applied, and hair stylishly curled, she led the lemur, once again, into her bedroom, on his leather leash. She brought a jar of honey with her.

She couldn't help but admire the animalistic swagger of the creature as he ascended the stairs. He put her in mind of the lions and tigers at the zoo, confidently sauntering from one side of their enclosure to the other, and the swaying of his testicles was impossible to ignore.

Claudia tied the leash to the steel bedpost. Something about having him leashed, his strength and power and unmistakable maleness held in check by her authority, appealed to her intensely. But the leash was long, and he still had free reign of most of the room. He sat on his haunches and stared at her, uncertain of what was coming next, but, his body language suggested, unafraid of whatever it might be.

But he was unmistakably erect.

The tall brunette quickly shed her housecoat, revealing the black silk bustier and matching stockings she had on underneath. She hadn't worn them in months, but right now, she needed to feel sexy or else she was afraid she might be too embarrassed to proceed.

She was wearing no panties, and her dewey vagina was entirely visible to Towser, underneath the trimmed black curls of her pubic hair. She sat down on the edge of the bed, now, and slowly began to unscrew the lid of the honey jar. She stuck a shaking finger into the sweet substance, spread her legs, and smeared it over her vagina.

Towser took a step forward. She extended the finger, still sticky, to him, and he licked it clean. Then he lowered his great big-eared head between her legs, and began to lick, lightly.

As this tongue touched her, every uncertainty melted away. She could, she knew, stop at any time, spend all her life ashamed of what she had nearly done, but this much would always have happened. Innocence was no longer an option. She would always be a woman who had led her son's pet into her bedroom on a leash and smeared honey on her vagina, and that certainty was liberating. What happened next - whether she let herself enjoy the depravity of it - was up to her.

"Mmmmm... good boy. Good boy," she whimpered.

His tongue was long and dextrous, lapping quickly at her, and Claudia cried out in pleasure. She pushed down the top of her bustier, freeing her small breasts, and started tweaking at her nipples, increasing her pleasure. Her other hand fell down to Towser's head, where she stroked his large, bat-like ears.

She'd never felt a tongue like his. It was long and slim, suited to probing into bees' nests for honey, she had read, and in a sense, that was what he was doing now, except she was the bee's nest. His tongue alternated so skilfully between her clit and her pussy hole that she knew Towser had to realize this was about more than honey. He wasn't just a dumb animal, she knew.

She squirmed, gasped, cried out as he pleasured her with his tongue. The honey was surely gone by now, but her juices were flowing like never before. No one, man or woman, ate her out this well.

"You sure it's your first time doing this, darling?" she asked. Towser stared up at her, his gaze holding hers with a sensuality that took her breath away.

She was getting close. She could feel a mighty orgasm brewing up inside her at his bestial ministrations, as that miraculous tongue moved against her, swiping from her clit all the way down to her asshole as his erect member batted against her shin.