“Mother, you cannot be serious!”

Despite all the years she’d spent cultivating elegance, grace, and refinement, it still took a great deal of effort on Yuyan’s part not to sigh at her daughter’s outburst. “Nayao, give me your earring.”

Her eldest daughter recoiled at that, confirming Yuyan’s worst suspicions.

I wish Mei Li’s husband had destroyed that thing, rather than simply suppressing it for so brief a time.

While Yuyan had initially seen no issue with Nayao wearing the fear-suppressing bauble – with their clan’s fortunes having gone from uncertain to dire in just a few short years, and Nayao being forced to shoulder much of the burden in what had ultimately proven to be futile attempts to turn things around, it had been necessary for someone so young to reach for magical help in overcoming anxiety – it had become apparent that she’d grown dependent on it, allowing the artificial courage to cloud common sense.

That was the only explanation for why she’d insult a xianxia so brazenly.

“But Mother-”

“Which of us has more tails, Nayao?”

Flinching at the rebuke, Nayao looked down as she removed the earring, seeming to shrink in on herself as she handed it over.

Tucking the trinket away within the folds of her robes, Yuyan took a moment to make sure that her daughter wasn’t going to act out again before repeating what she’d said a moment ago.

“We must accept that our clan is now a part of Lex Legis’s household.”

Spread out across the exquisite banquet hall, the rest of the Pimao Jingzhi looked just as shocked as they had before, when she’d first made that announcement.

Some, however, recovered from their surprise faster than others.

“Mother, are you sure about this?” piped up Jing Bei.

“You made it sound as if you were about to refuse him, before,” added Jing Xiao.

A ghost of a smile crossed Yuyan’s lips. While not as forthright as their elder sister – or as talented, having only three tails each – her twin daughters were nevertheless very perceptive, even if they still had much to learn about how the world worked.

“You are half-right,” she admitted. “While it was not be my place to refuse him, since the offer of ownership came from Mei Li, who is our clan’s matriarch now that she has the most tails-”

“I still say that something is suspicious about that,” muttered Nayao, sulking. “She marries that demon, and he makes her into a nine-tails, even though she only had three before? All without giving her the heavenly adornments that a nine-tailed kumiho should have? Is that not strange?”

Frowning at having been interrupted again, Yuyan didn’t have a chance to say anything as Shiji – her youngest daughter, who had only just gotten her second tail a few years ago, and was still a child by any measure – tugged on Nayao’s sleeve, giving her elder sister a distraught look. “Nayao, do you hate Mei Li now that she has nine tails?”

Caught off-guard by the question, Nayao struggled to recover her composure. “N-no, of course not! My heart was broken when we lost her in that last attack!”

“Fufu, that’s right,” laughed Jing Bei softly, raising one hand to her lips to imperfectly cover the small smile she wore. “Our big sister was very sad when she thought we’d never see Mei Li again.”

“She might have put on a brave face during the day,” added Jing Xiao, wearing the same expression and making the same motion as her twin, except for using the opposite hand to cover her mouth. “But we heard her crying into her pillow at night.”

Blinking at that, Shiji gave Nayao a wide-eyed look. “Then why aren’t you happy to see her again?”

“I’m very happy to see her again!” huffed Nayao. “I’m just not happy she sold us into slavery to that demon!”

“If you would all please settle down,” murmured Yuyan. While her tone of voice was soft, it was one she’d used on her daughters often enough that they knew she wasn’t making a request. As amusing as it was to see her other daughters bring Nayao up short, there were important things which needed to be discussed.

“As I was saying,” she continued once her daughters had quieted down, the other members of the clan following suit and watching her in silence. “I had hoped to convince Mei Li’s husband that our clan was not worthy of being her dowry. To a xianxia capable of turning a three-tailed kumiho into a nine-tailed one – and her tails are legitimate, even if she doesn’t know how to use them properly yet, let alone craft her heavenly adornments – a small house such as ours is a poor gift indeed.”

She closed her eyes at that, unable to help taking a moment to mourn how far the Pimao Jingzhi had fallen.

“That plan was unlikely to succeed,” she admitted a moment later, “as we have nothing of greater value to give him, save for a binding promise that if – forgive me, when – we regain prominence, we would honor Mei Li with a dowry that even her husband would have found impressive. It would have burdened us going forward, but at least it would have preserved our clan’s independence.”

She could almost see the question in her daughters’ eyes, as well as in more than a few of the others, all asking if there was still some hope of going through with that idea now.

Ridiculous, she groaned inwardly. I’ve already told them that won’t happen, and yet they need to hear it again.

“I hope that all of you understand that this cannot happen now. As soon as Lex Legis accepted us as Mei Li’s dowry, our fate was decided. The matriarch of the Pimao Jingzhi and her husband have reached an agreement; none of us have any right to gainsay it.”

She paused for just a moment before casting a sharp eye at the assembled foxes. “Unless you wish to leave the clan.”

No one met her gaze, nor was there the slightest sound to be heard.

Satisfied, Yuyan looked at her daughters. “Nayao. Jing Bei. Jing Xiao. Shiji. From this day forward, for the sake of the Pimao Jingzhi, I intend to devote myself to Lex Legis as his concubine. I ask that each of you do the same.”

“Yes, Mother,” answered Shiji immediately, and while Yuyan doubted the girl knew what she was agreeing to, it still warmed her heart to see how diligent her youngest was.

“We’ll serve him as best we can,” chorused the twins.

“Besides, we always outperformed Mei Li in our studies,” added Jing Bei cheekily.

“Perhaps if we pamper him enough, he’ll take us as brides as well,” finished Jing Xiao.

Having to bite back the urge to laugh at the pair’s antics, Yuyan turned to Nayao, who was looking down while chewing her lip. “Nayao?”

“I...I will serve him,” she muttered.

Nayao could sympathize with her eldest’s reluctance. As both her eldest daughter, and the member of their clan who had formerly had the most tails – after herself – Nayao’s marriage prospects had been one of the only remaining hopes for the Pimao Jingzhi.

Nayao had, however, begged her not to arrange a marriage for her until she’d gained more tails, knowing that the more she had, the better husband she’d be able to find. Even after they’d been forced to go into exile in the Thousand Kingdoms, she’d continued to work very hard, hoping that if she was able to earn enough tails, she’d be able to marry into a household with enough power to take the Pimao Jingzhi in as a satellite clan, allowing them to go home.

To find out that Mei Li had achieved Nayao’s goal while at the same time destroying her hopes had to have been a harsh blow indeed.

But Yuyan knew very well that such things were simply part of life.

Losing her husband, her brother, and her sister-in-law had taught her that lesson quite thoroughly.

Which was why she couldn’t afford to go easy on her daughter now.

“You’ll serve him,” she agreed. “As his concubine.”

“...as his concubine,” finished Nayao, her ears folding back.

Ignoring the petulant display, Yuyan turned to face the others. “I know this might be hard to accept, but-”

“Aw, no need to be so serious about everything, Yuyan!” came a slurred voice from the far side of the banquet hall. “Mei Li’s new husband might look like a demon, but if he can make new tails pop out of her backside, he must pillow like one too!”

The bawdy comment caused a number of faces to flush, though there were a few nervous titters as well. All of which caused Yuyan to frown. “Wenwen-”

“You damned huli jing!” Leaping to her feet, Nayao glared at the vixen who’d spoken. “Don’t you talk like that about Mei Li!”

“Ah, you’re saying that, even though you were calling her a loose vixen less than an hour ago?”

By now everyone was turning to look at Wenwen, which wasn’t an unusual occurrence. With her bright blue hair, plentiful curves that the slovenly state of her robes put on greater display than was proper, and the way she kept generously drinking from the jug of alcohol in her grasp, she tended to draw attention to herself wherever she went.

Of course, the fact that she was a huli jing rather than a kumiho meant that she had little incentive to clean up her act, despite Yuyan having admonished her many times. In the stratified society of fox-people, the kumiho were firmly at the top – though even then, the clans continued to struggle and jockey for position amongst themselves – with the other vulpinoids having to either settle for forming houses of their own kind that would never amount to much, or joining a kumiho clan with the knowledge that they’d never be more than servants or retainers.

Even if a kitsune, huli jing, or yeu ho somehow managed to gain nine tails of their own, the noble houses of the kumiho would never acknowledge them as an equal.

Yuyan had believed in the superiority of kumiho quite deeply in her youth; it had only been when the Pimao Jingzhi’s fortunes had begun to wane, and the other kumiho clans had either drifted away from them or tried to capitalize on their weakness, that she’d begun to change her mind, cognizant of the fact that her clan’s servants – all of whom were foxes whom she’d considered to be beneath her – had shown more loyalty to her family than the other kumiho clans had.

Nayao, however, didn’t seem to share that sentiment.

“That has nothing to do with this!” snapped the five-tailed vixen. “You will show my mother respect as our clan’s matriarch, or suffer the consequences for your actions!”

“Oh? But I thought Yuyan was just saying that she’s not the matriarch anymore, now that Mei Li’s new husband has given her all those tails?”

Nayao grit her teeth, having nothing to fall back on except the same complaint she’d been making about Wenwen for years. “You worthless drunk! You were supposed to be one of the best painters in generations, but instead of picking up a brush, all you do is lie around and drink!”

“You should too, Nayao dear,” shot back Wenwen with a smirk and a wink. “If you don’t relax more, you’ll get wrinkles, and what kind of concubine would you be then?”

Nayao’s face was turning red by that point. “You damned huli jing!”

Yuyan knew that she should have stopped Nayao there, but she couldn’t help herself, realizing what was going on as she saw the restrained laughter on more than once face. Wenwen, you sly thing! You knew how nervous everyone here was, so you decided to play the fool to help ease their fears.

“It’s not like this is such a bad thing anyway,” continued Wenwen, taking another long pull of her jug before speaking again. “Mei Li seems to be really taken with him, and she was always such a sweet girl, so even if her stallion looks like a devil, he clearly must treat her like a princess.”

“He was very affectionate toward her,” added Thi-Quyen – a two-tailed yeu ho vixen – hesitantly. “Did you see the way he held her so close, even though they were in public?”

“It reminded me of the story of the princess and the oni,” added Sakura, a kitsune vixen who also had two tails. “The one where the oni kidnaps the princess because he’s smitten with her beauty, only for her to come to love him while in captivity, which eventually changes him into a handsome prince.”

“Do...do you think that if we...please him...he’ll give us more tails too?” squeaked Sun-Hi, flushing in what had to be a combination of embarrassment and excitement, her single tail fluffing up behind her. Given that the poor girl’s ancestry was so mixed – having kitsune, huli jing, yeu ho, and possibly even kumiho blood in her – it was almost impossible for her to earn a second on her own, the possibility must have been tantalizing for her, even if the means of acquiring it made her look like she was about to faint.

Nore was she alone in her excitement, as more and more faces began to switch from looks of nervousness and despair to hope and wonder.

Yuyan couldn’t begrudge them that. Of the twenty-nine members of the Pimao Jingzhi clan, Yuyan was painfully aware that she, her daughters, and Mei Li were the only kumiho left. All of the others were servants who had served long enough and well enough to be adopted as members of the clan. It was purely honorary, of course; they would have no place in the line of succession regardless of the number of tails they gained, nor a say in how the clan was run, but they still had the right – indeed, the obligation – to use “Pimao” as part of their name, with the rights and responsibilities that afforded.

Of those twenty-three foxes, twelve were like Sun-Hi, having blood that was so mixed that they were little more than mongrels. Five were kitsune. Four were yeu ho. Wenwen was the one and only huli jing, as well as the only one to have more than two tails.

And then there was the last one, the vixen who didn’t fit any other category.

“Mother,” piped up Shiji, “if Mei Li’s husband can give us all more tails, can he do that for Teumessia as well?”

All conversation stopped then, the chatter dying abruptly as Yuyan made sure her features stayed composed. “I don’t know, child.”

Casting her eyes toward the far corner of the banquet hall, Yuyan looked at the vixen who had been her late husband’s concubine, whom she’d never been able to bring herself to exile after he’d died, since it had been his last wish that she’d always have a place within their clan.

Yuyan knew that on the increasingly-unlikely chance that her petition to the court of Yen-Wang-Yeh, the Celestial Bureaucracy’s god of the dead, to have her husband – as well as her brother and his wife – resurrected ever went through, he’d be heartbroken if he came back only to find that the vixen he loved most was gone.

That wasn’t something Yuyan could bear the thought of, even though it had been her husband’s obsession with Teumessia that had started the Pimao Jingzhi down the road to ruin.

“I don’t know either...”

Slowly, Teumessia stood up, the silver fur of her single tail – so unlike the coloration of any respectable breed of fox – glinting in the soft light, as did her argent hair as she ran a hand through it.

All breeds of foxes could trace their origins back to one of two deities: Huxian of the Celestial Bureaucracy, or Inari of the Yaoyorozu, the latter being the pantheon that was the Celestial Bureaucracy’s closest allies and greatest rivals.

But there was a singular exception to that rule: the “alepathropes,” more commonly known as werefoxes.

An all-female breed, they were the product of the interloper goddess Eshebala, the one who had brought Huxian and Inari together to form the fox pantheon.

And who had subsequently betrayed them both, causing that pantheon to not only break up, but the ki of all fox-people to be unbalanced as a result, with a permanent excess of yin.

Standing tall and proud, as though she wasn’t one of the evil goddess’s cursed children, Teumessia looked Yuyan right in the eye as she smiled.

“But I’m very eager to find out.”

Author's Note

As Yuyan puts the Pimao Jingzhi in order, the history of the vulpinoids is revealed, along with what happened to the fox pantheon!

How will Lex handle the web of relationships among his new concubines? Will his coterie of vixens prove to be an asset, or another problem that he’ll need to handle?