A Tale Of The Black Footed Ferret

I always knew I shouldn't trust that coyote fella.

Back in the days when Ferret was plump and plain, he sat with Coyote around a campfire. Coyote, the prankster, was teasing him something awful about his roundness. Suddenly Ferret had enough and lunged at Coyote. Only, in his anger, he forgot about the fire and rushed right through it, singing his paws and the tip of his tail, which has been dark ever since. When he saw what he'd done, he covered his face in despair with his stinging paws and, of course, turned the hair around his eyes dark, too. Now, Coyote felt kind of bad about this, and decided to take Ferret to his secret hunting ground at the prairie dog village. Coyote sat to wait for a prairie dog to come out of its burrow, but Ferret was fiercely hungry after his trouble, and dove into a hole. Well, he got stuck, and when Coyote tried to pull him out by the tail, first his tail stretched, then his body stretched; and finally, when his neck stretched out, instead of coming outside, he shot right back down into that burrow, long-bodied and dark-footed, and has stayed there ever since.

(copyright Madeleine Scott and Folkmanis, Inc.)

"Tell us another story, Uncle Argent!"

The Aztecs held that we live in the Fifth World; four before us have each been destroyed, some say in natural catastrophes, while others tell that those catastrophes were the results of the never-ending battle between the Gods, most notably Tezcatlipoca, the obsidian Smoking Mirror, enemy-of-both-sides, and Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent, creator of man.

Some of the worlds were destroyed in floods and storms, long before man was created under Quetzalcoatl’s rule in the Fifth World.

But the very first world, the world of giants, was ruled by Tezcatlipoca as the sun, until Quetzalcoatl struck him from the heavens with a heavy stick, throwing him into the sea. In his rage, Tezcatlipoca transformed into a jaguar, killing the giants and destroying the First World, and it is said that the spots on the jaguar’s fur are the ashes of that world.

(Loosely from the Codex Ramírez)

Story Time with Harry Potter!

(link is just text, but may cause mental scaring)

http://www.toplessrobot.com/2008/11/fan_fiction_friday_hermione_and_draco_in_creature.php

Of course you should not trust Coyote!!

/me recommends Coyote Blue by Christopher Moore. Not his best but topical to the thread.

Heh, I just read a little fantasy short story about a wizard who was trying to invoke one of the Greek gods for a youth potion... but he used taco seasoning on the sacrifice and invoked Tezcatlipoca instead and got himself transformed into a jaguar...

Oh, hey, it's online: http://www.webscription.net/chapters/1439132747/1439132747___5.htm#.