Check me out on:
Instagram | Twitter | deviantArt | Tumblr

🛍 Merch available on RedBubble and Etsy! 🛍
✨💖 BUY ME A COFFEE 💖✨

The Curiosity Shop Centaur

“Hello? Is that you, Ravlo? I’m just finishing up sweeping the floors back here like you asked. I’ll get started on mopping next—Oh, a customer! Sorry, usually the shopkeeper doesn’t let people into this back room… as you can see, it’s in need of a little TLC. Feel free to look around, though, and let me know if you have any questions!”

“…Oh, you have a question about me? I’m flattered. Well, go ahead, ask away. …No, I wasn’t always a centaur, but it’s been… wow, at least five years since it happened. It was quite a shock at first, but… I guess you could say I’ve grown quite attached to these four hooves of mine! Or maybe that’s just because they’re attached to me, ha ha. Hm? …You wanna know how I become a centaur? Oh, OK… let me think…”

Like I said, it all happened about five years ago. I was on what I thought would be a quick weekend road trip to visit some friends upstate. I’d left home early in the day and, since my friends weren’t expecting me until the evening, I decided to do some exploring and took an alternate route to see what I might find along the way.

Some distance down the road, I saw a sign pointing to this very curiosity shop, one promising a selection of rare wares you wouldn’t find anywhere else in the world. This piqued my interest and I thought I might be able to find something cool to surprise my friends with, so I decided to follow the signs deeper and deeper into these woods. It felt like it took hours to reach this place, but when I checked my watch only a few minutes had passed. I’m sure you experienced a similar feeling on your way here yourself, yeah?

Anyway, stepping inside the shop, I’ll admit I wasn’t immediately impressed with what it had to offer. Everything on display just seemed like the standard tchotchkes for sale at big truck stops along the freeway, you know, weird glass figurines, cheap beaded jewelry, that sort of thing. Ravlo—he’s the boss around here—was doing his best to make a sale, showing me trinket after trinket, each one he swore possessed magical properties. At that point, I started to check out—who’d ever believe these things were actually magical, right?—and made my way to leave. But when I turned around, Ravlo was standing right in front of me and continued his spiel.

Startled, I took a step backward, bumping into a shelf and knocking off a little glass bottle marked with the symbol of a bow and arrow to the floor below where it shattered, the powder within puffing into a cloud of smoke. Angered, Ravlo began to scold me, pointing his finger in my face and explaining that the bottle I’d just broken—or, more specifically, the contents within it—was apparently very expensive and highly coveted by those who frequent his shop. I tried to apologize and offered to pay for the damages, inadvertently breathing in the fumes from the shattered bottle as I did, but when Ravlo told me just how much the bottle’s contents were worth, I knew I’d never be able to pay him back, at least, not with my current salary.

I didn’t have much time to be concerned with paying back my debt, though, as I soon learned just how magically potent the items in Ravlo’s shop truly were. Having inhaled so much of the powder from the shattered bottle—I remember it smelling vaguely of fermented grapes—I began to cough, my legs seizing as I fell to the floor. Ravlo stepped away, seemingly aware of what was about to happen to me, and I looked down at myself in confusion. While Ravlo had been reprimanding me, my body below the waist had begun to change shape. My shoes had fallen off to reveal hooves in my place of feet—yes, the very hooves you see at the base of my hind legs!—and I felt the joints in my ankles and knees stretching and stiffening as they made tatters of my pants. My mind raced—what was happening to me? Was I turning into a horse? More importantly, how was this happening to me?

Seconds later, the appendages that would become my forelegs shot from what were, at the time, my human hips, the hooves at their tips tearing through my shirt, leaving me naked and writhing in pained pleasure on the floor of this shop. My spine ached, elongating to allow my equine belly space to expand between my new set of legs and my old ones. I felt one last tickling, pulling sensation in my rump as my tail grew in, when suddenly, everything stopped. Looking down at myself, I realized all of the changes to my body had occurred only from the waist down. My naked torso remained completely human while my body below the waist had been replaced with this strong, virile stallion you see before you today. I couldn’t believe it at first—was I centaur? How was I a centaur? Centaurs weren’t real! At least, that’s what I thought at the time, but I’ve since come around to understanding that centaurs are, indeed, very, very real!

I rolled myself onto my side, propping my torso up with my arms as I caught my breath. Ravlo came over to help me onto my unfamiliar hooves—it was quite an odd sensation to make contact with the ground in four spots at once while my hands remained free—and allowed me to get my bearings before once again bringing up my debt.

You can imagine I was somewhat disinclined to pay back Ravlo after what had happened to me—I was half a horse, for Pete’s sake! Knowing now that Ravlo’s trinkets were indeed magic, I demanded he find one that could turn me back into a human (I wasn’t too sure on my hooves at the time, but I had half a mind to trample Ravlo under them if he didn’t oblige). That’s when Ravlo outlined our predicament: he wouldn’t turn me human again not only until I could pay back the debt I owed him for the centaur powder, but also until I was able to pay for the item he’d use to undo my centaur transformation. And I couldn’t go back out into the human world as I was without being labeled some sort of freak, or worse. So, Ravlo offered me this arrangement: he’d let me stay here for free for as long as I remain a centaur, and I’d work for him as his shop assistant until I’m able to pay off my debts. Ravlo allowed me to contact my friends to let them know I was OK, but the weekend we planned wouldn’t be going the way we’d expected (especially for me!).

Realizing that I was still naked, I asked Ravlo if he’d supply me with any sort of work uniform, to which he asked me if I’d like to add the price of a shirt to the debt I owed him. Pouting, I crossed my arms over my bare chest and decided I’d be all right without a work shirt—come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve worn any clothing since my transformation! Fortunately, though, Ravlo did make good on his offer to let me live here for free otherwise. I don’t pay rent, and all the food Ravlo provides for me has made me quite the strong, healthy centaur. That day may have fundamentally changed my life in a way I never anticipated, but how many people get to say they spent part of their life as a centaur? Not many that I know!

“…So that’s it, that’s the story of how I came to be a centaur. If the fact that I’ve worked here for more than five years gives you any idea of how expensive that centaur powder was, you don’t even wanna know how pricey it’ll be to make me human again! It’s not all bad, though. In fact, It’s sort of fun to be a centaur: I don’t have to wear pants, and nothing feels better than galloping through a huge field with the wind blowing through my tail. If you can afford it, I recommend buying a vial of that centaur powder to try for yourself!”

“Huh? Have I considered giving up trying to become human again? You mean, stay a centaur for the rest of my life? …You know, now that you mention it, I guess these four hooves really have grown on me…”