Of cats real and imaginary and imaginary animals of various kinds

I am not a dog person. Cats are my faithful both real and imaginary kinds of cats. I've often wondered if this love of cats is a writer thing or something about my nature. People often think of cats as being sneaky and other things. I kind of think they are just very private persons. We no longer have a cat living with us and I still miss the one my children referred to as my "familiar." Actually Robespierre was a twenty plus pound Maine Coon Cat who my boys found when he was probably no more than three weeks old. He has been featured in some of my cozy mysteries and variations of him are found in other stories.

Do you use animals in your stories, ones that are out of theordinary. In The Henge Betrayed series, there are a few. The forstcats have the ability to send pictures of places they are. The perfect spy weapon since Ky who rescued them is able to communicate with them. This story also has an imaginary animal called a war steed. This is sort of a horse but with a single horn like a unicorn. They are choosy about who will ride them and pick their rider. There are also coursers in this story that resemble horses but with longer bodies and some unhorse like qualities like their ability to travel on the desert.

I love dragons. We all know they don't exist but we wish they did. Not the mean people-eating kind but like the ones in books that we enjoy. The Cross-eyed Dragon comes to mind. and also the one Novak writes about. I also have some steeds invented for another world. Wind steeds who have long flowing hair that when rode unsaddled looks like wings. In these stories I'll write one of these days there are cats who delight in swimming, ones with an acid like poison in their fangs, sand cats and ones that can fly. I guess you can see I like cats.

What about you? Do your stories have animals other than dogs and ones that are real or imaginary?