In the first quarter of the dawn, when the orange disk of the sun was only half visible, a soldier from the northern contingent of the army came with urgent news. He had been riding all night, because of the urgency of his report. He
The serpents had attacked the northern security post, appearing from what had been Persian territory. Their envoys to Persia hadn’t returned yet, and they hadn’t the slightest clue whether they would ever return. They had been expecting a pigeon from the envoys, but the pigeon hadn't shown up, and they knew enough to be worried about that.
The Sultana was pacing the conference room. It was nearly a palm tree long, and half a palm tree wide. There was plenty of room to pace, even though a gigantic central conference table dominated the room. She knew that a solution would have to be found soon, and solutions usually came when you weren’t looking for them.
She didn’t have the luxury of not looking, however. She was wearing a traditional linen gown that was crimson in color, perhaps in order to reflect her martial thoughts. Her allure was ever-present, and her matronly bosom was straining against the gown. Many in the room quietly followed her movement with their eyes.
Her raven hair was plaited and swung forward, so it fell around the outer periphery of her right breast, and all the way down to her loins. She walked fast, lost in contemplation of what they had just gleaned from a company of messengers.
The sisters were not invading their kingdom. Not yet anyway. They were instead systematically destroying security posts along the circumference of their kingdom. This was just as much cause for concern as a full-scale invasion. It made her think that the sisters had an agreement with someone else who would launch a full-scale invasion once all the security posts had been demolished.
Why bother with tactics? This was what confused the Sultana. The sisters appeared to be powerful enough that they could batter their way through her entire army, and there would be no opposition to them. Why would they bother with tactics of any sort? Somehow the key to defeating them appeared to lie in this.
The Sultan was sitting at the head of the conference table, with one of his nonagenarian advisers giving him advice on the situation. Whatever they were discussing, their minds were partially shut down, given the horrors that had just been described to them. Unlike the Sultana who simply sieved out the part of the missives received that were most important to strategy, most people in the room were preoccupied with the horror of what they had heard.
The latest attack at a security post had been particularly brutal. Two thousand soldiers from their army had been wiped out in an encounter with only one of the snake sisters. The messenger, who had actually been at the outpost, and had witnessed the destruction from the distance of hundreds of yards, had reported hundreds of soldiers being swallowed alive by the python woman’s hair.
He had also reported that she had paralyzed a contingent of the army with some sort of venom that made them await their death, while she battled others. She had left them paralyzed thereafter, without allowing access to them for several hours, while they died from the slow acting and painfully excruciating lethality of the venom.
His descriptions didn’t leave out any of the gory, heartrending portions. He described the cries he had heard for hours, while the sister having simply polished off the rest of the post, simply guarded so that nobody could help the paralyzed soldiers.
As earlier, all the causalities were men.
The Sultana continued to pace, concentrating, and pausing now and again, as if some important point occurred to her, as she tilted her head from one side to the other. The sisters’ attacks were very logical for an army that wanted to weaken border defenses because they couldn’t challenge a kingdom head on, but not very logical for forces of destruction such as the sisters. Then she shook her head and took her seat again. Something was perplexing her, and it just wouldn’t be solved.
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Rawer
Rawer didn’t kill them. He didn't kill innocents, regardless of what they heard. In this case, their threat was minimal, so he would let it go. The Hellene had been another matter. His murder was not only necessary to ensure his own safety, it also seemed to be a good thing. There are people who you know are a waste of clean, pure air.
Rawer instead delivered a message to the princess. He lay down that night, dreaming of her. His lovely Mediha, and her luscious breasts, her long raven tresses, and her inviting receptacle. He ached for her, but knew that tonight he would not get to be with her.
They had to find a way. Convincing the royal family that they were a match was as hard as ridding the desert of sand. The only other available option seemed to be to flee to Nubia. He didn’t like uprooting the lovely young princess from her people and her land, but he knew she'd understand.