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The Laugh Of The Hyena

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malins

Stumbling Seeker
Ahead, there was a large outcrop of rocks, a clump of trees clustered on one side, around it tall, lush grass. Through the shimmer of heat-haze, cat-tails swayed among a dense stand of reed, promising wet mud, perhaps even flowing water.

The wind against his nostrils carried a familiar note – recent death, flesh that had just begun to corrupt.

The absence of vultures betrayed the presence of something lurking there, something living that was fierce enough to not only deter, but drive them away entirely, to feed elsewhere.

Since it was a short and unannounced season of plenty, the arid plain becoming a banquet for scavengers of all species, none of the carrion-birds bothered to circle and wait; they had settled for easier pickings they could find with a few lazy flaps of their wings and a long descending glide.

Why waste energy. Do too much of that, and you’ll be the next meal.


The lone wanderer approached warily and came upon the site of combat.

A pack of hyenas had cornered a wounded lion, who in turn denied them access to the trickle of fresh water seeping from the rockface – and, shielded behind him, a heap or bundle of something yet unrecognizable.

Two of the attackers lay dead, the three others exhausted, wounded and intimidated. The sole defender, so much stronger in the beginning, was bleeding heavily. His challengers were waiting it out.

None of them had yet sensed the new arrival.

He was confident that he could kill or disperse them - one by one or all at once, and so he strode in.
 
With grim satisfaction, he thought… This was what it had come to.

The whole lot of them, all were enemies.

The lion still proud in doom as much as his three surviving opponents.

They had gone from barking and biting amongst themselves, all the way to fighting to the death.

Over a sparse but persistent trickle of water, which could be shared?

No. That was not it.

All four combatants had their senses locked on each other and remained oblivious of the decisive new threat.

It was the fifth who perceived him.

From what had appeared to be a shapeless heap rose the face of a sloe-eyed girl.

Upon it was calm resignation, not dread or fear.

She seemed an unlikely survivor.

But it was there, he could see it written on her face, not so much the will to survive but simply a nature to do so, to endure whatever was thrown at her, to exist in whatever world she was thrown into. That would be why she still lived as one of the last. She was beautiful, but her beauty was not that of a mere decoration.

He remembered the powdered tarts of the princelings, brought along for amusement by those foppish degenerates who imagined themselves heading for an amusing outing, an excursion to collect effortlessly gained trophies for a lavish triumph in the provincial capital.

Those helpless human ornaments. All their flesh was consumed by now. First taken by the hateful lusts of enemy conquerors, then gorged upon by the indiscriminate hunger of scavengers.

This one was different.

The enemy’s surprise thrust had made short shrift of any illusions of easy glory. They’d taken the heads of the princelings and the bodies of their pleasure-girls, for good measures also the army’s standard and ceremonial sword, but they’d lacked the strength to push through to complete victory.

Neither side had been able to make a proper battle out of the encounter. All discipline abandoned, it descended into two weeks of first hounding each other and then being hounded by the ever more emboldened eaters of the dead, the dying and the weakened.

These were the third army, winning an undeclared war, swelling their ranks as men of either side joined … turning from soldiers to scavengers, half-starved, heat-crazed, the laugh of the hyena bursting from their lips.

He had been one of those who’d served through the ranks, and when he finally might have led a carefully crafted campaign, command was handed to favorites of the addle-brained emperor, who promptly turned what should have been an incremental gain, into a devastating loss.

That was how loyalty was rewarded.

The girl, in a surprisingly graceful motion, unfolded herself from cowering in the shade, touched upon her protector's shoulder, and whispered to him, causing him to rise as well, with much effort.

Their eyes met. The enemy officer brought his hands forward, wearily, knowing it would be his last stand. A short sword in each of them.

Then he knew - though any of them would gladly take her as bycatch, it wasn't the girl they'd been fighting over, and it wasn't her he would kill the lot of them for.
Though of course he'd take her, too.
 
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With grim satisfaction, he thought… This was what it had come to.

The whole lot of them, all were enemies.

The lion still proud in doom as much as his three surviving opponents.

They had gone from barking and biting amongst themselves, all the way to fighting to the death.

Over a sparse but persistent trickle of water, which could be shared?

No. That was not it.

All four combatants had their senses locked on each other and remained oblivious of the decisive new threat.

It was the fifth who perceived him.

From what had appeared to be a shapeless heap rose the face of a sloe-eyed girl.

Upon it was calm resignation, not dread or fear.

She seemed an unlikely survivor.

But it was there, he could see it written on her face, not so much the will to survive but simply a nature to do so, to endure whatever was thrown at her, to exist in whatever world she was thrown into. That would be why she still lived as one of the last. She was beautiful, but her beauty was not that of a mere decoration.

He remembered the powdered tarts of the princelings, brought along for amusement by those foppish degenerates who imagined themselves heading for an amusing outing, an excursion to collect effortlessly gained trophies for a lavish triumph in the provincial capital.

Those helpless human ornaments. All their flesh was consumed by now. First taken by the hateful lusts of enemy conquerors, then gorged upon by the indiscriminate hunger of scavengers.

This one was different.

The enemy’s surprise thrust had made short shrift of any illusions of easy glory. They’d taken the heads of the princelings and the bodies of their pleasure-girls, for good measures also the army’s standard and ceremonial sword, but they’d lacked the strength to push through to complete victory.

Neither side had been able to make a proper battle out of the encounter. All discipline abandoned, it descended into two weeks of first hounding each other and then being hounded by the ever more emboldened eaters of the dead, the dying and the weakened.

These were the third army, winning an undeclared war, swelling their ranks as men of either side joined … turning from soldiers to scavengers, half-starved, heat-crazed, the laugh of the hyena bursting from their lips.

He had been one of those who’d served through the ranks, and when he finally might have led a carefully crafted campaign, command was handed to favorites of the addle-brained emperor, who promptly turned what should have been an incremental gain, into a devastating loss.

That was how loyalty was rewarded.

The girl, in a surprisingly graceful motion, unfolded herself from cowering in the shade, touched upon her protector's shoulder, and whispered to him, causing him to rise as well, with much effort.

Their eyes met. The enemy officer brought his hands forward, wearily, knowing it would be his last stand. A short sword in each of them.

Then he knew - though any of them would gladly take her as bycatch, it wasn't the girl they'd been fighting over, and it wasn't her he would kill the lot of them for.
Though of course he'd take her, too.
Great writing and concept...
:cool::rolleyes:

Tree
 
In a way, they actually had been fighting over a decoration.

The weapon in the enemy officer’s right hand was a well-used blade, notched and blunted, but the one in his left was more of an ornament.

The ceremonial sword of our army.
It would be the highest decoration with which any of their men could return from battle.
Even if only one of their warriors came home, if he brought this trophy, it might outweigh all losses, it might make him a chieftain.
After generations of humiliating defeats against the Empire, they would celebrate that warrior like no other.

Why had they not agreed to share the glory?

Tribal hostility, or just … ‘if you have the sword, at least share the girl with us’ … what did it matter?

He would have the sword back, to restore military honor, and then what other choice would the Imperial generalcy have but to appoint him to raise the new army in replacement of the one that had been led to disaster by incompetents.

The three renegades were the last to notice his appearance.
As their quarry shifted its attention to something behind them, they turned around – and did the smart, though cowardly thing. They broke and ran.
They had expected to wait for their prey to bleed out and had no stomach for a fresh fight.
Though there were beasts prowling the grasslands, most of them were well-sated already and posed a calculable risk, at least for an able-bodied man.
Facing the human predator was a far greater danger.

One of the three lagged, having a deep gash in his thigh, and the officer took a half-hearted swing at him with his right, missing by far, because he failed to step forward.
In fact, he was leaning on the girl now, resting most of his weight on her, struggling to stay upright.
He had taken a grave wound to the abdomen and was marked for death. His tunic heavy and sodden with his own blood.

Sheathing his sword, the new arrival stepped forward and addressed the doomed officer, enunciating slowly and clearly as he didn’t know how much of his language the other one could follow. Himself, he knew only a few phrases of theirs.

“You are finished. You cannot fight me.”
“Surrender our sacred sword of your own volition, and I will give you opportunity to fall on yours, so you may die honorably.”
“I promise you a proper burial so you can go to your gods with your head held upright. I know the basics of your people’s rites. The girl might point out any unforgivable mistakes… and as for her, I promise I will bring her away safely from this place of death – on the condition she is obedient, faithful and not rebellious, I promise no harm will come to the girl.”

He could see from their eyes they both understood him.

The man said something not quite intelligible, as if to correct or reprimand him. Then he retched up blood.

Then, “Where will you take her?”

“To the Empire. By fate she must be a slave – should she prove herself worthy – but her children could be free. Otherwise you know as well as I ... she will for sure be torn apart by predators.”

“You would be one of them?”, he asked, but didn’t wait for an answer; he turned to the girl and exchanged a few quick words with her. She nodded, stepped back, and wrapped her arms around herself.

Then the enemy officer dropped the sword in his left hand down into the mud, muttering a curse.

“Take your trinket. I go to die now.”
“I go satisfied, because victory is still ours. You came to take our lands and you leave without an army. From now on, you will know only defeat when you come against us.”
“Take her too, by fate she may be yours, but she will never belong to your Empire, and the free blood will run strong in the veins of any children she might bear.”

With that, he staggered away, out of sight around the rocks.

There were sounds like wet coughs, and a blood-choked gurgle. Something scraping in the dust until it went silent.

The girl shuddered but kept herself composed.
She had obeyed and respected this man, accepted him as protector – but she had not loved him.
Whoever she originally belonged with – or belonged to – was already gone.
That of course made things easier for him.

He waited a while, to avoid coming upon a still-twitching body, then motioned to the girl to follow, so they could see to the burial.

It occurred to him that the first thing the enemy officer had said to him, the word he hadn’t recognized and now couldn’t recall, might have been the girl’s name.

Perhaps she should forget it too.

For the week or so they would be traveling on foot, they would have only each other's company, and ‘girl’ should be enough.

In town she could get a proper slave-name, a name of a flower or a bird or such; if she needed help remembering it, it could be inscribed on her collar or branded onto her skin.
 
The dead man’s face looked relaxed, his eyes closed.

I go satisfied’ had been his words.

Maybe he was right, and the fortune of war will be on his people’s side in the future.
Some say that the tax, slaves and plunder to be gained from the borderlands provinces haven’t been worth the effort for generations.
But once you start withdrawing, where
do you stop?

He pulled out the sword from where it was rammed in, upwards underneath the ribs; it came out with an ugly, gristly, scraping sound.
The scorched dry earth greedily swallowed seeping blood.
He found a flat rock for the dead man to rest his head upon, and straightened him out, arranging him so it looked as if he was sleeping – as if waiting for the rising sun to warm his face, to gently wake him for a new day.
His right hand placed on his heart, the sword should go in his left, its tip on his right shoulder.
The girl watched silently from a few steps back.

“It would be better,” she said, “to clean it.”
“If he cannot go to the gods with the fresh blood of an enemy on his blade, it should rather be clean.”

She came forward and held out her hand, he passed her the sword and she wiped it with the remains of her dress.
She acted as if the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind, that he might hesitate to pass her a weapon.
Because in her hands, he realized, it wasn’t a weapon – the notion of attacking him was foreign to her.

This one might make a good slave, he thought.

He recalled some very different lessons learned about barbarian girls when he’d been posted to the North!

The sword back in his hands, he contemplated the girl’s words about the gods.
He ran his fingers along the steel, finding that it wasn’t entirely blunted halfway down it’s length, and made a shallow cut to the ball of his left thumb.
The girl watched with amazement.
There you have your fresh blood, a few drops at least. Go to your gods in peace.

He reunited warrior and weapon, and then it was time to build the tomb.
Rocks were strewn about this side of the outcrop, ranging in size from gravel to boulders.
He put in the first layer and let the girl continue.
At first she struggled, as she tried to lift rocks almost as big as the ones he’d carried.
But then she settled into an efficient rhythm of work, gathering smaller ones and stacking them. Like any peasant wife anywhere would do, clearing out field-stones from the ground to plough, and piling them up in a clearance cairn or dry-stone wall. One layer after another, tchock, tok.

However, the striped hyenas prowling these lands might paw their way through a heap of girl-heaved rocks, and so they finished the tomb with a handful of far heavier capstones.
These they carried together.
He watched the muscles strain in her thin, bronze-skinned arms, shining with her sweat, which ran in rivers through the dust and grime clinging to her.
She was a good worker, no complaining.
Though she did keep the weight off her left leg. He’d have to look at that. It wouldn’t be good for her to go lame. She absolutely had to be able to keep up, or be put down.

When the tomb was finished, she knelt at its foot, closed her eyes and recited some prayer or incantation in her language, making signs with her hands. Rising, she announced,

“His name was Haotopas. He was a good warrior, and a good man, who saved and protected me, and I obeyed him.”
“Now I am yours. I see that you keep your promises. Even though you were born to be enemies you paid him respect.“
”So you too, are a good man, and I will obey you as well, so that you can keep the second promise you made to him. I am ...”

He cut her introduction off.

“You are now my slave. Slave. You will address me as Master, and refer to yourself only as ‘this one’ or ‘this girl’ - in time a slave may receive a new name, that I and others who are set above her will use when necessary.”

The look she gave him would under normal circumstances have earned her a severe whipping, but for this time he decided to let it pass.

He counted to her benefit, that she had been perceptive enough to notice that he had made a promise only to her previous owner – not to the girl herself.

And the look he gave her prompted her to lower her eyes, kneel and respond, “Yes, … Master. This one will obey.”

The dead man had said, “by fate she may be yours, but she will never belong to your Empire.”

As I myself belong with heart and soul to the Empire, he thought, in which way can she not belong to it, with now being mine?
 
The dead man’s face looked relaxed, his eyes closed.

I go satisfied’ had been his words.

Maybe he was right, and the fortune of war will be on his people’s side in the future.
Some say that the tax, slaves and plunder to be gained from the borderlands provinces haven’t been worth the effort for generations.
But once you start withdrawing, where
do you stop?

He pulled out the sword from where it was rammed in, upwards underneath the ribs; it came out with an ugly, gristly, scraping sound.
The scorched dry earth greedily swallowed seeping blood.
He found a flat rock for the dead man to rest his head upon, and straightened him out, arranging him so it looked as if he was sleeping – as if waiting for the rising sun to warm his face, to gently wake him for a new day.
His right hand placed on his heart, the sword should go in his left, its tip on his right shoulder.
The girl watched silently from a few steps back.

“It would be better,” she said, “to clean it.”
“If he cannot go to the gods with the fresh blood of an enemy on his blade, it should rather be clean.”

She came forward and held out her hand, he passed her the sword and she wiped it with the remains of her dress.
She acted as if the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind, that he might hesitate to pass her a weapon.
Because in her hands, he realized, it wasn’t a weapon – the notion of attacking him was foreign to her.

This one might make a good slave, he thought.

He recalled some very different lessons learned about barbarian girls when he’d been posted to the North!

The sword back in his hands, he contemplated the girl’s words about the gods.
He ran his fingers along the steel, finding that it wasn’t entirely blunted halfway down it’s length, and made a shallow cut to the ball of his left thumb.
The girl watched with amazement.
There you have your fresh blood, a few drops at least. Go to your gods in peace.

He reunited warrior and weapon, and then it was time to build the tomb.
Rocks were strewn about this side of the outcrop, ranging in size from gravel to boulders.
He put in the first layer and let the girl continue.
At first she struggled, as she tried to lift rocks almost as big as the ones he’d carried.
But then she settled into an efficient rhythm of work, gathering smaller ones and stacking them. Like any peasant wife anywhere would do, clearing out field-stones from the ground to plough, and piling them up in a clearance cairn or dry-stone wall. One layer after another, tchock, tok.

However, the striped hyenas prowling these lands might paw their way through a heap of girl-heaved rocks, and so they finished the tomb with a handful of far heavier capstones.
These they carried together.
He watched the muscles strain in her thin, bronze-skinned arms, shining with her sweat, which ran in rivers through the dust and grime clinging to her.
She was a good worker, no complaining.
Though she did keep the weight off her left leg. He’d have to look at that. It wouldn’t be good for her to go lame. She absolutely had to be able to keep up, or be put down.

When the tomb was finished, she knelt at its foot, closed her eyes and recited some prayer or incantation in her language, making signs with her hands. Rising, she announced,

“His name was Haotopas. He was a good warrior, and a good man, who saved and protected me, and I obeyed him.”
“Now I am yours. I see that you keep your promises. Even though you were born to be enemies you paid him respect.“
”So you too, are a good man, and I will obey you as well, so that you can keep the second promise you made to him. I am ...”

He cut her introduction off.

“You are now my slave. Slave. You will address me as Master, and refer to yourself only as ‘this one’ or ‘this girl’ - in time a slave may receive a new name, that I and others who are set above her will use when necessary.”

The look she gave him would under normal circumstances have earned her a severe whipping, but for this time he decided to let it pass.

He counted to her benefit, that she had been perceptive enough to notice that he had made a promise only to her previous owner – not to the girl herself.

And the look he gave her prompted her to lower her eyes, kneel and respond, “Yes, … Master. This one will obey.”

The dead man had said, “by fate she may be yours, but she will never belong to your Empire.”

As I myself belong with heart and soul to the Empire, he thought, in which way can she not belong to it, with now being mine?

Turning up the interest and developing the threads in true Malins style! :)

:popcorn:
 
Thanks for the supportive comments!
I've run into a bit of a roadblock with my other story so I decided it might help to just visit some other places ;)
This one is a bit more straightforward, no mulitple nonlinear chronologies or recursively reincarnating characters ;)
 
Thanks for the supportive comments!
I've run into a bit of a roadblock with my other story so I decided it might help to just visit some other places ;)
This one is a bit more straightforward, no mulitple nonlinear chronologies or recursively reincarnating characters ;)

Recursively reincarnating, I like the sound of that....can't think why :D

Still, nice and simple has its charm especially under a hot sun though noticing the caution that this is only a bit more straightforward I expect complications to arise for our protagonist persons.
 
Recursively reincarnating, I like the sound of that....can't think why
Maybe you're looking forward to someone getting crucified who seemed to have swindled her way out of it...?
I expect complications to arise for our protagonist persons
Well he'll expect of her, When in Rome, do as the Romans do. There might be some cultural differences to overcome ;)
 
The dead man’s face looked relaxed, his eyes closed.

I go satisfied’ had been his words.

Maybe he was right, and the fortune of war will be on his people’s side in the future.
Some say that the tax, slaves and plunder to be gained from the borderlands provinces haven’t been worth the effort for generations.
But once you start withdrawing, where
do you stop?

He pulled out the sword from where it was rammed in, upwards underneath the ribs; it came out with an ugly, gristly, scraping sound.
The scorched dry earth greedily swallowed seeping blood.
He found a flat rock for the dead man to rest his head upon, and straightened him out, arranging him so it looked as if he was sleeping – as if waiting for the rising sun to warm his face, to gently wake him for a new day.
His right hand placed on his heart, the sword should go in his left, its tip on his right shoulder.
The girl watched silently from a few steps back.

“It would be better,” she said, “to clean it.”
“If he cannot go to the gods with the fresh blood of an enemy on his blade, it should rather be clean.”

She came forward and held out her hand, he passed her the sword and she wiped it with the remains of her dress.
She acted as if the thought hadn’t even crossed her mind, that he might hesitate to pass her a weapon.
Because in her hands, he realized, it wasn’t a weapon – the notion of attacking him was foreign to her.

This one might make a good slave, he thought.

He recalled some very different lessons learned about barbarian girls when he’d been posted to the North!

The sword back in his hands, he contemplated the girl’s words about the gods.
He ran his fingers along the steel, finding that it wasn’t entirely blunted halfway down it’s length, and made a shallow cut to the ball of his left thumb.
The girl watched with amazement.
There you have your fresh blood, a few drops at least. Go to your gods in peace.

He reunited warrior and weapon, and then it was time to build the tomb.
Rocks were strewn about this side of the outcrop, ranging in size from gravel to boulders.
He put in the first layer and let the girl continue.
At first she struggled, as she tried to lift rocks almost as big as the ones he’d carried.
But then she settled into an efficient rhythm of work, gathering smaller ones and stacking them. Like any peasant wife anywhere would do, clearing out field-stones from the ground to plough, and piling them up in a clearance cairn or dry-stone wall. One layer after another, tchock, tok.

However, the striped hyenas prowling these lands might paw their way through a heap of girl-heaved rocks, and so they finished the tomb with a handful of far heavier capstones.
These they carried together.
He watched the muscles strain in her thin, bronze-skinned arms, shining with her sweat, which ran in rivers through the dust and grime clinging to her.
She was a good worker, no complaining.
Though she did keep the weight off her left leg. He’d have to look at that. It wouldn’t be good for her to go lame. She absolutely had to be able to keep up, or be put down.

When the tomb was finished, she knelt at its foot, closed her eyes and recited some prayer or incantation in her language, making signs with her hands. Rising, she announced,

“His name was Haotopas. He was a good warrior, and a good man, who saved and protected me, and I obeyed him.”
“Now I am yours. I see that you keep your promises. Even though you were born to be enemies you paid him respect.“
”So you too, are a good man, and I will obey you as well, so that you can keep the second promise you made to him. I am ...”

He cut her introduction off.

“You are now my slave. Slave. You will address me as Master, and refer to yourself only as ‘this one’ or ‘this girl’ - in time a slave may receive a new name, that I and others who are set above her will use when necessary.”

The look she gave him would under normal circumstances have earned her a severe whipping, but for this time he decided to let it pass.

He counted to her benefit, that she had been perceptive enough to notice that he had made a promise only to her previous owner – not to the girl herself.

And the look he gave her prompted her to lower her eyes, kneel and respond, “Yes, … Master. This one will obey.”

The dead man had said, “by fate she may be yours, but she will never belong to your Empire.”

As I myself belong with heart and soul to the Empire, he thought, in which way can she not belong to it, with now being mine?
well written...this is very good. thanks
 
This is good thinking Malins - when in trouble, write your way out of it.
I hope your blockage in the other story clears, it has been a great journey, and you should be allowed to do it justice in the way that satisfies you.
Meanwhile we have this diversion :)
 
I hope your plan works. That said, this story is starting well. There always seem to be interesting scenarios told in your unique style and cadence. One can imagine being the soldier, looking through his eyes at the girl and wondering what sort of slave she will make, what name might ultimately suit her.
 
As they walked back to where the spring broke out of the rock-face, she followed a few paces behind him.
While entirely natural, it was a strange sensation to him, in that moment.
For many days, any movement behind him, the slightest rustle in the grass, the quietest padding of foot or paw, would have him spin around, blade in hand, ready to fight for his life.
Always it would be him who maneuvered to be trailing behind others silently, to be downwind, to remain concealed, to strike first, to survive.

He had to get used again to the idea that something alive might not be a threat!

There was one more ugly task to do – the bodies of the two slain renegades needed to be removed, so as to not attract the carrion-eaters.
The girl watched silently as he dragged them away a good distance, one after the other.
They should keep the hyenas satisfied a while, so that they would not bother to seek out other meat – why bother the living, even the sleeping, when they could feed undisturbed on the dead.
That offering should be good enough for a night, maybe two, but he and the girl should not linger here too long even if it was tempting.

It was not good to stay around beasts who had become accustomed to human flesh.

Early tomorrow they would strike out towards the lands controlled by the Empire, where he would return to his accustomed life.
And she would enter a world unknown to her, dependent, a world she would find her place in as his servant.

When he was finished with that grim work, the girl got up.

“I … this one... will gather and prepare food for us”.

He nodded his approval, and watched her disappear into the cat-tails.

In the meantime he explored the outcrop of rock, finding to his satisfaction it was almost a natural fortress, with one easily defensible way to climb up, where they could find a safe retreat for the night.

When he returned, he saw her dress hung up over a branch.
It was the ragged remainder of what had once been a garment of a simple cut but most noble fabric.
Mucking about, digging up rhizomes with both hands, in stifling heat, it made practical sense for her to go naked, and she was likely to return with both hands full.

So, weary of dealing with dead men, he sought a comfortable spot in the shade, sat down, and willed himself to relax – it was an effort, like releasing a clenched, cramped grip.
And he waited for her to emerge from the reeds, to reveal herself.
 
And while he was waiting for that green curtain to part and the girl to emerge, he remembered others who’d revealed themselves, willingly or not.

And he knew already, the powdered tarts in the princelings’ tents would not compare, even when she’d step right out of a swamp, even when she’d be covered in grime except where rivers of sweat had cut through it.

He remembered the girls coming out through the crimson curtain.
The slave market at Ennussim, one more perfect than the other.
A twinge of regret, and also anger, at the thought of Iris and Topaz, whom he’d had to sell off, not even to someone he knew, to somewhere he’d know they’d be safe, to someone whom they'd be well-kept with. No, it had to be away, to a trader, and all he could ever find was that an insufferably arrogant lady by the name of Asmodelia had shipped them off to her estate in the Despotate of Deliria.

And he remembered the feast, where he knew that the invitation was an opportunity to enter the inner circle.
Where he knew that him rushing off on the second day, and not answering the second invitation, and not receiving another one after that, meant his exclusion from that circle, and most likely, why it hadn’t been him who’d been awarded the command, instead it was those decadents, and that was why that army was no more, but perhaps that was also why he had that girl now, and also the ceremonial sword, which was supposed to mean a lot, and many men had likely died for, but now it came to him only as an afterthought. He remembered when at the feast, the slavegirls were sent in naked and unadorned, except for the bracelets of gems around their ankles, the colors of which told what they were meant for. There was amethyst and malachite, amber and rhodochrosite, and then there were two who’d passed proud and radiant, as if they stood apart from and above all, as if they knew what others never would. Black pearls, and he had seen them only briefly, and never again, but couldn’t forget, though he wanted to.
 
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And there she was.
She stepped out, quite unconscious of her nudity, having become absorbed in her task.
Tired, grimy, frazzled, and perfect.
A guileless beauty with no betrayal.

His gaze devoured her; she, unaware, put down the roots and shoots she’d collected, and looked about where her newly accepted Master might be.
With the descending sun in her face, and him in the shade, it took a while to make him out. She shielded her eyes with her hand and straightened up to look around.

Then, when she discovered him, that hand fell, and the other rose, and she curled in on herself, an instinctual movement to cover.
But she realized he’d been watching a while already, she remembered that she was his, and so it was a futile and pointless gesture.

She let her hands drop to her side and corrected her posture. What for a moment had been a sheepish smile became an inviting one, without shame, and everything about her said -- take me here as I stand.

The sacred ceremonial sword, the guarantor of his rehabilitation … a rogue could have seized it from right behind him at that instant and he could not have cared less.

Here right in front of him was the true treasure, that could turn a place of death into a paradise garden, and it was all his to revel in.

Then, very matter-of-factly, she said, “This one could pound out the roots but that takes time and the day will not be long anymore. We could roast them and chew them as they are.”

She looked off into the distance, where the renegades must hide somewhere, where beasts prowled, and asked, “Master. Can we afford to have a fire this night or is it too dangerous, to give ourselves away?”
 
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