???????? Chapter iv : Season of Snakes ????????
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The sun hung at its zenith.
A gold coin minted by the gods.
It herald the Saint Solstice.
Twas Verdesainte's custom, a yearly hunt amongst the dukes.
Either when the Sun reaches its highest or lowest point in the sky at the season of tigers and snakes.
This year, the roulette had fallen upon Duke Cinhoedl of House Arundell.
He ruled the western pass that led onto the ancient moss forest of Prycilla.
Where devout folk still pilgrimaged to venerate the elephantine deity, Eygor.
His estate was a bastion of stone amidst venerable pines.
Now fluttered with the regalia of the realm's most powerful and most dangerous men.
Before the first horn echoed through the ancient moss forest.
House Arundell played host to a feast that felt more like a siege at the western pass fortress, Loxodonta.
Renowned for the conflict wherein the elven Princess Elydria didst halt the demonic legion of Khuresh.
The Khuresh were a demon kind of disgusting affinities.
Wherever their presence is made known, they usher in decay and pestilence.
Hideous with their writhing tentacles and fetid with biles of putric acid allover them.
They were once men, but by some cruel twist of fate.
They've been rendered into these malformed entities of pure malevolence.
Their presence are thankfully scarce in the recent ages owing to the valiant endeavors of the Elven folk.
As scrupulously chronicled in the storybooks of the famous Aridian author, Arjmandar.
Whom wrote the famous tale, 'Journeys of the Warrior Princess'.
Back in the halls of Loxodonta,
Neath the lambent glow of tallow and the redolent aroma of roasted venison.
The power of Verdesainte sat in uneasy proximity.
Duke Cinhoedl, a strategist of renown.
He orchestrated the seating arrangements with deliberate discord.
House Arundell, perpetually coveted the crown.
Yet they were perpetually overshadowed by the House of Taliesion.
Once engaged in open conflict shortly post-Taliesion's coronation.
The conflict resolved by a duel between King Urwyll and Duke Carydog.
After both sides suffered catastrophic losses.
Victory favored Urwyll.
Cinhoedl, however, sought to stoke the embers of discontent between Duke Gruffyd and King Arwen.
He knew what kind of man Gruffyd was.
A man with a superiority complex, whom scorned Arwen to this very day.
For he bested him in a duel for the crown.
Duke Cinhoedl silently beseeched Eygor's favor.
At the head of the table, King Arwen found himself lost in his reflection within the wine.
The hammered silver distorting his visage.
Adjacent, Queen Guinevere maintained a regal bearing.
Though one could sense her exhaustion.
In her wake stood Feyja, who had replaced Sir Olewain's position.
Her presence was a silent challenge to the dukes who viewed her unit as a slight to their own chivalry.
Across the salt-laden expanse, was Duke Gurlouen who still harbored some animosity to Freyja and the queen for his son's knightly replacement.
Beside him was where Duke Gruffyd presided, his gloved hands clasped meticulously upon the linen.
Words were few, yet his gaze incessantly measured the chasm betwixt the King's reticence and the Queen's glacial demeanor.
Undoubtedly, a rift has been stirring ever since the ordeal of their child.
Guinevere still harbored some animosity for the king's waneful of support.
Whilst Arwen's pride felt challenged by Guinevere's growing power.
Adjacent stood Duke Alaric of House Maerwynn, a formidable figure with a ginger beard and locks.
He hails from the northern bastion of Hywell Basin, whence the chalice rivers spring forth at the bay of Hywell.
His discerning eyes swept across the table, halting upon a particular man.
A gentleman of considerable girth, possessing brunette locks and a curled mustache.
He did then articulate his thoughts.
"A rather generous spread! Cinhoedl!" Duke Ieuan of House Maelor observed.
He brandished a greased drumstick towards the elephantine banners venerating Eygor which adorned the rafters.
"Though I wonder if the grain we eat tonight is the last Arslan has to offer.
Given the 'unrest' Princess Chrywyllia's father finds himself presently submerged?"
He pronounced, as he consumed the surrounding fare with unrestrained gluttony.
Chrywyllia, a princess of a merely eighteen summers.
She was arrayed in a blushing rose silk girdle that embraced her blushed skin, her dazzling blonde tresses braided with the utmost elegance.
Reflective of House Leon's wealth.
She remained fixed upon her plate at the table's furthest reach.
"My sire quells sedition, Ieuan. He does not deign to measure bread whilst the kingdom is set ablaze."
Chrywyllia retorted.
Duke Cryderii had sent princess Chrywyllia in his place.
The rousing peasants have risen to a revolt against the duke for not quelling the Cadagonian remnants hastily.
"Traitors are like weeds..." Gruffyd purred, his voice cutting through the clatter of cutlery.
"One must wonder what seeds they came from. Perhaps they grow because the gardener has grown too soft to hold the shears."
He cast an oblique glance toward Guinevere.
"Or perhaps because the gardener is too distracted by his own nursery."
Gruffyd added.
Guinevere placed her goblet upon the table with a most decisive resonance.
It shattered the tranquility.
Her summer sky eyes turned towards Duke Gruffyd like the summer sun blazing upon him, her tone laced with glacial disdain.
"The gardener's distraction... Duke Gruffyd. Stems from wondering which of his neighbors is tossing salt over the garden wall.
My nursery is garrisoned by those bereft of all possessions. They do not engage in pursuit for recreation.
They pursue subsistence.
I discern that dedication far more dependable than the 'chivalry' of men who allocate more duration to preening their steeds
than honing their wits." She scorned Gruffyd.
Duke Ieuan scoffed, leaning forward with his fat belly pressing the table.
"Is such the designation we now employ, my Lady?
A 'Cradle-Guard'?!
It evokes less a company of warriors but more a refuge for the infirm.
I daresay! does Freyja possess even a modicum of understanding as to the proper handling of a pike?
OR does she presume to dissolve our adversaries through a deluge of tears?"
He punctuated his jest with a hearty chuckle, only to be seized by a fit of coughing courtesy of the venison.
Princess Chrywyllia, visibly repulsed by his display of unrefined table manners.
She watched with disdain as fragments of venison were unceremoniously deposited upon the table.
"Nay!" Guinevere countered.
Her gaze unwavering.
"Freyja stood firm at Black Ridge against the Aridian brigands who approached from the east!
Whilst you, Ieuan!
Were yet contemplating the expense of your armour!"
Guinevere retorted, her gaze incandescent.
"She sheds no tears! she possesses a keen memory!
Furthermore, she recalls the visage of every man who stood by while her village burned.
Perhaps it is that which instills trepidation within you!
The notion that my sentinels possess a more enduring remembrance than your informants!"
Guinevere scorned. As Ieuan jaws stood firmly open with venison bit dripping.
Arwen's grip upon the ceremonial dirk's hilt did intensify.
"The Solstice is a matter of venerable custom, Gruffyd.
Not a venue for puzzling games." Arwen warned Gruffyd from instigating rivalries.
"Assuredly, Sire." Gruffyd responded, a wan smile playing upon his lips.
"Let us aspire that the morrow's chase yields greater elucidation than this evening's repast.
Verily! The Prycillan woods possess an uncanny penchant for unveiling a man or a woman down to their true nature."
Gruffyd announced ending it with a sip of wine.
"I shall then slumber with untroubled repose..." Guinevere declared.
She ascended from her perch and beckoned Freyja to attend her.
"For my disposition holds no enigma for me.
I merely harbor the hope that the remainder of you may profess likewise when the shadows of Prycilla envelope you."
Guinevere spoke before he exit of the dining halls.
As the wine flowed, discourse shifted to the Cradle-Guards. The dukes, with mirthful indulgence, jested, dubbing them "Wenches of the Bereaved".
As Freyja escorted Guinevere towards her private chambers.
The Queen was beset by reminiscences of their initial conversations.
Which transpired on an eve when the moon was but a sliver of light.
Guinevere, quivering with the recollection of her child's vanishing.
She inquired of Freyja how she endured the bereavement of her own kin during her battles at the frontiers.
Freyja offered no empty solace.
She merely gazed upon the Queen and declared.
"I did not endure... My Lady.
I elected to pursue them to the most remote desert caverns where they sought refuge.
It was in those very caves.
I dispatched them, down to the last man.
Their tormented cries punctuating the silence of the caverns..."
Indeed, Freyja had always lived up to the aptitude of murder that surrounded her.
In the ensuing weeks, the castle halls became their shared haven.
Guinevere discovered comfort in Freyja's resolute fortitude.
While Freyja identified a renewed sense of purpose serving her queen.
Absent since the desecration of her village.
They spent countless hours discoursing on the worlds they aspired to create.
Realms where children need not worry of the consequences of wars.
The metamorphosis from trauma to affection was almost imperceptible and a fire was slowly kindling between them.
At the break of dawn, the trumpets resonated through the Prycilla woods.
The dukes then partitioned into a triumvirate.
Arwen was escorted by Gruffyd, they channeled towards the hills by the forest.
Whilst Guinvere and Freyja, were dispatched to the depths of Pryscilla.
With the company of the one-eyed Gurlouen.
In the verdant depths of Prycilla's age-old moss.
Where emerald expanses veiled every nook, a tranquil serenity enveloped wayfarers.
Yet, for the noble dukes, such peace was subservient to their pursuit of noble game.
Gurlouen, with measured cadence guided the two ladies.
His discerning eye interpreted the ancient moss as if it were the map of the realm.
"The King pursues the Hart, yet neglects the wolves."
Gurlouen intoned, his timbre akin to quarried stone.
He regarded Guinvere then cast a sidelong glance towards Freyja.
"Word reaches me the Council is in disarray over your new protectors, My Lady.
Duke Ieuan avows you've supplanted Maelor's steel with, and I quote,
'the lamentations of bereft mothers.'
His pronouncement, not my own."
Lady Guinevere's expression didn't flicker.
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"Ieuan assesses mettle by the reach of a spear.
Whereas I, by the depths of a woman's resolve when her world lies in ashes.
My Cradle-Guards.
You see, do not falter in their duties, Duke.
They understand that failure is not a mere depletion of coffers, but mortal demise."
Guinevere paused, a dawning realization in her eyes.
"Were you not, in essence, of a similar disposition?
You did challenge Freyja with your own progeny?..."
Freyja adjusted herself upon the saddle, her hand now residing upon the hilt of her blade.
"The Dukes find themselves aggrieved by their incapacity to procure us, my Lady.
One cannot offer a coin to a woman whose wealth is a memory of a child she could not save."
Gurlouen offered a brief, arid chuckle.
"Indeed!
However, exercise caution.
The realm is a delicate affair.
The peasant unrest in Arslan extends beyond mere sustenance.
It speaks to a diminished confidence in the Taliesion crown.
When a King finds himself unable to secure his own child.
The common man begins to question his ability to safeguard their livelihoods.
Gruffyd understands this sentiment.
He thrives upon such uncertainties."
Gurlouen forewarned Guinevere for Gruffyd now sees rifts amongst the court.
"And as for yourself, Gurlouen?"
Guinevere inquired.
Her cerulean eyes betraying a hint of scrutiny.
"Do your loyalties lie with the King, or do they perhaps venture towards House Glyndwr of Firewood?"
Guinevere inquired further.
"I pursue the annals!" Gurlouen responded with an air of mystique.
"History! Alas! Is a disheveled chronicler!
Recording merely the victors and those left to tell the tale.
I have witnessed the earliest settlers unearthing the secret of iron within Eygor's caverns!
House Glyndwr's discovery of firewood against the dragons!
Men of profound desperation, not unlike your own guard!
Freyja.
Desperation, I daresay, is the sole honest sentiment remaining in Verdesainte.
And I wish to see them all with my eye until death does me part..."
Gurlouen spoke with a glitter in his single eye like the radiance of a sun.
As Gurlouen ventured forth to reconnoiter a constricted passage.
The ambience betwixt Guinevere and Freyja underwent a transformation.
The contrived aloofness befitting Queen and Bodyguard began to dissipate beneath the dense foliage.
Each instance of Freyja extending a hand to deflect a pendulous bough for Guinevere, her touch tarried a fraction too long.
Whenever Guinevere surveyed the route, her gaze gravitated back to Freyja's shoulders.
They were sturdy, battle-scarred, and the only thing in the world that felt safe.
In the hushed seclusion of the verdant forest, Guinevere reached out.
Her fingers brushing Freyja's scarred cheek, tracing the path where an exchange of blades had nearly stolen her vision.
"Oh, Freyja...I can no longer contain myself..." the Queen murmured.
As though volcanic effluence escaped its caldera.
"Know that in your company, I've found a serenity surpassing all the privileges of my station.
Since that day you faced Morganough in the courtyard.
Freyja, my heart has been yours.
Even amidst the King's regrettable indifference, my love for you quietly flourished."
Freyja inclined towards the caress, her heart a tempest beneath the leather.
But a sudden grip holds her heart, she was the captain of the Cradle-Guard.
The Queen's bodyguard.
If their love blossoms, it would be a crime against the crown.
She tried with every might within her will to resist Guinevere's soft, silky and sensous lips.
But oh they ever so closes in to hers.
As Guinevere's lips were on the edge of embracing Freyja's, it was interrupted by a high-pitched whistle.
The ambush transpired with regrettable haste.
Insidious figures, clad in cloaks and black gloves.
They descended from the arboreal heights with arachnid grace.
Freyja, acting on instinct, swiftly pulled Guinevere as a projectile hit the saddle.
They sought refuge in the undergrowth, Freyja offering her person as a bulwark.
Guinevere didn't wait to be saved.
She unsheathed a short blade with a silver pommel from her boot.
"Freyja, left!" Guinevere exclaimed.
As Guinevere deflects a rather uncouth downward thrust and parries him with a clean sever of his head.
Whilst Freyja pirouetted, her blade a tempest of steel, severing the jugular of an assassin.
Further along the track, Gurlouen was unhorsed most unceremoniously.
His singular eye was obscured by the blood from a cranial laceration.
He found himself besieged by three of the assassins.
Who advanced as he endeavoured to retrieve his weighty axe.
One, with a jagged dagger raised, prepared to deliver a fatal blow.
"My Lord!" Freyja vociferated.
As she broke away from the men surrounding her.
She vaulted over a fallen mossy log and threw her own short-sword.
The blade buried with unerring accuracy into the chest of Gurlouen's assailant.
Pressing her advantage, she then engaged the second assassin.
She delivered a sharp blow to his temple.
While Guinevere, in a well-timed maneuver, used a fallen branch to fell the third.
She effectively concluded the deed with a precise fatal thrust to the neck.
The other assassins ran back into the thick of the woods.
Freyja, respiration pronounced, loomed above Gurlouen.
An arm outstretched toward the aged Duke.
Gurlouen gazed upward, beholding the woman he had for a mere hour prior, dismissed as a 'mother bereft'.
He grasped her hand, his considerable mass elevated by her assistance.
"By Eygor! you fight with the ferocity of Eygor himself, lass!" Gurlouen remarked.
Dabbing at a trickle of blood.
Surveying the fallen five assassins.
He inclined his head to Guinevere.
"I daresay, my earlier doubts were misplaced.
Steel may yield, yet a maternal combatant deprived of all else?
Verily, that is a force most indomitable!"
Gurlouen praised Freyja's mettle.
Upon the hills, leagues distant from the forest.
A deceptive tranquility reigned.
Gruffyd had been feeding poison unto the king's ears.
Spouting nonesense like Freyja was the queen's executioner and upon the rightful night.
The queen would reinstall House Goldmane as the rightful heir of the crown.
Though the king scoffed at Gruffyd's claims.
There was a developing envy to Guinevere's steady rise of power, and his insecurities would soon eat at him.
Upon Arwen's arrival at a placid pool bordering the forest, a hart materialized across the water.
As Arwen drew his arrow, hesitation gripped him.
His thoughts sullied by Gruffyd's deceits and the visions of his queen overthrowing him.
Then, from the reeds, the assassins emerged.
Bolts plunged forth, casting Arwen into the frigid depths.
His crown detached, descending into the silt.
Gruffyd remained aloof upon the hill.
A remote spectator to the regicide he had orchestrated but did not execute himself.
"Regicide rings of such unfortunate untidiness..." Gruffyd observed from his vantage, his steed recoiling as the assassins enveloped the pool.
"Let us instead deem it a peasant tragedy!" Gruffyd declared to himself with a smile, cracked open.
But the women were faster.
Emerging from the arboreal boundary in a flourish.
Freyja and Guinevere spurred their mounts onward, the steeds glistening with exertion.
Freyja, brooking no delay, executed a daring dismount mid-gallop.
Her boots impacting upon the chest of an assassin who was advancing towards the imperiled king.
She plunged him deep into the frigid waters, her dagger unerringly locating the aperture in his leather gorget.
Guinevere, in swift pursuit, her horse rearing as she threw a javelin.
The projectile found purchase in an assassin's eye, averting Arwen's imminent skewering.
She descended with haste, her boots kissing the shallows as her argent blade pirouetted.
It warded off the advance of three aggressors.
"Hark, to the King!" Lady Guinevere proclaimed, her intonation that rang louder than the tidal roar.
The combat was a chaotic blur of aqueous grey and bloody red.
Freyja, a veritable tempest of honed brutality, intercepted a spear-shaft with her bare forearm.
She disregarded the splintering agony as she redirected the wielder into the trajectory of Guinevere's blade.
On reaching Arwen, who was struggling vainly against the encroaching depths.
She, with a fortitude stemming from sheer desperation.
Securing him under the chest and hauled him toward the muddy shores.
All while deflecting a downward cut from a jagged scimitar with her own vambrace.
Upon the distant bank, Gurlouen made his presence known.
He notched a formidable arrow of ebony hue and loosed it with precision.
The missile sang past Guinevere's delicate ear, finding purchase in an assassin mere inches hence.
Thus transfixing him to a log.
Gurlouen, not one to tarry, released a second shaft.
It struck the earth nigh Gruffyd's stallion upon the hill.
A subtle intimation that the venerable Duke's gaze remained keen.
His discerning enough of political machinations to perceive Gruffyd's hand in the unfolding drama.
Perceiving the shift in fortune, the last vestige of assassins endeavored to abscond into the marsh.
Freyja, however, interdicted one of their departure, seizing him by the hair and ushering him forth into the open.
As she cast him down, an arrow found its mark, piercing his skull.
Freyja turned to the projectile's origin, revealing Grufyyd.
Who, in his action, assured the silence of his complicity.
"A most regrettable affair, Sire. I shall personally see to the scouring of these woods for the rebels in question."
Gruffyd ensured with an irritated look that hid in his face.
The Saint Solstice concluded in a frigid hush.
The hart was gone.
Arwen, soaked to the bone.
But observed from the bank as Freyja assisted Guinevere onto her steed.
He noted the exchange of glances between them.
An almost palpable connection as Freyja ensured the Queen's well-being.
A bond, stronger, it seemed, than his own vows.
A clandestine affection has fostered in secrecy.
Never had he witnessed Guinevere adorned with such radiant joy.
A potent envy commenced its ascent within his bosom for them both.
As yet, he possessed no tangible evidence of their liaison.
Duke Gruffyd, perceiving this as well, commenced the orchestration of his subsequent machination.
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