Aquitain barkedand herded them like sheep to get them all on the teleport circlethen used the trigger word given to him by Darkmantle to send themto the Palace. They all appeared at once in the general arrivalarea not far from the throne room. The place was empty. He led themup the stairs towards the throne room but the double door into itwas closed.
He transformedback to Miranda’s body form to open the door but it refused tobudge. He tried using the mind clay as a key but that didn’t workeither. The door was magically locked. It was going to need bruteforce to open it. He kicked it with his foot and swore at itdeciding that he would have to go into bear shape to break the doordown.
Since he wasclose to the area where the rats would be, he decided that the timewas right to give the hounds some protection magic. So he walkedamong the pack hardening the skin of each animal then his own. Hesent them a mental image of him transforming into a bear, thenchanged.
Instead of thenormal bear shape in his mind he grew to a huge sized bear. Hisshoulders stood taller than a Newman’s head and he was five paceslong. He projected an aura of fear. He felt more powerful than everin his life, he could feel the urge to kill and maim but he stillhad control.
The hounds allbacked away from him as if he scared them.
He wentbarrelling down the corridor at the door hurling his whole threeton weight at it. The doors exploded in a shower of wooden shardsas he crashed through.
He changed backto the hound form and howled for them to follow and the chase wason again. He charged towards the Trixie service corridor just as arat as large as a normal cat poked its head out to see where thenoise was coming from.
The frontrunning hounds saw the rat and howled for blood as they poured intothe corridor to be met by at least half a dozen rats. Once into theservice corridor, there were live and dead rats and bits of deadTrixie everywhere. The hounds swarmed down the corridor only to beslowed by more and more rats to kill. There must have been hundredsof them. They were in every room and they didn’t turn and run. Theyattacked the dogs biting and scratching and leaping around likeminiature acrobats.
Aquitain forgotwho he was in the mad frenzy of blood. The large alpha female houndbecame a killing machine. Grab, rip, tear, throw aside, jump,dodge, grab another, tear apart, blood, stinking hot entrails,steaming wet fur, blood, more blood. On the odd occasion when a ratleapt on his back Slivver send a blast of pain into its mindgenerally causing it to fall off and run in fear. On numerousoccasions he sent out a mental blast stunning groups of rats makingit easier to kill them.
The houndsfollowed reaping destruction on any rat that moved. Perhapsfortunately they never came upon a live Trixie. Eventually theyworked their way through the entire Trixie area killing every ratthey found, some escaped, but very few. When finally it was overAquitain was both physically and emotionally exhausted.
Aquitainshifted to Miranda’s body form and she called the pack together tofind that it didn’t go all their way. Every dog had injuries, somequite bad and three were dead.
She led them tothe hospital area and searched for first aid equipment. Luckily shefound two healing potions and by dividing them in half was able toheal four of the most badly damaged dogs. The others would have towait and at least have a bath so she could see where their injurieswere as all of them were lathered in blood and stinkingentrails.
She locked themin a large room, then standing in the corridor he called out forany Trixies left to come to him. A very frightened Bellen appearedand at the sight of Miranda in golden snakeskin armour and coveredin blood, rat guts and pieces of meat and fur turned totallywhite.
‘Hello Bellen, it’s me Aquitain.’
‘Dddid ... yer kill them all yerself?’ he said with wideshocked eyes.
‘No, I brought a pack of Darkmantle’s hunting hounds along tohelp. How did our people fare?’
‘Only about half made it to safety.’ he said. ‘What’shappening, Lady Warden? Nothing like this has ever happened before.The Palace is deserted.’
‘I’m afraid that without a Queen to bind them, the Lords haveturned against one another. They will all hide in their estates andsquabble amongst themselves until order and unity can be forgedagain and that probably won’t happen until we can sort out theproblem with the Mentarin.’
‘Yer is our Queen, Lady Warden. Yer will look after us won’tyer?’
‘Of course I will Bellen, that’s why I’m here. Now I have tohelp my pack of dogs and then see if Darkmantle needs me, so canyou get our people to clean this place up and then secure all thedoors leading onto the place. I’ll get back when I can. Andremember to stay away from that book.’
‘Yes, Lady Warden.’ he said still looking unhappy.
‘What else is wrong?’
‘A few of the people don’t believe yer should be ourQueen.’
‘Why?’ asked Aquitain quite surprised?
‘Some say they should have been asked before yer became Queen.Others say yer is away all the time and don’t care aboutus.’
‘Bring them here now!’
‘But yer need to clean up first surely, My Queen.’
‘No. That is exactly the point Bellen; I want them to see melike this. Why would I have done this unless I cared forthem?’
‘Yer right.’ said Bellen with half a smile.
He called andover the next few minutes they came, about seventy of them. Whenthey saw Aquitain their eyes opened wide with fear.
‘I ... I think most are here, yer Majesty.’ saidBellen.
‘Bellen has told me that some of you think you should
