The Acolytes responded with equal ferocity, shouting out the name of their One True God before charging into battle. A succession of human heads shattered from the impacts of rhino-ape clubs. An Acolyte was affixed to a cluster of spikes at the end of a club. With one arm the rhino-ape used his club to heft the still living human off his feet and plowed him head first into the ground.
In some cases, the rhino-apes used their bare hands to slaughter. Scores of Acolytes were pounded by the rhino-apes’ granite fists until they were reduced to crimson patches in the grass. The humans were superb swordsmen, but even their tempered steel blades proved insufficient to the task of penetrating the leather hardness of rhino-ape skin.
Mamid’s horse was taken out from under him with a bash to the skull by a rhino-ape’s club. The Acolyte leader leapt off the dead animal’s back with battle trained agility and advanced toward the rhino-ape prepared to mete out vengeance. A light flashed before the Acolyte leader and standing in the spot previously occupied by the rhino-ape was the being Mamid intuitively recognized as the demon-sorcerer.
Mamid paused briefly to take the measure of this foul creature. The demon-sorcerer was man-like in size and shape. His face, however, was a blend of serpent and human. Greenish scaled skin, deep socketed red eyes, smooth hairless head, thin jutting mouth curled in cruel mirth. The demon-sorcerer wore a flowing blue robe, covering a green form-fitting garment that radiated a luminescence distinct from the natural brightness of the day.
The Acolyte leader reared his sword back. “Abomination! To the fire will I send you!”
Ajunge laughed and thrust out his hand, emitting an invisible force that halted the human as if he had run head long into a stone wall. “Where is your One True God, Acolyte? Why does he hide from me?”
“Blasphemer!” The Acolyte bellowed as he strained to regain movement in his limbs.
A billowing torch whooshed from the demon-sorcerer’s outstretched hand, enveloping the paralyzed Acolyte leader. Mamid’s robes were consumed in a writhing blanket of flames that spread over his body. But his face remained unscathed. The Acolyte’s hatchet features stretched into a horribly contorted reaction to the unspeakable agony afflicting his body. Mamid could not scream, could not so much as let out a ragged whimper. His vocal cords were burned away.
The shooting flames ceased and the demon-sorcerer lowered his hand. What was left of the Acolyte leader collapsed to the ground in a smoldering heap of seared flesh and bones. The well-preserved face was locked in a permanent grimace of pain.
The rhino-apes annihilated the rest of Mamid’s followers with nearly as much ease.
* * *
The demon-sorcerer entered the queen’s palace as if he had ownership of the ground upon which he tread. He had already killed five Imperial Guardsmen posted at the gate; their bodies reduced to blackened lumps in a directed gale of demon fire.
At Ajunge’s appearance in the throne hall, more guardsmen readied swords and spears to protect their queen.
“No!” Zara called out to the guardsmen. “Lower your weapons!” She would risk no more guardsmen to this creature’s lethal sorcery.
The guardsmen complied with teeth-gritting reluctance. Nevertheless, they formed a perimeter around their queen.
“What do you want?” Zara demanded of the intruder.
In an eyeblink, the demon-sorcerer was standing within inches of Zara, so close she could feel his hot breath steaming her forehead.
The guardsmen whirled about, shocked to discover that the demon-sorcerer had breached their cordon.
“Stand down!” Zara shouted, putting on a brave façade to conceal her terror. Another emotion arose inside her to take the edge off her fear. It was hatred, pure elemental hatred. The more she harnessed that hate the more emboldened she was to meet the demon-sorcerer’s malice-filled gaze and hold it.
“Soon I will grow weary of your obstinacy, my queen,” Ajunge said with a carnivorous smile.
“But I will never grow weary resisting you, Demon!” The queen’s gaze bore angrily, defiantly into the demon-sorcerer as an ever-increasing portion of hate took hold of her.
“Oh, I think you will. In time your desire to send men to their deaths will exact a toll on you.” Ajunge looked around the palace. “Of course, I may decide to take up residence here before that day arrives.” The demon-sorcerer met the queen’s eyes. “Time to take a lover.”
A flash of light filled the throne room. When it subsided, the demon-sorcerer was gone.
That night another guardsman entered the queen’s bedchamber. The following morning, he met his ancestors.
Two days later, Zara ventured to her shrine room for a much-needed period of communion with her ancestors. The sight of a man inside her most confidential of sanctums stopped her in her tracks. Zara gasped in astonishment and shouted for her guards as she backed out of the room.
“Please, do not be alarmed. Allow me to introduce myself before you have me escorted out of the palace,” the stranger requested all too calmly.
“I’ll have you escorted, but it won’t be out of the palace,” Zara countered heatedly. “It’ll be straight to the dungeon!”
A half dozen guardsmen stormed toward the shrine room.
The man spread his arms to show he was unarmed. “At least hear me out before you confine me.”
Zara raised her hand, stopping the guardsmen short of seizing the stranger. “Speak then. Who are you and how did you get in here past my guards?”
The stranger displayed a shadow of a smile. “My name is Toulou, your majesty and I’m here to solve your demon problem. As for how I got here, let’s just say that I have a talent for gaining access into places where I am not supposed to be.”
“A talent? Are you a sorcerer?”
“No, your majesty, I am not.”
The queen analyzed the stranger. The man wore the white cotton sleeveless tunic and loose fitting dark gray pants of a coastal dweller. Yet the diagonal slashes on his right cheek marked him as being from the interior. He was tall and, she could
