Emperor Peleus of Macaria sat upon the back of his stallion, Diomedes, and surveyed all the carnage which he had brought about. In the far distance, across the dimming horizon, the encampment of the Trabakondai burned, ringing with the screams of their servants and attendants as the soldiers of the empire extracted their due. Closer by, upon the trampled pastures, the bodies of the fallen were picked at by scavengers both human and animal, one in search of valuable metal and the other in search of delectable flesh. And Peleus saw all from atop the nearby hill, and thought it good.

  Already the Emperor’s attention had turned to the history books and the triumphal pilrs. How would they depict this greatest of battles? For decades the barbarians of Far Trabakond had assailed the northern borders of the empire, and at st, upon the field of Benrath, the back of the invaders had been broken once and for all. The key moment was, of course, the great charge of the cataphracts, Peleus himself at their head, falling upon the right fnk of the barbarian line which had foolishly overextended itself in pursuit of the retreating Kemtriai skirmishers. That would look very nice upon an arch, a thousand horsemen all cd in shining scale, nces falling upon the half-nude savages with murderous force. General Eteocles would have his contribution remembered as well, of course; his infantry’s stalwart defense, holding the center of the line against an endless hail of arrows and hours of successive cavalry charges, would certainly deserve a line or two.

  As Peleus gazed out over all that he had done, one of his personal leigemen rode up behind him. He heard the approaching thud of hooves on soil, but did not turn until the man addressed him by title.

  “Hail, Emperor of Dawn and Twilight, Master of the City of Gold. I bring news.”

  Peleus turned his steed about. Then, with a wordless gesture, he ordered the man to speak.

  “One of the prisoners taken from the Trabakondai front line has revealed herself to be a woman, sir. She cims to be the Witch-Queen herself.”

  Peleus’s eyes glittered, but his mouth remained a stalwart line. “Have you any proof of this cim?”

  The rider—Peleus recognized him as a distant cousin of Bellerophon’s house—made a sort of half-shrug. “Why else would the barbarians send forth a woman in their front lines, if she were not their queen?”

  The Witch-Queen of Trabakond was a myth, a sorceress whose cunning maniputions and all-powerful magic had supposedly been the cause behind the rapid assembly of the ever-quarreling Far Trabakondai tribes under a single banner, leading both to a renewal of the long war and also to this crushing victory. Peleus had assumed her to be merely a story to expin the strength and power of some barbarian chieftain, or an overblown title for some heathen crone. But if she was a real woman, a flesh and blood leader of the Trabakondai, then her capture would magnify the glory of this victory a thousandfold. He would parade her naked, headless body through the streets.

  “Take me to her,” he said. “If this woman speaks the truth, then we shall show her the care with which we treat our enemies. If she lies… there will be no mercy.”

  The Macarian camp held more captive enemies than it did troops. The vast bulk of the army was still away, running rampant across the ndscape and through the enemy’s baggage train, and even the camp followers were out looting, leaving behind only those whose duty forced them to remain. Row upon row of white linen tents passed by as Peleus was escorted to his goal, and a dozen times or more he was forced to pause while battle-weary troops shuffled chained-together bands of mail-cd Trabakondai warlords out of the way. Eventually the rider indicated that they were in the right pce, and Peleus dismounted.

  The prison cell of the supposed Witch-Queen of Trabakond was no different to any of the thousands of stratiotai’s tents which stretched out for miles in every direction. The only thing that marked it out as unique was the eight men standing guard outside, spears high.

  “Hail, Thorn’s Keeper!” the stratiotai announced as one.

  By the crest upon the man’s helm, Peleus identified the unit’s dekarch. “The prisoner is within? She who cims to be the Witch-Queen?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Who stands guard over her?”

  “We do, sir.”

  Peleus surveyed the group. Eight men stood watch, and eight men inhabited a tent; which meant all of the guards stood outside.

  “You mean to say that the prisoner is alone within that tent? Expin the meaning of this.”

  The dekarch’s expression fell, his face withering with shame and fear. He turned to another one of his men, as though one of them might take his pce. “We thought it unnecessary, sir. She would not escape the tent without our noticing.”

  But Peleus was no fool; he understood well the meaning behind his words. He was afraid. A woman, unarmed and captured, had rendered eight armed men so helpless with terror that they could not bear to stand in her presence. Peleus scowled.

  “I will not suffer this cowardice, dekarch. Be relieved of this duty, and submit yourself to the whip.” Peleus turned to the riders who had escorted him, dutifully standing at attention until they had been relieved. “Cataphracts! Stand guard. I will speak to the prisoner myself.”

  The machinery of Peleus’s authority moved without further guidance, the infantry cycling out to face their discipline while his loyal knights took their pce. Peleus himself focused his attention directly ahead, as sharp and direct as the edge of a bde, and ducked low as he passed through the fp. The dekarch had spoken truthfully: there was only one inhabitant of that tent, and there was no denying that she was a woman fit to call herself Witch-Queen of Trabakond.

  She y on the floor, legs sprawled, both arms at her sides, with two chains extending from each wrist to terminate at wooden stakes hammered crudely into the dry earth. Her head was low to the ground, such that bck hair draped forward in a curtain to cover her face. Her clothes were of the distinctly foreign style popur in Trabakond, close-fitted trousers under a flowing cloak with sleeves, all made from fancifully-dyed sheep’s wool and threads of gold.

  Peleus took one step forward. Then another. Despite the audible crunching of his sandals upon the soil, the Witch-Queen appeared to have not heard him enter. Was she deaf? Asleep? So lost in the grief of defeat that she was numb to the world?

  Until, all of a sudden, she moved. Her body remained still, only her head raising in an instant to bring her eyes into line with Peleus’s gaze. This single look was so swift and so unexpected that for a brief instant, Peleus felt fear, his hand jerking towards the hilt of the long-bded broadsword at his hip. Though he regained his composure in less than a heartbeat, the Witch-Queen’s gre instilled in the Emperor a sense of eerie dread. She looked upon her captor, not with fear, but with a detached sort of interest, almost scientific in its gaze.

  “You are Peleus?” said the Witch-Queen. Her voice was sharp-edged, deep, and commandingly beautiful.

  “I am he,” Peleus replied.

  “Second son of Pyrrhus and Thalia of Macaria? Emperor of the City of Gold?”

  Peleus frowned, suddenly cautious. He had gone to great lengths to ensure that nobody of any importance would remember him as a second son. “I am he,” Peleus repeated. “And you cim to be the Witch-Queen of Trabakond?”

  “I have made that cim,” said the Witch-Queen, spreading her arms wide and affecting a bow. “For it is the truth. Shirrin of Trabakond, at your service.”

  Shirrin turned her face once more to the Emperor, gazing upward with bared throat and an uneasy smile. A show of vulnerability, Peleus decided, perhaps calcuted to draw out some sense of pity towards the fairer sex. Given the way she moved her legs, it may have even been a clumsy attempt at a seduction.

  “You will find no mercy from me, Shirrin of Trabakond,” Peleus said, taking another step forward. “Your liegemen are my prisoners, and my army runs roughshod over your nds even as we speak. There will be a terrible retribution for this purposeless assault upon the invincible walls of the Empire.”

  Shirrin merely rolled her eyes in callous disregard. “You really are as much of a brute as the stories say. If you have so little mercy within that conqueror’s heart of yours, then why not sy me? My death would break Trabakond for generations.”

  It was not a plea which issued from the prisoner’s lips, but a taunt. Peleus hated to be insulted, and so brought his hand to the hilt of his sword, this time with careful consideration rather than out of reflexive terror. But before he charged forward and ended her life with a single stroke, Peleus caught an odd sparkle in the eyes of the prisoner. She was not afraid to die. Far from it; she relished it. Was this some kind of trap? Was this merely a double, content to sacrifice herself so that the true leader could escape to fight another day?

  “I see your ruse,” said the Emperor of the Macarians. “You seek your own death. You are not the Witch-Queen, if even the Witch-Queen exists in truth instead of as a story, but a trap, a distraction to draw my attention while the true work goes on elsewhere.”

  Peleus stepped backwards towards the fp of the tent, but did not turn away from her; for how she reacted would determine much.

  As it was, the Witch-Queen scowled. “Do you mean to insult me, Macarian, or are you merely a fool? Kill me if you like, boast to my face about your victory, but do not dare insist that I am not the Witch-Queen of Trabakond. I am your foe, and you will treat me as such.”

  “Well, you certainly have the temper of a barbarian queen,” Peleus admitted. And, he realized, the jewelry of one as well. Hanging around Shirrin’s neck was a neckce, a thumb-sized piece of gold suspended from a simple hempen string. To a savage northerner, such a trinket must have been a royal bounty. “Nonetheless, where are your retainers? Your guards? Should not your loyal followers be assaulting this camp even now in order to take back their beloved leader?

  The Witch-Queen rolled her eyes. “Tch. I did not gain my position by being loved, Peleus. And my soldiers know very well that that from which I cannot escape, they have no hope of rescuing me.”

  Peleus chuckled. A certain level of bravado was to be expected, but such self-aggrandizement crossed the line into comedy. “You are but one human, and a woman at that.”

  “But one woman I may be,” she said, “and yet I am the Witch-Queen. Allow me to demonstrate my meaning.”

  The Witch-Queen moved swiftly, using the sck in her chain to reach her hand into the pocket of her robe. Then she vanished. The only sign of her presence was the two stakes driven into the ground, even the chains attached to them having disappeared into thin air.

  Magic! Peleus’s heart beat frantically, that exertion of sorcerous power unlike any he had ever seen from the temple priests and common alchemists of his homend. Though he was frightened, he did not freeze nor quail. Instead, he lunged forward into the space where the Witch-Queen had been, drawing his sword as he did in hopes that the disappearance was merely an illusion. Peleus’s bravery was rewarded when his hand found clothed flesh; the Witch-Queen had not moved, but merely rendered herself invisible to the eye.

  Peleus grabbed the first fistful of cloth he found, sword raised in preparedness to strike. “Unmake your spell, Witch-Queen, or I shall find out how well your magics can cope with a score of sword-wounds.”

  The Witch-Queen giggled manically, and there was a rustling of cloth. Even the sound was muted, as though heard from underwater or through a thin door. Peleus tightened his grip on his sword, afraid of some further sorcery; but after a moment, the Witch-Queen reappeared, grinning from ear to ear. Between index finger and thumb of her hand she held a ring, crafted of copper wire twisted about itself in the same way that thread is twisted into rope.

  “A ring of invisibility. A commonpce working, the witches of Trabakond learn to make such things as mewling apprentices. But it ought to demonstrate that I am who I cim to be, no?”

  The illusion had been very nearly perfect, and only through Peleus’s sheer bravado had he circumvented it. “Give me one good reason not to sy you,” he said. “Promise me gold beyond counting, sves by the millions, every head of grain grown in Trabakond for a thousand years. Give me every appeal you know and I may consider allowing such an abomination as you to live.”

  The Witch-Queen shook her head. “I will offer you none of those things. Instead, consider this: this ring I hold was created by my magic. But any who wear it will feel its effect. Go ahead, try it on.”

  The Witch-Queen offered out the ring in the palm of her hand, and Peleus snatched it forth. But he did not dare to pce it upon his finger. “If I die, or some heathen curse strikes me, my armies will know. General Eteocles shall take my pce, and he shall visit destruction upon your people such as will make them beg for death.”

  “I am at your mercy,” the Witch-Queen replied.

  Peleus pced the ring upon his finger. He felt a strangeness, as though some blockage had impeded the function of his ear; but when he looked down, he could still see his own body.

  “Go outside the tent,” said the Witch-Queen. “See how your men react. You will know then the truth.”

  Peleus saw no reason not to. As he moved he realized immediately what it was that felt so strange to his ear: all the sounds of the world were as clear as to be expected, except for those which came from himself. The crunch of his sandals upon the soil, the rustling of his steel armor, these things were muffled as though heard from underwater or through a thin door.

  Peleus pushed through the fp of the tent, expecting to see the dismounted cataphracts stand suddenly at attention, awaiting his order. Instead a few of them looked to the tent with suspicion, swords at the ready, and the rest made no sign of anything having happened at all. He circled them only once, and to his amazement none of them followed his movement, though he stepped close enough to touch them on the shoulder. When he returned to the tent and removed the ring, Peleus’s breast was swollen with potential.

  “This is a powerful working,” he said. “But one ring does not a queen’s ransom make.”

  “Of course not,” said the Witch-Queen. “This is merely a trifle, the least of my capabilities. I can do much more for you, O Emperor of the Macarians.”

  Peleus frowned, and stroked his chin, gone rough and stubbly from days on the march. He knew not what the Witch-Queen was truly capable of, and so he imagined every fantasy of dominion made manifest through sorcerous power. With her aid, he could quell the rebels of Philgeonia, bring at st the degenerate Sarraniai Imperials to heel, perhaps even brush aside his rivals within the Senate. Even mastery of Bdethorn, the true mastery which had eluded him for so long, might at st be within his reach.

  “Very well. I shall spare your life,” said Peleus. He waited for the moment of jubition, the smile of relief to form upon the Witch-Queen’s face, that he might crush it. None came. Her expression remained the same as it ever was. “And you shall live in the pace of Chrysopolis as my sve, doing your sorcery forevermore in my name, not that of the Trabakondai.”

  The Witch-Queen bowed low. “As you wish, my lord. May I make one final request as a free woman?”

  Peleus scowled. A queen so easily relinquish her freedom, accept the brands and chains of svery, for her life? Disgusting. “Very well,” he said. “Make your request.”

  “I request only that the war end here. And Far Trabakond go unmolested by your armies.”

  Peleus rolled his eyes. “As you so wish. All raids beyond the borders of the Empire shall be ceased, so long as the Trabakondai maintain the same peace.”

  In truth, all of the most verdant parts of Trabakond y in Near Trabakond, firmly within the bounds of the Empire. But, Peleus supposed, so long as there were no sughtered menfolk to drive their ire, the people of Far Trabakondai could consider their safety accounted for. The necessary discipline to keep the aggressions of the akritai focused on the proper side of the border would be a small price to pay.

  “Now, then, if there are not any other such extractions you should like to make of me…? I must take my leave. There are other matters to attend to.”

  Shirrin bowed again from her position on the floor, and watched as Peleus left the tent. As soon as he was gone, she began to grin. She drew herself up, slipped her hands free of her chains, stretched the joints of her shoulders and breathed deeply through lungs no longer compressed by a feigned hunching. It had been twelve years since st she had seen the face of Peleus, and he had not changed one whit; he was still the same power-hungry brute that she had always known.

  And he had fallen for her trap perfectly. All it took was a single promise of power, even a fraction of it, and he had reconsidered her, turning her in his mind from enemy to asset. He had chosen to let Shirrin into his home, into the very heart of his Empire. And for all that Peleus had done to her, she would turn that home into a prison.

  SaffronDragon