Where Women Worship The Serpent

Danai heard Saif chuckle as she became gradually aware of the meaning behind the paintings on the walls. He pushed down on her shoulders to indicate she should kneel before him. He stood with his dick conveniently exposed and erect in front of her. The blunt tip of the very long and thick Sheikh touched Danai's lips.

She licked a sticky drop oozing from the head.

"Legends sometime refer to this palace as the Temple of the Serpent," he said, "and this is where women worship the serpent." The Sheikh began thrusting as deeply as he could into her mouth. Danai choked on his size, wanted to retch each time he forced it down her throat but gamely allowed the obscene use of her face.

The Sheikh began to pant.

**********

After Danai had been taken upstairs and disappeared from view voices in the courtyard began to chant anew for blood.

"Let's get to it," Fareeq said with a superior smile. He motioned with his scimitar, "Over there, in the sand next to the well."

He stalked down the left side of the banquet table with hunched shoulders.

Derek followed him to the well. He walked with confidence and waited as Fareeq stripped to the waist. The crowd circled around. A few men picked up torches in order to cast more light into the circle of combat. Mayyada found a choice vantage point to watch the bloodletting, eyes agleam. Eagerness had transformed her dark beauty into a thing of ugliness.

She asked the assembled: "Now that all the children are in bed what shall it be? First blood? Or to the death?"

The crowd roared their answer. The mere sight of blood would never satisfy that mob.

"You heard them!" Mayyada reiterated to Fareeq and Derek.

Without fanfare the two combatants stepped to the center of the ring, swords raised. They touched their blades together in a form of ceremony then each man took a step back. Fareeq made the first slash. Derek parried. He knew his opponent would be good, but he was faster than expected. The captain brought the fight to him, his attack a flurry of cuts and thrusts. Derek stayed on the defense, fending his assailant's blade aside every time. Finally Fareeq dropped back to catch his breath, chest heaving.

The smile had left his face.

"Are you beginning to have some doubts, my friend?" Derek asked pleasantly.

Fareeq more or less replied, "You can mate with my camel!"

"Far be it from me to stand between a man and his true love."

The jest delighted the gathering but infuriated Fareeq. He charged forward, lashing out like a beserker. The scimitar in his fist weaved an impenetrable curtain of resistance. Derek engaged him head on. For several long minutes their steel sang and struck sparks in the night. As they fought the length and breadth of the original ring it widened to accommodate them. Neither man gave quarter. Those in the expanding circle watched in awe. Never had they witnessed such a dazzling contest between two swords.

At last the pair separated, their points to the sand, too winded to harangue one another. Even Derek's chest heaved. The only sound was of the two men drinking in oxygen. In his peripheral vision Derek saw Nu'aym right up front, watching nervously. He no longer smiled either.

Mayyada licked at her lips, aroused by the violence.

Fareeq leaped in again with a fortifying cry. Derek caught the stroke low on his blade, close to the handguard, and their swords locked. Each stood with legs braced and wide apart. For a while it became a struggle of brute strength. Sweat rolled down their faces and bathed their limbs. As if by mutual agreement they shoved away from one another to break the deadlock. Derek rebounded quickly and thrust low. Fareeq danced backward and slashed wildly with a two-handed grip. Derek found it necessary to duck beneath the deadly edge of his steel. He lost a lock of his long brown hair as the blade whistled above him. The ferocious inertia of the swing threw Fareeq off balance. His eyes went wide as he realized his fatal error too late; he had left himself wide open. Derek ran him through. His point went in at the breastbone and he drove his blade upward, all the way to the handguard. Fareeq made one tiny gasp of pain that only Derek heard.

They stood face to face, the light dwindling in Fareeq's eyes and hot blood gushing from his wound. He slumped against Derek's shoulder, only the sword propping him up. His scimitar made a slight crunching sound in the sand as it slipped from his loose fingers. Before Derek rotated the blade in his chest to ascertain a mortal wound he complimented the dying man.

"Never have I faced a bladesman such as you. I mean that."

Bright blood dribbled like paint from Fareeq's mouth, his eyes fluttered closed. He shivered as if very cold and then he died.

Derek extracted his sword cleanly from the man and let the corpse collapse to the ground. The entire camp held its collective breath, quiet descended, not even the palms rattled. He scanned the ring of faces surrounding him with disgust, each gleamed with excitement; Mayyada's gleaming the most. What could he expect now? The crowd would either applaud him or rip him to shreds. To his surprise, and their credit, they did neither.

He staggered toward Mayyada, exhausted. He halted ten paces away from her, brought his sword down with a swift jerk to flick the excess blood from the blade. A few drops splattered across her chest and face in a red diagonal. Their eyes met and held. Very deliberately and very slowly she wiped at her face with the tip of a finger and tasted the blood.

Derek said to her, "It blackens my soul to slay a good man like that for sport." He intended the words for all those present.

Pinpoints of light blazed in Mayadda's eyes like the facets of a diamond. Derek recognized a certain kind of woman, the kind who revels in violence and death. At ten paces he smelled the heated scent and knew she had soaked her loincloth. He would not have been surprised had she asked him to wipe his sword clean on her skirt. In fact two women from the crowd hurried towards him with scarves in their hands for just such a purpose.

He glowered at them to warn them away.

He rammed his sword back in its scabbard and knelt next to where Fareeq lay. He asked if anybody had a cloak that could be used for a shroud. Nu'aym came forward with quick steps, pulling at his own immaculate robe. Other warriors joined him, standing over their fallen captain and comrade.

Before the remains could be covered however the body began to glow and smolder. In less than a minute it had burned to cinders. Out of nowhere came a beating of wings, a swarm of bats swooped low and then vanished into the night. Derek crouched, a curse on his lips. From under the ashes of Fareeq's body slithered a long snake with black and gold bands. It wriggled across the sand and was gone as rapidly as the bats.

The crowd dispersed uneasily from the bizarre scene, some of them mumbling about the Temple of the Serpent. Retribution aimed toward Derek for the slaying of Fareeq seemed remote, unlikely, forgotten.

"Do you have an explanation for that?" Derek asked Mayyada.

She shook her head slowly, a faraway look in her eyes.

"I need to fetch Danai and get out of here before the men decide to hack my body into a hundred pieces."

"Fareeq's men will do nothing, that I promise. Anyway, I have better plans for your body." She stood very close to him, placed the palms of her hands against his chest. "Your sister is alone with the Sheikh. Now it's time for you and me to be alone."

"Take me to Danai or I'll find her on my own."

Mayyada looked unhappy. "Come with me then."

She linked arms with him and they crossed the courtyard to the front of the palace. A short stairway led to a landing enveloped in shadow. She entered an archway with Derek at her heels. A long corridor stretched ahead.

"This is not where they went."

"Just follow me, I know what I'm doing."

She yanked him into the first chamber they came to. Moonlight shined in through two narrow windows. In a frenzy she undid the golden cups around her chest and they clanked on the marble floor. Pushing the silk from her hips she came panting into Derek's arms. He stood as unmoving as a statue as she began to kiss and lick at his chest, still splashed with the dead man's blood.

"What do you think you're doing? Take me to Danai."

She squirmed against him, thrusting one of his hands into her loincloth and holding it there with her thighs clamped. "You slew Fareeq almost without trying," her breathing was uneven. "You shamed the crowd, every last one of them."

He remained with his hands hanging at his sides. "And that excited you?" he asked tonelessly.

"Can you not tell? I want you too much to wait."

He backed away from her, the odor of her arousal swimming in his nostrils.

"Where are you going, Derek? Come to me, love me."

Mayyada wound her arms around his neck but he avoided her kisses.

"I'm going to find Danai."

"You can think of your sister at a time like this?"

"She's alone with the Sheikh and he strikes me as a man most perverse."

Mayyada mashed herself against Derek, attempting to kiss him again. She slid down the length of his body, nibbling at the bulge through the material of his breeches. "I want to worship you," she whispered. Deft fingers unbuttoned his pants and she engulfed him in her mouth, warm and saliva wet with an inspired suction. Shortly afterward the serpent she worshipped paid her a generous if bitter tribute. She swallowed repeatedly as he held her head in place, wanting to feed her every single drop. Finally Derek squeezed her upper arms until she groaned with pain.

"That hurts, but you can hurt me if you want to."

He pushed her ungently away from him. "I've played enough of your games for one night. I want out of this den of sorcery. Take me to Danai or I'll take this castle apart stone by stone."

"You spurn my love?" she asked in disbelief.

She threw herself back in his arms and he shook her roughly.

"Danai!" he reminded her.

"Am I not beautiful, desirable?"

"At another time under different circumstances I might be more willing."

"Men have plotted and murdered to earn my affection. I have caused empires to topple, fool!" She hauled back a hand to slap him but Derek caught her wrist effortlessly.

"If you don't tell me where Danai is no man will deign to look at you again when I get through with you."

Mayyada tore her wrist from his grasp, cursing him. Then she began to hiss, more like a snake than a cat. The necklace of jewels around her neck broke in half and fell to her feet. The golden asp encircling her arm straightened and dropped to the floor. Mayyada hissed again. Derek blinked several times as cracks appeared in her face and body, transforming into reptilian scales. Then she was level with him, eye-to-eye, and growing taller. With every passing second she increased in size. Her jet-black hair receded into her head. From her mouth darted a long forked tongue.

In a panic he tried to race by her out the door into the hallway. A mysterious brutal force flung him against the wall. Blackness edged his vision and when he could see again a monstrous serpent coiled before him blocking the exit. The monster undulated toward him across the floor, its body the circumference of a tree. He tried to get his feet under him, make another run for the doorway but the slimy triangular head slammed him in the chest. All the air burst from his lungs with the fury of the blow. He sprawled flat on his back, wheezing like an octogenarian.

A loud hissing filled the chamber until drowning out any other sound. Tangible fear gnawed at his insides. A clammy sweat of fear broke out all over his body. He crawled backward using his elbows as the end of the giant serpent's tail lashed at him like a whip. A welt flamed up instantly on the leg where he'd been struck. The tail whipped again and a fiery line of crimson spouted from his chest.

Derek grunted with pain. The serpent's jaws gaped, venom dripped from retractable fangs. The hissing almost froze Derek with fear. He scrambled for safety but in the confines of the room there was none. The wedge-shaped head hurtled downward, mouth open wide. He rolled away. The floor vibrated beneath him as the head struck the wall.

As Derek tumbled he felt his scabbard battering his legs. Did he have room to flail a sword? The tail struck at him again before he could draw. Somehow he gained his feet but the wall pressed against his back. A desperate sidewise glance reminded him of the windows. He inched over to them hoping he'd discovered a means of egress. With any luck he could clamber out a window and leave behind the demon serpent. The thing that had been Mayyada was too wide to follow him out.

No luck, the portals were too narrow to permit him to squeeze through. He wasted precious time at the windows and the snake had managed to coil around his legs. It knocked him off his feet and continued wrapping itself around him. The coils tightened and hindered him from drawing his sword. Not a moment too soon he managed to free his knife. The tongue slid across his face and the hinged jaws threatened to engulf his head. He plunged his dagger upward through the roof of the mouth causing the head to reel back, but it shot immediately forward again. Derek prevented the jaws from snapping shut by lodging the dagger inside that awful mouth. It hissed in agony but if closed its jaws it would injure itself even worse.

With superhuman effort Derek pushed with the heel of his hand against the bottom of the snake's jaw to force the head away. An obsidian eye the size of a plate watched him dispassionately. A drop of venom slid down a fang and burned his chest like acid. Since the monster couldn't bite him it tightened and retightened its coils. Seconds more and Derek's bones would begin breaking. He quit pushing against the snake's head with his free hand, stiffened his fingers and brought them up with all his remaining strength to burst the lone cold eye.

The coils loosened instantly and he twisted out of their grip. He forced himself into a corner to present a smaller target. The reptile threshed, writhing blindly. It smashed against walls and the ceiling before crawling madly from the chamber. Derek exhaled, took stock of the damage. He bled from a dozen wounds and had forfeited a dagger. Mayyada was welcome to it; his sword still hung from his belt. During the struggle he'd lost a moccasin. While searching the floor for it he spotted the necklace the sorceress had shed, worth a king's ransom. He stuffed it into a pocket of his breeches, kicked off his remaining moccasin and departed the chamber barefoot.

With sword in hand he sprinted down the corridor and outside the palace. He longed to find Danai and put as much distance as possible between them and the reptile denizens of the kingdom of Djhedet. Among the tents down in the courtyard the wounded serpent was wreaking havoc. A brave few hacked away at it with axe and scimitar.

Good, thought Derek, no one would pay any attention to him. To his left he recognized the stairway to the tower where Saif al Din had taken Danai before his duel with Fareeq. Hoping he'd find no more terrors upstairs he took the steps three and four at a time. He vowed to chop off Saif's head if he'd harmed Danai. At a landing near the top he encountered an open door.

Cautiously he peered inside a candlelit room.

Danai sat calmly on a couch knotting lengths of torn bedclothes together. The Sheikh lay trussed and naked at her feet. His eyes got large when he saw Derek enter. With the gag stuffed in his mouth he could make only angry muffled noises. Danai picked up a shiny bludgeon and waved it menacingly in his face.

"I told you to pipe down, big boy! You want me to knock another knot on your head?"

Her captive lapsed into immediate silence.

Danai hopped to her feet. She had donned one of the Sheikh's tunics. It fell to her ankles.

"It's about time you got here," she said, melting into Derek's arms.

They kissed passionately and deeply.

"This brother and sister scheme is wearing a bit thin for my taste. Next time we are going to pretend to be husband and wife."

"Pretend? I married you almost two years ago." Derek pointed to Saif. "Did the two of you do anything?"

"What about you and she?"

"Why don't we chalk it up as the price of doing business?"

"And since the price has been paid there's no need to mention it again?"

"Ever again," nodded Derek in agreement. "How did you get the upper hand?"

"When he turned his back on little old me to undress I gave him a tidy whack with this stick."

"Can I assume there's a back way out of here?"

"Through that window. Are the horses waiting?"

"They better be. Are these sheets long enough for the climb down?"

"We may have to drop the last few meters, but sand isn't very hard."

"You didn't forget his black diamond, did you?"

She patted a pocket of the tunic. "It's the reason we came to this godforsaken Djhedet oasis for, isn't it?"

"Good girl." He'd save Mayyada's necklace as a surprise.

Derek secured the homemade rope around the leg of a heavy armoire while Danai fed the remainder out the window.

"What was all that racket downstairs?"

"A snake got loose in the courtyard."

"I hate snakes," she said.

"Me too."

The climb down went without incident. Once on the ground a hooded man appeared from a small clump of palms, leading two horses.

"Here's our transportation," said Derek, "right on schedule."

The man told them, "The canteens hold enough water to last three days. The first oasis south of here is only a day's ride. The sack of gold coins I promised is in your saddlebag, Derek."

He clasped the man's hand. "Let me congratulate you on your promotion to captain."

"I thank you both. Everything worked out well, almost exactly the way we planned," smiled Nu'aym. He watched them ride out across the dunes.