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01/16/10(Sat)02:17 No.7612040>>7611902
Let me speak to you of Rage, men of Linvara. Let me sing you a song of hate and fire vengeance. Let me tell you the tale of Hendragan, the toppled king.
Hendragan was a good man, as kings go, for the mantle of leadership is a weight that drives any man to madness in the fullness of time. A humble man, even. An honest man, no less. Perhaps there, my friends, was his downfall.
For his wife was his senior, there being no woman of his station to take as queen who was quite young enough for his liking. And the queen! Such a tempestuous woman. Striking, in her way. Cold and rolling and breathtaking as the ocean, she was. But the king always was a man of fire, and once their child was born, he did not desire her to share his bed, and told her.
Hell hath fury, my friends, that would shame a woman scorned - but the anger of a woman scorned is still a thing for worry. Such a cold woman. Such a selfish and prideful woman. The son was killed, aye, an accident she said. Fallen from the highest tower. The king mourned, slew the boy's tutor in rage, but did not truly know his good lady wife to be guilty. Nay, 'twas when he caught her abed with the stable boys. Aye, two of them! He may not have desired her, but a cuckhold's horns are maddening things.
They stabbed him, of course - three to the one, daggers at the bedside, for she wanted this all along. Cast him on the fire as he gasped fury from a ragged throat.
And voice spoke to Hendragan, then. A burning voice, like fire to the senses, like a hot blade on the skin. "Give in, Hendragan. Avenge thyself."
What was a king to do? A man at all to do? Dying. Betrayed. Burning. Oh, he rose again, lads. Hauled his burning carcass from the flames as they knit his flesh back together, crushing the skull of his queen into the flagstones... |