Friday, August 23, 2013

QUEEN TARAMIS AND SALOME THE WITCH by KRISTIN SCHOLZ


QUEEN TARAMIS AND SALOME THE WITCH
'You never had a sister?' came the sweet, poisonously mocking voice. 'Never a twin sister whose flesh was as soft as yours to caress or hurt?'

'Why, once I had a sister,' answered Taramis, still convinced that she was in the grip of some sort of nightmare. 'But she died.'

"The beautiful face in the disk was convulsed with the aspect of a fury; so hellish became its expression that Taramis, cowering back, half expected to see snaky locks writhe hissing about the ivory brow."
'Aye!' Salome's laughter was dagger-edged with hate. 'The curse of the kings of Khauran! They tell how the first queen of our line had traffic with a fiend of darkness and bore him a daughter who lives in foul legendry to this day. And thereafter in each century a girl baby was born into the Askhaurian dynasty, with a scarlet half-moon between her breasts, that signified her destiny.

Taramis was still beautiful, in spite of her rags and the imprisonment and abuse of seven weary months. She did not reply to her sister's taunts, but bent her head as one grown accustomed to mockery."

'I knew it!' It was a fierce, vibrant whisper, scarcely audible. 'She lives! Oh, Krallides, your martyrdom was not in vain! They have her locked in that dungeon! Oh, Ishtar, if you love true men, aid me now!'"
Robert E. Howard, A Witch Shall Be Born
Illustration by Kristin Scholz


1 comment:

  1. Late to the game, but: Her Majesty looks like Ming-Hua from The Legend of Korra (if the latter character had arms that weren't made of hydrokinesis, that is). Ironically enough: Ming-Hua is an anarchist.

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