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I rested, leaning on the ornate stone column and decorated wall behind me. Heavy footsteps thundered throughout the palace. Foreign voices shouted. Hoarse. Fearful. Desperate. I had bathed, attended to my most grievous injuries, and fully rearmed, completely aware that the battle had not gone as we expected. By treachery and sorcery, we found ourselves outnumbered 1000 to one. My warrior brothers and sisters stood defiantly and only died after inflicting devastating hurt to the northern demon beast and its fanatical minions. Blood ran in rivers. Rivers turned into oceans.
Enemy soldiers are racing up the palace staircase. Clanging, clumsy, dull-witted servants of the beast. Only their numbers were superior to us. They were lost, tired, wounded, and driven only by the threat of slavery and torture if they failed to obey their cold, white masters. Many of these soldiers would die soon, when they reached the top of the stairwell where I was guarding an empty royal chamber, enjoying the sweet fragrance of perhaps my last mortal breaths. I loved the smooth, cold marble on the bottom of my feet. I wished to see at least one more golden sunrise over the savanna. I wanted to enjoy a final hot, embrace with my wife; encourage my sons and daughters to complete their studies. The enemy saw me, hesitated, bunching up on the stairs; they hastily shouted commands for more troops, perhaps archers with deadly poisoned arrows. My musket was primed with powder and lead balls but I depended more on sharp, molded metal to teach these dogs a lesson that they would take to their graves and all the way back to the icy glaciers where they were spawned. The smooth, shiny shield I carried replaced the old battered one that I had to abandon in the throat of an invader; he was one of their highly esteemed commanders, supposedly an offspring of an immortal, warrior god. Strange that he had bleated like a common domestic goat when I sliced opened the side of his neck.
(Image: The Palace Guard by Ludwig Deutsch)
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