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Old 07-15-2006, 10:55 AM   #75
Folwren
Messenger of Hope
 
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Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: In a tiny, insignificant little town in one of the many States.
Posts: 5,228
Folwren is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.Folwren is battling Black Riders on Weathertop.
The prison guard - Khanun

The water splashed refreshingly over his face and neck but he only emptied half of its contents before something solid fell with the water. Khanun jumped with the first initial surprise and then started back with half a cry of fear as he realized what it was. A small, thin, cold and wet snake twined its tail about his ear and his body about his nose. Khnaun jerked back, dropping the flask of water, and yelled again. He tilted his head back forward in a wild attempt to knock the snake off as his hands struck at it, but instead of falling to the ground, the small reptile half slithered, half fell into the loose and open neck of Khanun’s shirt.

The guard leaped to his feet in a panic. Poisonous snakes were not uncommon in Mordor and an uncontrollable fear of being bitten by this thing filled all his sane mind. He jumped about frantically while his hands struggled to untuck the shirt from his breaches. Unmindful of the sleeping men nearby and the children beneath him, often random yells burst from his mouth, though he didn’t actually say anything. Finally, with shaking and trembling hands and a face blanched white beneath the unshaven beard and layers of dirt, he got the shirt free of his belt and the snake dropped to the ground. In a moment it had slithered off to safety among the rocks and bristling plant life.

Only at that moment did Khanun realize that he had awoken everyone in the camp. He looked up with wide eyes at the other men. To his great surprise and furry he saw that they were laughing. Laughing! There was absolutely nothing funny about the thing. He might have been killed! Worse than that, he now saw, was that he had made himself out to be an idiot.

“Who did it?” he bellowed with a passion. “Who dared to put that thing into my water?”

One of the men guffawed loudly. “Gar, I wish it were me who’d thought o’ it,” he laughed. “What a spectacle you made!” He stood up and began to jump and flap about like some great rooster courting a hen. The others howled with laughter. All of them, that is, save Imak. He stood up and caught the dancing mocker by the collar and brought him to a stand still.

“In all seriousness – who did do it?” he asked. “There’s no time for pranks like that. If the thing was poisonous, someone could have been hurt. Who was it?”

Everyone was silent. Khanun stood glaring at them all furiously and Imak looked coolly from one face to the next.

“Nem – you?” he asked sharply. The man mutely shook his head. He looked to the next man. “You?” In turn, each of them denied the charge.

Last edited by Child of the 7th Age; 07-15-2006 at 08:27 PM.
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