The old wooden cot with a mattress stuffed with dry ferns, seemed to her like it was made of the softest down. The pain in her body was constant since Regon left. He told her where he was going before he left, Fonelia knew he did, but now she couldn’t remember. She was vaguely aware that something had happened, something very important, something that distressed Regon, but now, at this moment all of it seemed to her far and unimportant.

She couldn’t feel her arms. They didn’t hurt, she didn’t even feel any weight on them, as if they were simply gone. This didn’t disturb her, she knew she should be scared, should be feeling her heart pounding, but everything was calm and moved slowly. She tried moving her fingers… they moved. Not even this information managed to stir anything in her. She knew that this is a good thing, that she should be happy, that she should rejoice that they even existed, but to her this was but another useless information. She couldn’t feel her legs either, but she knew they were there. Unlike her arms, she could feel heat with them. She was cold all over. She knew she should be hot, draped as she was in a thick woolen blanket in the middle of summer, and yet she was cold.

Something warm moved along her thighs, so Fonelia pushed a leaden hand to touch her womanhood. She feared she might have wet herself during some nightmare, buy now she couldn’t remember any dreams. When she looked at her fingers they shone like embers in the easterly rays of sunlight coming from the small window. Dread struck her like lightning and went through her, her quivering fingers began to register the heat trickling down them. In that moment everything that happened that day came to her and hit her with a force of a war hammer. Fear, white and hot drenched and drained away her pain. She wanted to yell, to cry for help, to call for Regon and ask him to save her, but she couldn’t. For her son’s sake she couldn’t.

Regon ran out to get ready, she knew that now, but she was dying… But they are coming… her inner voice said.

“But I’m in pain… my life is flowing out of me like a river.”

But they are coming. Again the same voice.

“And what of my son… who will raise him, who will protect him?”

So protect him… said the voice and went silent.

Fonelia closed her eyes and tried to calm herself. Now his life was in her husband’s hands, but maybe she could help.

For a time she looked at the low ceiling. The wooden planks that comprised it seemed oddly blurry. After a while her sight cleared and tears ran down her face.

“For Bakor.”- She reminded herself and lifted a trembling hand.

”Apender ela kroprav du ferer.”- she intoned. She wanted to sound determined, with no fear or doubt in her, she was doing this for her son, but she was disgusted with herself when her voice betrayed her and the last words were nothing but a whisper.

A few rubies the size of her thumbnail landed on her. She was surprised at the number,-“only three…” and then she remembered that Regon must have taken the rest. She closed her eyes; tried to stand. A sharp pain and feebleness stopped her from even moving from the spot. She would have to work laying down, without any symbols or help. She tried to recall something similar, but not even her father had ever tried something so complicated.

But it has to work! She told herself and placed the rubies at the points of an imaginary triangle on her belly.

“For Bakor.”- she reminded herself and began.

Words flowed from her mouth like water, words she had heard only once, words that tied up her tongue and plugged up her throat… words she never once misspoke. Her head was about to burst. With each word innumerable pictures, sounds and meanings pertaining to it would pass through her mind. She could hardly make them out and differentiate one meaning and the next. And yet she had to choose what she needed. She tried again and again; with each repetition she separated ever increasing number of unneeded ideas for the possible meaning of each word that were now clogging her mind. She tried to calm herself again, but she couldn’t. A big part of her couldn’t help it but think on the future… even though for her there was none. Even greater part of her couldn’t help but reminisce on the past, on her childhood, on her father, on the moment she first met Regon… what was left of her didn’t have the will to continue the spell, to continue this fruitless torture. But then she thought of something else, of something fresh, something that outweigh all her other thoughts. She thought of a sound, of a cry… or was it laughter, or maybe both a cry and laughter, her own laughter… and that of Regon, and the cry of her son. She opened her eyes and stopped her chant. The silence she was expecting didn’t come. Her head was still full of those sounds, of cry and laughter, her own laughter… only her own. And then she closed her mouth and only the cry remained. Not some phantom of an event passed, but a real baby’s cry filled the room… her son. Maybe she herself had no future, but Bakor had. And for him to reach it, he would need her help. She looked at herself. The rubies were no longer on her, they must have fallen…”Apender ela roptav du ferer!”- She commanded firmly and in a moment they were there again. She tried again. The phrases she had uttered so many times before left her lips with a curious ease. The familiar confusion followed, and her head was in flames anew. But it was easier now. Now that she no longer taught on anything else, now that she devoted her entire being to this spell, she found herself coping with the jumble of ideas much easier. She was ready in but three repetitions. Like three candles, the three rubies shone with an inner light, and the being she called upon was ready for a corporeal medium.

“Setsa!”- she commanded and extended her hand under the bed where the snake of the house lay. A smooth coldness started crawling up her arm. When the crawling stopped she opened her eyes, she had closed them to keep he concentration firm. Before her, just in front of her nose there was a snake’s head three thumbs wide. The two eyes, as black as onyx, stared at her. For a moment they regarded each other, a woman and a snake, a snake and a woman, like two statues of flesh, they neither breathed nor did they move. After that short instance had passed, the snake moved. Fonelia could feel it slowly coiling itself tighter around her arm. A forked tongue, which seemed to her like the small dessert forks thy used back at the castle, but red as blood, flicked out of the horned viper’s mouth. And for a fraction of a second, less than a heartbeat, it touched her nose. Fonelia shuddered, but the snake just relaxed her coils, and resumed its previous position. Her nose was again just a hair’s breath away from the snake’s horn. Fonelia smiled and with her free hand gently stoked its head and back. The snake was a perfect grey, groken only by the black strip down her long body, which like a second snake meandered itself from the tip of the snake’s tail to the base of its neck. On the snake’s head there was a black pattern that would mean nothing to an ordinary person, but Fonelia knew it as a diagram of protection, old and powerful. So old that not even Regon knew of it before Serma, Veda and Yon taught it to him.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

“I need your help.”- whispered Fonelia and glanced at the wooden cradle where Bakor still complained. She returned her gaze back to the snake that hadn’t shifted in the slightest. After a long pause, the grey head did a very slow, very deep movement, and Fonelia almost screamed in joy. She repeated the words once again to make sure the spell is successful and gently patted the snake in its head. Now the snake itself returned the gesture and pressed its head into her palm. This was such an unexpected thing for a snake to do that Fonelia was left open mouthed, and only when the snake moved to themiddle of the triangle formed by the empowered stoned did she remember what she was to do next. She waved her hand and released the spell. Without something so complex bogging down her mind Fonelia felt a strange lightness descend upon her, but it only lasted a heartbeat, the moment she saw the spasmic contortions of the snake’s body, what was once weighing down her mind descended upon her heart. She tried telling herself that it was only a snake, a mare animal… but the way it sought affection, the way it bobbed its head and agreed to the sacrifice, that wasn’t something a mare animal would do. This snake wasn’t just a mare animal, it was the protector of this home, the diagram on its head showed it as such.

She felt relieved when the snake’s contortions and hissing stopped. It’s finally gone. Without words, Fonelia said goodbye and thank you to the snake that now lay lifeless in the middle of an imaginary triangle. Suddenly the rubies lit up brighter than ever and just as suddenly they dimmed and rolled off the bed as dark and ordinary, empty, red pieces of rock. But the light of the magic didn’t dissipate, but transferred to the snake’s eyes. They were no longer black, but red and bright. The pattern of protection on its head was gone, and in its place there was something else. Fonelia didn’t know what it meant, but it was a simple black circle, solid black. Fonelia tried to move higher on the bed, to sit a bit straighter, and not lay helpless with a demon on top of her. But she couldn’t, this didn’t surprise her, she couldn’t do it before either. Whaqt did surprise her was that it wasn’t pain that stopped her now, but simple weakness. She was running out of time. She had to make the deal as soon as possible. She looked at the snake, it didn’t move.

“Tarbon?.?” She asked uncertainly, or maybe it’s more accurate to say she whispered.

The snake raised its head, turned it to the side and with a single bold red eye looked right at her left one. A long moment passed, and the woman was struck dumb, staring into that red coldness looking back at her, watching her, marking her. With unnatural speed the snake lunged, coiled around her and in but a moment was around her shoulders, still staring at her left eye. Slowly with an easy elegance, like he had possessed this body for an eternity, Trabon turned to her and opened its mouth. As if it was trying to bite her, taste her, even the white fangs, long and sharp, lightly curved inwards left their sheaths. But the snake didn’t attack, didn’t bite, didn’t even move, but spoke instead. It didn’t move its mouth or jaw, or even the tongue, but still, somewhere from deep in that dark mouth emanated a sound, and not just any sound, but words.-“What is your wish… child?”- a strong male voice echoed and stopped on the last word, as if it wanted to insult her, but reconsidered.

Fonelia gulped,-“I want you to protect my son.”- The words left her slowly, but with no hesitation, she didn’t want to waste any time, but couldn’t afford any mistakes, not now.

The snake didn’t move, but in the vice of Trabon a smile could be heard-“Aaa, so I protect your son until your death and you will owe me…”

“No!”- exclaimed Fonelia before the demon could finish, and the snake hissed.-“No, you are to protect him after my death.”- she corrected him.

“Till when?”- clearly disappointed he asked.

“Until the next full moon.”- answered Fonelia respectfully, but without a grain of fear.

“Possible… it can be done, there is a deal for everything.”

Fonelya smiled, the smile was heavy on her face, nothing hurt now, and that was terrifying.

“But it will cost you…”- said the voice in the snake, she could almost see the demon looking at his nails, with an evil smile on its face. For some reason she imagined that smile as red… maybe because red was the only color on the gray snake.

“What?”- asked Fonelia.

“Your body.”- said the snake and moved its tongue, almost licking its lips, this was the first movement Tgabon did since this discourse begun, since it coiled around her and opened its mouth as if in preparation of an attack, this movement was far scarier.

She knew she would have to pay something, she even knew that that something would be precious, something that meant a lot to her, but what meaning could a body hold to a dead woman… this seemingly low price disturbed her. Why would he want my body? She asked herself. She started going through all the uses of a body… Maybe it wants to eat it? She hoped it wanted to eat it. Even in the small fraction of magic she was aware of there were countless ways to use an ancestor’s corpse to aid or hinder a descendant, especially the corpse of the mother… and she had a feeling that Trabon wouldn’t help anyone. She seemed to weigh two evils on a scale, and she didn’t know which was worse. But even if it cursed Bakor… even cursed people lived, who knew if the necromancer after him would live him alive. She gulped, shut her eyes, and hoped with her whole being that she’s not doing a horrible mistake.-“Deal.”

The snake’s mouth contorted into a smile,-“Lets seal it then.” The deep voice left the half closed mouth with the same force as before and lowered its head so the black circle was now facing her.

Fonelia closed her eyes, lowered her head and tried to imagine the mark of the house snake in the moment her lips touched the cold skin of the horned viper. When she opened her eyes in the place of the black circle now lay the diagram of protection, but now it glowed with some infernal fire. She didn’t know whether the decision she made was the right one or not, but she no longer had the strength to fight the cold darkness calling to her. She turned to the cradle and focused on the little voice that broke the silence, she focused on this song that lulled her to her eternal slumber. The last image she ever saw was clearer, brighter and more detailed than any fantasy, memory or sight she had ever had, and it was of the snake. It was flying, it had wings made from an old skin from which it had half wriggled out of and was flying to the cradle where it landed and coiled to a corner post and faced the door it took that pose and went still.