Delios could feel cold sweat running down his back as he cleared his dry throat. “Anyway, the anax asks for your counsel on the plan master Mar’Doug and I presented today.”

Mistress Bel’Sara stared at him. This wasn’t the weird, slightly distracted woman he remembered from his childhood. The eyes measuring him right now were cold and focused.

She doesn’t believe me, he thought. Would she turn down a summons from the anax, though? Waiting for the sage’s response, Delios wished his sister had given him clearer instructions. As soon as they’d left the balcony, she’d excused the guards and sent Delios off to stall the sage’s departure. He’d asked her what was going on, but she’d looked into his eyes and told him that there was no time.

Delios trusted his sister more than anybody. She didn’t have any prophetic powers, but she could read people. And often that was just as good.

“Are we not leaving today?” the proprietor of the trading vessel asked. The merchant stood a bit behind mistress Bel’Sara looking nervously from her to Delios.

The sage ignored him. “I already gave your father my counsel. It has not changed.”

“The council was very impressed with the ideas master Mar’Doug shared with us,” Delios said, regretting the mentioning of the other sage immediately. Hearing the name brought a grim spark to mistress Bel’Sara’s eyes.

Delios forced down the nervous impulse to say more. Trying to convince her to follow Memnostis’ supposed request would only help to undermine his credibility. Nobody made the ruler of Riadnos wait. At least nobody in his reach.

“Make the ship ready,” mistress Bel’Sara said in a tone that allowed no protest. “We shall leave before nightfall.” She started to walk without sparing Delios or the merchant another glance.

The unhappy merchant seemed to want to ask another question back then shut his mouth again. As the saying goes, nothing good ever came from getting involved in the matters of gods and magi.

Delios refrained from giving the man an understanding nod, before joining the mistress’ side. Omiri and the two warriors accompanying Delios as guards fell in behind them.

To reach the main road up the hill, they had to pass through the harbor’ marked. Despite the brewing war, it was as lively as ever. Merchants and craftsmen offered their wares. Fishermen proclaimed the freshness of their catch. A constant noise of enthusiastic haggling filled the air.

Yet, one thing was different. Delios felt it every time he wandered the streets since the news of the Assanaten invasion had reached the city. He was watched.

Never interrupting their bustling, the eyes of dozens of his fellow citizens followed him, searching for any clue about their fate. Is this how a lamb feels when it is brought to the priest? Delios thought.

He sincerely hoped that this day wouldn’t end with his organs pulled from his body. Remembering that his sister had asked him to stall the sage, not to bring her back, he swallowed nervously. He had no illusions about what Memnostis would do if he thought him a traitor.

As they walked the crowd opened a respectful space around them.

He glanced down at the woman walking next to him. When they reached the palace and his lie was exposed, she might slay him herself. Would a quick spear thrust through the throat be better than being struck down by a curse? There were countless stories about the nasty things magic could do.

Lost in his worries, Delios took a heartbeat to notice when the magus suddenly stopped dead in her tracks.

“Mistress?” He turned back to her.

The sage stared straight ahead, her eyes unfocused. She stood like that, frozen in place, for several heartbeats. Then her head snapped around.

Following her gaze, Delios saw that she was focused on the mountains towering over Riadnos.

“What…” Before Delios could finish his question, a column of smoke broke forth from one of the tops, followed by thunder.

“Rehala!” The name was repeated all around them as people stopped what they were doing to look up at the distant mountain. Something had angered the goddess.

It didn’t happen often, but it was also not uncommon and so the people were more curious than worried.

“You!” the sage whispered next to him. “What did you do?”

The tone of her voice made Delios' blood run cold.

But mistress Bel’Sara wasn’t looking at him, nor was she watching the eruption in the distance. She was staring back in the direction of the ship. “Damn that fool!” She turned to hurry back.

Without thinking Delios held on to her arm. “What is going on?”

In the blink of an eye, Omiri appeared next to them.

Hot pain exploded in Delios' arm as the young nomad girl slashed at it with her knife.

“Ah!” he shouted letting go and stepping backward.

Omiri didn’t give him time to react to the sudden attack. A swift kick sent Delios flying into a stand.

“Hey, what’re you doing?”

“Delios!”

The shouts came from the two guards that had accompanied him from the palace. Having followed them at a respectful distance, they now stormed forward to protect the anax’s son.

What is happening here? Delios thought, trying to get back to his feet. He had to stop the situation from devolving further.

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“Wait!” he shouted at his men holding up his uninjured hand.

“I don’t have time for this,” mistress Bel’Sara said. She started whispering something in a language Delios didn’t understand.

“Mistress Bel’Sara, please”, Delios said, stumbling back to his feet, “I don’t know what is going on here.”

Omiri positioned herself protectively between her mistress and the men.

I must calm the situation, Delios thought. He held up both his hands. “Please, can we talk?”

One of the symbols decorating the sage’s staff began to gleam and smolder.

Speaking a final vicious-sounding word in the incomprehensible language, mistress Bel’Sara stared at Delios. He immediately felt a burning sensation from his chest. Then people around him started to scream.

The first came from one of the guards. Delios' eyes widened in disbelief as he saw the reason. The man who had been holding a spear until a moment ago was trying to fight off a snake wrapped around his arm. The monster hissed viciously and struck at the man’s throat.

More screams.

Next to Delios, a basket that had contained apples until a moment ago was overflowing with smaller black snakes. Open-mouthed he witnessed an apple that had been lying next to the basket transform and unwind into another hissing reptile.

He jumped back and almost stumbled when the burning feeling from his chest intensified.

“Snakes!”

“Magic!”

As the snakes spread out in all directions, panic spread rapidly through the crowd. Stalls were pushed over. People fell and were trampled. Wherever Delios looked, more and more objects turned. In a matter of moments, the market had turned into utter chaos.

Mistress Bel’Sara put her hand on her servant’s shoulder and the two women retreated toward the harbor.

“Wait!” Delios shouted. “What are you doing?”

He took two steps after them but then his path was blocked by a particularly vicious-looking snake, slithering out from under a stall. This one was particularly long. And thick.

Delios froze. While his mind identified the danger, he couldn’t tell his body to move.

The snake rushed forward.

“Haaa!”

Accompanied by a war cry the second guard rammed his spear through the monster’s mid-section. The snake hissed in pain and its head spun around searching for the attacker. Suddenly face to face with the monster, the lonely guard went white.

“Your sword!” he shouted. “Use your sword!”

The panicked plea finally snapped Delios out of his state of shock. The moment his hand closed around the hilt of his sword, the endless hours of training with his father’s warriors took over. Stepping forward, he drew the blade in a smooth motion.

Before the snake’s head could reach the man who was still holding on to the spear that was nailing the monster to the ground, Delios cut through its body. An arm’s length of snake hit the ground next to the guard’s feet, making him flinch away. “Ah, damn!”

Delios took stock of the chaos around him. Snakes of different sizes appeared everywhere. Right across the street, a stall’s wooden pols turn. The monsters immediately fell on the merchant who was trying to keep the crowd from trampling his wares.

Bodies lay here and there. Some had been trampled. Others had snake bites on their tights. The whimpering told Delios that not all of the victims were dead yet.

“What now?” the warrior asked, his eyes darting back and forth.

Delios gritted his teeth. Mistress Bel’Sara and Omiri were gone, having used the chaos to slip away. For a moment, he considered following them. He should easily be able to reach the ship before the sage could make them cast off.

And then what? He asked himself, absentmindedly rubbing his chest. The burning sensation was still there but he was able to withstand it.

Another scream forced his attention back to the scene in front of him. This one had been high – a girl’s voice.

Delios made his decision. He’d done what he could to delay the sage. Now it was up to Delia and master Mar’Doug.

“Come,” he said. “We need to help!”

They began to move through the market, hacking, and stabbing the vicious creatures as they went. And they weren’t alone. Some of the citizens hadn’t panicked but taken up clubs and other improvised weapons to fight back against the invading monsters.

Delios cut a mid-sized snake from the throat of a stocky middle-aged woman and pulled her back on her feet. “Get yourself to safety!”

Instead of doing as she was told, the woman picked up a baker’s shovel and started to stamp the vicious little apple snakes. “Get down here and help me,” she called to a group of men and women who had climbed the roof of the closest building.

“You can go on,” she shouted to Delios. “We’ll kill the little ones.”

Delios nodded, grateful for the resolute woman, and ran on to the next corner. Wherever he looked, he saw objects turn into monsters. The streets around him had mostly emptied of people except for those that were fighting. And the fallen.

Ahead, he saw a courageous girl, beating an apple snake to death with a stick until the stick itself turned in her hands. She fell backwards screaming, trying to shuffle away.

Delios started running.

The snake slid over the girl’s legs, coiling itself up to lounge at her throat.

His sword reached the snake just in time, looping the head clean off. How many had it been?

The first screams started to come from inside the houses. It seemed for every snake that was cut down another two or three objects turned.

Whipping away the sweat running into his eyes, Delios looked around, trying to decide where to go next. There seemed to be no end to this nightmare. Would this curse spread until the entire city was overrun with snakes?

His guard joined his side. “Where now?”

Delios didn’t know. For the first time in his life, Delios felt utterly helpless. And yet he’d been raised the anax’s son, his successor. He couldn’t show himself as weak and indecisive. And yet, he had no answer to the disaster playing out in front of him.

It was in that moment of despair that his eyes met master Mar’Doug’s. As if having appeared out of nowhere the sage was just standing there watching him. A feeling of relief washed over Delios. Help had arrived.

Ignoring the girl sitting at his feet, he ran across the street.

The master looked concerned. “What is happening here, Delios?” he asked without delay.

“Master, it was mistress Bel’Sara,” Delios said. “She spoke in a foreign tongue and things started to turn into snakes.”

“Things?” Master Mar’Doug raised an eyebrow.

“Apples, wooden sticks – all kinds of objects.” Delios waved, encompassing the whole market stretching out up and down the street. “And it isn’t stopping.”

“Where is mistress Bel’Sara?”

“I lost her in the crowd.” Delios quickly outlined what had happened.

The sage listened intently, staring down the street in the direction Delios had come from. “How quickly will the ship be ready to leave?”

Delios shook his head. “I am not sure. Mistress Bel’Sara might force them to cast off right away.”

Master Mar’Doug closed his eyes. It almost looked to Delios as if he was gathering his resolve. When he opened his eyes again, his face had adopted his customary neutral expression.

“Let’s go,” he said. “You need to guide us there.”

“Yes,” Delios said. Then he hesitated. “What about the snakes? People are getting hurt.”

Master Mar’Doug frowned, then addressed the servant standing behind. “Run back and tell all the warriors you meet to come here and kill the snakes. Tell everybody!”

“Yes, master!” the servant shouted and ran off. He looked incredibly relieved.

And the rest of them ran too. Delios let the group back to the pier where the merchant ship was hopefully still moored. On their way, they saw more objects turn.

A wagon wheel uncoiled itself into a brown snake, just as they passed by. Not easily surprised by the sudden transformation anymore, Delios hacked it in two.

But most of the monsters they had to leave untouched as they hurried to reach the ship in time. Delios felt guilty about it. He understood that rescuing Atissa had priority but the snakes they left behind might kill dozens in the meantime.

“There it is!” his guard shouted.

The ship was ready to cast off. The plank used for loading was gone and sailors stood in front of the ropes fixating the ship to the pier at bow and stern, but they didn’t move. They just stood there gazing toward the deck.

Are they waiting for instructions? Delios thought.

As they came closer they saw the cause for the men’s hesitation. There was a tumult on deck. Several sailors were shouting. Mistress Bel’Sara stood to the side gesturing at them.

They were all so distracted with whatever was going on, they didn’t notice the three men climbing over the railing.