Sitting in the small café on a side street in Toronto’s Greek Town was a treat for Tzal on so many levels; he had trouble keeping count of the reasons for his happiness.

As he watched the foot traffic trudge sluggishly by outside of the window near which he sat, Tzal smiled expansively at the woman with dark curly hair serving him his fourth bowl of soup. She was older than she looked, but with Tzal’s senses such things could not be hidden; not only was this lovely woman’s health superb, but her lusts had not become tired and desiccated in this cold land as she had aged.

No doubt no longer the ravishing beauty she must have been twenty-five years ago, she was still a vital woman. Small round face with large dark laughing eyes peeking out from a grand mass of pepper curls, beautifully interrupted and outlined by streamers of occasional salt, her figure, opulently curvy, had not yet yielded to gravity and fatigue. Young men might not look at her for anything more than glass of wine and a bowl of soup, but Tzal was not young, and did not suffer from such callow blindness to exquisite beauty.

Old and decadent when Cristoforo had reached this side of the great green sea, older yet when Pizarro captured Atahualpa, and Cortez made a monkey of the simpleton Cuitlahuac. …Served the idiot right, throwing me and mine aside for a man on a horse…A MAN ON A DAMNED HORSE!!!...the pain of all that power fleeing my body still hurts some mornings…dumb monkey! Hundreds upon thousands of sacrifices to me, the blood power and death of so many of your own people rolling down the steps to my Sun Temples… and you mistook some FUCKING SPANIARD ON A FUCKING PONY FOR YOUR GOD!...

Despite the threads of hatred worming through his thoughts, his witty banter and lascivious grin never faltered. “You must love avgo lemono; I’ve lost count of how much you’ve had.” She leaned extra low to reach for the newest emptied bowl, and the warm smile she gave him was almost enough to fire his lusts. The scent of her as she moved about him completed the connection for Tzal with an electric snap at the base of his skull.

Acidic, lemony from handling the soup and an undercurrent of fresh bread and sweat made her as appealing as a nap in the shade on a hot day. “I will eat this soup all day if that is what it takes to win your heart…” His smile, like his patter, automatic; Tzal no longer thought much about seduction beyond what was necessary. His mind traveled in parallel lines to what his mouth was spewing at the lovely serving lady. Jobs over the last two years for the Aesir, of the bulging bank account he had earned these last two years, people killed, blood spilled, men and women used until they were left as shivering, useless husks, some minor Powers, too if it came to that; it all added up to what little power he could now have with no followers to pray to him out in the world. And now, being in a warm eatery on a snowy day, lemon egg soup, and an attractive woman not yet past her “use by” date were enough to make him believe that Post Columbian happiness was not a myth.

Tzal was speaking to the woman, but had no clear idea what he might be saying; she would never notice how distracted he was by ruminating over the idea of happiness. He just noticed how far she had fallen into his eyes, the amorous gaze fixing on her face as he looked deeply at her while saying his sweet nothings. The warming colors that began to blanket her skin went on without his mind actively following, as the slow vacating of her will showed in her expression and body language. His priests once called this his "Serpents' Dance."

No longer a power in the world, Tzal could not just hypnotize any person he might like anymore, and had no adoring worshipers to throw themselves upon his altar. But someone interested in serving Tzal, and not just soup; any person attracted to Tzal or wanting to be with Tzal, were fair game and easily caught in the old serpent's glare.

“Dearest young lady,” this elicited a smile and a giggle. While Tzal looked like an older gentleman, frosted hair, lined face, well dressed but slightly out of fashion; he was to the average observer a very handsome, if older, man. “Please do me the honor of meeting me tonight at my hotel for…dinner…hmmm…and drinks?” His smile suggested all the pleasures of Xanadu, and his waitress’s face blushed further at the images her mind conjured to fill in the gaps in his words. Breathing heavily she nodded, and took the card he offered with his hotel information written in an elegant flowing script.

“And if I get off early?” She asked him in a husky voice. Tzal made a point of slowly looking over her figure as he said, “Then dinner will come early, but the night will remain as young as you.”

With a grin and a wink, she turned to tell her brother in the kitchen that she was taking the rest of the day off. Some terse words in Greek exchanged made it clear that “Antony” didn’t like her idea of leaving one bit, but when she pointed out their lack of customers, his strident arguments became merely mumbles and grumbles. He smiled.

Leaving the restaurant and trudging through the snow laden streets, Tzal felt every bit the winner in what little life he had eked out for himself in this new era. Assured his hypnotic suggestions would bring the tasty treat right to his door, he was giddy at what fun he could have in the next several hours, he began to whistle a pleasant tune not heard in this world since the early sixteen hundreds.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

Dawn the next morning came too early for Tzal, but the ringing of his phone meant more employment, no one who had his contact data would call him for anything but work, and he loved his work.

Rising from the bloody bed, he crossed to the dresser not caring if his noises might wake his guest. ...Hrrrm.... Not quite true, I would be VERY surprised if Lydia awoke at this point… A quick glance down at his gore soaked stomach and genitalia. …Oh, very surprised, indeed…it might be fun, though…I could use a few more hours of the games we played last night…

His datpad phone continued to chirp out the newest dance hit by the little Brazilian tart he liked so much these days. So much life, so much rhythm, even when she’s singing of lost love and the horrors of the world she lives in, she was, in his estimation, vibrant, and a star… I must meet her some day…I will show her how her people once worshiped…

With a click he opened the cell’s receiver to address whoever might need his very specialized skills. Tzal was surprised and delighted to find on his datpad the voice of the factor for Mister Iben Sakr.

Not only was it a voice that sounded like the woman who had called him some months ago, her voice the epitome of all that was alluring and feminine; but they needed him. He loved to be needed, it was a far cry from the sacrifices he might still miss, but it was better than the starving loneliness he once could not escape. And money was no object to Amra; if one did his bidding in this modern age, Tzal had found over the years that one could name his price.

"Oh, yes, Miss Constance! …No? I’m sorry, but you sounded so much like her. How delightful of you to call, are you perhaps ever in the need to be leaving the employ of the handsome Mister Amra, I could put your obvious talents to good use. I could see my way clear to giving you a good position within my humble offices.”

Tzal loved the Bond films, even the ones from over a century ago, and always tried to play the ridiculous word games of seduction with secretaries whenever he might get away with such things. But the games, and his many charms, rarely if ever worked over the phone, and rarely worked in person unless he used his Serpent's Dance.

Regardless of the eighty some Bond movies that had been made, he never had any luck on this front; so much for script writers. He had received many calls from dusky voiced women all working for Amra over the last year and a half, it was puzzling to Tzal where Amra managed to find so many women all with such alluring voices. Modern day Egypt must breed them specially to tease me… he thought.

What was plain was that they needed him badly! But he would never leave one contract for another; it was bad form. No more work came to those fickle specialists that couldn’t finish one job before they went running off to do another. Word got around. He had seen a few of the fallen gods of old take that path and never recover. They floundered around, botching one job and leaving a trail of unhappy clients. But never Tzal. He didn’t quite know for what SunRize might be paying him this time around, but they had been persistent. As he had spent the last few months in the coldest weather he had ever faced, Miss Constance began calling him with greater and greater frequency. Her answer to his newest quip was as ice filled as the view from his window.

“Ah! I see, how silly of me; pray, please continue.” It never worked on any of Amra’s office personnel. Had to be something about working for a real power in the world, I am no match for such charisma…might be my Latin American accent…no actor playing Bond was never from Central nor South America…or it could be Amra’s… his thoughts were cut off by the details of the job coming through the datpad carried along on the voice of pure feminine sexuality in all its manipulative glory.

“You have already lost many agents, and the quarry is in the wind…Three of them…I see, and do you know where they might be headed?” He waited for her answer as he negligently scratched at the dried blood on his stomach where a navel might be on a human. Flakes, shiny red ochre, glinting almost metallically, fell to the floor about his ruddy feet as angry sanguine snowflakes.

“America? Which half? Where, I’m in Canada at the moment…Your agents have tracked them to a flight landing in New York, and from there you think they will go south. I see…oh…yes, splendid. I would love to take this opportunity. Tell Mister Iben Sakr that there will be no survivors. Yes, thank you, Miss Constance. Have the funds put into my accounts, and the people are to be delivered to my home in Tenoxtitlan. Equal amounts of women and men this time, if you can manage it. Otherwise just women…no, no, their ages don’t matter…younger is fine, but I like older as well. Oh, how nice, thank you. Good day to you, my dear honey voiced lady.”

With a yip of great delight Tzal went to the expensive room's shower to rinse off before getting to his flight. SunRize International had a plane ticket waiting for him at the front desk by the time he checked out of the hotel. Housekeeping would find the remains soon enough. A quick hot shower and some new clothes later, and he was on his way to the airport in a very modern electric cab. Tzal marveled at the efficient little machine. He remembered not too long past the gas guzzling world’s refusal to switch over to electric cars. Now, however, he hardly ever saw an oil fueled auto about anymore.

"Change is inevitable." He said to the empty air with a too wide smile of the taxi as the little car sped him along to the airport.