(Awesome chibi Notte from Celine at PurpleTopHat.com.)
Unedited snippet. The scene makes me simultaneously wince and laugh. Enjoy!
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I do not know how long I wandered in the form of the Beast, but it was long enough for men to further develop their weapons. I saw the bows in their hands; I saw the arrows come toward me, but I had gone so long without physical pain – without any threat to me of any kind, really – that I did not think quickly enough to move.
My friend, they were made of wood.
The pain! Piercing, burning, slicing! Screaming, I ran from it, and yet it followed me, stuck through my flesh, burning me to the marrow, and so blind from pain was I that I lacked the sense to hide in the grass. The warriors on the wall got off a second volley.
I resembled a porcupine when I flung myself back into the grass at last, weeping, howling, shocked at what had happened. And in the process, I flushed the ones those warriors on the wall had actually been waiting to fight.
A large group of men startled badly to find me suddenly in their midst and bleeding all over them, screaming at them, running between their crouching armored selves like some kind of naked demon. Deeply confused, a dozen of them leaped to their feet with a cry.
The men on the wall now knew where they were, and commenced firing.
It was a storm of arrows, a rain of wooden pain. I ran and ran, in no particular direction, zig-zagging and leaping over foolish men who screamed and covered their heads uselessly. My movement showed the wall-warriors where they were, and the arrows that followed me pierced them.
I cannot tell you what war it was I bollixed. I can simply tell you that whatever attempt that was to overtake Kemet, I personally ruined the enemy’s chances.
