Nomen Regis

     “Eheu! Rex morte est. Inquam, O Mercuri. Astra declive!” Celatrix Verna’s voice trembled, building as she timed her ‘declive’ to coincide with the chanters’. Holding her hands to either side of the podium, she raised them with the palms directed at Kaiser Rudolpho Imler’s wounded face as he lay in his lidless coffin. While slowly turning her upper body toward Archel, Celatrix Verna continued, “Ecce! Rex nasci est. Inquam, O Iphigenia. Sol oriens!” Her impeccable timing once again apparent as her words blended into the chanted ‘Sol oriens!’

     From the front row, Colonel Thompson and General Michaels bowed their heads, listening to the foreign words. Michaels leaned over and whispered, “you know what she’s talking about?”

Media Nocte

     “Oh, sweet Mercury! What did you put in it, piss?” Brimley complained.

     “Yes. That’s the secret to warming it up. I piss in it,” Santos retorted.

     “Oh, now I don’t want it,” Brimley held the coffee cup away from her while looking for a place to put it down.

     “Here. Let me,” Santos offered.

     She mock handed him the cup, which he genuinely took, eliciting her to whine, “hey, give that back.”

     In the living room, Cassie whispered, “it doesn’t make sense,” to Archel who kept one enormous eagle eye on the bickering soldiers. “Do people never grow up?”

     “Chess,” Archel murmured. In stifling a yawn, all the feathers on his head and neck went ridged. “Game,” he exhaled. “Ooh,” he moaned, “I dreamed I was…” His beak fell and his lion’s shoulders slumped.

Liceat Mihi

     Whipping the Iago Citadel through Sanctuary City’s evening traffic, Lt. Musgrove watched the mirrors for signs of a tail. He used every evasion method he could recall from his questionable youth, and after 30 minutes of borderline reckless driving, he resumed his regular driving habits. As ordered, he drove into eastbound traffic headed for the Karman Tunnel. Once inside the tunnel, Musgrove hit his emergency flashers and slowed down. At the midpoint of the tunnel, he stopped the car, and popped both the hood and the trunk. He waited for a break in traffic, then climbed out. From the trunk he removed two emergency triangles, which he spaced out behind the car to give oncoming vehicles a warning. He tapped on the rear driver’s side window, nodded to Commander Randle Dante, Sr., and then went about the business of tinkering with the engine. The moment Musgrove’s head disappeared behind the hood, Dante slipped out of the passenger side of the Citadel. The commander walked against traffic toward the nearest emergency exit. While Dante disappeared through the tunnel door, Musgrove recovered the emergency triangles, closed up the Citadel, and then drove off. Musgrove had his orders: drive around aimlessly and in two hours return to the drop off point.

Me Piget

     “You are late,” the Inquisitor said without looking up from the solid oak desk in the warehouse manager’s office. He flipped a paper over, before entwining his fingers, and resting his forearms on the edge of the desk. Slowly, he turned his attention to the two men, “explain.”

     The duumviri hazarded a glance at each other, silently deciding on who would respond. Jougs answered, “we met trouble.”

     “Took care of it,” Vorant added.

     The Inquisitor waited, calm brown eyes boring into them.

     “We were followed…” Jougs hesitated, “by a bird and some Mercs.”

     “Got away, though, didn’t we?”

     “How?”

     “Firebombs and a smokescreen,” Jougs said.

Omnium Opinionem

     “Can I help you?” Colonel Dagon asked in confusion. “How?”

     Leaning close to the colonel, Cassie whispered, “we’ve never done this before.”

     Perplexed, the colonel’s eyes darted back and forth from the young griffin king to the adolescent messenger. After thirty seconds, he sighed, “I see!” Nodding, he contemplated the best way to break the news to them, he finally said, “I don’t think that’s going to be a problem. My liege, how old are you?”

     “Uh. I,” Kaiser Archel shrugged his furry golden shoulders and ruffled the eagle’s feathers of his neck, “thirteen. I think.” His irritated python tail twitched. “Why?”

     “Law, my liege,” Dagon answered.

     “Law?” Cassie asked.

     Turning to Archel, Dagon said, “you’ve got two years to learn.”

     “Learn what?” Archel asked.

     “How to rule your kingdom,” Dagon responded with a bow.