Just then, the buxom virgin returned, her greasy rosy ringlets bouncing. "Here it is, oh mother my queen," she cried with a pant, waving a crumpled chunk of ruby in her slender, orchid appendage.
"Give it here," the Queen barked regally, snatching the Ear of Neon from her daughter and lifting the enchanted mineral to her organ of hearing. In the distance, she heard the sound of a foreign tavern wench cursing mightily, and her son Grignr cursing back. In the oval cubicle, the Queen's daughter bent forward with wary eagerness, for she heard her brother's vocalizations dimly. "He is in a forest," the ruler of the barbarians described. "He hath found himself a wench." She tossed the ear away. "Always the same, that one." The maiden trundled away, purposing to restore the Ear of Neon to its place in the Royal Cupboard. The Queen finally noticed the young warrior again. "Well," she snapped in haughty rage, "why are YOU still here? Should you not be on your way to Gorgonzola?"
"Y-y-yes ma'am," the brave swordsman stammered in pure terror and with that he rotated about his center of mass and absconded in dignified haste, gazingly longingly at the harlot with two-toned orbs.
Meanwhile, in the Wood of Wdjrik, Catherna of the Tavern was howling in magnificent distress. The gold and silver harness she was wearing had caught itself upon the twisted tendrils of a tree, holding her so securely that she was removed from her mare's dorsal area and left to hang in the tree. Grignr halted at the racket and fixed his emerald orbs upon the wench dangling in the air. "Enough of this!" he bellowed. "I saved your life. The least you can do is stay mounted for more than five minutes at a stretch!"
"The tree grabbed me you slut!" the girl shrieked back. "Help me down. This thing is pinching in all the wrong places!"
"Very well." Grignr leaped from his horse's back and drew his sword witha rippling arm. With brave shrieks he hacked delicately at the tree-limbs, but he was answered with laughter. The tree began to shake the maiden up and down, waving her. Catherna screamed again.
"Not with violence, you idiot!" Grignr stepped back, puzzled. What did she mean?
The tree cackled nobly. "I will release her for payment," it said in a lusty, soft, deep, woody tenor.
"We carry nothing of value," Grignr said.
"Except my harness," the woman added with a crafty glint in her blue ovals.
The Ecordian glowered with excitement," Always ready to take your clothes off, are you"?
"This is NOT clothes," the haughty wench snapped. "Now hold me still tree." She shifted and shimmered about in the grasp of the branches, fumbling expertly with the harness buckles. Soon enough, the harness was in the tree and she was on the ground, naked and pale splendor among the murky dry dirt of the forest floor. "Are you happy now?" The tree chuckled with merciless glee, waving the harness about and then went still. The gold and silver chains were gone. All was silence and despair, except for Grignr and the horses. Catherna stood up, and remounted her mare.
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Okay, now I really have to get to work.
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"He attacks. And here I can kill him. But I don't. That's the answer to world peace, people."
-Stickles Shihan