Lepa was deep in an odd dream of being pestered by dozens of tiny dragons, nipped and scorched, when one of them landed a particularly painful bite on her nose.  She startled awake and realized she'd been stung by a bee, and her irritation was quickly washed away by guilt that she had fallen asleep, as well as alarm at what she saw.

For there was no sign of Hannah or the Prince, but instead a suspicious amount of blood on the soft grass where they'd napped.

In a near-frothing panic, she butted against Fuhsa's side until she awoke, and her panic woke Lobo, and so on in turn until all the animals were awake and filled with alarm for their mistress.  They spread out, and despite the charred grass of the clearing, the animal's keen noses quickly led them to Hannah's body and head amongst the trees behind the church.  They stood around the corpse, full of grief and anger.

"Ursa, how did this happen!" roared Lea to the bear.  "I bade you keep watch while I slept!"

"I did, but passed that charge onto Lobo," complained Ursa.  "What did you see?" she asked the wolf.

"Nothing, but I had told the fox to keep an eye and slept myself."

"And so I told the hare," said Fuhsa quickly, without waiting to be asked.  All heads turned to regard Lepa, who shrunk into herself.

"I tried, I really did, but I was so tired!  I fell asleep too," she admitted, and her shame hurt far worse than the throbbing of her stung nose.  Lea let out a terrifying roar, more threatening than the dragon's for its personal direction.

"Our mistress is slain by that cowardly Prince!  I'll have his head for that, but not before I take your own hide!"  The small hare cowered before the lion and braced herself to be eaten, too guilty to even try to flee.  But before Lea could take a step forward, Fuhsa leapt between them.

"No, wait!  There is yet a chance for redemption!" she cried.

"Speak quickly, morsel," growled the lion skeptically.

"I know from my mother of a small grove on a mountainside, many leagues distant, where grows a rare and special root.  It is said if the root is placed someone's mouth, it can cure any illness or wound, even unto death!"  The animals considered this, but Lea shrugged.

"So you can take us there and absolve your own guilt for trusting your watch to a coney, but that won't help her."  Fuhsa shook her head.

"No...the root must be used within twenty-four hours of the wound or first sign of illness, or it will not work.  You and Ursa are not fast enough, and even me or Lobo at our best would need dozens of hours to get there and back!  We all know no one can match Lepa for speed..."  Lea grumbled a bit, but there wasn't much for it.

"Mark me," said the lion to the hare, after Fuhsa had carefully explained how to find the grove, "you run like the devil himself is chasing you, for if you are one minute late, I will spend all my remaining days hunting you and send you to him in pieces!"

Lepa, who had started to relax a little bit after the unexpected ray of hope for her mistress, was nearly petrified with fright by this declaration.  Ursa huffed in exasperation and shot Lea a look, then stomped a paw.  With that the little hare shot off as if she was a knocked arrow and the bear had loosed the string.

For hours and hours she bounded, as much for love of Hannah as for fear of Lea, until her paws were raw and bleeding and every breath like fire in her chest.  But she came to the grove's entrance and saw why humans had not long since denuded it, for there was but a narrow crevice that a hare or fox might squeeze through while keeping out even the scrawniest two-leg.

As she entered, she despaired a little, for the sun had since set and she knew it had taken her more than half a day to arrive here.  She didn't have a head for figures like Fuhsa did, but she was pretty sure that meant she wasn't going to make it back in time.  Still, she dug down at the base of the strange blue plants until she'd exposed some roots, heedless of the further damage this did to her paws.  But once she'd begun gnawing at a root to separate it, she was suddenly filled with the most amazing vigor.  She felt perfectly healthy and rested, and her paws were once more whole and supple.

Encouraged, she chewed off three roots, as many as she thought she could securely hold in her mouth at a run, and then immediately set off to return.  Her new-found energy made her even faster than she'd been on the outward trip, and any time her breath caught or her muscles ached or her paw pads split, she just gave a little nibble on the roots she held and found herself once again in top form.

Even so, it was still a close thing, and when Lepa had returned, none of the animals could say for certain if it had been more or less than a full day.  Lea took Hannah's head by the hair, eyes still closed in repose, and nudged it up against her neck, then Lepa and Fuhsa cooperated with paw and mouth to get a root between the huntress' teeth and push.

"She lives!" cheered the animals, when Hannah's eyes fluttered open.  The huntress rose awkwardly to a sitting position and looked around.  Something felt strange, though she could not quite put her finger on it yet.

"What?" she asked, simply.

"We found you dead, your head severed...your cowardly Prince must have not wished to properly share his rule," said Lobo.  Hannah gasped.

"Dead?  But...he seemed so nice, and asked me to marry him..."

"Humans are sensitive, and treacherous," rumbled Lea, disapprovingly.  "Present company excepted, of course.  Perhaps he took insult from the delay in your acceptance?"

"But...if I was dead, how now can I be alive?"

"The fox knew of a mysterious root that cures all, and the hare managed to spirit it back here with little time to spare," explained Ursa, charitably.  Hannah tried to absorb all of this, but the strangeness she felt was too distracting.  She examined herself to try to figure out what was wrong, and quickly realized that her head was turned wrong way round, and facing her back.

"Oh my God!  My head is on backwards!"

"I told you," groused Fuhsa, who had indeed earlier complained that she didn't think the lion had correctly positioned Hannah's head, but no one had been entirely certain how two-leg bodies were supposed to be put together.

"Oh, sorry, hold still a moment," said Lea, chagrined, and with one swipe of her claws removed Hannah's head once again.  The huntress fell over, lifelessly, and the other animals let up a cry of shock and betrayal.

"How else were we going to fix it?  We still have roots, just put it aright!" roared the lion, and the other animals grudgingly dropped the matter.  Ursa set the head this time, and Fuhsa and Lepa placed a root again to revive Hannah, this time with her head situated properly.  She awoke once more, and the animals seemed satisfied everything was largely as it should be, but Hannah still sat glumly.

"I just can't believe Philip would do something like that..."

"Why not?" asked Ursa.  "It's not like you'd known him for very long."  Hannah nodded, but frowned.

"He acted nice...and he was so handsome."  Fuhsa let out a curt yip, and shook her head sadly.

"Only in stories do people's outsides match their insides.  Mama always said papa was the handsomest fox she'd ever seen, but that he knew it, and made sure everyone else knew it too."  Hannah thought that sounded depressingly true.  But she couldn't bear to just leave...she had to confront him, and ask him why.

Hannah set about regathering her things, and finally found the sword mostly hidden by some of the unburnt grasses near where she'd napped next to the print.  As she picked it up, she started to reconsider.  Why should she care what the stupid Prince did?  If he didn't want her, he was an idiot...after all, she had golden hair and a magic (or something) sword, and talking animals, and she'd just killed a dragon for Pete's sake.

For a moment she considered marching up to the castle, announcing she'd killed the dragon and challenging the Prince to a duel of honor, but even that seemed hardly worth it.  She'd go make her own life, and it'd be a darn sight better than sitting around in a moldy castle.  Let this crummy little kingdom keep its crummy Prince, and she'd waste no further time on him.

That decided, they descended the hill on the side away from town, and journeyed onward.

---

Months passed.  Hannah continued to have the animals perform, and began to demand larger and larger fees, for she now allowed the animals to talk in public as well.  She'd killed a dragon, hadn't she, so why should she fear stupid villagers who might cry 'devil' at anything they didn't understand?  She even demonstrated the sword's prowess by cleaving something in twain at the end of each show.

If the animals noticed the change in Hannah they did not much mind.  They loved her and thought highly of her, was it wrong for her to finally do the same?  It didn't bother them that the huntress' occasional teasing dalliances with men never seemed to turn into anything more, or that most people treated her more now with fear than with friendliness.

Still, Hannah was faintly dissatisfied with how she'd left things in Blackhill.  She found she didn't really want a man who just fawned over her like uncle William did aunt Acacia...she wanted to win someone, and kept thinking of Philip, who she technically already had.

Finally, she decided to pass back through the capital and see how things stood, if the Prince was still as comely as he'd been a year ago.  Once she'd had a look, she'd decide whether or not to make a stand on her rights.  When she returned, she found that the village was draped in red where black had hung on her first visit.  While arranging things for her animals, she inquired and was told that the Marshal had supposedly killed the dragon, and was due to marry the Prince the very next day, and it was all she could do not to call out the Lady Marshal on the spot.

Hannah spent a restless night.  These days, upon turning in to sleep, she often regretted how she behaved during the day, and now she was questioning a years worth of uncharitable thoughts towards Philip.  Why hadn't the Prince just said he'd killed the dragon?  Had he wanted to marry the Lady Marshal?  That didn't seem very likely, Hannah had heard she was a dozen or more years older, and hardened from a life of warfare, how appealing was that?  She'd have to try to find out tomorrow before the wedding.  If there was a chance Philip wasn't to blame for any of this, her heart wouldn't let her pass it up.

But in the morning, after dressing and arming herself, her nightly worrying seemed as overblown as it usually did.  Still, the possibility Philip hadn't willingly betrayed her made him even more attractive in her eyes.  As she broke her fast with the innkeeper, Hannah thought of a way to amuse herself and test her theory at the same time.

"Would you credit me if I told you that while eating here with you, I will have bread from the Queen's own table?" she asked the innkeeper boldly.  The woman looked her over, and saw no sign she had bread secreted on her person, nor could she think of how the huntress might've obtained any, no matter how well regarded her menagerie was.

"Never," she said, cheerfully, "I'd put a hundred bits of gold against that coming to pass."

"Agreed!" said Hannah, surprising the innkeeper, who had mostly been jesting, but now found herself bound.  The huntress gave a shrill whistle with a trill at the end, and Lepa came bounding in from outside where the animals were relaxing.  "I'd like some of the Queen's bread from the castle," Hannah remarked idly.  "Fetch some for me?"

Lepa ran to obey, though she had no good idea how she might accomplish the task.  But she'd brought her mistress back from the dead, hadn't she?  So she ran.  The sight of a young rabbit racing through the streets of town was too much for the local dogs, who gave chase.  Normally Lepa would have no fear of being caught, but they knew this town better than she, and she was forced to run for all she was worth.  When she reached the castle gate, she slipped into the sentry box with the guard none the wiser.  But when the dogs tried to follow, the soldier beat them about the head unmercifully until they fled.

The hare managed to make her way undiscovered into the castle, and considered just asking the cook, but some voice from deep inside her suggested that approaching a cook alone was a really bad idea, whether she could talk or not.  So instead she found the Prince and snuck under his table, scratching at his foot.  He complained, kicking her away irritably, but she was nothing if not persistent and eventually the Prince bent around the table to look, gaping in surprise when he saw it was a rabbit molesting him and not his dog as he'd thought.

"I know you, do I not?" asked the Prince, noting the hare wore a token of honor.  Lepa nodded.

"After Hannah slew the dragon, you gave me a token.  And then we slept and woke up and she was dead, which I always thought was really awful and surprising, but two-legs are always doing awful things and everyone else said you'd done it..."  Philip's expression grew pained.

"I...am bound not to speak of that day, though I can say that whoever had done such a thing would be a villain true.  But is there any kindness I can do for you?"  Lepa, confused but encouraged, nodded again, excitedly.

"She wanted some bread from the Queen's table.  I don't know why...she's different than she used to be before she came here..." But the Prince breezed past this, overjoyed at the underlying implication.

"She lives!  Yes, then, at once!"

"Oh and could you have the baker bring it?  The dogs in town are a caution and I don't think the bread would fare well if I had to dodge them again while carrying it myself..."

And so the Prince summoned the baker and bade it done, and Lepa shadowed her sufficiently to stay clear of the dogs on her return to the inn.  Upon arriving, she demanded the loaf from the baker and awkwardly carried it to the table herself, for she was determined to never again be accused of shirking a duty.  But the Queen's baker was recognized in the doorway, so the innkeeper knew the bread to be just as Hannah had said.  While the woman gathered her wits, Lepa spoke quietly to Hannah.

"The Prince didn't...well, it was confusing, but I think he is sorry?  And he definitely seemed happy to find out you were alive..."  Hannah's smile softened for a moment, then she shook her head and firmly spread a superior smirk back across her lips.

"There you have it," the huntress said, "a hundred gold, I'm owed?  But I find I've a taste for the Queen's own roast meat.  Would you care to wager double or nothing?"  The innkeeper was sorely tempted, not wanting to part with a hundred gold bits, but it was clear something strange was at work here and she declined to take the bet.  Hannah shrugged and whistled for Fuhsa anyway.  Any chance to show people how impressive she was was worth taking, the gold hardly mattered.

---

The innkeeper simply stared, as the huntress and her entire menagerie feasted in the common room of the inn.  In addition to the bread, the fox had fetched the meat, the wolf some greens, the bear some sweet pastries, and the lion had even returned with several bottles of wine...though she'd apparently needed to sample some and was rather tipsy...and all of it had been delivered in a manner that made it obvious it was from the Queen's stores.

For her part, Hannah still wasn't sure what the story was with Philip, but she was satisfied with how the joke had gone, and he seemed to be cooperating.  She felt supremely confident that with her animals and her sword, she'd be able to resolve matters to her satisfaction, so she declared one last impossibility.

"Having had such a fine feast at the Queen's expense, I think I could grow used to it...I suppose I'll have to marry the Prince and eat such fare every day," Hannah remarked with elaborate off-handedness.

"Now that's just silly," scoffed the innkeeper.  "The Prince is engaged to the Lady Marshal, and is to be married today!  How, in any reasonable world, could you accomplish such a thing?"  Hannah gave this a moment's thought, then giggled and held up a finger...which wavered a bit, as she was now herself a bit tipsy from the wine.

"One moment, dear innkeeper!"  She wove off unsteadily up the stairs to her room and fetched the wrapped bundle of dragon's tongues she'd kept all this time, never having managed to find that alchemist again.  She returned to the table and opened the bundle proudly.  "With these!"

The bundle smelled vaguely of smoke and preservative herbs, and the innkeeper thought herself to be staring at a gruesome collection of seven long-dead but sizeable snakes, only each with two pointed heads, and eyeless to boot.  She simply couldn't let this lie.

"You're well into your cups, huntress...there's just no way," she said, steadying her own voice a bit against the wine she'd shared.  "I'd wager my inn and the land it rests on besides against it happening as you say!"  Hannah clapped delightedly and dug out a thick bag from her pouches, dropping it heavily onto the table.

"Agreed, a thousand gold bits I'll match!"  The innkeeper looked as if she was doubting her own sanity as much as Hannah's, but nodded.  "But I'm in no hurry, the wedding isn't until noon, is it?  Let's finish our meal first."

---

The Queen had been a ruler for a good many years, and was quite skilled at it.  One of the first things she'd picked up was the knack of responding appropriately to unexpected events, while nevertheless appearing to be completely unsurprised.  It was very important that one's subjects saw only utter confidence from their liege.  Still, this morning's antics had been the harshest test of her composure since a nearby kingdom in the mountains had somehow been covered in thick snow and ice overnight, which then had all melted shortly thereafter nearly as quickly and as a result flooded half the farms on the east plains.  Her voice was thus quite steady when she'd gathered herself sufficiently to speak to her son.

"Philip."

"Yes, your Majesty?"  He was actually grinning, after having moped around the castle for a solid year without respite.

"Should we expect you to be happily acceding to the requests of an assortment of animals of varying wildness every morning, or would you say this is at all unusual?"  The Prince was more nervous than he seemed...there was still the possibility that if the Lady Marshal's deception was exposed, she would attempt to overthrow the Queen as she'd originally threatened.  But in the year since the betrothal was announced, she had spent little time in the field with the Queen's army, instead preparing to secure her position as heir to the throne.  They'd suffered losses under less talented commanders, and their loyalty to her was not nearly as unwavering as it had once been.  He judged these events on this day could be no less than divine providence, and decided to take the risk.

"I dare not speak of my hopes for the future, and I can say very little.  But I can say that if you send for the mistress of these animals of which you speak, you may find the meeting particularly edifying."

The Queen fixed Philip with a stare that would've wilted a lesser man, but he bore it without tremor, though his expression did become more serious than it had been.  After a tense minute, she nodded, and rang for a servant.

---

"I said," repeated the page, after the innkeeper's incredulous demand, "her Royal Majesty requests the presence of the Mistress of the Menagerie at the castle, as immediately as possible."  Hannah inspected her fingernails idly and tried not to laugh, though she hadn't actually expected the invitation at all.

"Actually," said the huntress, peering with one eye into an unhappily empty wine bottle, "I'm a bit indisposed...be a dear and have her Majesticness send over a carriage, oh and some much nicer clothes, I've been traveling for days and these need mending.  None of those corsets or poofy skirts though," she said over a sternly admonishing finger to the astonished page, "I have to stay mobile in case things get tense.  I imagine the Prince can help her with my sizing."  The servant simply stared as the room went quiet.  "Hop!" said Hannah, clapping her hands sharply, then dissolved into giggles as the page actually gave a little jump of surprise, then went running off back to the castle.

---

The Queen said nothing, only stared at her son with no expression at all.  The Prince swallowed heavily, then spoke softly, as if to a live adder.

"I genuinely can't explain, and I humbly beg your Majesty's forgiveness.  But it's...probably worth it?"  A couple of minutes of silence went by.

The Queen actually needed to instruct the terrified page twice before he believed her.  In a rare break in her otherwise iron composure, she began to drum her fingers on the arm of her chair, and this was not a good sign.

---

The procession to the castle did not go unremarked.  Though most of the animals were riding inside the carriage with Hannah, Ursa and Lea were too large to fit, and instead had stretched out along the carriage's arched roof, behind the terrified driver.  The huntress, terribly pleased with herself, occasionally leaned out of a window to smile and wave as they passed townspeople.  She was still drunk a touch, but she'd eaten a bit more and taken nearly an hour picking an outfit out of the assortment of clothes that had arrived with the carriage.  Though she did not know it, Hannah had settled on one of the Lady Marshal's dresses...which had been on hand for darning and was hurriedly finished...all black silk and leather, with silver studs and edging and split skirts for mobility.  Though the dress was a bit shorter than suited her, and Hannah was not as modest as she once was, she'd added a pair of fine black leather leggings beneath, lest she reveal more than even she preferred.

Thus costumed, she presented a fine figure and was not immediately recognized by the Lady Marshal after being ushered into the throne room, though the warrior did squint at the uncannily similar cut to one of her own dresses.  The Prince could not help but smile upon seeing her, but the Queen herself was clearly not in a mood to be trifled with.

"Your Majesty, Your Highness, Your Ladyship," greeted Hannah, with an appropriately deep bow.

"Mistress of the Menagerie," said the Queen, coolly.  "Your pets have been making rather free use of our castle of late."  She eyed the animals, who had come in behind Hannah and none of the guards had dared stop as a group.  Though the several guards in the throne room gripped their weapons tightly, ready to defend the court with their lives, if necessary.

"I do apologize for my impertinence, your Majesty.  I admit, I sought an audience...I had past dealings with the Prince once upon a time, and I thought the requests might amuse us both.  Truly, I meant no harm to you or his Highness."  She pointedly left off the Lady Marshal.  The huntress itched to put the magic sword through her murderess' neck, but even that didn't seem quite good enough.

"So, here you are..." prompted the Queen, still far from deciding to forgive the Huntress' behavior.  Hannah thought for a moment, then an idea struck her.

"I learned the Blackhill dragon had been slain, nearly a year ago...I thought I would like to pay my respects to the talented and beautiful victor, for I would have been hard-pressed to tame such a beast."  Philip held a kerchief to his face to stifle laughter.

"She sits before you," said the Lady Marshal, "and to wed the Prince in but an hour as my reward for the deed...not that I truly needed any reward for doing my duty."  Hannah's blood rose, and she almost took up the sword that moment, but again restrained herself.

"Truly, you must have been cunning indeed to defeat your foe," she said, her voice now void of artificial politeness.  The Marshal simply nodded, oblivious.

"Have you any tokens of the battle?" Hannah asked, trying to keep her tone idle.

"Of course!  Your Majesty, if I may?"  After a nod from the Queen, the Lady Marshal clapped her hands and servants moved in seven displays on rollers, each one mounted with a preserved dragon head.  Hannah approached one, and ran a finger along the ruin of one of its eyes.

"A small target, an eye..." the huntress said.  "Impressive skill to take so many," she added, glancing at the other heads.  The Marshal seemed a bit troubled by this, but did not show it in her voice.

"My bow and sword have never been more swift and sure than they were that day," she intoned.  Hannah nodded, and turned back to the dragon head so the others could not see the anger that flashed over her face.  She glanced into the dragon's mouth, and nodded to herself.

"I have heard the mere words of a dragon can cast fear into the bravest heart...did this one try you so?"

"I...no...this dragon had no tongues...perhaps it swallowed them in fear of me."  Hannah levered open the jaws of the nearest dragon head, so the interior of the mouth was visible to all.

"Better to swallow a tongue than lie to your betters," said the huntress quietly.  The stump of the dragon's tongue could be seen, but might have been mistook for some natural feature of its mouth.  Only Hannah then unwrapped her bundle of tongues...she eyed them for a moment, then held the proper match in place, and it was clear the edges matched precisely.  The Lady Marshal's eyes widened and she leapt to her feet, drawing her own sword.

"Guards, seize this charlatan...there is clearly some trickery here, if not indeed devilry!"  But the guards in the throne room were the Queen's own, and looked to her for confirmation.  The ruler narrowed her eyes, but did not nod.

"Mistress of the Menagerie, how came you by these tongues?" the Queen asked, quietly.  The Lady Marshal licked her lips nervously, but did not yet dare to act without her liege's permission.  Hannah told the whole tale, of finding the sword, of the Prince's attempt to sacrifice himself, of her arrows and the animals aid with dousing fire and misleading noise.  And ending that her animals had found her murdered, only saving her through the most slim of chances and rarest magic.  She couldn't help dramatizing the telling a bit, to make herself seem more impressive, but she told no outright falsehoods.  "And what say you to this tale, Philip?"

"It is just as the huntress said, my Queen," said Philip, with considerable relish.  "I was bound by my oath not to reveal what happened to those who did not know, but now that you have heard it all, I am free.  An oath I gave after your Lady Marshal stole this good woman's life, and threatened myself and your Majesty with usurpation and a similar death should I refuse."  Hannah's mouth fell open as she understood fully now what had happened.  The Lady Marshal, however, whirled to face the Queen and her son.

"Devilry, your Majesty!  She admits she has returned somehow from the grave...she must have bewitched the Prince somehow, just as she conjured these false tongues!  I beg you, give me leave to slay her and end her spells!"  The warrior took two steps towards Hannah, but froze in frustration at the Queen's command to halt.

The regal woman regarded Hannah for a moment, then nodded to herself.  "Mistress...after you claim to have been returned to life and health, why would you not confront your murderess, or inform me of a supposed traitor in our ranks?"

"I did not know the details until this moment, your Majesty, or that your Marshal might be involved at all until I heard of the betrothal upon arriving yesterday.  And all were asleep, exhausted from the battle, when the deed occurred.  I had only just met his Highness, and...if I am to be honest, though I could not fully credit his involvement in my assassination, I was confused and vexed enough to want to wash my hands of the whole matter."  She wanted to add that she wished she'd had more faith in Philip, but somehow couldn't quite bring herself to say it.

"A pretty puzzle.  It seems undeniable that there is strong magic here, so devilry could perhaps be involved."  The Queen still glowered grimly, and held up a peremptory hand when Philip seemed about to object.  "But then by all logic the Mistress' tale seems better fit.  The Prince's mood this past year has not been that of a joyous bridegroom, nor even a grateful and dutiful Prince.  We find it all too easy to believe he might put his personal oath and honor...and concern for our safety...above more sensible courses, such as privately informing his Queen, who is of course vastly more experienced with this sort of thing..."  Philip looked uncomfortable as the Queen stared down her nose at him, but refused to wilt.

"But your Majesty," protested the Lady Marshal, "this is all an evil spell!"

"If devilry is so strong as to manufacture such an abundance of evidence, we would truly despair for humanity in that eternal battle.  But over my reign, we have seen us, by and large, pushing back the darkness, and that too, does not fit."  She regarded Hannah for a moment.  "Mistress, or huntress, as the Prince calls you...suppose I judged your tale as true.  What price would you see paid by your assailant for her crimes against you?"  The Lady Marshal's face went white at this quiet question, and her eyes flicked between the Queen's guards.

Hannah thought about it seriously.  The Marshal may have been a good person once, but she was blinded by ambition and full of deceit.  By all rights she ought to be hung, or have her own head taken.  But a more poetic impulse struck her, and she spoke it at once, reveling in the feeling of superiority.

"I would see her stripped of rank, title and property, but left otherwise unharmed.  Instead let her see me raised above her as the true dragon-slayer and heir, and live out all her days knowing the cost of scheming against her betters."  The Lady Marshal's face flushed with frustrated anger, but also showed hints of relief that she might escape so lightly, all things considered.  The Queen did not miss this, and nodded once more.

"I cannot see someone lost to the devil showing such mercy...I think that seals the matter," the Queen said.  "Unfortunately, the former Lady Marshal is thus guilty of additional crimes, namely treason, coercion and threat against the Royal Family and our person specifically.  We shall leave additional punishment to the discretion of my councilors, but we shall recommend that they decree the traitor be drawn and quartered by the four strongest oxen available."  She finished her pronouncement with steel in her voice, and finality.

The warrior's face had collapsed in despair as the Queen ruled against her, but at the addendum, her face showed desperate panic.  Sword already drawn, she leapt towards the dais where the Queen sat.  The guards and Hannah were too far away to intervene in time, but the huntress gave a shrill whistle and Lubo sprang forward with liquid grace.  The Marshal did not wear full armor to Court, and the wolf's teeth tore deep into the unprotected flesh above one boot.  She screamed in pain and sprawled at the Queen's feet, sword flying free.

The guards quickly surrounded the Queen, but they only dared to take the warrior into custody after Hannah called off the wolf.

"Oh, your Highness...I'd be happy to accept your proposal now, if you're still interested," Hannah offered, grinning.