Treachery of Kings

FORTY-SEVEN

Sicdin didn't care for humans. The Fay was good, but he was never comfortable around them. Humans didn't smell. They didn't smell bad, they just didn't smell at all. That was only one of the qualities he didn't like. Next to a Badgie, they had very little hair. Good, thick hair and a smell you could count on set a Badgie apart from humankind and most other Newlies, as well.

A Bowser, now, creatures that every Badgie loathed, a Bowser had a most unpleasant smell. Especially a Bowser that was wet. Now that was not a good smell.

The Mycer, she was something else again. The Mycer smelled nice. Musty, dusty and sweet. You wouldn't tell a Badgie female that, she'd tear you to bits. But it was true. The human tied up across the cell found the Mycer appealing, and Sigdin did as well. One kind of folk could find another attractive, it happened all the time.

Sigdin felt bad about doing away with the Mycer, but he knew he'd feel a lot worse if he didn't do what Maddigern said. Everyone in the King's Third Sentient Guards feared the Captain/Major, and well they should. It was common knowledge in the barracks that Maddigern was completely deranged. Touched, wiggy, whacked-out, nuts. Cross him, look at him crooked, and he'd have your head on a stick.

So, as much as he might regret it, Sigdin gave the Mycer's stool a little nudge, then another, and another after that. Slowly, the way the Captain/Major said. Soon, she began to make really awful noises in her throat, but the human male was screaming so loud, and the scaly thing was squawking, making such terrible sounds, that Sigdin could hardly hear her at all…