Vignette:The Plague Victims


 * This vignette is a work in progress.

On a scorching desert day, a shabby caravan arrived at the entrance to Uyume Canyon, where Queen Nobuhle had lately been staying. A warrior girl came to Nobuhle as she bathed in the cool, refreshing waters of the shallow Uyume, beneath a shady rock outcrop. "The supplicants have arrived, my queen," said the girl calmly and with a bow. "We let them pass and did not harry them, just as you asked."

"It is well," replied Nobuhle. "Have them enter-"

"Plague!" cried another servant, a young male, running, panting, and falling in the sand before Nobuhle and the warrior. "They carry plague, my queen!" he exclaimed between gasps.

The regal figure showed no sign of alarm, but grinned. "Don't you know that I am immune to such mortal afflictions?" The servant nodded. "So too are you, if you are loyal to me. Have no fear."

The servant bowed. "Of course," he said, wanting to trust his queen, but uncertainty still hung in his eyes.

The victims filed in, one by one, to beg for healing at the feet of their God-Empress. Some walked on their own, with hunched backs. Others were carried in on cloth stretchers. Most appeared gaunt, small, and weak, their bodies wasting away. "Dreadful," said one servant to another in a hushed voice. The canyon echoed with coughs and groans.