Queen Yavara Chapter 12
- 3 years ago
- 33
- 0
Chapter Seventeen ELENA The sound of morning birds chirping roused me. Destiny curled up closer to me in her sleep, murmuring softly. I relaxed in my position, savoring the feeling of her lying partially atop of me, her thigh pressed against my morning wood. A familiar hand caressed my cheek. I looked up to see two burning orange irises staring down at me. “Hi Elena.” Yavara giggled, “I see you made a new friend.” “Yavara!” I exclaimed. “Shh,” Yavara whispered, putting a finger to my...
YAVARA I had seen Elena naked hundreds of times. During our early teens I’d been horribly envious of her woman’s form, and I often admired it. I remember how she used to blush when she caught me staring, but she never attempted to hide herself. I knew why then, but I never said anything. Homosexuality was disgraced in Highland society, and I feared for her sake. Truth be told, I feared a little for my sake, for even at the age of thirteen, I’d felt an odd tingling when I gazed upon the...
LEVERIA My father stared in disbelief at the enchanted mirror. King Dreus’ face stared back. “…I hope that we can come to a diplomatic solution here, Clartias.” Alfred Dreus said, “I have five-hundred-thousand beasts that reside in my city, and I cannot condone any aggression taken by you or your people.” “I can’t believe this.” Father sighed, collapsing into the chair, “My own daughter.” He’d remained silent as King Dreus recounted everything that had happened, from the failed rescue...
LEVERIA “…three, two, one!” Elena grunted, and with a heave, we tossed Sir Fraldias’s corpse down the spiraling staircase. It clanked and boomed as it disappeared into the stone blackness, then ended with a distant splash. “How are you going to explain it?” Elena asked, catching her breath. “I’m the queen of the Highlands; I don’t need to explain anything.” I smiled, wiping the blood off on my already-ruined night gown, “No one will question me about a missing knight, but a dead one at my...
ADRIANNA I immediately locked down my thoughts, shutting Yavara out from even the most banal of my musings. She pouted her lips. “I was only trying to see what you were dreaming about.” Though I was groggy with alcohol, I could smell the wine fresh on her breath. She’d already been drinking, and it wasn’t even eight in the morning. “How did you get in here?!” I snapped, my breath tight in my chest. “Last I checked, this is my castle.” Yavara tittered. “And if you must know, I used the...
Interlude Yavara sat upon a black throne. She closed her eyes and savored the discordant symphony of wails and moans, the drone punctuated by the clanking of chains and the cracking of whips. Exhaling contentedly, she opened her eyes. Below her laid a spectacle of depravity, churning masses of flesh oscillating to some unheard cadence, their glistening forms bathed in the crimson torchlight. The prisoners’ eyes were wide with horror, as what was being done to them was horrible, but comingled...
CRYSTAL The arrival of the Dark Queen had disrupted the equilibrium of the Gorge. Brock, already insecure about his position, was made even more so, and Master’s concerns about the intentions of her beloved had deepened. I could see the rift that was forming between Brock and Master, and indeed, the rift in Yavara’s own court. As of now, the greatest threat the two posed was to each other, for the division they sowed would pull at the Dark Queen, and paralyze her. The morally-flexible Zander...
ADRIANNA Riding a warg wasn’t anything like riding a horse. With a horse, I felt the power of the beast as it beat its hooves against the ground, springing me forward with each stride. With a warg, I didn’t even notice the ground it ran upon, for the warg didn’t beat the ground, but ripped through it, its massive paws tearing into the earth to create footholds for it to launch forward with each ferocious drive. The muscles on Sasha’s back rippled along me as I clung to her mane, and peered...
Chapter Fifty-seven LEVERIA I took a deep breath, and my nostrils were filled with the smell of spent lust. Warm morning skin moistened in a dew of hormonal sweat, the subtle pungency of sexual fluids, and the tang of orifices that had not yet coalesced into their fleshy confines. Ah, what a wonderful miasma. My eyes fluttered open, and I sighed with contentment. The morning sun wasn’t yet up, but I felt no need to rise. The day would bring immeasurable bloodshed, and so I clung to the...
Chapter Sixty-One YAVARA It took me months to fully heal from the wounds I suffered atop the tower. Even with the full expertise of the royal mages, my stomach and liver were permanently damaged, and my abdominal wall had to be held together with a stiff corset lest I develop a hernia. It made it damnably difficult to sleep, but at least my posture was always good. Headmaster Lucian assured me that it would only be a temporary measure, for he and his best mages were working diligently to...
Adrianna’s Story synopsis Adrianna employs her skills as a commander to rule over the wild population of tribespeople and Ardeni immigrants. She earns their respect through a brutal show of force, and in turn, proves to the other hybrids that she is capable of being governess, even if she reluctant to do so. There are seven other hybrids that Yavara changed. The women turned hermaphrodites are: Eva Alecia, Furia Agustinia, Alexa Jenania, and Kiera Lestria; the men turned women are: Faltia...
YAVARA I struggled to sit upright in my throne as the priest before me droned on and on about the Holy Mother bestowing me with my right to rule. The seats before me were filled with hundreds of minor nobles and rich merchants, for there were no representatives of the Noble Court to witness me anymore. Perhaps it had become much less dangerous to be queen of the Highlands, but it also had become much less prestigious. To make up for the lack of nobility, I decided to conduct the ceremony in...
Chapter Twenty-Three LEVERIA “…do you see that?” A nasally voice cut through the darkness. The darkness had been pure bliss, a blanket of nothing to drape over my mind, gently dulling the cruel light of life. The voice was an interloper, a screeching rooster at dawn’s window, rousing me unbiddenly from the deepest of slumbers. “What is that?” Another voice asked. Oh, it was a sweet sound, a songbird’s melody to announce the gentle rise of the sun, its warm rays filtering through my...
Chapter Four ELENA I was more than a little disappointed that the other rangers hadn’t found Yavara’s camp. It was less than a hundred yards from the main road and parked right in a clearing, as obvious as could be. The smell of rotting orc should have at least been a solid clue. I inspected the wound, confirming by the petrified flesh that it had been made by a Nadi arrow. I traced Yavara’s tracks a few hundred more yards into the woods until I found the remains of nine more orcs. I...
Chapter Fifty-Five LEVERIA I awoke to an explosion. Metal screeched, then banged, and I was suddenly hurled from my bed, and smashed into a wall. My head smacked against the stones, my teeth clicked, and whatever sleepiness remained left in my brain was shot out with a concussive thud. My blurred vision made out a pair of orange eyes, each of them bulging and trembling with wrath. “Good morning, Yavara.” I groaned. “What did you do?!” She snarled. I blinked, trying to focus my vision....
YAVARA I was in the midst of a great silence. It was deafening. The world around me seemed to pulse with it, fading in and out like the cadence of waves. Blood ran from my sister’s nose and mouth, and pooled onto the hollow of her throat. Her eyes were bloodshot and dull, staring at the ceiling. She was dead, and I didn’t feel anything. There was no catharsis, nor release, nor even a settling of peace. There was just emptiness. It was then that I realized how much of me was actually her. The...
Chapter Seven ELENA She looked so much like Yavara, but it wasn’t quite her. Her skin was tan, her hair black, her eyes were green, and her ears were rounded. She also was doing things that Yavara would never do. Yavara was adventurous, yes, but she wasn’t this adventurous. I watched as the woman who called herself ‘Trisha’ showed off her new pet: Prestira Rasloraca. She couldn’t be Yavara. The Yavara I knew was saving herself for a good man. The Yavara I knew spent her days practicing the...
TITUS The sinking sun cast the sky in crimson, illuminating the thick fog of the marshlands in ethereal red, the helms of the Highland army barely glinting through the haze. I watched it through the silk fabric of my mask, the rest of my body submerged in a murky pool. Topographically, this part of the Highlands was not part of the ‘high lands,’ for it was flat marsh without so much as a tree stump to raise the elevation. The border was drawn after the collapse of Alkandra to ensure that no...
Chapter Fifty ZANDER “Make way for the queen!” the crier yelled. One goblin rang a bell, another blared a farting trumpet, a third struck a snare with a military cadence, and the crowd roared with laughter. “Make way for the queen!” The crier yelled again. The trifecta of successive noises sounded, and the laughter and jeers answered once more. “Make way, make way, make way!” the crier yelled atop the float, zealous and gleeful with his role. He was dressed in the traditional garb of a...
GORLOK The rising sun was red over the Highland Rift, casting the silhouettes of trebuchets and ballistae in a bloody hue. The morning was still, interrupted only by the annoyed cawing of a distant crow. To my left, the horde’s line stretched to the northern horizon. To my right, there was no one. The tundra grasslands gave way to pine trees, and the Highland Rift ascended into thousand-foot cliffs all the way to Castle Thorum and the Knife River. I sat atop Ginger, my prize warg, the beast...
ZANDER “Yavara, it’s way too easy for me to get through that head. You need to either defend or counterattack; not try both.” Prestira lectured Yavara as the dark-elf collapsed on the floor, her chest heaving. “Can you explain to me how I’m supposed to defend against that?” Yavara gasped as she pulled herself up. “I told you, when you feel me manipulating our connection you need to block my advances. If you feel me up here,” Prestira placed her finger on her forehead, “that’s where you...
LEVERIA Head-ranger Adarian knelt before me. I let him kneel for quite a while, my anger simmering silently in the throne room. “Rise.” I finally commanded, “Explain yourself, Ranger.” “My queen,” Adarian said, rising to his feet, “our attack on the Terdini tribe was repelled. Brock Terdini was not present, but we did dispatch his wife.” “I don’t give a shit about his wife!” I said angrily, “How does an elite company of rangers lose to a pack of beasts?!” Adarian paused. “You Highness,...
LEVERIA The previous night had been a sleepless one. I’d sat in my office, drinking wine and contemplating the mirror before me. Its twin was hanging over Elena Straltaira. She was awake, staring up at herself, a thin rectangle of moonlight shining on her face. Though her jaw was swollen, her eyes were bloodshot, and her face was filmed with dried sweat and smeared blood, she shown like an angel to me in her lunar aura. “What the fuck is wrong with me?” She asked herself. I’d been asking...
LEVERIA “Wake up, sleepy-head,” a musical voice giggled. I opened my crusted-over eyes to see the blurry image of a bronze figure standing over me. This hybrid was fully-female, and her flesh was tattooed with calligraphy and chains that wrapped her like inked bondage. The parts of her that were clothed, were clothed in leather straps that squeezed her large breasts, crossed her tummy, encircled her thighs, and ended in garters that became fishnet stockings. She wore a feathered butterfly...
YAVARA Elena was straddled across my hips. My buttocks conformed perfectly into the inner portions of her thighs, and her cock nestled comfortably between them, its underside running pleasantly across my pussy and anus, teasing the receptive nerves there. Her thumbs kneaded the knotted muscles of my back, turning them into gelatinous mush that flowed warmly beneath the flesh. Her hair tickled my face, as it was cast over one side of her head so that she could plant delicate kisses upon the...
BROCK “…I don’t know what is custom for Highlanders, or royalty, but in the tribes—in the Terdini anyway—well, the Protaki as well, and those of the Northern Pines… goddamn it.” I growled to myself, took a deep breath, and tried again. “My queen, Yavara. I know that I am unworthy… no, confidence, Brock. Yavara—too informal? Confidence. Yavara…” I assessed the area around me, then brushed some of the dirt away from the floor of my tent, and got to one knee. “Yavara, I don’t know what is...
ADRIANNA The woman’s name was ‘Hannah,’ and she was a scout in Esmerelda Giana’s rebellion. The force was made up primarily of women and the elderly, which had undoubtedly been laughable to the nobles of the Feractianas province when they’d first heard of it. They weren’t laughing anymore. Esmerelda’s army had swallowed entire swaths of the southern Highlands, moving untouched through estates that would’ve been armed to the teeth in peacetime. If the gentry of Feractianas had thought that an...
Chapter Forty-Five ADRIANNA It had taken Furia and I a lot less time to get back to Alkandra. We didn’t bother going through the mines since Arbor had already caught us, so it took just two days in our swift vampire forms before we saw the candle-lit skyline of Alkandra between the trees. We transformed back to our elven forms, donned our stately robes, and rubbed the wrinkles out of them. I peered out from the tree line, and looked both ways. The agrarian fields were empty, the last...
CERTIOK The city was in chaos. People ran to and froe, shouting and screaming. No longer did the wide boulevards of Alkandra feel like a beast utopia, but like the walls of a cage. Windows were frantically boarded, men and women sprinted toward the castle in various stages of undress, watchmen handed out spears and swords without a care for who grabbed them. Everyone was a soldier now, and no one was. “Go to you posts!” I yelled, and began thrusting my finger toward the docks, “Remember...
BROCK “Please!” The elf scout screamed. “I don’t understand why you’re complaining,” I said as I loaded him into the trebuchet, “I’m returning you to your army.” “Hold on to this tightly, Imperial, and don’t release it too soon.” Trenok grunted, tying the parachute straps to the terrified man’s wrists. “It won’t work!” He cried. I knelt to his level, and put a compassionate hand on his shoulder. “Progress is made by silencing doubters, little imperial. All great scientists of our...
Chapter Twenty-Six TITUS I’d always considered myself the foremost connoisseur of humanoid creatures on Tenvalia. I’d had every kind there was to have, and indeed, I’d developed something of a food pyramid to rank them. Yes, much like grades of meat in the butcher shop, there was a hierarchy when it came to quality of species. Bottom-shelf varieties included: orc, goblin, troll, and ogre. Orcs were too salty, goblins were too lean, trolls were too tough, and ogres were downright disgusting....
ELENA I kneeled in the great hall of Castle Bentius, King and Queen Tiadoa staring down at me from their white thrones. Princess Leveria Tiadoa sat at a lower throne next her father, not even trying to mask her contempt. I suspected she was quite glad of Yavara’s disappearance. Were it not for my ranger training, I might’ve jumped the bitch. “You may rise, Ranger Straltaira.” King Clartias Tiadoa spoke. I stood up and looked up at the king of the Highlands. “Do you know why you have...
Chapter Thirteen ELENA “Spin around, Opal, show Sherok your new tat.” I said to my favorite slave as the tattooist finished his work. “Master’s Little Anal Slut, that’s classy Elena.” Sherok laughed as Opal shimmied her hips, the fresh ink contrasting her pale backside. “Well, Opal’s such a classy little girl, aren’t you?” I grinned, filling my hand with her supple ass. Opal’s tail curled upward in arousal, exposing her holes. “Not now, Opal.” I said, running a finger down her taint,...
BROCK “Loose!” I roared, and a hundred siege engines released at once, sending great boulders into the air. Those that were launched from the trebuchets tumbled as they arced, those that were launched from the catapults flew unspinning upon a line-drive path. The trebuchet boulders rained into Mid Fort, and the catapult boulders smashed into its walls, caving in the final few lengths of its eastern-facing side, revealing the inner sanctum, the citadel, and the high tower. Debris blasted in...
YAVARA Torturing Leveria wasn’t pleasing to me; it wasn’t even satisfying. When her shrieks of agony split the air, and she writhed in the perdition of her flesh, there was no joy in me; there wasn’t even a fury like there’d been when I did my work on Adarian. There was only anguish now, and the more Leveria suffered, the more I did as well, but within the depths of my own darkness, in my anguish that danced with her agony, I found some measure of release, and that release gave me a moment of...
ELENA The name ‘Prestira Rasloraca’ was familiar to me, and since my worldly news came in the form of barracks gossip, that meant she was probably a big deal. Upon further investigation, I learned that Miss Rasloraca had been First Mage of the Ardeni University for fifty years, which was no small feat. After that, she’d served as Arcane Master under the late Rondar Dreus, the previous regent of the Lowlands, of which Ardeni Dreus was the capital. There were several categories of witches and...
TITUS I shuffled over to Zander, every step a labor of agony. It had been two weeks since I’d sustained the wounds, but I still felt them acutely. Solar fire and Nadi wood were not things a vampire could simply recover from. It took the specialized training of the greatest wizard on Tenvalia just to get me walking again. He sat in his chair, smoking a pipe and staring out at the elven encampment three miles west. We were atop a hill, one of two hills in the entire Tundra, it seemed. The...
Prologue Yavara sat upon a black throne. She closed her eyes and savored the discordant symphony of wails and moans, the drone punctuated by the clanking of chains and the cracking of whips. Exhaling contentedly, she opened her eyes. Below her laid a spectacle of depravity, churning masses of flesh oscillating to some unheard cadence, their glistening forms bathed in the crimson torchlight. The prisoners’ eyes were wide with horror, as what was being done to them was horrible, but comingled...
IVANKA Tiffany and I watched from the mouth of the Broken Pass as the sun sank into the horizon, casting violet rays into the sky that faded to purple, then blue, then black. I waited until the last light faded, then I stripped my robes, and felt the cool wind caress my naked flesh. I took a deep breath of the night air, and my blood surged with a primal thrill. I pulled Tiffany into a heated kiss, tasting the avarice on her tongue, the suffusion of sexual desire and blood hunger, the need to...
Chapter Twenty YAVARA I blasted through the roof the chieftain’s hut. I didn’t stop for their exclamations, nor to see their faces of wonder before I scorched through the sky. Prestira’s dying thoughts were echoing in my mind. They took her, she said, they took Elena! Stay with me! It’s too late. It’s all my fault; I did this. No! I thought, This was Leveria, not you! I killed Patricia, Prestira’s telepathic voice sobbed, I burned her alive. She screamed ‘why’ the whole...
LEVERIA I walked to the dungeons, my footsteps echoing into the still night. The guard nodded to me and opened the iron door. He guided me by torchlight through the catacombs, the wails and shrieks of captured beasts echoing through the halls. I followed with one hand on his shoulder, carefully watching my footsteps as I navigated the uneven stairs. A familiar voice reached my ears. Mother’s sobs rang through the dark halls, each new lamentation punctuated by a whimper. Her cell was lit with...
CERTIOK I was stuck somewhere between boredom and existential terror. Within the shadow of Castle Alkandra, my battlegroup of the disabled and geriatric was shielded from the raining hell of boulders and missiles. The distant cacophony created a droning thunder that echoed off the castle’s atrium, which acted as an enormous stone bandstand. We hung about the castle steps, watching the destruction unfold with grim faces. For two hours, we just sat there, and as we sat there, terror turned to...
PRIVATE HESIA OF THE HIGHLAND ARMY “…I’m telling you, you’re safe if you don’t put the helmet on.” Alex said to me. We were stationed in the Crescent, a part of the Rift that bowed inward. It was the safest part of Sector Two, as the inward bow would funnel enemies into a crossfire. After being part of Droughtius’s fifth division and getting absolutely smashed at the Battle of the Tundra, it was nice to just man a wall. There’d only been one assault of the Crescent during the entire...
ADRIANNA I awoke from the best sleep I’d had in recent memory. I pulled the tangled mess of hair from my face, inundating my sinuses with the sweet smell of Furia’s morning skin. She was lying on her back, her cute little snores whistling from her, her fat cock standing at full mast from her womanly thighs. What a sight to wake to. I admired it for a few minutes, watching it throb and pulse, the apex shining with a delicious layer of her frosting. But I didn’t have time to indulge myself. I...
ADRIANNA There were times in my life where I stopped, considered the situation I was in, and whispered to myself, “What the fuck happened?” I was having one of those moments when I woke up that morning. The first thing I noticed, was that the gnawing in my nethers had subsided substantially. It wasn’t gone, but it was manageable. The second thing I noticed, was that I needed to take a huge shit. “Don’t.” Came a voice beside me, “I know what you’re feeling, but it will pass. You just need to...
ELENA Five days ago, we burned Sherok’s body. The Terdini and Protaki stood in solemn silence as Brock set the pyre aflame. He didn’t show his sadness, but we all knew his wrath. The next day he began to whip the Protaki into fighting shape. He was brutal and merciless with the ill-trained men, often times beating them into submission when they failed. Despite his ferociousness, he was fair, or “fair” by orc standards. He fed them better than they’d ever eaten at the Bend, and let them walk...
Chapter Ten ELENA One breath, then another. Adarian taught me that. ‘When you’re in the shit, and the world’s falling apart around you, just take one breath, then another. The first breath keeps you in the present, and the next brings you to the future. You’re still alive; you took the second breath. Congratulations. Now, take another.’ Of course, Adarian taught everyone that lesson. Only for most other rangers, it was meant to keep them centered in combat situations. For me, it was...
PRINCE MATTHEW DREUS I surveyed the coastline, marking highpoints on my map where we could erect towers for the mirror relay. It was how my father communicated with Queen Tiadoa and Ambassador Wentz in the Highlands; a series of mirrors aimed at each other over great distances from great heights. There used to be a relay from Ardeni to Alkandra, but it had been destroyed centuries ago. I didn’t imagine we’d ever have to rebuild it, even after Yavara had revealed her identity. Alkandra was a...
Chapter Forty BROCK “…put your arms forward like this,” I instructed the little imperial scout, “then, when you’re at the precipice, you want to open them like this,” I motioned my arms outward, “and you’ll just glide over the top. Did you get that?” “W-w-w-what?!” I rolled my eyes. “Practice it with me, little imperial. Ball.” I crouched and hugged my knees, “Arrow.” I shot up with my hands together overhead, “Eagle.” I finished, spreading makeshift wings. “Ball, arrow, eagle. Ball,...
PRINCESS PRESTIRA TIADOA Being a Highland princess was a lonely ordeal. Though my mother was a “free spirit” and encouraged me to make friends outside of the castle, I couldn’t bring myself to do it. A princess had her place, and it was not with the commoners on the street. That was why my only friend was my cousin, Adrianna Straltaira. Adri’s mom was a really busy woman, being the ambassador to Alkandra, so Adri spent most of her time living with her grandma, Great-Aunt Lydia, just a few...
BROCK The Terdini village was gone. The imperials had burned it to the ground while we were away. As I stared at it, I was glad that they had. Seeing it empty when it would never be filled again would’ve probably broken me. More so than I was already broken, anyway. My feet had carried me here on muscle memory, and now they did not know where to take me. South? North? West was the Highlands, and East was the Lowlands, and I didn’t want to see either ever again. South would take me past the...
PRESTIRA They tortured me all day. Hours and hours, I begged like a whore for them to make me come, but they just drove me to the brink, then stopped. They injected me with more poison when they were done, worsening the torment tenfold. I humiliated myself just for a touch; not even a fuck, but a caress, a slap, a punch. Every part of me was electrified, my nerves raging beneath the flesh, my synapses overloaded with sensation. I wasn’t Prestira anymore; I told them as much. “My name isn’t...
ELENA The drip of water, the howl of wind. The cold on my naked body. One breath, then another. That was what Adarian taught me so long ago. The room was lit by a barred window. It cast a dim ray onto my body, centering my exposed belly with a square of light. I was strapped to a wooden board in my cell, my limbs stretched in a spread-eagle, open and helpless. The binds were unescapable, I knew, for I’d placed many beasts in them myself. Only for them, the worst interrogation practice had...
Author’s note I decided to introduce the character of Adrianna (formerly Thomas Adarian) gradually throughout the story. At first, you only hear accounts of him, then you only see him through the eyes of other characters. It is only at the beginning chapter 20 that I let the story play through Adarian’s eyes. I wanted to give the reader the impression that his character was important, but I didn’t want to bog down the plot by introducing him early in the story when so many characters –Yavara,...
YAVARA It was two in the morning when Zander shook me awake. “What?” I groaned. “King Dreus is calling you.” “You think he’ll break this time?” I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, and sat up. “I think he’s ready.” I sighed. “Make me look pretty, Zander.” He cast a spell, and my disheveled appearance righted itself, makeup was applied to my face, and my eyes were cleared of redness. I threw on yesterday’s clothes, walked over to the mirror, and palmed the glass. “Yes, You Highness?”...
ADRIANNA I felt like I was being eaten from the inside. Something had been gnawing within my nethers, and it had only gotten worse with time. As the days went, my thoughts became muddled, my vision became hazy, tinged violet at the edges. My nipples were hard and taut, aching with fullness. My belly had constant butterflies, nearly nauseating. My flesh teemed, hot to the touch, yet goosebumps came at a moment’s notice. Feminine salvia dripped from my lower mouth and wetted my thighs. It was...
ELENA When I awoke, my heart was pounding in my chest so hard that I could feel it in my throat. What had I been dreaming of? Nothing. That timeless void, that empty space in my memory that existed between my fall from the tower, and my rebirth in Jonias’s catacombs. A chill crawled through me, though I was sweating bullets. I curled into the bedding, and suppressed a horrible sob. “Can’t sleep?” came a whisper from the darkness. In that moment, I wouldn’t have cared if the devil himself...
FIELD MARSHAL SHORDIAN I was groggy the next morning. Battle always took its toll the night afterward, when adrenaline and terror had eased from my body, and pain took up residence in their wake. I stepped from the citadel, and out onto the ruins of Mid Fort. Usually, I would have to take a few downward steps before crossing the threshold to the courtyard. Not today. The bodies were piled five-feet-high, and even higher along the walls. Thousands were dead in this small spot, no larger than...