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This follows on from Heard Through The Grapevine.

In seconds everyone in Therakles’ remarkably extensive quarters was awake, even Cassiope who came to the window pulling on her tunic.

“Not so close that anyone on the outside can see you please, ladies.” Therakles unfolded himself from a shadow in the heavy drape beside the window, still in the clothes he’d been wearing the previous evening. “You should be a surprise for whoever did this.”

“Who was it?” Hesiope asked the question as she did up the ties on her jerkin.

Therakles’ answer was forestalled by a short, syncopated knock on the door of his quarters. “I have to get this, excuse me.” He almost skimmed across the floor, the snake looped around his shoulders becoming obvious for the first time. He unlocked and opened the door, bowing to the man who came through it pulling a blanket wrapped woman behind him. “Majesties.”

“You were right and I was wrong,” admitted King Perdikkas. “Half-brother, may we shelter with you and take counsel to end this threat?”

“Of course,” Therakles closed the door and locked it behind them. “I am loyal.”

“Our body servants are dead,” Queen Semestra reported. “Poisoned probably. Do you know of any other moves against us?”

“They tried to kill your couriers.” Therakles smiled, “But I‘ve spent my evening surrounded by beauty, so they failed.”[i]





[i] Therakles’ familiar is a pantry snake/grass snake hybrid. Essentially this is a Lamprophis/Opheodrys hybrid. It is green with copper/red patterning.

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This is written to the Thimbleful Thursday prompt, "Heard through the grapevine." The characters are from the Hesiope and Therakles mini-kink bingo series, which is not safe for work - it involves bondage and non-consent (moving to informed consent), so if those are issues for you, you might be happier not to read them.

Hesiope thought she saw Therakles standing on the Great Hall’s steps when she rode into the Palace courtyard with her delivery, but that shouldn’t have been possible. She couldn’t see him after she’d dismounted and handed off dispatch bags, and so put him out of her mind.

She didn’t think of him again until just before lights out, when he slid quietly into the courier’s barracks above the stable. He glanced appreciatively around the room over the stables before directing his gaze at the far-end window. “My apologies, ladies, but needs must. I know many of you neither trust nor like me, but your lives are in danger if you remain here tonight.”

“Why do you think that and why should we trust you?” Maenea was half undressed but she wasn’t letting that faze her.

“Sentences half heard. Whiffs of fear and excitement in the corridors. Because killing you isolates His Majesty from the rest of the realm. Because I do like you all and I’m loyal to the King.” He held his hands out beseechingly. “Please, come with me now. Quietly. Your horses are already being moved and so are the stable lads.”

“He believes he’s telling the truth,” commented bright-haired Atheda. “Let’s go.”

At midnight their barracks and stable blossomed into flame with a soft whump!

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I wrote this for the kink_bingo January mini-challenge for the "collars" square on the communal card I picked.

“So, why did you really want to keep the collar?”  Therakles and Hesiope were eating dinner together.

“It’s beautiful,” Hesiope told him, “and I like pretty things but living out of saddlebags, I don’t have space for clothes or ornaments.  Jewellery’s a bad idea for a courier – too many people think we shouldn’t have valuables.  The castellan’s wife at Hadrasan used to confiscate things and give them to the King’s Messenger ‘to be returned to their rightful owner.’  No-one’s tried to confiscate this.”  She smiled shyly at him, “Three or four people have asked me who made it.”

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