Trembling how her hand lingers on the dirk's sweat-slippery haft
Wandering how her thoughts splay like maiden legs against the coming Dark

She has waited for Him for too long

Who can remember which heart's marked for piercing
Which has only earned responding beats
Which she twined her sinuous self about
Which beguiled and which repulsed her

So she takes this breath that was never His to give
Takes it back into the breast whence it was filched

Same way she had liberated many a Theran guardsman's purse
For what is a heart but a greedy hoard of love?

And so He approaches her bent in supplication
Flattened in prostration, spine and hips and milky neck
Slicked down by soaked and filmy ritual garb

And so He bows himself and that hand no longer trembles
Those thoughts are gathered together till they form a gleaming spike
And even if His heart never beat
Even if His lung never drew breath
This final kiss will end His reign
And she will never kneel again

Penned by my hand on the 23rd of Lupar, in the year 955 AF.