They were caught between a rock and a fiercely venomous snake. If they lied to Lord Siss, he might kill them. But if they told the truth, the poison absolutely ’would’ kill them.
The oldest hyena, swallowing a lump of pure terror in his throat, squeezed his eyes shut and decided to follow Kaya’s script. It was the only way to ensure the poison in his stomach stayed dormant.
"M-My Lord," the hyena stammered, his voice cracking pitifully. "We... we bring grave news. The Free Clan... the human woman..."
Lord Siss stopped swirling his wine. His slit-pupil eyes, the color of glowing, toxic amber, narrowed slightly. "Speak clearly, mongrel. Did you capture the human, or did you fail the simple task I purchased your miserable lives for?"
"We failed!" the hyena blurted out frantically, keeping his face pressed to the floor. "But it wasn’t our fault, my Lord! The information... the rumors... they were entirely wrong! The Free Clan is not a small, disorganized gathering! It is a massive, highly structured military force! We walked right into a heavily fortified stronghold!"
Lord Siss’s delicate, flawless eyebrows crept up slightly. "A massive force? In the desolate neutral zones?"
"Y-Yes!" another hyena chimed in, desperate to sell the lie to save his own life from Kaya’s imaginary poison. "They have soldiers, my Lord! Hundreds of them! They are heavily armed, fiercely loyal, and they are mobilizing as we speak! The human woman is not playing politics; she is building an army to challenge the West! We were ambushed the moment we got close! We... we barely escaped with our lives to bring you this warning!"
They kept their heads bowed, trembling, praying to whatever gods listened to bottom-feeders that the Snake Lord would buy the story and dismiss them. They just wanted to leave. They wanted to hide in the deepest, darkest cave they could find and wait for the rest of their miserable lives to end.
But they had forgotten one crucial, terrifying biological fact about the entity they were trying to deceive.
You can lie to a snake with your words. You can hide your face, control your expression, and steady your voice. But you cannot hide your biology. Snakes do not just listen to the air; they taste it. They feel it. They experience the world through the microscopic chemical changes in the environment.
Lord Siss gently set his silver goblet down on the armrest of his golden throne. Slowly, fluidly, he slid his massive upper body off the chair. The heavy, muscular coils of his lower half slithered across the marble floor with a chilling, scraping sound. ’Sssshhhhh. Sssshhh.’
The sound of his approach made the hyenas’ blood run ice cold. They wanted to scramble backward, to run for the heavy obsidian doors, but their bodies were entirely frozen in primal fear.
Soon, the Snake Lord was looming directly in front of them. The sheer, overwhelming size of his serpent half was terrifying up close. Thick, dark coils silently began to wrap around the perimeter of the hyenas, boxing them in, trapping them in a living, breathing circle of indestructible muscle and iridescent scales.
Lord Siss leaned down, his flawless, beautiful face hovering mere inches above the oldest hyena’s trembling head.
"Aiya," Lord Siss murmured, his voice dripping with mock sympathy. He reached out a pale, perfectly manicured hand and gently stroked the coarse, dirty fur on the back of the hyena’s neck. The contrast between his delicate touch and the lethal threat he represented was mind-bending. "Why are you all trembling so violently? You shake like leaves caught in a winter storm."
The hyenas couldn’t answer. Their teeth were audibly chattering.
"It’s almost as if you are absolutely terrified of me," Lord Siss whispered, tilting his head slightly. His long, silky black hair fell over his shoulder like a dark waterfall. "But why would that be? You are merely delivering a scout’s report. Even in failure, messengers are rarely punished for the strength of the enemy. Hmm... is there something wrong, my little scavengers?"
"N-No, my Lord!" the youngest hyena practically shrieked, tears of sheer panic welling up in his eyes. "We... we are just traumatized by the battle! We did our work! We brought you the information!"
Lord Siss smiled. It was a beautiful, terrifying expression that did not reach his cold, amber eyes. "You did your work, did you? You fought a massive army, barely escaped with your lives, and bravely ran all the way back here to warn me."
"Yes! We done it! We swear it!" they chanted together, desperate to appease him.
The heavy coils of the snake tail slowly tightened around the group, shrinking their safe space, forcing them to huddle closer together. Lord Siss began to slowly circle them, his upper body gliding smoothly over the marble.
"If my memory serves me correctly," Lord Siss mused, tapping a pale finger against his chin, "I hired twenty of you. A full, vicious pack of the most ruthless mercenaries the Southern borders had to offer. Yet, I only see five of you groveling on my floor. If you barely escaped... where are the rest of your brothers? Why so few?"
The oldest hyena’s heart hammered against his ribs like a trapped bird. "They... they were attacked! The human’s soldiers slaughtered them! We were the only ones fast enough to break through the lines and run! The others bought us time with their lives!"
It was a perfectly crafted lie. It covered all the bases Kaya had designed for them. It explained the missing mercenaries, it inflated the threat of the Free Clan, and it positioned them as loyal survivors.
But as the hyena finished speaking, a heavy, suffocating silence fell over the throne room.
Lord Siss stopped moving. He stood perfectly still, his back straight, his eyes locked onto the shivering mercenaries. For a long, agonizing moment, he did nothing but stare at them.
And then, his lips parted.
From between his perfect, white teeth, a long, slender, dark-purple forked tongue flicked out into the air. It tasted the atmosphere, vibrating rapidly for a few seconds before slipping back into his mouth.
The Snake Lord closed his eyes, analyzing the complex chemical profile of the air he had just pulled across his Jacobson’s organ.
He could taste the dirt on their fur. He could taste the old, dried blood from their wounds. He could taste the lactic acid in their muscles from three days of non-stop running.
But most importantly, he could taste the pheromones.
When a beastman is in combat, when they are fighting for their lives against a superior army, their bodies release a specific cocktail of adrenaline and aggression. But the air in this throne room did not taste like the aftermath of a glorious, desperate battle against a massive army.
It tasted like absolute, unadulterated, subservient terror.
It was the specific, distinct pheromone signature of prey that had been cornered, broken, and completely subjugated by an apex predator. Furthermore, Lord Siss could hear their heartbeats echoing through the sensitive scales on his underbelly that touched the floor. Their hearts were not beating with the steady rhythm of soldiers recounting a battle. They were erratic, frantic, skipping beats in a chaotic symphony of pure deception and panic.
They were lying. And they were terrified of something far more immediate than a distant army.
Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!
Use arrow keys (or A / D) to PREV/NEXT chapter