FicWad

The young novice stepped through the archway of the Temple of Urania. She stared numbly at the scene before her. She stepped back in horror and began to scream as blood pooled around her from the stiffening remains.

Antiope looked up at the sound of the screams, then quickly dashed out of her room. Meeting Atalanta chief of the temple's guards outside her door, they ran down the corridor toward the temple. Antiope pushed past the crowd of onlookers clustered around the entranceway.
"What has happened?" She asked
Penelope, one of the priestesses, gestured toward the main room of the temple as she cradled the sobbing and shaking novice in her arms.
"Sella had come to make an offering to Urania and found the two guards, dead with their throat's slit." She turned a troubled gaze toward Antiope. "The belt of Urania has been stolen." Antiope gasped. The belt of Urania could only be worn by the chief astrologer at the Feast of Urania. If it wasn't returned to it's resting place in five days, it's power would be loosed and destroy the world.
She turned to Atalanta, "we need to retrieve the belt. Gather up six of your most faithful guards. We leave in an hour."
Atalanta nodded and turned, hurrying out of the temple.
Antopie turned to Penelope, "take Sella to her room and tell no one about this. No one is allowed in the temple." Then she hurried off to her room.

The women moved swiftly through the forest, following the hastily covered tracks of the thief. Atalanta stopped suddenly.
"I think they want us to follow them," she said frowning. She turned to Antopie and the guards. "Be on your guard. We may be walking into a trap."
Without warning, the silence was broken by bodies crashing through the bushes. The women grasped their weapons, preparing for an attack. Twenty men rushed out at them, their swords glinting in the moonlight. Antiope thrust her own sword into the gut of the first attacker, spilling his intestines on the ground. One of the men grabbed Antiope from behind, knocking the sword from her hand. She fought in vain to free herself, her captor subduing her with ease.
She looked around helplessly as Atalanta and the guards were subdued as well.
A man in black leather walked out of the trees and stopped in front of Antiope.
"It seems we meet again Antiope," he said stopping in front of her.
Antiope's eyes widened, "Laius," she said, her blood freezing in her veins. "I thought I killed you."
Laius laughed, tracing a deep, white scar that ran down his face, "you nearly did. I laid there dying, Panacea took pity on me and healed my wounds. She left only this scar to remind me of your treachery." He strode forward and grabbed her by the hair, "I'll enjoy killing you slowly." He turned and began to walk back into the shadows, then stopped and faced her again. "After I give you to my men of course."
Antiope spat in Laius's face.
He slapped her, then drew his knife, "I think a mark on this pretty face would make you less proud." Antiope spat the blood in her mouth on the ground.
As the point neared her cheek, it suddenly went spinning into the darkness. A group of men swarmed into the clearing. The man holding Antiope threw her to the ground where she landed in a heap. He drew his sword, swinging it wildly at one of the men. The new arrival side-stepped the blow, grabbing the attacker by the arm and throwing him to the ground. Before Lauis' guard could regain his footing, the man stabbed him with the guard's own sword. The man turned a concerned eye toward Antiope and helped her up. "Are you alright?" he asked. Without a word, he carried her away from the fighting. She could only nod as he set her down on the ground.