Daughters, Swords &Dragons

She hung on the poles from the ceiling. There were many of them.

Her room was largely painted in the finest rose pink, the ceilings carved with intricate patterns of roses.

A collection of painted roses hung at a corner on her wall and some artistic oddly shaped ceramics clustered in another corner.

Mirrors of different shapes and sizes lined the east wall of her room.

On the west were different colors of eggs with chicks hatching from them, oddly enough they were plastic.

A shelf filled with golden shoes lay in another Corner. The vanity had different shapes, sizes and color of combs arranged on top of it.

Scented candles filled every edge and corner of the room so much so one would choke.

A giant frog shaped armchair squatted in another corner of the room.

But the oddest thing about the giant room were the slender long snake shaped pink poles hanging from the ceiling.

"Everytime I step inside this room it feels like a fever dream." Valdis wretched, muttering to herself.

Serafelle stretched her legs, hooking it on the pole letting her hands go.

She floated in thin air with only her feet hanging on the pole.

Her body bent like a fish as she twirled and caught the other pole.

"Sister?" Valdis called startling sera who gracefully descended from the pole.

"To what do I owe the pleasure?" Sera drawl with no interest.

Valdis sat on the large bed watching her sister stretch her toes.

"Deyanira has invented something fascinating that we all must see." Valdis informed sera reading a scroll intensely.

Sera rolled her eyes taking a graceful leap she caught a pole higher up the air twirling with one leg a float the other curl on a pole.

Her movements would be fascinating to anyone, she giggled as she danced her strange dance, her leg the only thing hanging on a pole, her body dangling from the dangerous height but she'd land either way on one toe.

Valdis hissed "How does your body not scream in pain, I would really love to cut you up and study your anatomy."

"That's a strange way of saying you enjoyed my dancing Valdis." Sera chuckled as opera wiped her sweat with a silk towel.

Opera undid the pins of her dress and the white silky dress fell in a pool around her, carefully opera helped her into a dark purple velvet dress while summer tied her dark hair into a most constricting bun then placed her veil at top her head.

Summer placed the silver crown in sera's hair, touching up her face with a powder as well, while opera bathed her in perfumes.

Sera turned and gave Valdis her most pleasing smile "Shall we go and see what monsters our dearest youngest sister has conjured?"

A mischievous grin lit up Valdis face "With pleasure but first we must pick up Eris, she'd never forgive us if we did it without her." they giggled.

Eris stretched the bow aiming her arrows "One."

Three servants stood holding apples on their heads. They were to run without the apples falling.

They all shook with fear, "Two." she hissed.

Aiming the three arrows in her bow, her eyes in slits, momentarily she dropped the bow and arrow then picked up an apple taking a bite.

They breathed a sigh of relief as she slowly chewed the apple "Three."

The servants took off running as fast as they could without the apples falling unless they sought death.

In one quick movement Eris grabbed the bow and shot the three arrows hitting all three apples shattering them to pieces hitting a stray bird along the way.

She smirked "You all are very boring, can't you run any faster?"

They whimpered in fear, she rolled her eyes just then Serafelle and Valdis arrived. "Sisters...I was beginning to think you wouldn't make it that you'd died along the way."

Valdis shrugged "And a good afternoon to you too."

"I'm not in the mood to exchange pleasantries. Let's go to Deyanira's lair." Eris said as her servant wiped dust from her hands.

Sera analyzed the shredded apples, tired servants and dead birds with a shake of her head "Don't you think you could be a little nicer to your servants?"

Eris stared at her as if she uttered nonsense "Don't you think it would be wiser if you mind your affairs?"

Tolerance was a limited virtue in the alcon family. Valdis knew better than to butt her head into her sister's affairs yet she interfered "I'm just trying to remind you that your servants are human."

Her words fell on deaf ears as they approached the river by Eris garden. Eris owned the hunting gardens; it was a gift from their father to her at a very young age of seven.

While he gifted Emery the quiet river, she was soaking in it as usual. She was at the river's very depths five servants waiting on her as they stood at the bank of the river.

"Sometimes, I wonder if she is a fish, how does she breathe in there for so long?" Eris wondered.

Valdis stared at her reflection in the river "Fascinating, she's really breathing in there isn't she? "How long has she been in there?" she questioned the maids half excited.

"5 minutes." Olivia Emery's trusted maid informed them.

Sera frowned "Is that even humanly possible?"

"So I am right sister is a fish." Eris chuckled just then emery sprang out of the water splashing water all over them.

She gracefully stepped out of the water and was quickly wrapped in cotton sheets by Olivia "If you want to gossip about me do it where I cannot hear and you cannot distract me."

Eris wiped her wet veil in frustration. "That's not very funny, emery."

"Gossiping isn't funny either." Emery snapped as the maids dressed her. "Now if you're done wondering if I am a fish we may go and pick up Neera."

Nervous, eris rubbed looked anywhere else but at emery "You heard that?"

Emery gave her the stink eye "Every word, my swimming habit doesn't make me a mythical creature."

Serafelle had enough of their squabbling and went ahead of them to the garden house where Neera spent her time painting.

A maid was tied to a tree bark with a snake wrapped around her full bosom and leaves covering her womanhood.

Eris's jaw dropped at the sight of the maid "Lord I have insane sister's."

"Sisters welcome to my gallery." Neera said merrily as they arrived

Horrified expression on their face "What is this?" serafelle blinked at the exposed maid standing on one foot, on the back of another equally under-dressed maid the other foot in the hands of another maid dressed in a golden veil with no petticoat.

Gold on the tips of her rose bosom and gold on her womanhood. "This is art." she smiled.

A hot pot was brewing in a corner and it smelt awful at the same time delicious "what catastrophe do you have in that odd pot?" Valdis dared ask.

"Poison." she said with a smile making an outline of the pot in her portrait.

Serafelle forced a smile "Okay I think I've seen enough crazy for one day."

The sound of a loud bang shook the entire garden choking the words in sera's throat.

They rushed to the tower house opening the large doors and there was smoke everywhere.

With wooden well carved sticks and metals an odd smell also filled this room as the five princesses stared at their sister deyanira covered in soot and charcoal.

A broad grin on her small young face as she said the words "I have created a weapon even more terrifying than a sword, a weapon that will end our enemies in seconds."

They assessed the boomerang shaped object in her hand and the large hole it had made in the tower wall "I have created what I will now call a death blower"