Heart of a Lion
A Short Story of Reimagined History
By Maryanne Peters

Who was he, my master and Lord of my Heart? Richard the first of his name King of England, Duke of Normandy, and of Aquitaine, and of Gascony, Lord of Cyprus. Count of Poitiers, and of Anjou and Maine and Nantes, Overlord of Brittany, Richard Coeur de Lion – the Lionheart.

MADDY
“Riiiiiight… Now, we both prefer monochrome, but you mentioned colour. Shall we get the pudding served, so we can clear the table to look at your portfolio?”

He hoovered up the ice cream I offered, so it wasn’t long before the table was cleared, dishes left soaking for the moment. That was what I normally did, but he didn’t need to know any of that. His portfolio was a large folder of paper prints, and one set caught my eye, as while it looked monochrome, there was a tiny dot of colour down near the bottom edge. I stood on the brake several times, but we got there, and in summary, the bite-sized chunks made perfect sense. I could feel the commas and full stops reasserting themselves in his speech.

Another week successfully completed; in a few hours, I can head home and enjoy some peace and quiet in my little corner of the desert. Well, hopefully for at least two days. Of course, then the grind starts all over again: five days of my job and the commute that goes along with it. My little corner of the desert is quite a ways from our offices, requiring a daily commute of almost fifty miles.

Chapter Four.

Meanwhile. In Granaria several convoys were despatched to different areas of the country, with the largest and most modern actively pursuing the object that was being brought gently to the ground by its two parachutes.

“Are you ready for this?” I asked Linda.

“I’m ready,” were the last words she ever said with her body’s mouth.

“Ready,” some of Linda’s family members said.

Linda’s torso was perched on top of a small table with a pillow on it, with her rear legs on the floor and her front legs stuck to the sides of her head in preparation for the pairing.

An aging queen returns to her old stomping ground for a final hurrah and is joined by someone starting their journey.

Chapter 4: Running with Sis

NEIL
My school days were long past, but they still rode me hard, revisiting when I least expected them, or perhaps when I was least able to handle the memories. I was deep in a sump well below Castleton when something triggered my memories and switched on the classic fear/flight responses. It took me several minutes to put them back behind their wall, as I lay in the cold and dark, seeing and hearing the other boys as they threw whatever they had learned from their parents at me. Thank god I was always so much bigger than they were at all ages. Sticks and stones would never break my bones, but what I understood of their words still bloody hurt.

It was sheer bedlam in the casino, a group had booked the whole casino and hotel for seven days straight, we are talking major money here. No info on the group was shared down at our level yet, but it was rumored they were major high rollers. The problem was quite a few employees were on vacation, something the casino allowed, in fact encouraged, right after the Christmas holiday. So the powers to be were down interviewing everybody to see who could work extra shifts to fill in the gaps.

After flubbing a powerful incantation, meant to give newly coronated Demon Queens the wisdom of their ancestors, Devilla Satanne awakens to memories of her past life as Jacob Divington, a human from Earth. Having gained a new perspective on life, she quickly comes to a rather horrifying conclusion: she's been a complete and utter brat! No wonder everyone hates her!

And then there's the fact that she's apparently been reincarnated as the villainess of Tower Conquest, a lesbian porn game with a surprisingly intricate plot. One in which the Heroine conquers Dimona Tower, turning Devilla's people against her in the process. In victory, the Heroine brings about a glorious age of peace between demons and humans for the first time in millennia. ...Which actually sounds pretty good for her people, come to think of it. Devilla knows her terrible behavior is beyond forgiveness, but maybe she can still make up for her past mistakes? She just needs to make sure the events of the game unfold correctly. Though there is one little detail she'd like to change - the part where Devilla herself is killed or enslaved!

The series cover was commissioned from https://twitter.com/HaizeUqei