Exit Tiny Despot

So, will you do it? Is your stick sharp enough? Is your spray can full and shaken? Asked the Sphinx when Melusine came to the river.

Why should I participate? I have no affiliation to the dark or the light, replied the La Fee Melusine, fingering the sharpness of her stick.

Fair point. Have you ever been in love? No. I see, what then pleases you? I am pleased by a sinister twist, a flick of the wrist, a test of strength, a bird in the bush or a rat up a drainpipe, have you any of the aforementioned secreted within your pocketses? No. I’m out then, so long.

Wait, I can offer you many rewards. Like? Sandwiches. What filling? Smoked salmon and cucumber. Old school, eh, white bread or brown? Your choice. Sounds good, I’ll do it.

The tiny despot sat at a table so large that he looked even smaller than he actually was. There was so much gold colour thereabouts that it might make our eye nauseous. The hall in which he sat was so huge that small clouds formed and the frescoes of his perceived glories on the ceiling were all but lost in the mists. Upon the table sat a box which contained all the insane wishes and vainglorious dreams of the despot. As a result of the contents of this box, one hundred thousand mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, aunts, uncles, grandparents, cousins, friends, relations, work colleagues, lovers, rabbits, granddaughters, neighbours, shop owners, farmers, accountants, street cleaners, nurses, architects, musicians, bricklayers, writers, mayors and mayoresses, tree surgeons, surgeon surgeons, seamstresses, dentists, bakers, gardeners, policemen and women, nurses, soldiers by the bushel, adolescents, oldalescents, babies, toddlers, shop assistants, hairdressers and electricians, lay dead.

This kind of destruction and abuse of power had been very popular during the past few thousand years, indeed, since before the reach of recorded time. The number of invasions, exploitations, enslavements, slaughters etc. was a big, big number. But recently this kind of behaviour had become less prevalent and so the dead people were a bit surprised, as were their wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, children, cousins, neighbours etc. etc.

If they had read their history, they would have been less surprised.

Then an invisible sharp stick discomforted the despot in the ear and so he fell down upon the floor in a disappointing swoon.

What was it all for? he whispered before expiring.

Later, when the invisibility had worn off, Melusine reappeared and returned to the underworld via the river Styx and continued to plan mischief. The Sphinx had given her a package of smoked salmon sandwiches in white bread to take back and then Sphinx made her way back the City of Az feeling very pleased with herself.