Character/s: OCs
Merlin Bingo M2115: I1 Lamia
Author's notes: According to wiki, in their wars with the Ancient Kings, the High Priestesses of the Old Religion combined the blood of a girl with the blood of a serpent's, creating fearsome and powerful monsters who were able to kill with a single touch. The Lamia were extremely powerful but proved to be more dangerous than their creators imagined; the High Priestesses lost control of them, and the Lamia continued to kill, unwilling to stop.
Disclaimer: I do not own the BBC version of Merlin; They and Shine do. I am very respectfully borrowing them with no intent to profit. No money has changed hands. No copyright infringement is intended.
The Blessed Isle was filled with smoke. The ceaseless bombardment of boulders and rotten carcasses and caskets of oil set alight was taking its toll even as the walls started to crumble, and disease ravished young and old alike.
The war was not going well. Those of the Old Religion, the priestesses and acolytes, those of small gifts and large, were huddled together, trying desperately to figure out what to do next. It had been a small thing to start, a request from one king and then another, those jockeying for power and lands and gold, and the High Priestesses had refused them all, thinking to keep the peace by remaining neutral.
It didn't work.
One king in particular, Modron of Mercia, had somehow got control, spreading lies about those with magic, talking about poisoned wells and changeling children and, more importantly, hidden treasure beneath the Isle's castle keep. Pushing hard to take all those of magic and turning them into slaves for his unceasing conquests.
The other kingdoms falling in line, no doubt using the chaos for their own greed, they turned as one against the High Priestesses, against the Old Religion, and this was the result.
But desperate times called for desperate measures.
Now, much as Olwen protested, her fellow priestesses pushed on. A drop of blood of a maiden fair, a bloodied fang from a serpent's mouth, and magic, powerful, deep, old, remorseless. They argued that there was nothing left to do, no way out. They needed a legion of Lamias, serpents in the form of a young girls that could kill with a single kiss. They argued, too, that with magic, they could control the Lamias, that they could send them out into the kingdoms warring against them. A fairy-tale kiss and destruction.
So, it would end in death, they argued, so be it. Better the kings set in greed and power to breath their last than to have the Isle of the Blessed fall.
But Olwen was no ordinary Seer. Steeped in magic, she could see past the few days ahead and into the years beyond. She could see how it would bring them all down in the end. She begged, she pleaded, she offered herself as go-between to try and end the war, knowing that it would likely mean her death, in pyre-bright agony.
There was no stopping the others, and in the end, the Five Kingdoms fell to serpent-girl kisses.
It worked, it worked.
But they had wrought something they could not control, and almost as one, relentless, seeking only the death of their victims and finding fewer and fewer, the Lamias turned on their makers.
Even those with power to shake the world could not stand against them.
Olwen escaped, knowing that the Blessed Isle would fall, not from war but the High Priestesses' own willingness to do anything for power. Running, hiding, trying to find a way clear to defeat their greatest achievement and worst nightmare, she knew in the end, it would be like this.
Seduced and sucked dry of life, Lamia's victims lay all around Olwen. She had tried so hard to turn the tide and even now, fighting for her life, she could feel Lamia's siren call and want nothing more than a single kiss.
Then Lamia smiled and Olwen was lost.
There was only a final brush of lips and growing darkness and silence.