Without her, he would die. And so, he glided rapidly down from the trunk
of his favorite tree and emerged into the paths of the garden just as
Dionaea's bleeding head rolled out from the base of the steps.

Baena coiled his length protectingly about Dionaea. For an instant he
was at a loss, noting her horribly desperate attempts to speak without
breath, her mouth opening and closing and her tongue licking snake-like
in and out.

Baena realized after a moment that there was no hope for the Queen to go
on living. A head must have a body.

Glancing about, Baena saw nothing but the numerous coils of _his own
body_, and after an instant's hesitation, he took his tail in his mouth
up to the tenth joint and bit it off! Shrinking along all his length
with the terrible necessity that faced him, Baena quickly slapped the
bloody stump of his tail fast to the bleeding neck of Dionaea and said
one of the few magic spells he could remember....

* * * * *

Turning his body slowly until his severed nerves told his spine that the
connections were as accurate as could be expected, Baena waited while
the spell slowly took effect. He lay there all night, waiting for his
own life's blood to reanimate the mind of Dionaea.

As Dionaea came back to her senses, Baena began to experience the
strange phenomena of wanting to go two ways at once, and as the
phenomena became more and more troublesome, he decided that he had
better have an understanding with Dionaea once and for all. But what
poor male ever won an argument with a woman?

Thus it was that Baena resigned himself to a life of traveling backward,
and that was that.

As a snake, he wished only to eat and bask in his favorite tree, but as
Dionaea, he wanted only one thing--and that with all the fervor of hate
a sorceress is capable of--a fitting revenge on the man who had visited
her execution upon her!

Day and night Dionaea plotted, and in her mind a fitting revenge
grew--it would include the lovely Feronia, Druga's beloved.... Carefully
she prepared the incantation.

It is here that my story really begins. What has happened, and how it
happened is of little consequence to what is to come--except perhaps to
introduce you to the characters. It is very simple. Dionaea was a very
evil sorceress, and Druga, most heroic of men, had long sought to bring
her into his power, and to end her evil days. Armed with the white magic
of Feronia, his loved one