ver since that strange woman was married it had been a blood bath. The herdsmen could no longer venture out. The villagers were at their wits end. The Unicorn gored two more locals in the past month. The adults were forced to send their children out to collect wood and send for help, but the woods still held wolves and great beasts who cared not for their purity.
The Temple Maidens rode in on great white steeds, glistening with silver barding embellished with carved bone, and each Champron was topped with a silver horn encased in jewels. The rider's gossamer rainment shone in the sun, and each touch of the breeze would hint at the untouched forms beneath. Each maiden carried a small sword clasped to their hips.
The head Priestess called the village together and passed around a shield to be filled with whatever money they had to offer. Once it was filled they bade the residents to erect the makings of a great pyre, then return to their homes. They should shutter their windows, and that none were to stir from their huts until dawn.
The moon rose high in the night sky as the Priestess stood in the center of the forest. The maidens began to beat a tattoo upon their shields. Their voices rang out clear into the night, luring the scorned beast to their circle.
The unicorn emerged from the darkness. Entranced by the bounty of purity before it, it did not detect the song of binding until it was too late.
A great clamor broke through the forest. Shouts of the maidens and the screaming of horses echoed through the night and then fell silent. Soon the smell of charring flesh wafted from the field.
The sun spread across the fields and the Priestess called the villagers from their homes. She presented a bloodied horn to the village leader, indicating the deed was done. The Corpse was charring in the field and they would be no longer tormented. Mounting her steed, she and her maidens trailed off into the forest.
None noticed that her steed had acquired a more powerful and elegant form in the night. It twitched and fidgeted beneath its armor. The faint glow of the domination spell hidden in the early sunlight.
The switch was complete, the villagers would find the charred remains of a common horse, the bone of its brow scraped as though de-horned.
They would completely break the creature at their base, and in a year she will send out a fresh agent to lure out another Unicorn to the town. Soon The Maiden's army would be completely furnished with the most powerful cavalry in the kingdom, funded by the very people over whom they would someday rule.