Another Paul Kidd character, this from his novel 'Fangs of Ka'ath'. Shame so much got sliced out of that for the final printing. There were some yummy scenes and intrigues...

Shiraj is high priestess of a rather nasty and not-forgotten-enough goddess. The big things I was experimenting with in this piece were rendering cloth-of-gold, and the copper blade of the dagger that she carries. The linen was a bit more challenging than I expected, as well.

The dagger is loosely based off of a curved middle Eastern dagger frequently referred to as a khanjar or khinjar, but with a ribbed copper blade (I reasoned that a soft-metal stabbing weapon would most likely be ribbed in this fashion, many bronze age weapons were) and with a more Egyptian-ornamental hilt and grip.