“What about you?" I swallowed the hard lump in my throat.
"Get ready to run.” She repeated, her words solid. Unmoving. “You have to get Artamene out of here.”
“But… what? Aren’t you coming?”
”No.”
“You can’t fight alone!”
“Heed me, Sara!” Balena whispered in strained demand, her eyes still burning the trees hiding these sadistic strangers. “Go to Queen Perseathea. Tell her I think they‘ve found us. Or get my sister, Laidea."
I kept place on my belly, fear stalling me. Bringing questions there was no time for. Making me wonder how I had place to go directly to Queen Perseathea, or just who these strangers were to be such paramount threats. “The Queen?”
Disregarding me, Balena slid Artamene down her leg, inching the baby toward the mud. Slowly… until she gurgled. At the sound, Balena froze. I stopped breathing. Artamene looked up at her mother cooing and flapping her arms. Her sounds, so soft and ordinary only moments before, now seemed loud and daunting.
“Shhhh, Artamene.” Balena pleaded, asking in a tone that wouldn’t upset the baby. At a snail's pace, she slipped Artamene down next to me, sitting the baby on her bottom in the mud. Artamene sat wobbling, sucking tiny fingers.
"Get her back safe, Sara. I beg you. Stop for nothing."
With my heart pounding, I lifted into a shaky crouch, reaching for the baby. “Balena, please go with me.”
“I can’t.”
“Please-”
“If I run, they will follow me.”
“Balena, you can’t do this alone. Go back with me. We’ll get help.”
"I have no time for answers, Sara. Just get Artamene out of here!"
I dropped my eyes to the whimpering baby in my arms, my stomach knotting. Burning. "Shhhh, Artamene. Please."
Balena kept her stance, refusing to look at Artamene again. Pain peeked through her face… the fact that it would be too distracting, hurt too much, to look on her child in danger. Instead, she listened to the surrounding jungle, the howling monkeys, the wind, a slow and building rumble of thunder above us.
I closed my eyes, cleaving to Artamene. I wanted to cry. I wanted to be the one curled up in the safety of someone else’s arms. I wasn’t ready for this, and shaking in it, I felt I never would be. I was a brave, not a warrior. Not a protector. How could I protect Artamene? How could I leave Balena, the closest thing to a mother I had? I wanted to go back in time. Erase these moments now gripping me. Changing my whole world. My whole future. I stopped my mind’s rambling. Just get back to the village and everything will be alright…!
"Are you ready?" Balena whispered.
"Yes." I lied.
Balena shot up, twirling her axe. "Now!"
And the forest vomited several soldiers. Balena ran blade ready into the thick of them.
I darted out, Artamene squeezed under my arms like a cornhusk doll, running past the muddle of soldiers. The trees stretched out before me like a cluttered maze, our once familiar path disappearing. I rushed through the jungle, heart racing, green blurring before me. Hurdling logs. Rocks. Flashing through the thick undergrowth, leaves and vines cool to the touch as they swiped past, Artamene joggling at my breast.
The baby sputtered out grunts as we ran, gradually turning those grunts into a wail, and then screaming red faced. Her hot tears soaked my shoulder as I palmed her head, trying to prevent its wild wobbling.
With my side burning, I clattered to a halt, crouching in some bushes. Fearfully glancing around. No one seemed to have followed, but Artamene howled loudly, drawing assured attention. Her face pinked with tears. Her elfin arms flailed. Her cries cracked against the moist air. The baby wanted her mother, and the running and bouncing about had no doubt terrified her.
The sound of fighting, of clanging blades and Balena’s shouting, hit me. Shaking, I shoved it from my mind. I had to find the Queen. It was Balena’s only chance. Bolting back up, I held tight to my crying Artamene, and launched into another sprint.
Once again, the trees flew past in a blur. After making it a goodly distance from where the soldiers attacked, I slowed to catch my breath. The village had never felt so far away! Artamene looked up at me, her lips pouting, puffing out her pink cheeks to splutter sobs. Thunder rumbled above us and a burst of wind ushered in the scent of rain. I glanced up through the web of vines to see a ceiling of gray clouds. Another screech from Artamene-
"Shhhh! Shhhh!" I begged, my chest tightening. I watched the trees for movement from my crouch in the vines. My breathing burned so hard that I could barely hear a thing above myself and the whining child. "Shhhh!"
Desperate, I bounced the crying baby in my arms, but to no avail. Artamene squealed out, shaking tiny arms and balling tiny fists. I gawked the cluster of trees, my heart now beating so hard I worried my chest bones might splinter. I leaned Artamene back, cradling the baby in my knees. Cupping her cheeks, I blew up her nose. Artamene squinted, startled, but beyond a sputtered cough, she went quite.
CRACK.
I whipped in the direction of the snapped branch. Artamene began whimpering into another cry. Desperate, I pulled the baby back in, once again blowing up her nose. One… long… puff…. She squirmed, uncomfortable with the sensation, but quieted down. I took one last look into the trees. I didn’t see anyone. This might be my only chance. I sprung back up to run.
"Grab her!" Boomed a male voice.
The words summoned three soldiers from the trees. I stumbled forward; fighting for speed, but soon came under several heavy hands. The three men grabbed me, twisting Artamene from my frantic fingers.
"No!" I thrashed under their bruising grip reaching for the baby girl. "Give her back!"
A barrel chested man with silver black hair approached, his frame shadowing over mine. Staring down at me, he summoned the soldier with Artamene with the flick of a stained palm.
“Zog-Reon.” Another clap of thunder punctuated the name.
The burly soldier with a ragged black beard took a pace up, Artamene bawling pink faced under his heavy elbow. “Sir?”
"Take the child back."
“You want me to do it there?”
His words rushed like ice water through my veins, surging me with adrenalin. I busted back into a fight. "No! Don’t!”
Gragore eyed the soldier as if they shared a secret. “You know what to do.”
“The pleasures mine.” Zog-Reon snarled his lip.
“Oh,” Gragore paused, “and make sure the warrior woman sees it."
The soldier nodded again, and then retreated into the trees with the baby screaming under his arm.
Struggling under the mammoth hands bruising my shoulders, I stared after Artamene. Her blues eyes wild and glassy. Her bottom lip puckered out, showing her fear. And right then I knew. In that terrible moment I felt vomit stirring hot in my stomach. I was never going to see that baby again. Artamene was disappearing into the trees, right before my eyes, and I could do nothing to stop it. Balena had been trying to avoid just this, and I had failed her. Failed Artamene. Feeling the rush of warm tears pushing up my chest, I wrestled against the man holding me.
“Bring her back!” I shouted over and over after the soldier, long after he had vanished from my sight.
The other soldier, silent and indiscernible up unto this moment, stepped in, startling me. Leaning in, his rank breath fumed hot on my ear.
"They’re going to split that little baby open, you know. Just like a spring lamb."
The monster of a man holding me mashed his fingers into my arms, laughing, his corpulent belly shaking against my back. And then like an omen, the thunderstorm awakened, its sprinkles transforming into downpour. The water bringing shock and disbelief down with it. And I stood there, my heart in my throat. Stinging. Bleeding. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak. The whole world had just shifted, knocking me off me feet, and the shift smelled like rain.
Gragore stood quiet, satisfied, the rain shining on his face.
"No…." I whimpered, spent. Wanting to fight. Wanting to stand a chance. But this warlord, these soldiers, tripled my size. My resistance was doing no more than amusing them. They enjoyed it, or at least the warlord did. I could see it in his gray eyes. A sort of sick excitement conjured by my struggle. My pleading. My desperation energized him.
Lifting a dirty palm, Gragore cupped my mouth. Hard. His hand like a vice crushing my jaw. "Let me see your eyes."
He leaned down, ogling me with those menacing gray eyes. I stared back at him, my instinctive tears streaming over his dirty fingers. He held his gaze for agonizing moments, grinding into my jawbone. Studying me. The rain dripping down his nose. His neck.
"Gragore." A voice came from behind. Feeling like I was in a dream, it took a moment for me to realize it was the soldier holding me.
"Silence!" The warlord threatened. "No…. This is not how the warrior woman described her."
"What do you want to do with her then?" My soldier asked. "Kill her?"
My stomach dropped like a rock at those words, sending my mind into a million fearful thoughts of how these crazed strangers might do it.
"No… we will make use of this one." Gragore reached for the burlap sack tucked under his belt, freeing its straps with a swift pull. The man holding me tightened his cruel grip, pulling my elbows to nearly touching behind my back.
“What about the Amazon woman and her kid? You going to send that whore queen our message?”
Gragore never glanced up from the leather straps, his voice as calm as a sunset. “After Zog-Reon carries out my orders, Perseathea will have no doubt of my message.”
Gragore dropped the burlap over my head, plunging me into the dark. Itching under the suffocating sack, I felt the ties pull snug around my throat. Struggling to breathe in the wet heat, an invisible palm throttled into my throat through the sack. Bruising. Pinching off my air. I felt panic shivering up my wet body, causing me to gag.
"Tell your Queen my words.” The warlord clenched heavy on my air. “I am coming for my daughter. The blood lost today is just a taste of what is to come if she does not deliver the girl.” I nodded, sucking in desperate breaths from under the hot burlap. “One life for a thousand or a thousand lives for one. It‘s her choice."
Chapter 77
A week later.
Getting out of the heat, Masseeia ducked into Lokran’s tavern, the familiar smell of stale mead and salty pork assaulting her senses. The tavern women draped themselves over a collection of drunken men at the bar, tittering on and shrilling in intoxicated laughter. The rest of the tavern stood near barren, too early in the day to summon the casual patron.
Looking the place over, Masseeia spotted a secluded table in the far corner. Scraping heavy boots across the wooden floor, she sauntered passed the drunken men, eyeing them as she went. Plopping her tired bones in the chair, she lifted her boot, resting on the wobbly table top. A plump serving woman with greasy hair in her eyes ambled over, a jar of mead and an empty mug in her hand.
“The same I ‘spose?” She asked in her husky tone. Masseeia nodded, and the woman sloshed the jar down on the table. “Seen battle at the Gragorian fortress, did ya?”
Masseeia growled, pouring the mead. “Did more than see it.”
“Looks like it.” The servant woman combed the greasy hair from her eyes, then left the warrior woman to her drink.
Masseeia eased back in the chair, ogling the drunken men as she swallowed down the mug. She sat, waiting for one of the drunkards to mouth off, giving her a good reason to brawl. She needed to brawl. Askca and Perseathea were both still alive and her plans in ruins. But not for long. She stared passed the bar to the door, waiting. Moments after, a scrawny built young soldier sauntered into the tavern.
"Sae-mond." Masseeia shouted loud enough to turn the head of every patron, and the boy turned nervous eyes in her direction. "Grab another jar and join me.”
Sae-mond nodded, trying to avoid the stares from the bar. Collecting the mead from the barkeep, he headed over to the warrior.
"Masseeia, I-"
"First Commander." She cut in.
"First Commander."
Masseeia smirked. “So I take it the hiding went well?” “The hiding?”
“The hiding you did during battle. If you had actually seen battle I would have known better than to send for you…
lest I wanted a good look at your bones.” Masseeia took another swig of mead.
“Oh….” Sae-mond stammered, the red glow in his cheeks apparent.
“Never mind that. I’ve more important things to discuss.” She glanced back to the men at the bar, making certain they were involved with their women and drink. Satisfied, she dropped her boot from the table, leaning into the boy. “This is not over, Sae-mond.”
"What do you mean? Gragore is-"
"Gragore is dead and that suits me well enough.” Masseeia hit the table. “He is done. But I’m not."
Sae-mond leaned forward in his chair, whispering. "But I thought-"
"That’s your problem, boy.” Masseeia hissed, clawing fingernails into the wood. “You don’t have cause to think. It leads you to trouble. Just as you thought you should go into the woods that night. That was a bad idea, wasn’t it?"
"Woods? What night?"
"The night Laidea nearly broke your chicken neck."
"How do-”
“The night you fowled up your order and lost half your teeth and all your pride."
“How do you know about that?”
Masseeia rolled her eyes, leaning into the boy. "I was there.” She eased back in her chair, taking another full swallow. “I followed them the whole of the journey… until they dropped from my sight. I was here the night you brought them to this very tavern. I had lost sight of them, but you brought them back to me."
“See? I did what I was to do.”
“Barely.”
"But I don’t understand.”
“Shocking.”
“Why not just take the girl that night?"
Masseeia lowered her mug, glaring at Sae-mond shifting nervously in his chair. Leaning into her elbows, she eyed him.
"Because this was never just about the girl." She took another drink. "And now, we finish what I started."
Chapter 77
The afternoon hazed bright, warming my shoulders as I took my place on the exalted marble, just as I had the night of my Allegiance Ceremony. The jungle surrounding GarTaynia serenaded the day with the twittering of sparrows and humming locusts as countless mimosa blossoms dotted the breeze pink, floating down over an ocean of people like blush colored snowflakes. I took in the sweet scent with a smile, looking out over the celebration. This day glowed with new hope. The rainbow after my storm.
Paces down the marble, Queen Perseathea stood summoning forth those who had aided in her safe return. I again fell captured by the sight of the woman, as I so often had all the days of my childhood. The sun glowed above the Queen like a blinding halo, shimmering through her hair like liquid gold… casting the woman fantastic. The traditional oxblood red and blaze yellow symbols of Queen hood splashed over Perseathea’s skin like flames. Proclaiming her. Honoring her. Queen Perseathea hypnotized, possessing such untamed beauty that just to behold her stirred the soul. I gazed, infatuated. This courageous and most magnificent of women… was my mother.
As Bartamius and Nahlla drifted up the steps to be recognized before the masses, I dropped my eyes to my side. Palius gazed back up at me with bold blue eyes aglow with the same awe-inspiring pride. I smiled, wrapping an arm around the girl. Tythose and Soh-la now emerged the multitude, joining the heroes at the top of the marble. In a rush of bows, the Arcanian Queen Reb-Becah ascended the steps, taking Queen Perseathea by the hand. Meesha and her Amazon sister, Elissea, followed with Meesha’s young son Aidehn at their side.
I looked out over the more than hundred row of Amazons, my heart full in this day of celebration. We had come so far, me and the small fellowship
that had ventured out of GarTaynia that night. To overcome. To know the truth. To stand here in the glory of this day. That all things might be set right. And they had been, except for one. To feel whole… I needed Saratiese.
“Askca. Palius.” Queen Perseathea turned doting eyes. Taking Palius by the hand, I walked out before the sea of faces to stand before their Queen. Lifting her chin to the host of warriors, Queen Perseathea pulled Palius and I in, and in the embrace, I felt safe for the first time in a very long time.
“Blood of my blood.” The Queen proclaimed. “The fruit of my fate. GarTaynia, I give you the daughters of your Queen.” Perseathea’s bold announcement hung in the air, followed by a small number of claps growing into a hum, and then into a roar of cheers.
I hugged my mother, looking out on the approval of my sisterhood. In this moment, the moment I had dreamt of all my days, my heart soared. My mother Balena and Artamene would finally be proud of me.
The Queen dropped her arms from us, putting palms up to the crowd to silence them.
“And now sisters of the Nation, I name my rite to Queen hood.”
An intense hush fell back over the people. This decision was long awaited and held as the highest and most sacred a Queen could make. Queen Perseathea stepped out to the center marble, looking out to her people. Silence captivated the crowd once again, every ear eager to hear her appointment.
“This place in the Nation, as sacred as life, the Queen hood of GarTaynia, I now bestow upon…” Perseathea stood
in the quite of the afternoon village, allowing the song of sparrows and locust. Savoring the moment. “First Commander Laidea.”
A rush of gasps waved through the crowd. In Masseeia’s treason she had given up her title of First Commander as well as her rite to Queen hood. Many in GarTaynia still did not know the truth of Masseeia’s betrayal, but the announcement went unquestioned, every soul secure in the decisions of the Queen. Perseathea turned warm eyes to Laidea, inviting her with an outreached arm.
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