Battle Cry

by Lara Lee Hunter

  This picture showed a great city in flames. Nobody knew who had drawn the pictures or how long they had been there, only that they had been there since Reena had been born. Liam said that the drawings were older even then his grandfather, and his grandfather before him. Whoever had painted those pictures on the walls of the caves had been a skilled artist, using materials that no one had ever seen before or since.

  Nobody knew if the paint used to create pictures had come from the world before the Great War or if it was something created afterward. Whatever it was had real staying power because it remained to this day.

  “Maybe we should separate and try some of the smaller caves.” Deal was nervous. He kept scanning the area around him and his thin chest rose and fell rapidly.

  “There isn’t time. The soldiers are riding hard and we can’t go any further right now.” Reena was not alone in her exhaustion; many of them were stumbling and staggering. One woman had begun to cry silent tears of misery a little while before and Reena had seen her sagging toward the earth when they finally did stop. “Besides, nobody would risk that wrath—not even Heidi. Telling the secret of this cave is akin to bringing down the greatest curse right on your own head. She would not do that and even if she did there is no sign that the soldiers have been here yet. We have to risk it.”

  That was the simplest truth. They had no choice. There was no other shelter to be found. Lucas had said that the tribe had never used the cave and so Heidi would not have seen it and to divulge its whereabouts, even in conversation, was to risk punishment from the gods, so there was a chance she had no way to point the soldiers to it. It was a risk they had to take, and they did.

  They entered the cave wearily and some of the men rolled a stone in front of the slit that was the doorway. A fire was lit because the smoke would drift out of a large hole in the back of the cave and disperse without being seen. None of them knew about the natural filters that the cave provided; they assumed it was just magic, and they were grateful for it.

  They had not eaten on the long march; there had been no time, but they had all made small kills and gathered a few things along the way as they had learned to do over the years.

  Deal had a rabbit, Lucas a brace of birds. Reena had a pocket full of herbs and ground roots weighing down her simple pack. They offered the rabbit’s fur to the cave and dusted some of the herbs across the floor and added more to the fire before they began cooking the meal.

  After their hunger was satisfied, everyone just picked a spot and rolled into whatever they had to sleep in or on. Reena was asleep before her head even hit the small fur she had been given, but when she awoke the next morning, that picture was the very first thing she saw: the city with flames all around it and a long column of people marching out of it, marching toward…

  She frowned and leaned closer. Her eyes narrowed as she stared at the picture more intently than she ever had before. As a child the picture had always been a source of amusement, a way to while away the time while waiting for her father to return from hunting for something to look at in the cold nights. Maybe there was more to this pictures and she had thought before. Now that she knew that Barkley was not in fact a hero, maybe she should look at the painting from a new angle. She frowned, trying to make that make sense. There was something there, what was it?.

  The people leaving the city were marching into the desert. The very desert that everybody said was impassable. Yet Barkley had crossed the desert, and if the old man who had possessed the sword that she now held was to be believed, there was a another city past that desert, one even greater and larger than Aretula.

  Reena knew that since she had grown up in the woods she hadn’t heard all the same legends that people in the city had heard. Having been to the city, having heard a lot of the legends, having seen the museum in the books, and having had so many people tell her there was another city, she began to wonder about it, to even believe it. But even the people who spoke of it in the city said it was a fable, a myth. If it had existed, there was no way to know if it still did. There was only one city in the world, and it was the one from which she had just fled. It was the one what she had declared war upon.

  There was a thought in the back of her head that had not yet formed, and she could not quite make it all come together into a cohesive thought, or plan. Lucas stared out of his sleeping and stood, stretching his giant frame all over. He smacked his lips a few times and scratched under his armpits, a habit that she had long since begun to equate with men. Why did they all do that? It was really gross!

  Lucas joined her and asked, “Have you never seen this before?”

  Reena replied, “Yes, many times. But there’s something about it… Something that I’ve never noticed before. Look at the people, they are leaving the city and fleeing into the desert.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  “So the city they are leaving is Aretula.”

  Lucas frowned and leaned closer to the wall of the cave. She was right; the city had changed quite a lot in the centuries that had passed, but there were still notable landmarks. Nobody had ever been able to say what happened to the original citizens or the city, where they had gone or why. The legend said that Barkley had found the city deserted, without life. If there had been people there in the city and they had left the city to go to the desert, was it possible that they had indeed traveled beyond the desert to a city on the other side?

  Reena was having the same thoughts. She asked, “Is it possible that two different cities simply sort of… switched places? Is it possible that the people from one city crossed the desert to go into this one and the people from this city came across the desert to live in the other one?”

  Lucas shook his head, “I’m not saying it is impossible, I just don’t understand why they would do that.”

  Lauren, who had awoken and come up behind them said, “Maybe it was the centuries between. Maybe they lived elsewhere and forgot about the cities until they found them again. Maybe it wasn’t as simple as the people from the city just walking out into the desert and found another one and vice versa.”

  It did make sense. Although they had always assumed that the city was one from long before the Great War and it was, but which city was painted in the picture was something they had never wondered about. If this was indeed Aretula and its citizens had walked away, fled, and one of them had even managed to paint this picture inside the walls of this cave…was it possible that the descendants of that painter, of the people leaving the city, were alive somewhere?

  If so, where were they?

  And could they help them now?

  Would they help them now?

  Reena said, “I think if we’re ever going to be strong enough to overthrow the Governor we’re going to have to find out the answer to these questions.”

  Lucas said, “Reena, you must be joking. Even if that had happened, there is no way that we could cross the entire desert on the chance that there might be somebody on the other side who would be willing to help us. If there is a city over there, they have likely forgotten about Barkley years ago. Do you know how many centuries it has been since they came to this side of the desert and created the city here? Do you have any idea of how many people there would even care that there was a city on the side or that it was at war with itself?”

  Stubbornly she replied, “We have to try. There has got to be a way for us to do this. It isn’t enough for us to gather just the other Outlaws. There was a reason that they sent me after this sword, and I don’t think it has anything at all to do with just gathering up the rest of you.”

  Lauren said, “Are you saying you have been sent on a quest?”

  Silence fell. Quests were holy, arranged by the gods themselves, along with the fates. To be sent on a quest was something from the legends—while many young men, and even women, went off in search of things or hoping to find something, that was not the same as a god-decreed quest. A god-decreed quest was not something one could say no to.

  “I
don’t know if that is it exactly. I just know that I was sent out here to get this sword and now I have come to this cave and …this all sounds really ridiculous.” Her heart sank. At the mention of there being a quest involved, most of them had perked right up but now they were drooping again. She saw Lucas frown, and then he spoke in his deep and mellifluous voice.

  “Yes,” he said. “This is a quest and we are all a part of it. You should consider yourselves blessed by the gods!”

  What was he doing? Was he nuts? He couldn’t say things like that! He was not done though because he continued. “The gods have seen fit to guide Reena to us and to the cave that tells us the direction we are to go in.”

  Dax said, “Wait, didn’t you tell us that a priestess of Isis was one of the ones who helped Reena to escape?”

  Reena said, “Yes. Why?”

  “Because perhaps they did know that you were going to find these paintings.” Dax looked around at the other people gathered around them. “We all know that Isis was the most powerful goddess of them all. All the other goddesses looked up to her and wanted to have some part of her power. We all know the stories of the gods and goddesses, how many goddesses attempted to either trick Isis into giving up her power or attempted to murder her in order to take her powers? It was said that Isis alone had the power of seeing into the future. It was said that she alone had the power to make it three sisters change their minds: those who spin, shape and cut the string that is our lives.”

  Reena said, “Yes, she was a priestess and I met her in the death cart. We were both being carried off into the Arena to die. And then I had to fight for her life a second time.”

  “There is all the proof any of us need that this is indeed a quest,” Lucas said firmly. “If you would turn your backs on something the gods put in your path, speak now!”

  He was using the quest as a reason to keep them united. Reena stared at him in utter awe. No wonder he was a good leader, he could use anything he had to without fear of reprisal. He was determined not to lose his Tribe and if that meant going to war he would. If it meant traveling across the desert he would do that too.

  Reena knew she would never speak of the thoughts she had. What if this was not a quest but all coincidence? What if all of this was just happenstance and she got everyone with her killed?

  It was too late for those questions now.

  Lauren said, “We have small children with us. We can’t possibly go trekking into the desert, we would all die. We don’t have enough in way of supplies to make it here within the woods in the woods. We all know that the desert gives nothing and takes everything.”

  Lucas said, “You said yourself that many children that are on the farms do not belong to the farmers themselves.”

  Nobody spoke. Those who had children looked down at them and a few rested their hands on their children’s heads, a small gesture but one that had much meaning. Lauren said, “I don’t think any of us are safe if we go out on our own now. The soldiers are looking for Reena far too closely, the woods are crawling with soldiers and the governor is determined to have his due. If he has to kill every Outlaw he sees — and their innocent children, then that is what he will do.”

  One of the women stepped forward, her hand still on her daughter’s little head. She said, “I would rather see my daughter with a farmer, risking the hunger of the seasons than see her out here in the woods risking the wrath of the soldiers and the Governor. I know I should keep her with me; I have kept her with you perhaps far too long. Now she’ll have to remember me and that is unfair to her, but with things like they are, I think now would be the time if there ever was a time, to save our children.”

  There was a general murmur of assent. Most the children began to cry or cling to their parents because having been raised as the children of Outlaws, they knew just how serious this decision was, and why their parents were making it.

  Reena had known that she had somehow become the leader of this gathered tribe. She did not know how to handle that before and she certainly did not know how to handle it now. There were at least fifty or more Outlaws somewhere in the woods, hopefully hiding and not captured by the soldiers. Ifthey found them there wasn’t enough of them to make a difference in a war against the Governor.

  Reena did not believe much in fate and lately she had very little use for the gods and goddesses either. They didn’t seem fair and nothing seemed to be right. But she had to consider that perhaps this was exactly that; perhaps it was in fact nothing more than fate having her way.

  That frightened her a little bit because everyone knew that fate was a fickle woman. What if she changed her mind at any moment? It wasn’t so hard to try to fight it; she was put on this road and she would have to walk it. It was the reason she had the sword, and if this sword had come from across the desert and it had been what had sent Barkley fleeing West, then she would take the sword with her back across the desert in an attempt to raise forces to fight his evil descendants.

  Chapter 4

  Taking the children to the farmers proved to be far more difficult than it ever had been in the past. Most the farms were highly scrutinized by the soldiers, as many of the soldiers knew that the farmers helped the Outlaws along. Many of them did it willingly although they never would’ve admitted it, but many more did not. Their crops were often targeted however, and while Outlaws made it a point to never take anything more than they needed because they knew that their taking would create starvation for the farmer and his family, the soldiers knew that they Outlaws did in fact take.

  They waited until night had fallen and then they began to slip out one at a time, only the women with their children. Reena knew exactly how brave those women were being; if they were caught they would be murdered and their children right along with them. They would have no protection — their only protection was their being women.

  Maybe the soldiers would take pity on them and let them go, maybe not. It was a tossup, but it was the only chance those children had. The desert would not be kind to them; it would not be kind to any of them but the children would most especially suffer out there. The purpose of them taking the children to the farmers was twofold. The first, of course, was to make sure that their children were safe and the second purpose was to attempt to get things that would last out in the desert.

  While the women took their children, Reena met with her men and young boys and the women who were childless. None of them knew much about the desert; all they had was the tales they had been told to them as children, but Reena had long ago decided that it was those stories that would get them across that burning sand.

  In every legend there seems to be some small grain of truth; the trick seems to be weeding out all of the chaff, finding the common feeds and using those to sow a plan.

  Lucas was the first to speak. “I’ve heard that you can in fact get water out of the desert, if you but know where to look. The elders used to say that there were plants that grew there that were deathly to the touch, that they had spikes made of silver dripping with poison. They said these plants have veins of pure water running through them and a smart man could tap them.”

  Dax said, “I think a few of us might have enough brains to figure out how to do that.”

  The mood had turned from somber to almost jovial. Reena could not puzzle out why for a moment, but then it hit her: they were just happy to be doing something—to be moving in a direction, any direction.

  There was another reason as well, one none of them wanted to truly comment on. Without the children they would be able to speed up, and what worries they had about their children would be assuaged by the fact that they were safer away from their parents than they were with them.

  Reena said, “My father told me that the desert is boiling hot in the days and cold at night. Even at the mouth that was true, at least as far as I can tell. If we travel like we usually do and try to find shelter during the day when it is the hottest, wouldn’t that be easiest on us?”

  Lucas sai
d, “Yes. Those are the kind of decisions we’re going to have to make in order to make it now, in order to preserve our strength as much as possible. If it were easy to cross the desert everyone would do it. We know it has to be more than three days to the East.”

  “Why three days?” Lawrence’s forehead was knitted into long lines. “Perhaps it is only three days, I mean we have never been in there so we don’t know.”

  “We do know.” Lucas folded his arms across his chest and said quite sternly, “If it was only three days to the nearest city, we would’ve seen people. We would’ve seen smoke would’ve heard the noise, you know that. It is not inconceivable for something to travel three days in order to receive food or shelter. It is a three-day trip from the furthest part of the woods to Aretula. If there were people three days east, we would’ve seen them.”

  Dax pointed out, “If there were people seven days east we would’ve seen them. That is unless of course the desert is lethal enough to kill you within two or three days.”

  Reena replied, “The old man I met in the hut — the one that I took the sword off of. He said he got lost in the desert, he said he saw the city and walked towards it, but that it was never there.”

  They all looked at each other, not knowing what to say. Finally one of the women who had not gone along with the others spoke up. “I remember when I was a little kid my father was telling me about cities that will bloom in the desert and then disappear again. He’d said that they were born out of sudden fever, and sand that shaped itself and then blew away in the wind. He said it was a Devils trap.”

  “Then we know to avoid them.” Reena had seen the superstitious shudder going through most of the people around her. If there was ever a time to make sure that nobody had any unreasonable amount of fear going in, now is it. There was every reason to be afraid of crossing the desert: lack of water, lack of food, intense sunlight that could melt flesh off of a person’s bones. With all those things to take into consideration, there was no use in adding things that they could do nothing about. So the devil had a death trap of the desert… So be it. They would have to remain on the lookout for those shifting and false cities, that was all.