Battle for Tristaine

by Cate Culpepper

  “I should always be nice to your little sister.”

  “Nope.” Brenna skated her fingers up Jess’s throat and wrapped them lightly around it. “I’ll always have your back, Jesstin. In any fight, you won’t need to look around for me. I’ll be right beside you.”

  Jess covered Brenna’s hand with her own and leaned in to kiss her. They were getting better at this now, with weeks of sweet practice.

  Brenna’s lips moved, warm and pliant beneath Jess’s searching ones, then parted to admit the slow sweep of Jess’s tongue. They breathed softly, drinking in each other’s taste, their mouths warm and pliant.

  “Yer sure you’ve got no use for Amazon macha now?” Jess drawled and kissed her again.

  Brenna explored the planes of her face. “You’re gonna tell me. . .that’s who’s kissing me, right? The macha Amazon?”

  “Ah, no, lass.” Jess skated her lips over Brenna’s lifted chin and down her taut throat. “It is indeed yer own sweet Jesstin, smoochin’ you here on this log. But it’s the macha Amazon warrior doin’ this.”

  Strong hands gripped the front of Brenna’s blouse and ripped it open with one yank, baring her breasts. Jess lifted her gaze from naked cleavage to blue sky and grinned. “Thank ye, Lady Gaia, for this bounty I am about to receive!”

  Brenna laughed, a high, breathless sound that was equal parts surprise and pleasure. Jess shifted closer to her, and the soft fabric of her shirt warmed her bare breasts. A flush rose in Brenna’s cheeks.

  “I’m makin’ ye blush.” As always on such occasions, Jess’s brogue was deep as syrup. She leaned forward slowly and Brenna leaned back.

  “Maybe it’s aggression you’re seeing, and I’m getting ready to pop you one in the nose,” Brenna suggested, leaning further back. “Hey, Camryn taught me that base-of-the-palm-to-the-nose thing. It looked real, real, painful—”

  Brenna sputtered into silence as Jess employed her best time-honored technique for shutting her up. Jess’s kiss grew forceful, as she bent Brenna down on the log. She covered her with her upper body, holding her down against the rough bark. Her hands found Brenna’s breasts and circled them lightly, their erect nubs tickling her palms.

  Jess squeaked, and Brenna lifted her head.

  “My back,” Jess gasped.

  Brenna frowned and began to sit up. “Damn it, Jesstin, I told you—”

  “All better now.” Jess’s grin was gamine, and her body relaxed instantly, pressing Brenna back down on the log.

  “You rotten punk,” Brenna snarled, slapping Jess’s shoulder.

  “Amazons heal fast.” Jess lowered her head and continued healing.

  *

  “I’m not the one who brought up pythons, Jesstin. Shann brought up pythons.”

  “Brenna?” Jess scanned the snarled branches overhead. “If you’re eaten up by a rabid lion, or ambushed by a giant snake, I’ll make Camryn suck the poisoned blood from your—”

  “Blech. You and what army, Amazon?” Camryn yanked on the vine Jess pointed to and snapped it free of the branch above.

  Brenna measured the coil of vines looped over her shoulder, frowning. “You really think these things are strong enough to catch an adult female in free fall? Of average height and weight?”

  “We’d best stop at the canyon on the way back to camp and test them.” Jess threw Camryn a bland look. “Cam, you and I are still too shaky from our battle wounds, so Brenna will have to tie these to her ankles and jump off the—”

  “You’re having a good time with me, aren’t you?” Brenna slapped Jess’s shoulder. “I’d like to see you navigate gridlock City traffic at rush hour, Jesstin.”

  “Blech.” Jess shuddered. “I’d rather test the vines.”

  She began kicking a path through the high grass of the thicket, and they started back to camp. Brenna waved a hand to disperse the small winged creatures scattered by their progress. She stifled a yawn. Her dreams had been especially vivid the night before, and sleep had come in discordant snatches.

  More important, though, Kyla had passed the night well. Her wound showed no sign of infection, and the pain was localized and manageable with Shann’s mild herbal tea. Camryn was still quiet this morning, but that wasn’t unusual. Brenna had come to recognize silence as her natural state.

  “I’m not sure how we’ll find Tristaine, Bren.” Jess rested her rough hand on Brenna’s arm and guided her around a snarl of brambles. “But if the village is quiet, we’ll do what we can to get a message to Samantha in the City.”

  Brenna drew in a quick breath. “Hey, I’d like that, Jess. A lot.”

  “We’ll have to be careful. They might be watching her. But we still have some people in place in the City. One of them can contact her eventually.”

  “Wait…and risk getting caught?” Brenna’s hope dimmed. “If Caster found out I tried to contact Sam, Jess, it would be bad for her and her husband. She’s about to have a baby. I’m not sure I want to take any chances.”

  “I bet she’d want you to take a chance.” Camryn walked a few steps behind them. “Your sister, I mean. She’s probably real worried.”

  They stopped and waited until Cam reached them. Brenna noted she was limping slightly.

  Jess’s palm was gentle on the back of Camryn’s wiry neck. “I think you’re right, adanin. Your Lauren would want to know the truth, if it was you missing.”

  Camryn nodded. She’d given Brenna her only picture of Lauren for safe storage in her journal. Cam’s younger sister had been lost in the same ambush that killed Dyan.

  The sun was touching the western ridge by the time they reached the meadow adjoining their camp. Even in fall, the golden grass was still flush with the rich growth of high summer, and they waded through knee-high waves of it.

  Brenna heard the faint screeing of some new species of grasshopper—probably carnivorous—and scanned the ground uneasily. Her ears pricked again at a new sound, a musical trilling whistle that rose from the far end of the meadow.

  She looked up to see Shann, standing on a large rock near their base camp. She was too distant for Brenna to discern her expression, but her head was tilted, and she seemed to be searching the skies.

  “Hey, do you guys…?” Brenna turned and saw that Camryn and Jess had stopped several yards behind her. They looked like mirrors of their elder sister, their eyes trained on the cloudless blue expanse above them. The soft screeing sounded again, and this time Brenna followed their gaze skyward.

  “What is it, Jess?” Brenna frowned. “Are you hearing a plane?”

  “No, a gyr.”

  “You’re hearing a jar?” Brenna squinted.

  “A gyrfalcon, Brenna,” Jess answered. “It’s a kind of bird.”

  “Thank you, Jesstin. I know a falcon is a bird—”

  “I see her!” Camryn pointed.

  Brenna tried to follow Cam’s finger. She picked out the tiny silhouette before many City women could have. Her weeks in the mountains under the Amazons’ tutelage had sharpened her senses.

  She heard Shann’s eerie musical whistle again.

  At first the falcon was a tiny, dusty thread flapping against the blue bowl of sky above them. It circled, descending in lazy spirals toward the far end of the meadow. Brenna shaded her eyes and traced its path.

  “Watch your footing.” Jess’s hand brushed Brenna’s back in passing, making her jump. “The field’s pocked with gopher holes, and a twisted ankle won’t bring Tristaine’s tidings any faster.”

  This cautionary lecture was lost on them all, including Jess. Brenna wasn’t sure yet why they were running, but her own tension matched the sense of urgency emanating from the two Amazons. For one thing, she wasn’t wild about watching a bird of prey dive-bomb the unprotected head of Tristaine’s queen, who waited motionless on the distant rock.

  Brenna jumped over a furrow, then caught her breath as the falcon slowed its descent. Its glossy silver wings sent up a backdraft of chill mountain air as sharp, curved talons stretche
d toward Shann’s upraised arm. The gyr touched down with surprising gentleness, leather tethers trailing from its leg.

  By the time they reached Shann, she was smoothing its breast feathers with the backs of her fingers. She spoke to it in a low, crooning tone, her eyes shining with pleasure. Brenna, ever practical, noted with relief that beneath the falcon’s fierce claws, Shann’s forearm was wrapped in several layers of thick denim.

  “Isn’t she beautiful? Her name is Talfryn, Brenna. It means ‘the high end of the hills.’” Shann smiled proudly. “Look at her wingspan, Jesstin. She was just an eyas when you were taken!”

  “Aye, she’s lovely, Shann, really.” Jess clawed her tumbling hair out of her eyes. “What does she say?”

  Shann handed her a small folded paper, then gathered the bird’s trailing jesses and wound them around her wrist. Jess shook open the parchment carefully and studied it. Brenna felt a stab of misgiving as a look of unpleasant surprise flitted across Jess’s rugged features. She handed the tattered square to Camryn and Brenna.

  The creased parchment felt like soft cloth in Brenna’s hands. Red lines interlaced with black to form a twirling symbol that covered a third of the worn sheet. The drawing made no immediate sense to her. No eventual sense either, to be accurate, but something in the strong, blocky design chilled Brenna. The news wasn’t good, whatever it was. She looked up to see Shann studying her face.

  “Lady, we should leave for Tristaine tonight.” Cam looked like she wanted to bolt.

  “It’s only a secondary alarm, Cam. There’s no immediate dan-ger. Jesstin? My arm’s wearing out.” Shann waited while Jess wound her jacket around her forearm, then transferred the large falcon to her with the ease of long practice.

  Brenna still openly gawked at the bird, transfixed by its alien, prehistoric beauty. Both Shann and Jess handled the exotic creature as naturally as Brenna had once punched numbers into a cell phone.

  “Blades?” Shann shook out her arm. “How soon do you think we can have Kyla ready for hard travel?”

  “Wait, I need to sum up.” Brenna ducked slightly as the bird flapped its wings, presumably for balance. Its talons looked wickedly sharp. “This big messenger pigeon is named Talfryn, and she was sent here from Tristaine. She somehow found us in this one little field, in the middle of a huge mountain range. And she’s carrying a message in her beak from your village that says, ‘Come home, there’s trouble.’ We don’t know what kind of trouble. That’s where we are, right?”

  “The scroll was tied in Talfryn’s jesses, but otherwise, well done.” Shann smiled. “I love watching your eyes when you’re learning something new, little sister. There’s such life in them.”

  “Thank you,” Brenna sighed. “And that’s all the parchment says?”

  “Yes, that’s all this glyph tells us.” Shann nodded. “Tristaine is endangered and we’re needed. It’s a matter of leaving a bit earlier than we hoped. We’ll not be able to spare Kyla the recovery time she needs, but we can rig a pallet to carry her.”

  “At least,” Brenna said faintly. “If we’re going to be climbing mountains.”

  Shann’s voice was working its usual calming magic on Brenna’s nerves, but she thought she could detect a subtle tension in the lines of Shann’s body. She couldn’t read the language of her movements as easily as she read Jess’s, but Brenna had learned to trust her clinical eye.

  Shann turned to her second. “Jesstin? What’s your counsel on the urgency of Tristaine’s message?”

  “We can break camp in the morning. I’ll rig a stretcher for Ky tonight.” Jess stared into the falcon’s gold eyes, an odd smile lifting the corner of her mouth. Then she glanced around. “We make fine targets out here, sisters. Let’s find some shade.”

  Maybe it was just an adrenaline- and falcon-fueled energy surge, but the moment Jess spoke, Brenna’s upper arms prickled. She felt vulnerable in the wide expanse of the pasture, and she quickly closed ranks with the three Amazons as they moved toward the trees containing their camp.

  Brenna felt Shann’s hand on her arm. “How much time does Tristaine have, adanin?”

  “At least a week, I think.” Brenna blinked. “Wait. How much time before what?”

  “It’s all right, Brenna. You answered me.” Shann smiled at her, then wound her arm around Camryn’s waist. “Let’s show Talfryn’s message to your adonai, Cam.”

  Jess had turned to wait for Brenna several yards up the muddy path. The powerful falcon rested easily on her raised forearm, and the muscles in Jess’s shoulders stood out in stark relief beneath the last red rays of the sun. The trees overhead sent dappled shadows across the strong lines of her face, and Brenna felt that small, secret muscle in her sex relax.

  Brenna’s City friends would say she avoided fanciful thinking, but in her eyes, Jess was rendered an engraving out of myth, gold-edged and timeless.

  Jess lifted an eyebrow, and then her smile turned roguish. As her insolent gaze slid slowly down Brenna’s throat to fasten on her breasts, Brenna felt her nipples stiffen and rise. She strode past Jess, muttering invectives, and they returned to the fragile safety of their camp.

  Chapter Two

  Brenna ignored the dampness of the soaked earth seeping into the seat of her jeans. She was almost too tired to register her discomfort or do much else besides sit, slumped on the muddy hill and nodding inside her musty poncho. The rain had let up ten minutes before, but she had yet to muster the energy to push back her hood.

  The incessant rain that had plagued them for three days had finally stopped, a blessing the Amazons attributed to a benevolent goddess. This was fine with Brenna. She was willing to worship anything that could turn off the maddening drizzle for a few hours.

  At least she had pleasant scenery to enjoy, stupefied or not. Jess had found high ground to lay their holdings for this brief rest, out of the worst of the runoff from the storm.

  Brenna sat on a moonlit hill, the ghostly globe the Amazons called Selene visible overhead as scudding wisps of cloud swam across its surface. A silvery vista of treetops lay below her, a deep gray-green blanket stretching back unbroken miles.

  Brenna set the softly glowing lantern behind a stump, blocking its meager light from the valley. She took such precautions automatically now. Living among mountain women was helping her adapt to the wild through osmosis.

  She lifted the edge of the heavy spiral notebook in her lap and stifled a shivering yawn. Her body was exhausted, but her nerves were stretched taut. Sleep was not impossible, but felt unlikely. When it did come, it was too filled with chaotic dreams of battling and dying horses to bring true rest. If she couldn’t sleep, she might as well try to write.

  Brenna glanced over her shoulder as she fumbled through the journal to the first clear page. Shann boiled some kind of root mixture over the remnants of their fire. Jess was a silent shadow several yards above their camp, sitting watch on a high rock formation that looked out over the valley. The two blanketed forms that were Camryn and Kyla were motionless, and Brenna hoped that meant they slept. Shann caught her eye and smiled as she stirred the small pot. Brenna smiled back, with more assurance than she felt, and turned back to her journal.

  What we thought was a three-day hike might take twice that. The terrain we’re covering isn’t brutal, but carrying injured, it’s treacherous and hard to navigate in this bloody downpour. At least the rain cuts down on those tiny, demon-bred, buzzing gnats that target my eyes and drive me to psychosis when the sun is out. May each and every one of them fry forever in some horrific little bug hell.

  Kyla gets more and more quiet as we travel. At first, she griped about being treated like an invalid, but lately she just closes her eyes, grips the wooden poles bracketing her pallet, and hangs on. She worries me.

  We trade off litter-bearing duties. Shann and I try to make sure Camryn and Jess don’t push themselves too far, but there’s precious little we can do to spare them. Cam’s limp is pronounced at the end of a night’s travel, and Je
ss has got to be simply worn out.

  She’s everywhere, laying traps to catch enough protein to keep us on our feet, hacking out trails through snarled vines, moving swiftly ahead of us to scout out our next route. The damn woman either refuses to sleep or honestly can’t. It seems whenever I open my eyes I see hers, shadowed but alert, moving restlessly over the camp. Keeping watch.

  We’ll reach the ridge tomorrow.

  This time Brenna did hear when Shann walked up behind her. She scuffed her feet with such earnest warning, Brenna had to smile. Shann spread her poncho on the wet grass beside Brenna and pointed sternly. Brenna lifted herself with an effort and sat on it as Shann lowered herself beside her.

  “Oof,” Shann groaned and snugged her jacket over her knees. “Sweet Artemis, when did I become an old woman?”

  It seemed a rhetorical question, so Brenna grunted something sympathetic and accepted the steaming bowl Shann handed her. She sniffed it curiously.

  “Arsenic root,” Shann said quietly. “It’ll give us enough strength to make Tristaine. But it will alter our gene structure. We’ll all have testicles when we arrive.” She gazed out over the valley, then looked at Brenna again and snorted with laughter. “Brenna, it’s onion soup!”

  “Oh.” Brenna blushed again, grateful for the dark. “Sorry, Shann. But arsenic soup would be fine with me right now, if I could sit down while I drink it.”

  “Poor Blades.” She swept her fingers gently across Brenna’s forehead. “You’re never one to complain, but I know how tired you must be.”

  “We’re all pretty spent.” Brenna warmed her hands around the bowl. “Kyla’s hurting.”

  “Yes. There’s not much more we can do for her tonight. Tristaine’s infirmary will have stronger analgesics than we can risk in herbal remedies.” Shann rested her elbows on her knees as she absorbed the moonlit view. “Though I believe we passed a patch of dynamite hallucinogenic mushrooms, about half a league back. They’ll do in a pinch.”