Battle for Tristaine

by Cate Culpepper

  “Amazons have love chants?” Brenna squinted dust out of her eyes and peered upward for her next hold. She could see Jess, taking in line carefully as Shann eased herself around a tangle of brush. She and Camryn were better than halfway up the cliff’s face, and she was beginning to believe she would live to see the sun set. “The City has Reproduction Clinics. I think Tristaine is more romantic.”

  “We have reproduction clinics too,” Kyla piped up, “but I bet they’re a hell of a lot more fun than the City’s.”

  “Save your breath down there!” Jess called.

  A gritty scrambling of stone drowned out her voice, then Shann’s sounded, sharp and clear. “Rock!”

  Luckily for Brenna the instinctive thing was also the only thing she could do. Her forearm shot up over her head, and she braced herself against the cliff’s face, making herself as small a target as possible.

  Shann’s foot had struck a loose shelf of shale, which broke off and hurtled toward them in dangerous chunks. For a moment, all Brenna heard was the impact of stone ricocheting off rock, and she hissed in fear for Kyla, swinging unprotected below them. An ugly thud and a muffled cry reached her scant moments later, and her eyes flew open to see Camryn reeling against her line, a hand pressed to her head and blood welling between her fingers.

  “Shann!” Jess called.

  “I’m secure, Jess!” Shann answered immediately, breathless but anchored again to the cliff wall.

  “Brenna, Cam?”

  Jess was answered when Camryn’s line went slack and she sagged senseless in the halter securing her to the guide rope. Brenna lunged to the side and reached for her, but couldn’t span the distance between them without losing her hold and snarling the rope that held the sling.

  “Brenna, stay there!”

  She heard Jess’s shout through the tympani of her heart in her ears and craned her neck to search for Kyla.

  “I’m okay, Bren!” Kyla had been able to shift her body so that most of her weight was taken from Camryn’s line. Brenna felt the increased pull in her arms and legs.

  “Cam, you talk to me!” Jess barked.

  Camryn spun in a slow half circle, her hands trailing limply. A thin line of blood wended its way down her face.

  “She’s unconscious!” Brenna called to the group at large. She clenched both rock and line so tightly that the tendons in her wrists stood out like wires.

  “It’s all right, Bren. I’ve got her.” Jess stood braced on the lip of the ridge, the nylon rope secured around a stone pillar. “You’re tied off, all of you. Now keep your heads! Shann! Lady, can you reach me without my help?”

  “I can, Jesstin.”

  “Then come.” Jess gripped the rope and the woven vines that secured the sling.

  “Brenna? Shann and I will help you lift Kyla and Cam. Camryn will be dead weight, but the harness will hold her,” Jess called down in a clear, even voice. “Do you understand?”

  “Maybe we could just c-camp here?” Brenna didn’t even know if she was kidding. The ridge had changed from a benevolent challenge to a deadly trap in seconds, and she couldn’t catch her breath.

  “Jess.” Brenna’s voice shook. “Tell me what to do!”

  “Brenna, lass, go easy.”

  Brenna looked up to see Shann lift herself safely over the edge of the cliff, then roll quickly to her feet. Jess was well braced and held most of Camryn’s weight off the main line.

  “We’ve done rescue lifts like this. Those knots are made to hold! You just need to keep climbing, adanin.”

  She tried. With every straining sinew and ounce of courage at her command, Brenna ordered herself to scale the rock. She forced her gaze away from Camryn’s still form and found a sturdy ledge within reach. She heaved herself up to it, grunting with effort. The vines creaked alarmingly in her ears, and she looked down to check on Kyla.

  “Good, Bren,” Kyla’s voice trembled, “don’t worry about me. I’m fine down here.”

  Brenna’s eyes locked on the yawning space that separated them from the forest floor. She felt as if the rock itself exhaled, breathing out against her in a cold, implacable wind to force her off its face. She gasped raggedly and clenched the rock in a spasm of fear.

  “Brenna, Jesstin will help you lift,” Shann called down, somehow her voice both calm and commanding as she laced the rope around the pillar. “Carefully, now,” she cautioned.

  Jess can’t lift all three of us, part of Brenna’s mind tried to reason through the chaos. Shann’s securing the slack in the line to brace us, Jess is taking half of Kyla’s weight and most of Camryn’s. I have to help her. I can do this. I’m strong enough. If I can just stay balanced. . .and let go of this bloody rock.

  “So, I must rescue your skinny butt again, Stumpy.”

  Brenna wouldn’t have thought anything could penetrate her paralysis, but the strange voice that floated to her ears made her jerk in shock. She looked around wildly.

  “Vicar, sweet Mothers!” Shann’s tone was rich with relief. “Can you reach them?”

  “On my way, lady,” that new voice responded

  Brenna watched a tall form rappel down rapidly toward them from the top of the ridge. She shaded her eyes as gravel clattered in her wake and tried to bring her breath under control.

  “Yahoo! It’s Vicar!” Kyla cried as she braced herself carefully against the rock with her hands. “She’s one of us, Brenna. Vic is so cool!”

  “Brace Camryn, Vicar,” Jess called.

  Brenna’s jaw hung slack as a tall, muscular woman landed lightly on the rock beside her.

  “Who’re you?” the woman asked bluntly. Her r’s carried the same light brogue that flavored Jess’s speech, and she was of similar build. However,Vicar’s coloring was different. Intense brown eyes drilled into Brenna’s, beneath a tousled mop of blonde hair.

  “That’s Brenna, Vic. She’s adanin.” Kyla’s voice had begun to sound thin and reedy. “See about Cam. She looks really hurt.”

  “Aye, little sister.” Vic gathered herself and pushed off the rock’s surface, and Brenna felt a sick moment of vertigo until the line caught and curved Vic’s flight. She swung past Kyla, then pulled herself up beside Camryn.

  “Whoa, youngster, that’s a wicked bump!” Vicar said. “All right, Jesstin, I’ve got her!”

  “Hakan is here too, Kyla.” Shann’s voice reached Brenna. “The three of us can pull you up with Vicar’s help. Brenna, are you ready?”

  Brenna felt the sudden shift in her harness when Vicar took on most of Camryn’s weight and balanced the sling carrying Kyla. Her body suddenly made sense to her again. She understood the amount of energy needed to move it, and the mountain no longer seemed to want to shrug her off its surface.

  “We’ll take it slow and steady,” Jess called from above. Brenna looked up briefly to see her flanked by Shann and a third woman in dark clothing. All three of them held lines.

  The climbers rose in gradual stages. Brenna moved methodically, trying to tamp down the demon of panic that still threatened to break free in her chest. The Amazon called Vicar climbed with ease beside her, even with Camryn slung over one broad shoulder.

  Brenna got close enough to see Jess’s face, and that both helped and hindered. The encouragement she saw in those cobalt eyes strengthened her, but her lover’s pallor reminded Brenna of how narrowly they had skirted disaster.

  Shann eased herself under the line and knelt on the ledge to help Vicar lift Camryn over the ledge. “Thank you, adanin!”

  “She’s coming to.” Vicar clambered up and knelt by Shann. “I could hear her mutterin’. Are you all right, lady?”

  “I am now, Vic.” Shann spared her warrior a warm smile and clasped her hand. “Gaia’s blessings on you and Hakan for your damn fine timing.”

  Jess pulled Brenna over the lip of the ridge. She felt Jess’s strong arm slide around her waist, and she leaned against Jess for a moment before they finished lifting Kyla to safety.

  Shann checked Cam
ryn’s eyes and probed the back of her skull. “Brenna, can you see to Kyla?”

  “Sure,” Brenna panted, as she fervently hoped blood would start to circulate in her fingers again soon, so she could feel the straps of Kyla’s sling. The hammering of her pulse had finally started to quiet now that three feet of solid ground separated her from the ledge.

  “Is she awake?” Kyla, too, was pale again, and her hands trembled badly as she fumbled with her straps.

  “Getting there,” Shann murmured, “here she comes.”

  Camryn grimaced then blinked. “B-Banshee bile,” she stammered. “What hit me?”

  “Your queen,” Shann sighed. “Camryn, I’m terribly sorry. It was all my fault.”

  “Camryn, you idiot!” Kyla’s tone was sharp despite her ashen complexion. “You could have ducked! You scared the crap out of me! Are you all right?”

  “Stop shrieking at me, Ky. I’m fine,” Cam mumbled and felt along her scalp gingerly. She blinked at the woman who supported her, then grinned. “Hey, Vicar!”

  “Hey, bean sprout.” The big warrior cupped Camryn’s neck gently. “Don’t you budge now till Shann gives the word.”

  “That small cut’s already closing, but we’ll watch you for concussion, little sister.” Shann tilted Camryn’s head carefully. “I want you to tell me if you feel dizzy or nauseous, or if your head—”

  “Ah, Shann, up it comes.” Cam groaned and leaned over Vicar, retching.

  Vicar braced Camryn carefully until Cam started chuckling into her lap. Then she snorted laughter too and eased her upright again. “I see a season in a City Prison hasn’t taught this brash little dyke any manners, lady!”

  “I’d say throwing up on you is a pretty reasonable reaction, mate.” Jess stood smiling down at them, winding the nylon rope into a neat coil.

  The lines in Vicar’s forehead relaxed. She got to her feet, and Brenna’s jaw dropped again. There was definite filial resemblance between Jess and Vicar, but the blond Amazon towered over Jess’s very tall form by a good three inches.

  “You look well, Stumpy.” Vicar took Jess’s shoulders and appraised her keenly. “We’ve been worried about you.”

  “Warriors are masters of understatement,” Kyla observed, and Brenna smiled at her.

  “Nice save, Vic.” Jess’s eyes brimmed with tears. “My thanks, adanin.”

  The two warriors embraced, briefly but hard. Brenna was still amazed at how easily Amazons touched each other and the amount of love evident even in such fleeting contact.

  “One or both of them are leaking, I take it?”

  Brenna squealed in surprise and jumped a foot sideways when the low voice sounded behind her. The prodigiously muscled black woman called Hakan smiled at her politely.

  “Poor Blades!” Shann laughed from her place beside Camryn. “We can’t seem to stop sneaking up behind her. Brenna, meet Hakan.”

  Not especially tall, Hakan looked as if she could snap an aspen with her teeth. Like Vicar, she was dressed in warm, close-fitting furs, an ensemble unheard of in the City. She wore her glyph, an intricate twirling of silver lines that looked almost like a web, high on top of one cheek.

  “Jesstin tears up easily,” Hakan explained, extending sculpted fingers toward Brenna.

  “She does,” Brenna agreed as she shook the callused hand. “Thank you, H-Hakan, for your help.”

  “Did one of our gyrfalcons reach you, lady?” Vicar crouched beside Shann. “We sent all four by different winds.”

  “Yes, Vicar. Talfryn brought us the council’s alarm.”

  “And the elders sent the two of you to find us?” Jess asked.

  “Aye, Jess.” Vicar nodded at Hakan. “We’re one of three patrols the elders charged to track you down. We figured the southern meadow was our best bet.” She grinned at Kyla. “We heard this youngster’s sweet singing and swashbuckled over in the nick.”

  “Can our injured travel, lady?” Hakan asked. “Can we make for the village?”

  “With all prudent speed, yes,” Shann said before Kyla or Camryn could speak. “Tell us, adanin, what’s happening in Tristaine?”

  “Our source in the City says the Feds are about to move,” Vic said quietly. “We can expect attack before snowfall.”

  Brenna saw a bleak look pass between Shann and Jess.

  “We’re preparing for migration, then?” Shann asked.

  “Yes, Shann.” Hakan’s eyes on her queen were compassionate. “We await your order to evacuate the village.”

  *

  Except for the bite of cold in the air, Brenna was experiencing an odd déjà vu. A quiet stream of Amazons, moving with purpose through mountain splendor under a darkening sky toward an uncertain fate. Traveling with Jess and Camryn and Kyla after their escape from the Clinic had held this same element of anticipation and foreboding.

  Shann walked beside Camryn, keeping an eye on her throughout the long night’s passage. Jess and Vicar followed them, carrying Kyla’s pallet. Hakan led their party through the high hills toward Tristaine, and Brenna figured she was paired with her for her own protection.

  She still flushed with shame when she thought of the ridge. What if help hadn’t arrived just in time, in the warrior-ex-machinae forms of Hakan and Vicar? Would she still be there, frozen to the cliff’s face in a rictus of fear, useless and worse in her first true test before the women of Tristaine? None of them had blamed her for her paralysis, or even mentioned it, but without much effort, she could imagine scorn emanating from the silent warrior beside her.

  Brenna shook herself mentally. There was self-examination and there was self-pity, and she was wandering perilously close to the latter. She made herself focus on her surroundings, the cricket-laden twilight and the path through the pass ahead.

  She cleared her throat. “Do you need quiet, Hakan, to concentrate on the trail?”

  “Not here.” Hakan spoke for the first time in miles. “Closer to the pass, we’ll need to watch for patrols.”

  “Patrols?” Brenna swallowed. “Patrols from the City or Tristaine?”

  “Both,” Hakan replied.

  They walked quietly for a while.

  “Hakan,” Brenna said, “may I ask why you—”

  “My line was born on another continent,” Hakan broke in, “generations before my family migrated to the City. You’ll see women of many colors in Tristaine.”

  “Actually, I was going to ask about your glyph, not your race.” Brenna smiled. “But thank you for telling me. I’ve seen pictures of black people,” she added. “There’s a black neighborhood in the City, but I admit I haven’t—”

  “Black citizens are limited to their own borough.” Hakan’s voice was toneless.

  “Yes.” Brenna looked at her rugged profile. “I realize I won’t get a grip on everyone’s history until I live in Tristaine a while. Shann’s tried to tell me about everyone’s origins, but it gets confusing. Why Vicar and Jess speak with a brogue and no one else does, for instance, and who in Tristaine is really descended from ancient Amazons, from which continent, and how women who come from the City become Amazons. . .”

  Brenna realized she’d begun to wave her hands, and she smiled shyly at Hakan and folded her arms. “You’re from the City yourself?”

  “I am. My mother brought me to Tristaine fifteen years ago, but I was raised in the Black Borough.”

  “Did you feel welcome when you came to the village?”

  “After a time. Beginning a new life can be difficult.” Hakan’s boots were soundless on the uneven, rocky ground. “When I first came to Tristaine, I tried to earn my place by riding one of the clan’s renegade stallions. I ended up on my back in the dirt with this huge brute lunging over me.”

  Brenna tried to smile. “Please tell me this isn’t one of Tristaine’s initiation rites. What happened?”

  “I froze.” Hakan chuckled ruefully. “Couldn’t have moved if Gaia herself commanded it! Then your Jesstin jumped in and distracted the beast, while Dyan dragg
ed me out of the arena. It was the first time I owed my life to them. Far from the last.”

  Brenna pressed her folded arms around a pleasant warmth in her chest. “Yeah, Jess can make quite an impression.” She paused. “Thanks, Hakan.”

  “For?”

  “Your story. You saw me freeze on the ridge. You know I’ve been there.”

  “And now you know I have.” Hakan shrugged her broad shoulders. “As Shann says, Brenna, if we had no personal demons to battle, we would not need sisters. Shann was raised in the City too, by the way. Amazons are Amazons, wherever they’re bred.”

  “That’s true, isn’t it? I’d forgotten Shann was City-born.”

  “And glad she was to shake its dust from her feet,” Shann said behind them. She turned and called over her shoulder. “Jesstin, Vicar? Bring our wounded songstress so she can see her village.”

  Brenna had been so engrossed in her conversation with Hakan, she had missed the sense of anticipation rising in the Amazons as they approached the pass. Jess helped Kyla stand, then lifted her easily into her arms. The seven women moved through the lush undergrowth toward the low rise that dipped through the mountain range.

  For a moment, Brenna feared another attack of vertigo, but the descending trail sloped in a gentle grade to the heavily wooded valley below. She came to a sudden stop, struck by the beauty of the moon rising over the shadowed pocket in the earth. Her gaze skated across the night sky, over constellations the Amazons held sacred, then down into the valley. In the midst of the trees, Brenna saw a gathering of fireflies—softly twinkling lights that might have been those stars fallen to earth.

  The campfires of Tristaine.

  Jess had stared out barred windows many sleepless City nights. The smog-shrouded lights of the City milked the stars of much of their brilliance, but Jess drew comfort knowing they sparkled brightly over her Amazon village. She hadn’t believed she would live to see these campfires again.

  Jess sighed and heard Kyla echo her softly from her place in Jess’s arms.

  Brenna felt the solid warmth of Jess’s shoulder against her and leaned into it, sliding her arm around her waist. “Welcome home, Jesstin,” she whispered.