Attack of the Amazons (9 page)

“We find the Dark Lord has agents everywhere we go,” Abbey said quietly. “Do you think the queen will listen to her?”

“Not unless something terrible happens.”

“Well, let's hope it doesn't,” Dave said fervently. “I didn't like the look in that old witch's eyes!”

G
aelan went about his work after the football game, but there was hope in him that had not been there before. The fame of the warrior maids had spread throughout his world, so that they had seemed invincible. Many of his people had been kidnapped into slavery by the women of Fedor. However, since he had seen their finest warriors tumbled in the dust, his heart sang within him. And now as he moved along the row he was hoeing, he said to himself,
They
aren't
invincible. This won't last forever. Sooner or later I'll be free!

After he had finished hoeing the beans, he shouldered his hoe and ambled down to the laundry area where some men had gathered to wash clothes again. He saw Rolf and joined him. “How about another football game, Rolf?” he whispered, nudging him in the ribs.

Rolf grinned at him unexpectedly.

Gaelan knew Rolf had been troubled by the violence of the game. He was the mildest of young men. But seemingly, in the rough and tumble, Rolf had found a fiery spirit of competition within himself that shocked him.

“Well, I expect we could play among ourselves, but you took plenty of punishment from my sister over the last game, didn't you?”

“It was worth it.” Gaelan grinned back. “But maybe you're right,” he added quietly. “Someday we may be able to do things a little better.”

“A little better?” Rolf said, a puzzled light in his eyes. “What do you mean by that?”

“Haven't you noticed, Rolf, that everything is all wrong here? I mean, women aren't really more able than men.”

“Why, of course they are! The maidens are the warriors.”

“Only because that's the custom. Did you see how easily you put some of them on their backs? They didn't look like warrior maids then, did they?”

“Well, maybe not, but hunting is different from playing a game.”

“Not really,” Gaelan said easily.

Gaelan had been talking with Dave and Sarah, and the three of them agreed that Rolf could, perhaps, be the key to their freedom. If they proved to him that men were qualified to soldier and rule, the battle would be half won.

Rolf said slowly, “It's always been like this. I don't think it can be any different. Look at my father—he couldn't rule the way that my mother has. He's just not the right type.”

“Maybe not. Some men aren't. But you are.”

“Me?” Rolf stared at him, genuinely shocked. “Why, I couldn't rule the country!”

“Only because you don't
think
you can. Look, Rolf, you can run faster, lift more weight, and with a little training, with your coordination, you could shoot straighter than anyone. Have you ever done any sword fighting?”

“Well, as a matter of fact, I have fenced with Merle a little bit.”

“I bet you could've beaten her too.” At the look that crossed Rolf's face, Gaelan grinned. “I thought so. You didn't do it because she was your sister and she
was a woman, but if you'd gone all out you could've bested her, couldn't you?”

The idea seemed to be novel. He let Rolf think about it awhile.

“Perhaps I could,” he said slowly, “but I wouldn't do that to my sister.”

“You might be doing her a favor. From what I hear, anytime the Londo tribe attacks, you're liable to get wiped out. Isn't that true?”

Gaelan had hit upon a touchy subject, for Ulla, chief of the Londos, had sworn to obliterate the women of Fedor. He had fierce warriors, and in several pitched battles the warrior maids had barely managed to stave off defeat. They had lost large numbers of their best warriors, and now the threat of an attack from the Londos hung over the entire village, although it was not publicly spoken of.

Rolf said nothing, but Gaelan saw that his mind was working rapidly. He was, Gaelan knew, a quick-thinking young man, with a razor-sharp mind, although he had never fully used it.

Gaelan stood there with him on the riverbank as he stirred clothes, idly talking about nothing but dropping ideas into Rolf's mind. Finally, when he thought it was wise, he said, “We'll talk about this later.”

“All right, Gaelan.”

Gaelan made his way back to the queen's home, where he put his hoe into the shed, then walked toward the house.

When he entered, he was met by Princess Merle. He had knocked her flat on her back once during the football game, and he knew she had never forgiven him for it.

Her eyes flashed now as she said, “Where have
you been? You were supposed to be here to help Father.”

“I was hoeing beans, and then I went down to the river and talked with your brother.”

“You've got more to do than trade useless stories with Rolf.”

“I don't know that they were useless. Your brother is a pretty sharp young fellow.” He grinned widely. “And a pretty good ball player too.”

Princess Merle's face flushed at the mention of the game. She flared up. “Don't you stand there laughing at me!”

“I wasn't laughing,” Gaelan protested, drawing his face into a frown. He suspected this made him look ridiculous, and he realized he couldn't hold it. He laughed suddenly, saying, “Well, I couldn't help it. You
were
funny rolling around in the dirt. But then, I rolled some myself.”

At the reference to being flattened, Merle's temper erupted. Her hand flashed out.

She did not strike Gaelan's face, however, for he had reflexes faster than hers. He grabbed her wrist. She struggled to free herself, but he held her effortlessly. She slapped at him with her other hand, but then this was pinioned too. She stood there struggling, her face growing redder, and he smiled across at her, holding her easily as he would a child.

“Let me go! I'll kill you!” she said.

“I don't doubt that.”

“What's this?” Queen Faya stumped in through the door, holding onto her crutch. She took in the scene and said, “What's this man doing?”

“He insulted me, Queen Mother.”

Gaelan released the princess's wrist. “I merely kept her from striking me, Your Majesty.”

“Why would she want to strike you?”

“That I can't say.”

“He's impudent, that's why. He needs a thrashing, and I'm going to give it to him.”

“Are you?” Queen Faya asked, raising her eyebrows. She herself did not believe that beating servants and slaves accomplished a great deal. “I don't think you'll find that satisfactory.”

But Merle's blood was up. “Come along,” she said. “You're going to get a caning.”

Gaelan exchanged a steady glance with the queen and for some reason smiled. “Excuse me, Your Majesty, your daughter has…business with me.”

Gaelan's manner had amused Queen Faya, but she said no more. She hobbled to a chair and sat down, staring out a window. Soon she heard the sound of blows being administered in another room.

When Merle returned, she was flushed and unhappy-looking.

“Well, did that make you feel better, Daughter?”

“Yes!”

“I doubt that. Come and sit down by me. We need to talk.”

Reluctantly Princess Merle sat down by her mother. Actually she had a great affection for both her parents; but she was about to receive a lecture, and she pulled her lips together in a thin line, determined not to hear anything.

“You are a very strong-willed young woman, which is as it should be,” Queen Faya said gently. There was a faraway look in her eye, and she smiled. “I was exactly like you when I was seventeen years old. Not as pretty as you, though.”

“Yes, you were,” Merle insisted loyally.

“No, I was not. Many men wanted me for their mate, but it was only because I was the queen. Only your father loved me for what I was besides being queen.”

“How did you know that? You never told me how you and he met.”

“He was just a commoner, and at the time I was a princess as you are now. He was the smartest of all the young men, though not the best-looking. He never spoke to me, but I felt his eyes on me,” Faya said quietly, remembering old days. “There were others who were larger and stronger, but none had the look in their eyes that your father had.”

“So how did you come to choose him?”

“I found a poem that he had written. He didn't know that I'd found it. It was a wonderful poem. I still have it.”

“Could I see it?”

“No, it was a very private love poem that he wrote for me—the only one I ever got,” Faya said. She looked at her daughter. “I don't suppose you've gotten any love poems?”

“No, I—I think they're silly.”

“Then you've missed an education.” The queen looked sad and for a time remained silent. “I think most of our young warrior maids miss something fine and wonderful. Your father is a quiet man, and he doesn't say much, but for years I have not made a decision without his counsel. Does that surprise you?”

“N-no,” Merle said slowly. “I've always known you two were closer than any couple in the tribe, but I didn't know why.”

Queen Faya took her daughter's hand and held it. “It's because he has love and gentleness. Our women have little of that. They are trained to be fierce warriors;
and I think when a woman becomes a warrior, she loses something.”

“But it's what I've always wanted to be.”

“It's what I've taught you to want—what the others have urged upon you. But inside there is a beautiful woman who wants to be loved and to be told that she's pretty and to be admired.”

Amazed, Merle could not speak. As her mother went on, suddenly, to her surprise and shock and horror, she felt tears rising to her eyes. Her mother was saying the things that had lain deep in Merle's own heart for years, thoughts she'd felt disloyal to speak. She turned her head away, but her mother saw that she was weeping.

“Never be ashamed of your tears, my dear,” she said quietly. “If our women could learn to cry, they would be more complete. It's all right to weep. I do it myself sometimes.”

“Mother, why have you never talked to me like this before?”

“Because I'm weak,” Queen Faya said, shaking her head. “I've known the truth—that our women are not gentle and therefore are not fully women. Women
should
be strong, and they
should
stand with courage, but we've bred ourselves to be nothing but fierce animals, knowing nothing but fighting and killing. It's the men who have the gentleness—men like your brother, Rolf, who's like your father. And that young man that you just beat, he has courage like a steel bar—I see it in him—but there's a gentleness and a goodness in him too.”

“No, I don't believe that!”

“Don't you? Then you're not a woman yet, or else we've bred all that out of you.”

“Mother, I don't want to hear any more of this.”

“No, people don't want to hear the truth, but you know in your heart that what I am saying is so.”

Princess Merle jumped up and left the room. She passed Gaelan, who was sitting outside on a bench. He looked up at her, and their eyes met. He said nothing, but there was no anger in his eyes, as she had expected. It would have been better if he were angry, she thought. His very silence and refusal to rebuke her hurt worse than if he had struck her. She walked blindly away.

Within a week after the football game, the young men had suffered almost all they thought possible.

Josh, Reb, Wash, and Jake were working out in the common fields under the hot sun when suddenly screams came from outside the stockade. They watched the guards run to the small portholes, trying to see what was going on. Then the screams faded away.

“What was
that?
It sounded like a child,” Josh said.

“It was a child,” Gaelan said, his face grim.

“What was the matter with him?”

“Probably a wild beast.”

Gaelan was right, for word soon spread inside the compound that a small girl, eight years old, had been seized by a huge tiger, who had simply snatched her up and dragged her away into the depths of the jungle.

Instantly the village was alerted. The tiger could not get inside, but they well knew what their future held.

“When a beast like that finds the compound,” Rolf explained, “and once he's tasted human flesh, he's there forever. That's how the queen got mauled. She led a charge against the biggest tiger anybody had ever
seen. She killed him too, but not before he ruined her leg.” His face clouded. “No one person ever stood up to a tiger. The whole tribe goes together to run them out. Even the men go as beaters to drive the tiger into the warriors' spears.”

“Why don't you trap him!” Jake demanded.

“How do you do that?”

“Well, lots of ways,” Jake said. “Dig a hole, let him fall into it. Rig a snare, so that he strangles. Lots of way to kill tigers.”

“We know none of those ways,” Rolf said. “Besides, the women would think that was cowardly.”

The immediate result of the child's death reflected directly on the Sleepers. It was Mita, of course, who went through the village screaming that her prophecy had been fulfilled.

“Kill the Sleepers,” she said. “Kill these strangers in our midst. They bring the wrath of Maug down upon us!” Her cry went on until the villagers were upset.

The queen finally came and took her throne, and everyone in the village gathered before her.

Mita was in her element. She spun around, pointing a bony finger at the Sleepers, repeating her prophecy that they must die before Maug would be appeased.

A long debate developed, with Faya reluctant to condemn any of the young people. However, she had been queen a long time, and she read her people well. She caught her husband's eye, and Chava shook his head, but this time she could not refuse. The pressure was too strong.

“You cannot have them all for Maug, Mita. But you can have that one.” She pointed at Wash.