Family Matters and Other Matters

Cuthbert and Joan 2 are blissfully asleep, naked in each others arms, until....

Illura

Later.....

After having been awaken to an odd....half remembered but exciting dream.... I first blink at what one of my battle sisters have....

Good Lord, I blink to myself behind a mask that hides my abrupt surprise, Astra lessons and speech seems to have moved me much more than I would ever given credit!

It was almost if, for a second, I was thinking like a true Amazon. That is what she tended to call her fellow female Amazonian comrades in arms back in her lands. Indeed even these first few lessons (of which more I and the others....I see so clearly now.....would gladly learn) has endeared her (as well as her friends) to us!

Could almost say I am becoming to actually see myself and the others as Amazons and not New Amazons (something that we seemed to become named only through happenstance than by design).

....

And while we are on that track it would appear that one member of our new friends, the Joan with no number behind her name (and I have to wonder at such a strange custom of naming...but then again it's not my land's custom to use numbers with names).... Well, it appears that she's made quiet the impression on Aaron.

So much so that when I last spoke with him he had the most.....strange plans. Plans that he said would see me to the throne of my land AND Daria if something....should happen to Samuel. Went into some details, saying that he expected very much to BE that "something"....or somehow involved with that "something".

Given the situations I and the others have been facing....this mad situation....lends credence to his words. And whilst I would never have thought he'd ever renounce his title (did it right in FRONT of me, for God's sake)....his suggestions and reasonings were valid and.....

But I don't want him to leave....!

Maybe......maybe he'll change his mind and....

Get your mind back on track! I command myself, severely.

Well, let's just say that I'd....miss him and his advice! Despite suggesting quiet a few advisors he trusted (and I trust as well despite current political ill winds towards me and my battle sisters)....

There it is again!

"Hold him and I shall awaken the others," I command calmly, "They must be here in order to help decide the best course of action for these....intruders."

For a brief moment I have a flash of insight one what would have happened if things had not changed and I remained dead..... Being few survivors and disorganized, I feel that they would have been ill suited in their campings at night and thus prime targets for any sweeps by the enemy doing "mop up" operations (as Cuthbert put it). Whilst they are trained enough to be competent in battle, I fear that sometimes I still had to guide them in certain things like "watchbills" and sentry setup and such. Something I'd not gotten around to drilling into them yet enough to feel comfortable about..... Well, as rattled as they would be and are now, I fear that they'd make mistakes and end up....dead along with me if things hadn't changed.....

Dead. Despite it sounding so....eldritch I believe Aaron....

Thank God that I can give them aid here...and the advice to improve on things that Astra and her friends gave made the sentries even more effective (and harder to surprise).

What....odd business....all this is.... Being back from the dead....if..... Clearly, though, it is a clear second chance given by God....

Later I shall shake and shiver over it all. Duty first! It is an Amazonian's duty to her comrades in arms that.....

"I have got to get more sleep next time an unexpected crisis comes a-calling," I mutter to myself as I quickly dawn armor and arms, "Otherwise I wouldn't be so shaken as to...."

I mutter something more as I quickly dress...only slightly started at how....quickly and skilled it seems. Oh, I have learned by need to do such, all considered what was arrayed before me by Hengist's forces. The way of the warrior I had learned before, but still it was not like this. It's like my arms and armor are . . . coming to be like an extension of myself.

Oh, how odd....

I put that out of my mind, silently dismissing as ridiculous that either things seem a little shorter than what I remember when I went to sleep....or perhaps I've grown. I put out of my mind how much.....lighter my arms and armor seem . . . and even how somehow even the plainest of my battle sisters seem somehow more. . . . handsome and strong. Mayhap, if I am any judge, they may even start to appear more appealing to those of the opposite sex?

No, that's ridiculous. Such things can't happen overnight, now can they!

Awakening the others (and fighting off the oddest impression that Aaron seems shorter than I last remember....or that I might have grown some).....

Somewhere in the back of my mind I am slightly surprised that he wasn't in Joan's tent. And then again he rather is traditional in certain things. That and I'd overheard something about Joan whispering about "waiting."

None of which is my business and entirely irrelevant right now!

.....

I go and "knock" on Cuthbert's shelter, the next to last people I'm after (last being Joan's place), and here him mutter something in that strange, foreign tongue of his before coming out.

He is bare chested and rather....muscular if I do say so myself. His wife is slim but I can see the play of muscles as well. Both fine warriors!

Both have covered themselves for modesty sake but I pause as I see that Joan 2 has a rather large ruby in her naval?

Nevermind. She's not of my land but I shan't condemn her for odd customs! She is a comrade in arms and a true ally, I know in my heart!

.....

"Okay," I mutter to myself, muttering something about needing coffee to snap out of this strange frame of mind I keep sliding into.

He and Joan soon are quickly fully dressed and with the rest to view the disgruntled "hunters" who've somehow stumbled across my camp.

Their stories of merely being hunting (or "poaching" more like) rings false in my ears for some reason. No, they were hunting alright. But not regular game. From the surprised looks on their faces, I rather doubt it was for New Amazons!

Somehow I get a feeling it was Jarlath's group they were "hunting".

"What is this?" Jarlath asks softly, reaching out to remove something from around the hunt leaders neck.

"It's only a good luck charm and....." he protests, trying to pull it away...only to wince as one of my sentries growls and place a sword by his neck....stilling him in fright.

We can run him through, you know, and examine whatever he has on him after! Whoever these local mercenaries are (for I know their type, alas), they might be skilled hunters but hardly worthy warriors!

And he knows that.

.....

"Coffee," I mutter, shaking myself some, "Need coffee."

Beginnning to sound like an old Amazonian warrior instead of.....

Jarlath looks, seeming to look at it without just his eyes, and them mutters a small curse.

"Magic control talisman," he whispers, pointing up at an odd raven that looks oddly...familiar to me. It seems to be dormant right now, not looking our way. Indeed, not looking at anything, really.

Come to think of it, that bird seems to have been....hanging around rather too much?

Almost without thought, I string my bow and let fly with an arrow, killing it as it instantly.

"Our magical opponents' eyes," Andrea mutters, nodding as if that made sense. Which...it does.....

"Who's owners shall believe was killed by either poachers or outlaw," Cuthbert explains to Aaron, who's looking as if he's about to ask a question. Something like the wisdom of my rather.....unexpected act.

Birds in the sky who's eyes send back images. Were it not for Astra, that avian spy would have spotted us camping out plainly in the open....

Jarlath then points to the hunters, who look back. Some are silent, as if awaiting the blow to kill them. Others look ready to whimper and plead for their lives.

"What do do," I hear him ask himself, "What do we do?" All considered, that's a rather good question! Logic dictates that we kill them here and now, and so not to let the rest of the world know too soon we Amazons...er... New Amazons still breath. However that would be a utterly cowardly act.

Besides, by now any scouts will have found the battlegrounds with all it's dead...and find at least me the leader, missing. That would at least signal to even the densest of generals that at LEAST the head of the serpent (as they probably view ME) is still alive. Alive and still a threat. Meaning that I believe that soon we shall be facing trouble.

Yes, I think to myself, Best to learn these "new ways" of battle from our new battle sister, Astra! That or else our quest for equality will be for not!

See, unlike the Amazons of legend, this particular Amazon known as Astra has preached that women are...and should be....equals to men. Not superior to men, mind you, but equal.

Something along the lines of "two wrongs not making a right." Odd way of putting it, but the meaning is clear enough. When and if we do gain power, we shall not do back to the men as they've done to us. Would be....dishonorable to say the least, as she puts it. Unworthy of warriors worthy of the title of "Amazon".

Still, what to do with these foes?

Cuthbert, as it turns out, brings the answer home when he draws forth some kind of weapon (looks something like a crossbow, in a sense, in configuration) and smashes it across the face of the hunter leader....knocking him senseless!

The other warriors quickly follow suit, knocking our hunters unconscious.

"Magic?" he asks as Jarlath pulls out a potion, "What kind?"

"Diluted Lethe," he replies, "Will make cloudy what has been going on for the last month....at least!"

"That and I guess it'll not be such a marker of strangeness as if we cast spells," Andrea sighs, "Guess that might be how they might have homed into our general area."

"Always be prepared," Jarlath sighs, looking up at the heavens, "Always the Cub Scouts motto...but still...."

Yes, I say to myself, I must ask more about that and other things when I get the chance.

Cuthbert had mentioned something about a suspicion about somebody out there might not liking them casting magic spells. . . .

Meanwhile, Astra is now teaching us about how to wear camouflage and moving about in the forest to not be observed. That and the skills of covering one's own tracks. We also discuss where next to go, and what ultimately where we might have to go....

Yes, sooner or later we must cut off the serpent's head of OUR enemy, Aaron. Hengist, I fear, is now....rather beholden to Aaron and may soon find himself rather....out of a job?

Would be rather like Samuel, that kind of betrayal, I fear.

While moving out, meanwhile, Aaron ask one rather odd question that's been floating around in my mind. Have many question, actually. That and have to do a lot of planning and scheming if we are all to live through this....especially if what Cuthbert says is true about Rebecca!

Wish we could have questioned those hunters, but Cuthbert had rightly pointed out that where there was one hunting party there will perhaps be more too nearby for comfort. Best to be a moving target than a sitting one. Harder to hit....

However,all that said, Aaron's question is also a question, whilst not exactly the most profound, one I have on my lips as well ever since....

1. "What's a 'Cub Scout'?" I hear Aaron ask, despite himself.

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