~The Last Conqueror~
by
Kamouraskan and Lariel
Disclaimer: Characters are owned by Renaissance Pictures & Studios USA. No profit is gained through this story.
Full disclaimers in Part 1
Part 9
Perdicus was in the midst of arranging blankets for more drop-ins when he became aware that all the voices in the sleeping hall had suddenly fallen silent. He looked up and saw that the normally rambunctious lodgers were staring in shock at a space directly behind him. With his heart in his mouth, he turned. He couldn't help showing his relief that it was Xena and not Alti or her guards, and Xena shook her head in mock dismay.
"I don't know who else you were expecting, but I could get a little upset that I'm not your worst nightmare."
Perdicus looked to the smile with some uncertainty, but didn't back away. "I did what I thought was best. It was stupid and I nearly got us all killed. You know I won't go to Alti again after that."
"So it was just stupidity and we're all friends now?" Xena leaned in close, and hissed into his face, "Especially as I heard yesterday that you're claiming you survived Potadaia."
Perdicus stiffened as the icy eyes bored into his, and he placed his hands slowly on his hips, mainly to stop them shaking so much. "Gabrielle said you were to be treated as a friend. She said that there were more important things going on and no matter what you did in the past, you were to be welcomed here," he replied, with a certain amount of bravado which belied his lurching stomach.
Xena straightened, and stood looking down at the boy. "So you really are from Potadaia? And I'm welcome here..." She shook her head slowly before spitting out, "What sort of dung is that?"
Perdicus heard a plaintive note in the question, and waved to the children to relax. "I'd be dead a dozen times if it weren't for Gabrielle. She wanted you to feel safe with us, and that's enough reason for you to be welcomed here. If she was wrong, and you're here to finish the job you started five years ago..." He closed his eyes and waited, though he could not stop the trembling of his hands and legs.
Xena took in the sight in front of her, smiled slightly and stepped back. "Relax. I just wanted to ask you some questions. And I'm impressed. It looks like you're handling things well enough here without Gabrielle."
Perdicus took a deep breath. "She's been gone for almost a week, and someone had to take charge." He shrugged, and seemed to look at the filth covering the woman in front of him for the first time and called to a group of the children. "Our guest here needs some food, and some clean clothes." His nose wrinkled. "And a wash."
Suddenly there were two cherubs alongside of her, tugging her towards a chair, and Xena had to fight the urge to pull away violently. A table and fresh fruit were put in front of her and still she stared at Perdicus. "What are you up to? And don't tell me you're just such perfect forgiving people. You're thieves, conmen, beggars. Don't take me for another easy mark."
This time Perdicus did not tremble, and Xena was reminded of the easy anger that had flowed from Gabrielle as his control broke and he lunged over the table top to spit his furious words in her face. "You really wanna know the truth? Do you? I've imagined you dying a thousand times since we left what you... I don't care if your men went out of control, or you weren't even in command that day. You should pay for what you did. But now I can see that Gabrielle was right all along, about the Empire. This city's going to be the centre of a war, and she says you're the only thing that stands between that and everyone in this room being killed." He stopped, panting for breath as the fury washed away. He cast her one last angry look, and slumped into a chair opposite her, and gestured to the children who had gathered around him. "For them, and for Gabrielle, I'll clean your boots if I have to. So, I'm going to make sure you're healthy and alive, okay?" He called behind him, "Mercia, get the fresh meat out of the larder, and get Callus to sear it fast. And some juice while you're there." He turned back to Xena. "Now what did you come here to find out?"
Still taken aback by the boy's swift changes, Xena almost hesitated. But she took a bite of an apple, and chewed while arranging her thoughts. Perdicus seemed willing to believe that Potadaia had been an accident of command. Strange how some people still refused to believe that she would deliberately raze a defenceless farming village to the ground. She wondered how Perdicus and Gabrielle would respond if they knew the truth. In the years that had followed, whenever her own conscience had troubled her, she had reminded herself that the destruction of Potadaia had saved hundreds of other villages, and thousands of lives. The fear that the massacre had engendered had made any resistance melt before her army, just as Alti had promised. It was not an argument that would satisfy this boy or Gabrielle, and increasingly, herself. She swallowed. "Okay. So we know where you stand. What about Gabrielle? When was the last time you talked with her?"
"A few days ago, before she left to see the Green Dragon." At Xena's look of disbelief, he explained. "She dropped messages from her window, and we sent ones to her by slingshot. We know what's going on pretty good."
So Gabrielle's orders hadn't changed from the time she had become Alti's protégé. Why did she still think she needed Xena? How much was this a game of Gabrielle's just to keep her options open?
"Everyone seems to trust Gabrielle. But why should I?" Xena asked.
"Because she deserves it. Look, I'm busy, we have a load of kids that're gonna need a place to sleep in a few hours. Eat your food, and if you want to know who Gabrielle is, I suggest you read her scrolls. She always wanted you to."
"Wanted me to? When did she say that?"
"Five years ago when she wrote them. You want them?"
"She wanted me to read them? Why?"
"Because she wanted you to understand. But I doubt..." He hesitated, and then brought over a bag stuffed haphazardly with scrolls of all different sizes. " Here. They're a mix. Some are her story scrolls, some are journals that she wrote on the way here from Potadaia. She stopped writing soon after we got here; it was just too tough to try and survive. She always wanted to be a bard, but then you happened to her." He began to walk away, adding, "Enjoy your meal. And your reading."
Two candlemarks later, Xena was staring sightlessly at a wall, realising that she'd been suckered, but good. A couple of kids had drawn her into an ambush as skillfully as any she could have built, and she'd fallen for it. 'Enjoy your reading,' indeed.
The problem was that it had started so innocently. The first scrolls she had read were simple childhood prattling, but after a few she found herself engrossed, caught up in the young Gabrielle's skill at creating a story out of commonplace incident. A butcher's difficulty in finding sausage became a monumental crisis in her hands, and the woodcarver who made flutes for the children, a hero. She'd almost forgotten what she was there for until she was in the middle of reading it.
Though it was written by a girl just barely in her teens, Xena had been there, and was brought back by the force of the words. She'd somehow remembered that it had been a sunny day but hadn't recalled all the details of the season that Gabrielle had summoned up. The perfect summer day that had contrasted so horribly with the stench of burning homes, and bodies.
A few of the children had been in the woods all day, and had returned singing and laughing at sunset, telling stories much like the ones Xena had been reading. Gabrielle's last stories, Xena knew. She'd come over that hill, a child for the last time, wondering what the strange burning smell had been, and stumbled into the most horrific massacre in recent Greek history. Seeing not just anonymous victims, but the remains of human beings who had lived and loved that very morning, just as Xena could now see them. Xena felt her pain that the butcher would never laugh again, and that the flutes would be forever silent. Gabrielle had made them all real to Xena, and made her feel their sudden silence and loss. Through the scrolls, she was forced to follow Gabrielle to what was left of her home. Discovered the bodies of her Mother. Father. Sister. She'd heard Perdicus and the other children whimpering in fear and shock beside Gabrielle.
Then came the anger. The rage at the person that had done this, and this was more than familiar - Xena knew from her own heart. Just as she'd wanted to kill Cortese, Gabrielle seemed bent on finding and killing the Warrior Princess.
But why hadn't she? Gabrielle's anger was consuming, and focussed on everything around her. She cursed the summer day for its ironic beauty, and that night after finding only a few scraps to feed on, she'd cursed the clear night sky that evening for its loveliness, determined that such things would never touch her again. That they would always be tainted with pain and anguish.
But there, the parallel to her own descent into hatred had ended. Because there were the other children with her, Gabrielle had been forced as the oldest to take charge. And that, she wrote, had been her salvation. Responsibility was what people like Xena did not take.
'People like Xena steal and cheat and kill and lie because they feel no responsibility. They love to force people to do what they want, and then when it's all ending in death and ruin, they blame the other guys or they run away because they can't handle what they've done. Taking responsibility is hard and it hurts, but that's what makes us stronger. Not afraid to let people close and always pushing people away because it's easier. Hating because it's simplest. I won't be like her, I won't. I'll never give in to that emptiness, I'd rather die.'
The children had been turned away from every door they had come to. Too much war had made extra mouths something to be shunned, and the scorched farmland made it impossible to forage or survive in the wild. So she had decided to take them to the city. Somehow, she had brought them all across country and when they'd finally arrived, ragged, starving and dirty, she'd found them all shelter and she'd stolen to feed them. And so it had started. There had been more children who had been abandoned, and more food was needed, more theft.
Xena had rigorously avoided seeing anything through the eyes of her victims for so long that this was a blow she needed time to recover from. But part of her mind focused on what it revealed. Alti's insistence that all of Potadaia be destroyed took on a new significance. The dreams that Xena had of the God of War urging her to completely destroy the town and slaughter every person suddenly meant much more than a battle stratagem. It implied that the prophesy was real, and that Gabrielle was its foundation. Even if Ares and Alti hadn't known who Gabrielle was, they'd known that someone existed in that small town who was a danger to them or their control over Xena, and she'd been used as the very tool to try to destroy it. But Gabrielle had survived. Somehow, with help or not, she had survived. And that meant that she really was the one, and the prophecy was for real.
Which meant that there was a future, if Xena could find in herself the strength to change. If she and Gabrielle could... what? Did Gabrielle know the truth? Alti certainly did, and had all the advantages.
Everything but time, because restless armies were massing, and the cataclysm was fast approaching.
And Gabrielle. Unlike all of the other betrayals in Xena's life, all the other people she'd lost or thrown away, Gabrielle had found some way past all the hatred and had found some sort of... forgiveness? If that was true, Xena owed her more than loyalty. And if she was wrong, then it didn't matter. She'd be just as well off dead, because this would be her last offering of faith to any mortal. She stretched her shoulders to straighten them out, and wondered how long it had been since she had thought about her past, thought about anything so clearly. It was as though her association with Gabrielle had freed her in some way. She gripped the chair she was seated on, marveling at its firmness, and her assurance that it was part of a reality she shared. It wasn't much, but it was a start.
She'd been sitting like a statue for so long that her sudden movement from the table startled the few children still up, but in a moment Perdicus was in front of her.
"Find out what you needed to know?"
She gave him a resentful glare. "As you probably figured, more than I wanted." There was an awkward pause while she searched for the words, but finally she asked, "Gabrielle... was she really that good a storyteller?"
Perdicus had expected many questions but not that one. "Yes, she was good. She would have been one of the best. But you took her home, and her family, along with everyone and everything we knew. The gift died. She knew... what difference would her scribblings make?"
Xena ignored the question it seemed. Though inwardly she answered "Because it's another of the wounds I made, and I need to know them. I want to make sure no one else, especially me, hurts her again." Still not sure why she felt this commitment, nevertheless she stood, and gave her body a quick examination.
"I need a bath, and I need to fix my leathers. If I'm going into battle I'd better be prepared." Perdicus nodded, and his eyes shone slightly. Xena chuckled ruefully. "Yeah, you got me. Way my life has gone, you'll probably regret it, but you got me. But I have a few things I have to take responsibility for first, you understand?"
She tucked the scrolls carefully back into their bag, and handed it back to Perdicus.
*****
Ephiny had been pleased with Gabrielle's progress through the training. She was fit and strong and young, which was more than they could say for many of their recruits.
Even so, after almost a week of riding, Gabrielle was ready to fall out of the saddle and Ephiny had assigned herself to watch her. She was ready when high on the hillsides, just a half days ride from Ming Tien's encampment, the girl lost her balance and nearly slid from her mount. Ephiny was immediately by her side. Even so, she couldn't help but tease the girl. "I thought you were getting the hang of this?"
Gabrielle was not in the mood. "I've never been on a horse in my life before this week, so what do you expect?"
"Just the usual perfection from an Oracle. But you can relax for a bit. We're stopping here anyway, so you might as well dismount."
Curious, but with ill-disguised relief, Gabrielle did so. "Tell me I don't have to get back on?" she grumbled, staring up the tall, cream coloured flanks of the mare she had been riding for the last five days. Ephiny, eyes twinkling, shook her head. Gabrielle sighed. "Are you sure I can't ride in one of the carts?"
"Alti's orders."
"You're kidding? Training with staves all night, riding all day - this is the plan, right? Why didn't she just kill me in the palace and get it over with? " Gabrielle sighed again, louder. "So, why have we stopped now?" she asked as she rubbed her aching thigh muscles.
"You'll see," Ephiny answered, and as if on cue, Terreis rode over.
The casual evasion was enough to trigger another outburst from the exhausted blonde. "Oh, not more travel plans that I don't know anything about! So much for being an Amazon sister. I thought I was supposed to be leading this damn expedition. Enough secrets - I want to know what's going on!"
Terreis smiled and spread out her arms "This," she stated, proudly. As her hands spread, the hills were filled with cries, and thousands upon thousands of women began to stream down from all sides of the hills that surrounded them.
"This is the new Amazon Nation, Gabrielle." Seeing the girl's astounded face, she grinned and laughed. "You said that Alti was worried that some force might get to Ming Tien and arrange a coup before she could talk to him? Well, you were right. One has."
*****
The door to the ratcatcher's room opened, letting light stream into the darkened room. Framed against the sun was a blond head, atop a short, slim body. Xena knew immediately who it was, and her heart lurched.
"Hello, Solon." She stepped out of the shadows, and brushed dust off her clothes.
"Xena." He sounded neither surprised nor afraid to see her.
"How did you know I was here?"
"Alti followed the Amazon. She promised Gabrielle she wouldn't touch you, but she's given up waiting for you to come for her."
"So she compromised and sent you. How... Alti of her."
While watching her carefully, he moved his hands from behind his back with a deliberate motion. "She gave me this very special crossbow. It can fire three quarrels at once. She said you might be able to catch two." He raised it to his eye.
Xena snorted a laugh. But did she warn you that I could take out the bowman with my chakram first? "So, what are you waiting for?" she asked calmly, her fingers lightly brushing the metal disc that hung from her belt.
