The sun shone warm and orange from the cloud free cerulean sky. Gabrielle's latest horse, a grey white mare, rode along peacefully on the road towards Poteidaia. More and more the road and places seemed familiar yet distinctly different. The world had grown older in her sleeping absence, but it lacked none in beauty in her eyes. The deep green of the grasses and bushes, the perfectly crowned trees and here and there peaceful farmsteads seemed to greet her with each glance of her sea green eyes.
She felt a peace and calm in her heart that hadn't been there since she had jumped overboard and swum to Higuchi. Xena's burial and her stay at Eve's hospice had done her some real good after that depression she had developed on seeing Greece again. There were still lingering thoughts of that and her mysteriously openhearted talk with Ares, but all in all she was feeling like she was in the middle of a month long vacation. Her propensity for attracting trouble seemed to have faded somewhat since she had left Xena's quest in Egypt.
Gabrielle reined in her horse and looked around as came to the final bridge before she headed into the valley surrounding Poteidaia. It seemed well kept and strong enough to carry her and her horse. Suddenly she heard a faint sound from across the river. She focused her senses. The ability was getting easier and easier to call forth. It was just a question of focusing on her hearing and sifting through the sounds then letting her soul see and understand what lay behind those sounds. She was beginning to think that this ability to focus using her inner being could be used for other things.
She heard the sound of metal hacking into wood. She heard the sounds of rapid foot steps followed by the sound of men yelling and a woman cry out in pain. Quickly her mind and soul connected the clues for her. At least three men were attacking a man and a woman and he was defending her with a staff or stick. "Yah", she yelled and spurned her horse into a full gallop, thundering across the wooden bridge and heading towards the battle close by.
Aikaterine felt the cold ground underneath her. Somewhere around her she could hear someone throwing their belongings of the cart probably in search of money or goods. She knew with chagrin that they would only find sacks of grain that they had been planning to sell at the markets of Poteidaia. Now their plans for a farm of their own would be dashed again and they would have to continue slaving away on the fields of Nikodemos for another year at least. She heard Ianos grunt in pain again. He had tried to stop the robbers with his walking stick, but he was not even capable of fighting in a barroom brawl much less against these thugs with their deadly weapons. She wished that she hadn't caught that heavy blow from the other robber's club, but otherwise Ianos would have been dead by now. Again Aikaterine prayed to the gods that her unborn child would survive this battle and that her pregnancy would go well. The haze of pain was slowly lifting and she managed to open her eyes and turn her head just in time to see her husband be thrown to the ground by two of the three robbers, while the last one was probably the one looking for loot in the cart. Their leader a massive dark and dirty man in dark leather lifted his double edged sword. "You'll die for resisting us", he said in a heavily accented voice.
Suddenly a piercing and shrill sound resounded between the trees and a metal ring clipped the robber's sword down to half size, destroyed the other one's club in the same manner, rebounded on an old tree and whirled back down the road. Aikaterine became aware of hooves hammering into the ground then silence. Was the Poteidaia militia coming to their rescue? She slowly turned her head to look in the same direction as the thieves. There no more than a couple of yards down the dirt road a woman sat astride on a large white horse. Her red clothing and silver jewelry looked very expensive and beautiful; her form was equally beautiful and even more surprising it was tanned, muscled and athletic. She was hooking the metal ring to her silver plated belt and quietly got of her horse. The thieves gathered in the middle of the road facing of against the woman, leaving her and her husband lying on the ground.
"Why don't you guys get away from this valley and head somewhere else", the blond woman suggested with no mirth in her voice.
"Why don't you get on your horse, little girl, and ride off to your parents and tell them that there is no festival around here, so they shouldn't let you ride around in a costume", the leader of the thieves suggested while a broken toothed smile.
"I think not. You should leave. I am a better fighter than you and I don't like killing people even scum like you, so why don't you give this up and leave", she suggested again, while she bent down and lifted two very foreign looking daggers from her boots. She unceremoniously whirled them around them held them with the butt end pointing towards the thieves.
"Get her. Her jewelry alone will pay for an entire night in the hore house", the leader yelled and ran towards her.
Aikaterine noticed how the woman neither flinched nor seemed frightened as the three thieves attacked. Of course only one was still armed with a club, but Aikaterine had seen many a single fighter taken down, when attacked by several enemies back in the days she served in the tavern. She gasped as combat was initiated.
Gabrielle took initiative immediately as the three thugs ran towards her. She ran a few steps forward and high kicked the man with the club in the throat, while parrying the fist of the leader with a sai supported forearm. She whirled about and turned the movement into a spinning kick to the back of the man's lower legs. He tumbled to the ground. She came up to stand and had to leap out of the way as the third thief tried to hit her with the club of his friend.
Aikaterine could barely believe her eyes. The woman fought better than anyone she had ever seen. She danced and leapt around her opponents, kicking and hitting them hard. The blows of her strange weapons seemed to be hard enough to lay the men down and she did all of this with a white smile pasted on her face and a look of fierce joy in her eyes. Then she thought the woman's luck ran out. The leader managed to hammer a hard blow into her stomach. Surely this meant the defeat of the now weakened woman.
Gabrielle felt his blow ramming her in the gut, but she had seen it coming and rolled with the blow, while tensing and relaxing her muscles knowing from experience and instinct that doing so would lessen the damage and pain. She forced herself to ignore it. She had to make a decision. Would these men give up? Her gut instinct told her that the two followers would, but their leader had a fanatic look in his eyes and demeanor. He could not conceive of defeat to a woman. She would have to disable him fully or even worse possibly kill him to win. Either that or get hurt and as Xena had taught her. Better them than she. Gabrielle felt her high spirits drop a bit as she did a flying back kick into the one of the two standing thieves. "Surrender", she pleaded their leader. But his eyes showed that he only believed her to be bluffing or even worse on the edge of giving up. He wouldn't change his mind. She came to a grim decision.
Aikaterine saw the joy and smile disappear from the woman's face. Something had turned this fight serious. She realized that the woman hadn't even been taking this fight seriously until now. That was an unsettling thought seeing as the woman's fighting ability already outclassed that of any warrior she had seen in her life until now.
She managed a drop kick onto the leader's shoulder and sent him down for a breath, but the first guy she kicked in the throat was in need of some more attention. He charged at her from behind. She did a backwards flip and soared over the club and past his onrushing attack to stand behind him. She quickly kicked him as hard as at all possibly in the right kidney. He dropped to the ground screaming hoarsely, he would need a healer for both neck and back now. Almost too late she saw the leader, who was again back for even more to add to his already black and blue beaten body, rushing towards her brandishing the leftovers of his sword. She easily ducked below his swing and attacked upwards from her crouch. Gabrielle hammered the pummels of her Sai's into the leader's chest and sent him to the ground. For a few seconds the fight stilled then he rose and charged her madly with a roar, this time seeming to want to strangle her with his bare hands. Gabrielle felt sorry for him as he did exactly as she had known he would. In rage he tried to use his size and weight to his advantage to bowl her over. Gabrielle easily sidestepped him and got ready to skewer him, when suddenly an idea came to her and she smacked the two iron sai into the back of skull of the man. He fell heavily to the ground and remained there.
She turned towards the last thief standing out of her range seemingly ready to bolt. "I am sorry. I didn't want to, they made me do it", he claimed and Gabrielle took a slow step towards him. He hobbled off in the direction of the bridge immediately. Gabrielle just looked after him, deciding that he wasn't forth running after. Then she smiled. She was happy that she hadn't been forced to kill anyone. She whistled for her horse.
Aikaterine finally got off the ground and woozily staggered over to Ianos, who was still lying on the ground nursing a bleeding cut over his brow. She quietly cared for the wound trying to stop the bleeding using a piece of her own clothing, when suddenly a shadow fell over them. "I might be able to help", a sweet female voice with a lot of timbre and the accents of a thousand places offered.
Aikaterine rose and curtsied to the heroic woman, who had saved them. That immediately got her a hasty and seemingly irritated suggestion: "Don't do that", from the mighty woman. Aikaterine looked at her without understanding as the woman, who she now realized up close looked even more grandiose and rich than she had from afar, sat down besides her husband with her waterskin and some things she had retrieved from her saddlebags. Barely a hair was out of place on this mighty warrior after defeat three robbers. She suddenly saw the magnificent green tattoo of some wondrous beast, which adorned her entire back.
Suddenly puzzled Aikaterine looked around to see that the two remaining thieves had been tied to a tree with what looked like a whip and were both still unconscious. She looked back to see the woman carefully dapping something on her husband's forehead. He winced in pain. "What are you doing?" She asked hesitantly. "The wound needs to be cleaned now. I will stitch it up, when it is clean. It is going to be a little painful, but if I do it like this there should be nearly no scarring. Believe me, I have done it before and had it done to me many times", she explained and began the careful work.
Later as they had gotten their stuff together and Ianos was feeling better, they sat out again for Poteidaia. The warrior was going in the same direction, so they traveled together. Finally she worked up the courage to ask the warrior some questions.
Gabrielle rode in silence besides the ox cart of the farmers, while the tied up thieves bitched and moaned as they either walked or were dragged by her horse towards their coming appointment with the magistrate. The farmers seemed like fine people, even if she didn't recognize their family name; they were probably some of the new people attracted to the flourishing Poteidaia. "Excuse me my lady", the timid farmer wife suddenly spoke. Gabrielle smiled, while her title entitled her to a Lady or even a Majesty, she had never been addressed as that outside the Amazon nation.
"Please don't call me that. My name is Gabrielle and I am not a noble. At least not around here", she explained.
"Gabrielle? I've heard that name before, but I can't remember", Aikaterine blurted out loud, while she tried to remember that story. It had been good and about someone famous, someone from this very valley. She had been told about it by some of the old women at the well. It was about some bard, who had left Poteidaia and become a legend. Suddenly she remembered and looked back at the blond woman again. She fit the description like a glove.
"You're Gabrielle of Poteidaia", she stated in awe of the legends told about her and the brilliant stories made by Gabrielle that she had loved as a child.
The blond woman looked at her for a long moment then smiled at her indulgently. "Yeah, I am Gabrielle, The battling bard of Poteidaia", she admitted with what sounded like a sigh.
Aikaterine and her husband both gasped in surprise then noticed that the thieves had also done so. She decided not to speak for a while as memories of those stories flashed around in her mind. She suddenly remembered the stories clearly. That Gabrielle the gifted bard was the best friend and traveling companion of Xena the Warrior Princess that she had been at Xena's side against the Olympians, that her stories were considered some of the best in the known world and that she was an actual Amazon queen. She had seen hundreds of battles and several wars. She had stood against the gods and their servants on her own and with her friend the god slayer. She was known as merciful and good to the core, but she would fight for the greater good and only killed when it was merited. She was truly a living legend believed dead and possibly even had been killed several times, but the stories told that she had survived or come back from the dead to keep on fulfilling her mission to fight for the innocent everywhere at the side of her friend. Yet here she rode and seemed very real and non legendary. Her boots were dusty from the sandy road; her brow was still wet from the sweat of fighting and the heat of the day. This was a real life woman. A woman she could have grown up with. In fact she realized some people around Poteidaia had, even if only the older people around here remembered that now.
"Not far anymore", she heard Gabrielle whisper to herself. Did she imagine or did the woman actually sound wary.
"If you don't mind me asking, what brings you home?" Aikaterine asked with a friendly smile.
"So you finally decided to talk to me like I am a real person. Good I am no more a hero than you are, so I dislike being treated as one. I am just Gabrielle", Gabrielle replied with an equally friendly smile, "I am coming here to see my remaining family. I hope they are okay; it has been more than a year since I was last home. I've been gone for a long time without sending word again. I bet my sister is really angry with me. But hey at least it is better than the last time, then I was gone for over 25 years and everyone thought I was dead". Gabrielle felt the intense regret over that. Even Ares had admitted that his actions had been a huge mistake. It had in a way cost Joxer his life and Eve her upbringing with a loving family. Many things in the world would have been different if he hadn't done what he did. But that was in the past and the things she had said to Xena in the beginning still held true. You had to leave the past behind, while learning from it so that you didn't repeat it.
The day carried on as they rode through the final stretch of woodland before they reached the town of Poteidaia. Gabrielle saw the white clutch of houses and town wall which constituted the town centre and markets; however a newer clutch of thatched wooden houses, probably owned by artisans, surrounded the town wall and Gabrielle had already noticed a larger amount of farmsteads in the valley. Everything looked peaceful and prosperous like the last time. Maybe Ares had only wanted for her to go home; she contemplated for a mere moment, and then discarded the thought. No, she realized that he was more likely warning her of some brewing war that was coming to Poteidaia soon. Maybe her hometown needed her help.
Suddenly a group of warriors approached on horseback. "Ah, here we go", she thought with little mirth. "It seems my gift for attracting trouble was only taking a vacation. Welcome back then old friend". Gabrielle looked around for a second making sure that she knew where everything was in case of a skirmish. She checked her weapons and then looked up just as the riders stopped a couple of yards away.
A young man clad in traditional brown leathers and blue cloth, pulled off his heavy looking helmet and looked at her. She judged him to be around her age. He had a serious face with grey eyes, light skin and brown hair. "Ho there warrior", he greeted her.
"Hello there. Should we get out of your way?" She asked with a mischievous smile.
"No, actually we are the Poteidaia militia and we were going out to capture some thugs roaming the borders of the valley. It seems to no longer be necessary", he said with a smile and looked at the two thieves with recognition easily seen in his eyes.
"Yes, I stumbled on these fools attacking these two, when I entered the valley. I was planning to take them to the Magistrate", she explained and unhooked the whip from her saddle.
The man indicated to two men to unseat and take the thieves in custody. The thieves were smacked in manacles immediately. The man turned back to Gabrielle who was coiling her whip and replacing it onto its place on her saddle. "Now if I may. We don't get many amazons in Poteidaia; may I ask your business here?"
Gabrielle looked at him for a second realizing that this man was educated enough to recognize the abundance of amazon symbols on her clothing and possessions. Of course the fact, that she was a female and a warrior, was a dead giveaway as well. "I am here to see family actually. I am only an amazon by adoption", she explained with a smile at his incredulous expression, then he indicated that she could move on, while he asked the two farmers to accompany him to the Magistrate so that they could give evidence again those thieves. Gabrielle smiled happily at another small task well done and put her horse into a slow trot towards her family's homestead.
She approached her old home and immediately another big smile sprung into place as she realized how well the day was going. She had saved two people from certain death, defeated three robbers and brought two to justice. Now she was just a few hundred yards from her ancestral home. She looked around. The fields that had looked so badly kept the last time they had been here; were now filled with grain and a few fields held grass where some sheep were laying about. The fences seemed freshly made and she could see that their old home was looking splendid with new thatching on the roof of the main building and a fresh coat of paint on all the buildings together with some rather complete looking repairs. She wondered for a few seconds, if Sarah was some kind of handywoman wizard or if Lila had hired help to do such a large job, but then she reminded herself, it was over a year and a half since she had last been around here.
Gabrielle swung herself from the horse with practiced ease and mused for a second as she remembered the many years, she had traveled without out a horse first because of her memories of her beloved pony, then as a matter of habit. In the end the massive changes she had decided on after her crucifixion had brought her past that limitation and now she wouldn't go without one most of the time. They were a darned practical thing to have around that she would have to admit. She took her saddle bags of the horse and hoped that Lila could find a good place for it in her stables. She realized that she hadn't named her yet, but she would do it soon that she promised herself. She was no Argo, but she was quickly picking up her training and would be a great warhorse soon. Maybe she would name her Ghost, Gabrielle thought as she walked towards the wooden front door. Suddenly it was torn open and two children ran out. The boy and girl stopped and stared in surprise at the strange woman standing in front of them, she realized in her surprised daze. They were both too old to be either Lila's or Sarah's, maybe they were the neighbor's kids and Lila or Sarah was caring for them that had happened a lot in her childhood. "Excuse me, but do either of you know where Lila is", Gabrielle asked.
The girl, who was a cute little blond and obviously older than the boy, looked at her. She smiled shyly and looked up to the tall woman her curly locks falling into her eyes as she said: "No. But my father might know. He is very smart", she explained with the absolute conviction of a five year old. "Daddy", she called out, "A rich woman is here to talk to you".
Again Gabrielle sighed. She couldn't for the life of her figure out, why people went around claiming she was a noble or rich woman. She looked down at herself and then as slow realization dawned on her, she looked back at the man in brown and grey cloth and leather with patches that came walking out the door. She suddenly realized that she had in a way been leading the life of a rich woman since they had gone to India. Their fortune had built up over the years as unused rewards, prizes for her performances and payments for her scrolls, then the money she constantly received from her amazons even if she asked them not to give her what was theirs and things seized from the warlords they had defeated without anyone to give them to, had accumulated in their possession, when they had only their traveling expenses to cover. So over time they had gotten rich on adventuring without even trying or wanting to. Xena had wisely decided to quietly shift the money away into different nations, lending it to people she trusted with it like her mother, but in the end most of it they had buried in the ground in spots known only to them. That was the way they had survived their 25 year snooze in the beginning and even now their caches around Rome were a little smaller than here in Greece. In a way she was really a rich woman with little fortunes hidden all over the known world. Of course she still lived of the meager remainders of the gems she had been given in Japan so there was no reason to go to the cache buried near Amphipolis. With a meek smile she greeted the puzzled dark haired man who seemed confused by her continuing silence. "Excuse me, but where is Lila?" She asked surprised that it looked like he had just come out of the living room of her childhood home.
"I am sorry, but I don't know anyone named Lila", he claimed and looked at her in confusion.
"But this is her farm, the farm of my family, it has been our farm for generations", she stuttered in shock, fears welled up inside her and she almost cried out in alarm.
"Well, if that is the case, then I am sorry to tell you that whoever they were, they must have sold it to Nikodemos the merchant, because I bought it off him over a year ago when we moved here. I never met any Lila or any other owner of this place", he explained with pity in his eyes as he beheld the complete and utter despondence that had just appeared in her eyes.
"What now", her mind cried out, while her mouth spoke in an even unemotional tone: "I am sorry to have disturbed you. I'll be on my way then". Gabrielle walked towards her horse, picking up speed and nervous energy with each step. She would have to find someone, who knew Lila or Sarah or maybe even her. Someone who knew what had happened. Somewhere inside her mind that meager little voice of hate and violence that had grown slowly over the years demanded that whoever had forced her family into exile would pay for it with blood. Gabrielle silenced it and slipped her foot into the stirrup and lifted herself into the saddle in one quick and trained movement. She spurred Ghost with her heels and set off in the direction of central Poteidaia in search of someone or something that would tell her where Lila was. That thought dominated her mind as much as the thought that her sister was one of the few things left of her entire life aside from thousands of nameless people saved by her and Xena's adventures. She was in many ways her remaining link to the regular world, to the common people. The white horse thundered towards the collection of white buildings that made up the center of town.
