Part 11:
Xena's eyes shot open and focused on a gray sky, sleep immediately leaving her as she rose to a sitting position in her bedroll. The startling blue eyes narrowed and she cocked her head to the right, listening intently.
It was quiet in the clearing - much too quiet for her liking.
Xena cautiously rose to her feet, turning in the direction that her ever-faithful Argo had been grazing in when she had fallen asleep the previous night. The golden palomino mare whickered nervously, her liquid-brown eyes huge as she stared at her approaching mistress.
"Hey…" Xena murmured soothingly as she stood in front of the horse, gently reaching out to pat the velvet muzzle.
Argo bellowed loudly, suddenly backing away from Xena and rearing up in front of her. Xena was so surprised by her normally calm steed's actions that it was only her lightning-quick reflexes that saved her from getting hit by a hoof. She reached out and grabbed her horse's reins and shouted, "Calm down, girl! Shh!"
Xena continued speaking softly to Argo, and eventually the mare calmed down. Xena, however, was not nearly so sanguine as she temporarily left the mare to have a quick bite to eat and then break camp. Her hand kept creeping over to her chakram of its own accord several times and she had to mentally force herself to leave the deadly weapon alone.
Xena gazed up at the sky again as she mounted Argo and sighed; no sun today, but it didn't look like it was going to rain either. The gray sky suited her equally bleak mood. She had been gone from her family and friends for far too long and she had missed them terribly while journeying back from Chin for the past few months. Her thoughts turned to them.
Eve, at seventeen, turning into a poised, beautiful, and strong young woman… Gabrielle, her green eyes sparkling with excitement as she told stories of their adventures that would hold her audience captive for hours upon end… Joxer, playing his lute, always ready with jokes or silly stories that would make everyone laugh… Adora, her lips pouting out in concentration like her father's did as she drew on any empty piece of parchment that she could find… Andy, his short blond hair flying around his face, laughing merrily as he ran into Jett's waiting arms… Even Autolycus still shamelessly flirting with her after all this time was enough to bring a tiny smile to Xena's lips. It's true: you don't know what you've got 'til it's gone, she thought to herself. She made a clicking noise and Argo obediently moved forward.
Horse and rider moved along in companionable silence for some time until a slight breeze stirred up and a faint and odd-smelling odor made its way to Xena's nose. She halted Argo in the middle of the path with a soft murmur and inhaled deeply. Xena exhaled sharply and her stomach roiled in sudden recognition. It was a scent she knew all too well - the sickening stench of bodies decaying combined with the sharp, metallic scent of blood.
Xena's heart sped up in her chest as she urged Argo forward. "YAH!" she cried. Argo's hoofs thundered down the dirt road in response to her mistress' yell. As she rode along the path that would bring her home, Xena carefully scrutinized the land, searching for any clues of a battle recently being fought in the vicinity.
The scent grew stronger as Xena continued riding and dread filled her soul. One hand slid from the reins to clutch at her chakram before she forced herself to concentrate fully on her riding. Her sharp eyes scanned the horizon as she drew Argo to a halt when she spotted a single small puff of smoke rising into the gray sky from a large hill. Her lips drew together in a thin line and her eyes narrowed as she grimly turned the mare towards the smoke.
Xena reached the top of the hill and her eyes widened in shock when she saw the amount of bodies scattered across the plain. She had Argo come to a halt and she nimbly dismounted from the mare, murmuring for her to stay while she looked around. The mare snorted, but she put her head down to graze while Xena cautiously walked towards the outskirts of the battle with sword drawn and eyes darting back and forth.
Xena sighed as two vultures lit down and greedily began feeding on the carcass of a half-eaten man not too far away from where she was standing. She turned away, her face drawn up in disgust. The scent of decaying bodies made her stomach churn uncomfortably. Her nostrils flared as she straightened to full height and grimly began picking her way through the dead but she stopped short when something registered in her whirling mind.
Xena's eyes widened when it occurred to her that the dead weren't soldiers but villagers upon closer inspection. There were shields, swords, maces, and other weapons normally seen in combat but none of the dead were clothed in any particular garb that would identify them as any part of a specific army garrison. As she continued to pick her way amongst the corpses, Xena even saw that a couple of fallen men held pitchforks in their stiffened hands and she shook her head in disbelief.
Xena knelt down beside one of the bodies and she saw that whoever had killed the man lying next to her was no professional. He had not died from a single quick stab to the gut or had his throat slit, but he had been stabbed repeatedly. She noted how haphazard the wound strike pattern was and it seemed to her that the killer had gone completely insane with rage, striking out blindly until his victim fell.
Xena swallowed hard as she rose to her feet and began walking again, her sharp mind taking in everything that she saw in minute detail. She heard the softest of moans and her blue eyes widened in alarm. Gods… Someone is actually still alive… she thought to herself. She whirled around in the direction of the moaning, her ears straining until she heard it again and she could determine exactly where the person was. Grimly, she slowly and carefully maneuvered herself over the fallen until she found the man.
A metallic taste filled Xena's mouth when she saw the man's condition - and his age. He was no more than eighteen summers, she reckoned as she knelt down next to him. He didn't have long to live, she saw. Infection had already set into the gaping wound in his stomach. She could see some yellow-green pus weeping from the wound in conjunction with the slow stream of blood that trickled out with every shuddering breath of air he took in his failing lungs.
The sight of the man and the foul stench of imminent death, combined with the knowledge that there was nothing Xena could do to help him except for delivering a quick and final blow of mercy to relieve his suffering suddenly threatened to overwhelm the battle-hardened warrior. She resolutely swallowed back the bile that rose to her throat as the young man's eyes opened and focused on her.
"X-X-Xena," the man whispered, his unusual silver-colored eyes wide as he recognized the tall warrior.
Xena carefully put her hand over what was left of his upper arm - the man's hand and part of the lower limb had been hacked away. "What happened?" she asked in as gentle a voice that she could muster under the circumstances.
The man's breathing was becoming labored. "World's gone mad," he managed to choke out. He coughed once, a harsh rattling cough. A trickle of bloody spit fell down his chin. "Death everywhere… Towns burning…" His eyes were beginning to lose their focus.
Xena's eyes widened at the man's last two words. "There's a town five leagues to the south of here…"
The man's eyes widened as he drew in one last, wheezing breath and became still. Xena rose to her feet shakily, staring down at the man's face. It seemed to her as she moved away from him that his eyes stared up at her accusingly, damning her for having the unmitigated gall to still live. She turned away from him, her face drawn up in an ugly scowl that hid her increasing anxiety.
Argo whickered uneasily as her mistress approached. "Me too, old girl. I don't like it either. Let's go home," Xena growled low in her throat, taking a moment to pat the mare's neck once in reassurance before mounting up and heading back down the road at top speed, her fury and anxiety increasing with each stride the golden mare took.
As Xena rode along the road, she met no travelers along the way but she saw many dead bodies off the road, and once, she had to slow Argo down and guide her around two half-decayed bodies lying smack dab in the middle of it. She saw that both bodies had swords stuck through their stomachs. Her anxiety grew and threatened to overtake her several times as she approached her home. She held onto the reins so tightly as she urged Argo onward that she didn't even realize that the leather straps were beginning to cut into the palms of her hands.
A couple of hours later, Xena finally reached the town's outskirts and she drew Argo to a halt, gasping sharply when she saw that the gates leading into the sleepy town had been destroyed. She slowly dismounted the golden mare, unsheathed her sword, and warily led Argo through the remains of the town gates and down the path that led to the marketplace - only there was no marketplace.
There was simply - nothing - nothing but burnt-out remains of buildings. The memory of leading her army to loot and burn Cirra came back to the ex-warlord's mind with a vengeance and Xena's face turned white.
Cirra post-sacking looked like downtown Athens compared to this place.
Xena heard a noise a short distance away from her and she whirled around, sword held before her defensively. She breathed in, trying to calm herself down when she saw that it was only a piece of pottery that had fallen from the remains of a windowsill.
"Gabrielle… Eve…" Xena murmured, her mind immediately slamming back into the present. Dropping Argo's reins, she broke into a sprint, running as fast as she could towards Gabrielle and Joxer's home, her heart beating in her chest like a sledgehammer as she ran.
Xena didn't even feel her sword drop from her nerveless fingers as she skidded to a stop before her best friends' home. "Oh no," she moaned, shaking her head in disbelief. "No…" The strength left her legs and she fell to her knees. "No," she repeated over and over, her voice growing louder as she stared with wide eyes. Gabrielle's sais… Joxer's sword, lying to one side… The burned skeletal remains of a leg, separated from its body…
Xena had killed many men in her past life as a warlord and had been both the cause and witness of many gruesome scenes in her life, but - nothing - had ever prepared her for anything like this. Her head kept shaking in disbelief as she continued staring, her voice rising to shrill screams as she repeated over and over: "NO… NO… NO… NOOOOOOOOOO!"
As Xena's grief-stricken cries echoed through the silent valley, a gentle rain began to fall from the gray midday sky.
"NOOOOOOOOOO!" Xena yelled, her heart pounding in her chest as she bolted upright in her bedroll. She breathed in deeply in an effort to calm herself, her mind distantly registering the fact that she was sweating and that her body was shaking like a leaf. Her eyes flew up to gaze at the sky - a deep and almost cloudless azure. She could hear birds chirping in the trees and Argo neighed cheerfully to her mistress in greeting.
Xena fought back the temptation to be sick by continuing to take in several deep breaths and hanging her head low until the sensation passed. "A dream… It was nothing but a bad dream," she murmured, wiping her sweaty forehead.
"Morpheus sometimes takes his job a little too seriously, I'm afraid."
Xena immediately shot to her feet, all traces of her earlier distress gone, replaced with fury. "Athena!" she growled as the Goddess of Wisdom appeared before her. Her fists clenched together as she drew herself to full height. "What do you want?" she demanded in a deadly soft voice, her eyes narrowing dangerously.
Athena gazed at Xena serenely. "I think you know why I'm here," she said simply.
Xena licked her lips, taking in the Goddess' words. "Eve... Adora…" she said in a whisper. "It's beginning to happen, isn't it?"
The Goddess nodded. "You must hurry, Xena. Time grows short." Athena then disappeared into the ether in a flash of white-hot light.
Xena blinked furiously as the after-effects of the Goddess' departure flashed before her eyes for several seconds. When it finally stopped, she walked towards Argo, who whickered. She reached out and gently scratched underneath the golden mare's chin. "We've got two days of hard traveling, old friend."
Argo snorted in reply and Xena smiled grimly. "I just hope that we're not too late."
