Betas: Kam, Tazmy and Prankster, to whom I owe a big debt of gratitude. Thank you for your help and support.

Chapter Eight

hundred years, hundred more
someday we may see a
woman king, sword in hand
swing at some evil and bleed

"Teyla, please!"

The merest fraction of a second, and Teyla held back the rod at the very last moment.

He was a conjurer, a professor of tricks. "Please."

He was "Please."

a criminal "Please."

like his friends, the dark-haired man and the man with wild hair "Please."

that she had sent to toil in the field. "Please."

His collar was covered with his blood and his eyes were opened again but becoming unfocused,

but she was king "Please."

and couldn't care about that.

She pushed McKay away so that he fell back in the dirt again.

Centris watched with interest.

"You are a disappointment," he said, matter of factly. "Do the people of Sey mean so little that you would fail to execute a dangerous criminal in their midst?"

"He is innocent."

"How do you know?" With that he waved his hands and the sentries moved in to claim the pale man.

"No, you will leave him!" Teyla stood up over the professor, keeping herself between him and the guards.

"Have you forgotten your oath to serve in the best interests of your people?"

"I am your king. I am devoted to my people." But she wasn't so sure anymore because her anger toward the pale man was fading and her urge to protect him growing stronger with every beat of her heart.

The Prime Minister clasped his hands behind his back and leaned forward and back in deep thought. "You resemble our royal clan, but you are not of it," he said, nodding to his sentries, who moved again towards the professor.

"Leave him!" Teyla stood even more resolutely before McKay.

"You really are the image of Tarrissa, our queen, and you ruled as well as she until now, discarding the unproductive among us."

"I condemned only one man to death, and he is here, alive. I rescind my order and command that he be set free."

"Your conscience cannot thwart a death order, Your Maje. It is truly set in stone."

"I said leave him!" and with that she hoisted her smooth bar and stood ready.

"If you do not allow the executioner to perform his duties and do not take on the task yourself, then your sentries will do it for you."

She said nothing, but felt her body preparing for battle, her heart speeding up, her spine tingling as if she had switched on an extra-sensory device, as if she possessed an extra sense that had always been there, humming just below the surface of her consciousness.

The first sentry raised his bar and Teyla bent her knees to steady herself, and then her heavy rod connected with his arms and his head and then with his legs, all in one motion it seemed. As he fell, she gave a great shove and hurled him backwards out of her way, like a discarded apple core.

Another sentry was dispatched with equal speed. Others approached, most of them now without their usual smug expressions, but with fear in their eyes. Teyla easily disarmed one of them and then had two iron bars at her disposal. Left hand, right hand, left hand, right, moving and spinning, ducking and kicking, she took out one sentry after the other, all the while ensuring that no one came within striking distance of the professor, who still lay on the ground clutching his head.

Her weeks-old lethargy vanished with each blow to her hated sentries. They had placed collars on people, pulled them along by chains as if they were oxen!

Many men went down in the dust. Centris watched impassively as this happened. Teyla paid him no attention, but relished the idea of taking him down when she had the chance.

His hypnotic, velvet voice drifted by. "You should stop before you become injured."

"Never." Teyla moved against the sentries, wondering at the calm that centered her, for she was fighting for nothing but the life of a pudgy inventor, a tinkerer of sorts.

"He is nothing." The minister seemed to read her thoughts.

A hit to a sentry's side, a poke in the chest, a kick to the groin. Then a flick of her wrist and the man was sprawled ten feet away. The ones still standing hung back, now, some of them looking to Centris for guidance, but he calmly blinked, communicating his desire that they continue to fight their king.

"You never know, Teyla, but someone could come up behind you."

"I would know of his presence."

"What makes you think that, Your Maje? Have you fought like this before?"

Momentarily doubting herself, she turned, checked that her back was clear and faced forward, only to take a hit to the side of her face. The blow knocked her off balance and she fell to one knee.

Damning herself for listening to Centris, who seemed to have taken trickery to the level of an art, the king grabbed a lungful of air and leaped to both feet, still blocking, turning, knocking bar to bar, defeating each sentry in turn until only a few remained.

"You will drop at some point, my dear," Centris's honeyed voice, once so warm and calming, now grated on her nerves.

Then Centris motioned for the sentries to fall back. "I have saved the best for last," he intoned.

Teyla stood there panting, watching downed guards crawl away, cradling injured heads and limbs, and wiping at bleeding lacerations. At her feet, the professor groaned and moved a little in a semi-conscious twilight.

"The best?" she inquired angrily, breathing heavily and wiping grime from her eyes.

"When you and your people came through the ring, we thought that the gods had heard our pleas. Imagine, two strong men to work the fields, and a beautiful woman, the very image of our queen, to take up the throne emptied by revolt only days before. The three of you could have done great things for us. The fourth…" he gestured at the writhing professor. "He was concerned with machines and inventions, things that we do not need."

"Why do you speak of my traveling here with these others? I am your king, Centris!"

"You are a girl who came with this professor and two others through the ring!"

Teyla cast her gaze down at the professor, whose name was still lost to her, and saw only her memories of her royal training, her imperial tutors, gown fittings and rich meals eaten on golden plates with silver goblets brimming with mellow wines. She saw her mother and father, the people from the paintings in the Great Hall, sitting at table with her, also dressed in splendid clothes and making sure that the young Teyla minded her manners. Then this vanished and she sat at supper in a crude lodge, at a rough board, remembering her family destroyed not by rebellion but by invaders from the sky.

"I have lived here always. You are telling lies!"

Centris shook his head, just as she expected that he would.

McKay groaned again and, for an instant, Teyla felt as if she knew him, as if he were important for reasons beyond her understanding, reasons that lay deeper than the guilt that had plagued her since condemning him.

She placed her hand on the professor's shoulder and he grasped her fingers and held them fast.

"You will see," Centris replied, amused. "You did not sup this evening and the potion I've been giving you lasts only a short while. Once it wears off, you will remember your real life and be as useless to us as the professor. So neither one of you will leave here alive. My most skilled fighters now stand ready to take you and this professor both."

"What are you talking about? I am ordering you to desist!"

Centris flicked his fingers and the remaining four sentries came to attention, ready to engage in battle not with the king's enemy, but with the king, herself.

…..

McKay lay in the courtyard, uncoordinated and pretty sure that he had significant brain damage, seeing the very picture of grace dancing before his eyes. This was Teyla fighting with her sticks, moving brilliantly as if she were the embodiment of a great idea. There she was as he'd seen her before, fighting off predators. If he could have, he would have fought with her, just as he would have all the times before.

Then there were four sentries left and Teyla put her hand on his shoulder and he clasped it to give her something to show how much he appreciated her efforts on his behalf.

Then she rose to fight again.

He pulled her back, refusing to let go. "No, Teyla, I'm not worth it."

If he had seen defiance in her eyes before, it was nothing compared with what she shot at him now.

"I fight for both of our lives," she said.

"Oh." He paused. "That's okay, then."

McKay lay back once more. Then again came the reverberations of bar hitting bar and Teyla's breathing and the rustle of thin boots kicking up dust as the furious battle continued.

One man went down, then two. McKay allowed himself to believe that Teyla might win this after all. Then he grunted in surprise when an unseen sentry grabbed him from behind by his heavy collar and pulled back sharply. He clutched at the metal ring as it choked him. Teyla turned to the sound of this and in a flash was overwhelmed by the two remaining sentries still on their feet. They took her down hard, one striking her back and her neck, the other ramming her legs out from under her. She landed heavily, dazed, next to McKay, who felt his collar go slack as his assailant, satisfied with his ploy, released him.

The scientist gathered Teyla in his arms, uttering soft encouragement that he wasn't certain she heard.

"It's okay," he said. "You were great, Teyla. Really, I mean it."

It was hard to move with the cuffs locking parts of him together, but McKay did what he could to comfort his friend. Centris approached with more sentries. They all carried the iron bars so ubiquitous that McKay knew exactly what was to come.

Teyla stirred and McKay felt dismayed that she would have to die like this, lying in the dirt with him instead of standing tall in battle or else old and in a comfortable bed with her family all around her.

Centris said nothing but raised his weapon and McKay curled over Teyla's head, wishing that his last act could be something more meaningful. The bar wooshed through the air.

TBC…