As she arose from her grass bed in the secluded copse, Fiona reflected on the anger that came back to her with the dream. The emotions from most dreams, those omelettes of ideas made from the leftovers of the day, faded with time. But with this sort of dream — a vivid memory replayed — the emotions came back every time in just as much detail. And of all the emotions this dream brought her, the most vivid was the anger that coursed through her.
She'd like to believe that her compassion for the slaughtered ogre she'd have shown for any innocent being. But her own anger, her own violent response, that was definitely her own ogre on display.
The dream also left her with an aching sense of emptiness. The emptiness settled deep in the way dreams do, emotion painted more vividly than imagery. Unlike the anger, she knew the emptiness was just a memory. She had filled that emptiness. She was anything but empty today; she was excited. Today was the day she'd capture Rumpel and end his reign of oppression.
It was his filthy politics that had scapegoated ogres. Those villagers would have hated and feared ogres under any regime, but Rumpel's incitement was what had emboldened them to the slaughter. Rumpelnomics made the villagers' lives miserable and small, but vilifying ogres gave them someone to stand on to feel bigger.
More than a year ago, she'd been terribly injured, and a pair of ogres, Moyre and Groyl, had stumbled upon her and taken her in. She sometimes laid awake trying to think about how she might make the world better for them. Before the savage day relived in last night's dream, she'd always had an unstated axiom that she would try not to hurt anybody. That she would try to capture Rumpel, and give an inspiring speech, and convince everybody that they should go back to ignoring ogres.
After that day, a piece of her heart had been expunged. The axiom had disappeared.
She was ready to kill to protect the people she loved.
Fiona laced up her leather boots and set about reattaching her weapons to her body. Dusk was still two hours away, but she was way too fired up to have any chance of getting back to sleep. She swigged a mouthful of water from her canteen.
She was excited. Excitement was a new state of mind for her. In the past, many other emotions had driven her to action, such as the anger that propelled those pitchforks into the lake. But today was different, new. In the seasons since that wicked day of inaction, she had built something, something important, something that mattered to dozens of her peers. That thing was finally about to come to fruition, and it was hers.
Fiona strapped the massive dagger to her thigh. The magic of her transformation had its own quirky boundaries: it extended to her clothing, but didn't reach her weapons, even though she wore both. So her dagger and its scabbard were absurdly outsized, even as the strap resized itself so it was possible to fasten to her willowy leg. Human Fiona was quick and agile, but not strong enough to make the dagger anything other than ungainly cargo in the daytime.
And if the dagger was ungainly, her axe was downright burdensome. She'd made this daylight trip enough times that she had rigged a criss-crossing backpack strap to transfer its weight into her shoulders and keep her hands free. Still, the oddity of the situation struck her. The magic thinks my clothing is part of me, but my weapons are not. Interesting.
She tucked her few provisions into her satchel and slung it over her head and under one arm. The strap threaded through an oversized, dented helmet of thick iron, a cluster of alkonost feathers sprouting from the dome. Fiona elbowed the payload around behind her and set out on her journey towards the encampment.
Traveling before dusk—or today, in the late afternoon—meant traveling as a human. This presented two risks.
The lesser was the risk that some other human might spot her; her bizarrely oversized accoutrements would surely draw unwanted attention. Or worse yet, some brigand might happen upon a delicate unaccompanied lady and think to make sport of her. She chuckled at the thought; while she hadn't much bulk, she was so well trained at this point that she could make Brigand Skewer at thirty yards. Well, not with a dagger that big. But she was a big girl, she could take care of herself. Besides, Brogan had chosen the location for the encampment precisely because the chances of crossing paths with a human was negligible; his estimation had proven correct.
The greater was the risk that some ogre might spot her. A particularly thick individual might identify Fiona's weapons and get the wrong idea, that this lithe lady had somehow managed to separate the weapons from the ogress that owned them, and that ogre might rush in to reclaim his leader's belongings. Quick and agile she was, but she'd be no match for even the tiniest ogre in this body.
The greatest concern, however, was that a sufficiently canny ogre would spot her, recognize her hair and clothing, and work out the connection. That, that would be the worst case scenario. No, she wouldn't likely come to harm. But the cause would dissolve. Ogres were difficult to unite under any circumstances; their confidence in Fiona's leadership was the glue binding the ragtag band together. Discovering her secret would shake the army to its foundation. To an ogre, each one would drop his weapon, pick up a morsel for the road, and walk home dejected, she was sure of that. One by one they'd be captured, enslaved, extinguished.
On the other hand, covering ground from copse to camp early had important benefits: It meant effective invisibility to the witches' aerial patrols, a much more difficult threat to hide from than a human happening by. But most importantly, it meant she arrived at the camp earlier, maximizing nighttime. Getting more done meant increasing their chances, and she'd do anything to secure the victory.
Fiona reached the bog. She navigated carefully to avoid the deepest mud. Schlorp, schlorp. Usually the bog was already forming a low fog as she passed through it, but she was early today. The rich perfume of peat and decay filled her nostrils. Where she could, she stepped on weed clumps; they sank less. It wasn't that she disliked mud, and her boots already had their share of mud caked on them; it was just that a wrong step might give the bog a chance to claim a boot. Today was not the day to be procuring new equipment.
It took only a few minutes to clear the bog and return to the trail. She glanced up at the sky before the trail wound into the dense part of the forest. Crossing the bog meant another fifteen minutes to the cave; the sun had more than an hour to go to reach the horizon.
The "cave" was really just a modest depression in a sheer cliff, but it was well shrouded by dangling ivies and ferns. A stream sent narrow rivulets dribbling over the cliff; the spattering water obscured any evidence of her deviation from the trail into the hiding spot.
On any typical day, she would congratulate herself on timing her arrival at the refuge just as the sparks of transformation began to fly. Before the cave, she was a random human traveling in the late daytime; after the cave, a completely unremarkable ogress roaming the trails at night. Good timing meant she lost almost no time to the transition.
Not today, however. Excitement made her eager to hit the trail, but that was silly after all. There was no sense in traveling beyond the cave until her body returned to normal. She detoured off the trail, stepping on the familiar pattern of rocks to prevent footprints, and let herself through the drapery of foliage. Having arrived, she came to a stand, hands on her hips, looking around the shelter maybe twice the size of an outhouse. There wasn't anything for it but to find a seat; she had an hour to kill. An hour, and an imp.
Fine, she thought, disappointed to realize she'd waste the head start after all. She made herself passably comfortable on the rock, leaning against her axe against the rugged cliff face. I can plan, anyway.
There wasn't much planning to do. She'd already been over the plans, the backup plans, the contingency plans, the auxiliary plans. She had memorized every plan forwards and backwards, and her lieutenants Brogan and Gretched had done the same. There was no more thinking to do; she had the situation under complete control. As her mind raced in circles, it did the only thing left to do. It worried.
Lieutenant Gretched. She rolled the title over in her head. It was still an odd concept, that her friend and mentor should have become her lieutenant. Ogres didn't actually use titles; this language came to her from her towerschooling. The title fit, though: Gretched was Fiona's right-hand ogress. She had found confidence in Fiona's leadership, and stepped naturally into the role. Her help was invaluable, of course, but moreso the deference she showed Fiona made it clear that Fiona was the de facto revolutionary authority.
Fiona's heartbeat pulsed firmly, throbbing in her ears, but it was slowing as she was forced to rest.
Confidence in Fiona's leadership. There was that idea again. Her first response was anxiety: all these people really depended on her; she didn't want to let them down.
Then another feeling filled in behind the anxiousness, something more confident. Yes, the ogres relied on her, and yes, she was putting them in peril, bringing them to the climax of war. But they relied on her because she was giving them a fighting chance. They banded together instead of hiding alone because of her courage. She felt accomplished. She had done something that mattered.
Fiona, the delicate tower flower, who for so long had hoped for rescue before she wilted: She had made something of herself. Things happened because she made them happen, and ogres were in a position of strength because she had led them there. She had stopped waiting and started acting. Finally, her world made sense.
Fiona looked at the impromptu tartan skirt over her lap: its design was rustic but the clean hem tidy, an apt uniform for a warrior clan. She lifted her left arm and flexed it, appreciating the bulging muscles she had built on her already naturally-strong frame. She looked pretty damned mighty.
She hadn't paid much attention to her appearance since the days of pampering her braid and powdering her nose back in the tower – well, in the years before she'd destroyed her mirror. There hadn't been much reason for vanity, and certainly not much time. But today, in this little break in the action, she took just a sliver of pride in whom she had become, whom she had made herself.
The contemplative moment evaporated not long after it appeared. Fiona closed her eyes, took a deep breath, opened them, and then peered out through the glistening leafy green curtain to gauge the sun. It had dropped below the canopy, and what shafts penetrated the woods were nearly parallel. A fading sunbeam reached its way up to her hideout, and as it collided with the dripping veil, it split into a thousand sparkling diamonds. The sparkles glanced off her alabaster skin, golden glitter showering the cave.
Her heart leapt into her throat. Before the magic had finished its work, Fiona rolled onto a knee and pushed herself onto her feet, smoothed her skirt over her derriere, stuffed her helmet over her crown. So long she'd dreaded the sensation of transformation, but today it thrilled her, the fireworks signaling the start of the final sprint.
Author's Notes:
Moyre and Groyl are the names Gadfly gives Shrek's parents in his stories, including Before Forever After, in which they're not his parents.
Gretched as friend is a callback to the AU interpretation of Locked in a Tower. I hope that's not too presumptuous.