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Dearest Readers, may the valleys you traverse be one of light and discovery.
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﴾ THE HIDDEN SWORD ﴿
Book Three: Meeting of Fires
Chapter 71: Not So Little Amazons (Part One)
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"So I thought to myself - not only am I getting the most official excuse to hop out of Beregost, but I'm also helping out a bunch of fellow green sprouts like myself."
As she recounted, Irse had volunteered to accompany a handful of new recruits ordered to arrest a deserter, and it was obvious why she would gladly sign up for this task. Certainly one can envisage the desperation of not gleaning even a single sighting of Okami, and the frustration at the futility of weeding out Tranzig from among the few thousand heads presently residing or passing through Beregost. Thus, the sun elf saw the assignment as her only opportunity to expand the search outside the town for both former mentor and the source of the bounty.
"And wouldn't you know it – Captain Brage gave me permission," she buzzed, cupping her chin with both hands. "Isn't he amazing?"
Skeptical, Xan's eyes darted to the side. 'Amazing' might be the least appropriate descriptor to be ascribed to someone who would purblindly place their faith in one so young and impertinent.
"He could be so stern and flinty, especially with those poor Knuckles who get the Flaming Fist Code subsections mixed up with an inn menu," Irse said. "But underneath all that Mister Tougher Than a Dragon's Nail shell of his, you know he only wants the best for everyone."
Perhaps, likening him to Okami hence her admiration, Xan pondered. Still, it was remarkable that a member of the proud and haughty Ar'Quess would ever deign any non-elf to be worthy of their esteem. Indeed, how the realms have turned upon its head.
"But you are here, and the recruits are not. What became of the mission?"
"We went straight to the deserter's homestead to serve the warrant but found nothing other than a bed piled with clothes he didn't stuff in his pack and worse - an empty pantry."
The group was about to return to Beregost when Irse suggested checking the areas near the border, if perhaps the man might attempt to flee into Amn and beyond the Fist's jurisdiction. Further down the road and close to the boundary, the squad chanced upon an ongoing bandit raid.
Fortunately, the traders were succored but a few recruits had been wounded in the battle. Irse bade her compatriots accompany the merchants and the wounded back to the town, while she alone continued her pursuit of a pair of escaping brigands.
A stroke of luck and fortuity that these outlaws happened to be Tranzig's associates transporting the Iron Plague Potion while escorted by Tazok's men who obviously failed to resist the lure of easy pickings with the caravan rather than focus on their mission.
Having tracked them into the Fireleaf, she had come across an abandoned sack of vials containing an unidentifiable liquid. But deeming these to be of no import and preferring the pursuit to be light, Irse had only taken a pair of the ampoules with her out of curiosity.
"Good thing you told me what they are," she said sheepishly. "I was thinking of pouring them on my pancakes first thing when I get back to town."
Eyeing the sun elf and not trusting her to fight the temptation, Xan protectively patted at his cloak's inner pocket. Hopefully these remaining samples in their possession might somehow be sufficient to uncover this noxious mystery.
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"Stop that."
Startled out of his customary cogitations, Xan twitched. "Must I cease doing what?"
"The way you're looking at me," Irse muttered. "Like my head's on a chopping block. It's unnerving."
Mood-dampening, joy-killing, even appetite-destroying.
Those who knew him would describe his resting shrew-face as such. But 'unnerving' was certainly a new one for the tomes.
"Had it not been nearly the case when I tried to escape? You implied a fate worse than death for a Fist who loses a detainee."
"Ohhh, that," she mumbled, shrugging. "Well – you're right. It is as cruel as you'd expect! For a captive who bolts under your watch-"
Xan steeled himself. Of course, trust the N'Tel'Quess to devise the most vicious and bestial means of punishment.
"- they'll dock your entire pay, the number of days depending on how serious the prisoner's crime. But you still have to report for duty! And even worse – they'll forfeit your rations! Imagine that – everyone gets their wages and food allowance while you're supposed to keep marching around and shaking your bottom against danger without pay! I'd understand if the punishment is less hours off-duty or even scrubbing the cells and latrines, but come now, isn't that just too harsh?"
Knuckles on her waist, breathing roused by the indignation, Irse glowered at the injustice. He eyed her dryly, but decided not to contest.
At least the punishment involved no reciting, singing, and dancing an entire series of theatrical opuses penned by senior members of the organization. And being compelled to perform them before the entire city in each festival over the next decade.
Xan shuddered and nodded in genuine agreement.
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"Well, this is one huge sand pit," Irse said with a whistle.
Having veered far more eastward than usual, they found themselves standing atop a ridge above a valley peculiarly desiccated in an otherwise verdant section of the Sword Coast. A place appropriately named the Valley of Tombs, as Xan recalled from a map studied prior to his now unregulated itinerary.
"We could march through northwards, see if we'll find anything."
Hopefully not the blacksmith's grave, Xan surmised as her true intent. He craned his neck and shrugged. "It appears this place is devoid of life. I doubt there is any object of interest or worth among the stones." But onward to futility.
"Let me try something first," Irse said, then cupped her mouth. "Okami!"
Across the valley the name echoed, poignant and hollow. She paced along the ridge, shouting as if to spread her plea to every corner of this lifeless realm.
"Oh, look. A targe," Irse exclaimed and bent down to pull at a dented rusted shield half-buried in the soil. "This ought to do."
For what peculiar purpose in that improvident mind of hers, Xan questioned. Tongue sticking out of the corner of her mouth, the sun elf drew a dagger from her side – one with the same dusky blade as her sword. Nay, not a dagger. A butterknife.
She winked at him and proceeded to bash at the shield with the haft of the knife while calling for her former mentor. Across the valley the clanging reverberated, discordant with her shouting.
"Okami! Okami! Where are you? Are you here? Okami Munechika!"
As expected, no answer returned to them. Only the wind, parched and searing, offered silence and dust.
She paused, downcast like a fox cub foiled. "It's not working."
"Was the pointlessness of this exercise not evident?"
Irse ignored him and gazed down at her navel, then slapped furiously at it. "Hey, hey, you stupid stomach! Why won't you grumble now? Maybe he needs to hear you too!"
Xan glared at the sun elf. That monstrously vociferous bottomless pit is not actually on constant cue?
"Maybe if I shout something else."
"I doubt a variation on your already clamorous tactic would succ-"
"Okami! I'm hungry! If you don't come out this instant, I'm cleaning out every single tankard house in the Sword Coast without paying the bill," she cried, pounding at the targe with greater force and frequency.
"Could you cease with this unearthly ruction," he griped, hands clamped over ears. "It is enough to disturb the dead."
"All the better! Maybe they'd pop out of their tombs like a bunch of moles for whacking and tell me everything I need to know!"
He watched with ringing irritation as Irse resumed marching back and forth across the length of the ridge, shouting much louder while drubbing at the shield. How fortunate that this place is barren and lifeless.
In other words, except for a typical desert region's venomous snakes and lizards-
- and toxic arachnids,
- and swarming fire ants,
- and giant predatory cats,
- and aggressively territorial bees...
This valley seemed certainly free from hostile humanoids of sizable threat to their survival.
"Who goes there? Show yourself," a voice answered back, female but deep and resonant.
From behind a cluster of granite pillars, a group emerged. At seeing potential sources of information, excitement quickly registered on Irse's face. The sun elf tossed the shield to the side and deftly bounded down the slope.
But what if these people prove antagonistic? Xan looked to the sides and behind but remembered the fruitlessness of his prior attempts at escape. Groaning, he awkwardly clambered down the ridge as well while the other sprinted and waved towards the group.
What he saw made his stomach sink deeper than the valley itself.
"Whoa," Irse gasped in awe of the newcomers.
Four women, two armed and armored in gleaming plate mail, the other two hooded but no less intimidating as they both casually pushed their cloaks aside to reveal their own well-protected frames.
Interestingly, the latter pair's ages were a generation apart – one of them quite young but the other white-haired and aged of face.
Regardless, all the women towered over the elves, the least of them still taller than Irse. With their statures so formidable and their countenances so stunningly fierce, they stood proud in the desert sun as if they were colossal sculptures of Chultan goddesses come to life.
"We are truly doomed," Xan moaned.
"An elf! Two of them! Perhaps one of them is the bounty target," shouted the one of the armored women. At her warning, the group readied themselves for combat.
Clearly accustomed to such encounters, Irse merely waved dismissively but towards Xan. "Obviously you don't mean him – look at those ears, as perfect as a pair of biscuits straight out the oven."
How kind of her to shield his hapless hide by exempting him from their claim, yet not even protesting her own innocence. Xan cast wary glances between Irse and the other women.
Their leader, the tallest and most daunting, pointed a wickedly gleaming mace at the sun elf. "Then it is you, the one with the ruined ear. You thought you could hide in Amn to escape those who seek your head?"
"Well, who's wanting my head to begin with? Friends of yours? Give me their names so I can root them out when I get back to the Coast and tell them what I did with their Little Amazons," Irse taunted back.
Xan clutched at his throat. Admirable how she would still attempt to gather information, yet is not the gravity of the situation so obvious to her? Four formidable warriors against two – a competent yet young and reckless sun elf, and a moon elf on the last pages of his componentless spells.
No, not counting on the teu'kerym that much either, he ruefully assessed.
"Such a spirit and mouth on this one," the second armored woman said with a laugh. "If you must know, elf girl, it is Tranzig alone who gave the notice to us. Whom he serves matters not to our purse."
Irse sighed, shoulders dropping. "Ugh, is that Tranzig really doing everything by himself? Well, how about you give me your names, so when I find that scumbag, I can tell him myself how he hired the wrong people to cross the wrong elf."
How is she still unperturbed by their dispiriting odds, her eyes impassive and seemingly unfocused on any target? And then he noticed how the sun elf ever so subtly slid one foot back, perhaps in preparation for a sudden charge.
Xan gritted his teeth even as he readied his hands for casting. A grim challenge presented itself to him- how to chant a spell unnoticed lest he alarm the women into attacking simultaneously. Hopefully, the charm enchantment refreshed in his mind would be enough to turn even just one of these foes to their side.
"Oh, I will give you my name, so you might tell your ancestors in the next life who it is that bested you in battle," said the leader. "I, Lamalha, will take your head and shame your clan for siring a weakling such as yourself."
"Yeah, you could trounce me up and down with those muscles. That is, if you're quick enough," the sun elf said, grinning wildly at the challenge, then paused as if startled.
"Wait, Lamalha? Your name is Lamalha?" Irse frantically pointed at each of the other women. "Then which one of you is Maneira?"
"I'm Maneira," the youngest chirped, bobbing up her chin and raising her hand. A glare from the apparent second-in-command sent the hand and head down.
The sudden familiarity likewise surprised everyone else, their battle stances broken into puzzlement.
"How is it you know our names, elf? Answer me," Lamalha demanded.
Irse beamed, a flash of excited recollection in her eyes. "You must be Mandla's siblings! He mentioned you both to me – his dear sweet baby sisters all grown up and going out in the realms in their own adventuring band. Just wait 'til I get back to Iriaebor one of these days and tell him where and how I ran into you!"
"And how do you know my brother," Lamalha snarled, now more offended.
"Yes, how do you know my future husband," growled the second armored woman.
"Oh, quit it, Zeela," Maneira snapped, throwing up her hands. "How many times do we have to say it? You can't marry our brother because we're cousins! That's gross!"
"Fifth cousins, so it's perfectly acceptable," Zeela said indignantly. "And I wouldn't have to join this dumb band if I didn't need coin to help pay for the wedding and our own future house."
At the befuddled looks from the elves, Lamalha wagged her head. "Ignore her. She is delusional."
"I am not delusional! After we return from the south, I will succeed in wooing and marrying him and then I will bear him an army of the strongest warriors, and there is nothing you nor this pipsqueak can do about it!"
"Hey, who are you calling a pipsqueak, hag-face," Maneira piped up.
That girl is hardly a pipsqueak, Xan mentally protested, his neck strained at gazing up at them.
"Shut up, both of you before I stuff you into a termite mound head-first," Lamalha threatened.
And as the women fell into bickering among themselves, the fourth one and the oldest of them seemed to have heard nothing, merely staring blankly at everyone. Evidently addled due to her great age. Grunting and hacking, the old woman turned on her heels and strolled aimlessly behind the group.
"Eh, your granny's wandering off," Irse called out, awkwardly pointing.
"Oh, don't mind Auntie Telka. She does that a lot," Maneira replied casually before returning to the argument.
"Enough of this!" Fed up, Lamalha screamed a bloodcurdling war cry which effectively silenced her compatriots. Impatiently, she rounded on the sun elf. "You! Tell me why you know my brother!"
"I know your brother, the tavern enforcer at the Snakeherd, because I used to be a blacksmith's apprentice in Iriaebor. We give him discounts because he always buys our custom-forged knives in bulk, says they're for his sisters and some for his cousins. And I must say, those were a lot of knives he bought from us through the years."
Lamalha paused for a moment, then drew a blade from her belt and held it aloft.
"You mean – this knife?"
Likewise, Zeela pulled out the same pair from holsters on each leg. Maneira spread both sides of her coat to reveal rows of similar blades.
Irse beamed, clapping with gleeful pride. "Yes! Those knives! Lend me one, I'll show you something!"
Skeptical yet obliging, Lamalha handed over her blade. Irse received the knife with both hands, reverence flashing upon her eyes, evidently taken back to the joys of her former profession.
"You see, the make was based on the Kozakuran Santoku. Notice the oval grooves on the broad face here?"
"I've always wondered what they're supposed to do. Not the most elegant design on a dagger," Zeela commented.
"Well, it's not for making it pretty, but because these indentations keep things from sticking to the blade by limiting the surface area and friction. Watch-," Irse explained with the sureness of one who had truly fashioned the knives with her own hands.
She flipped the weapon into a dagger hold and approached the nearest prickly plant. "Sorry, Mister Cactus," Irse whispered bashfully, then knifed it a few times. Indeed as demonstrated, the blade plunged and re-emerged with smooth swiftness, earning hums of esteem from the women.
"No wonder my stabbing's gotten faster and cleaner! And my throwing's more accurate and sinks much surer! All because I ran out of wounding darts and switched to these a couple of years ago," Maneira exclaimed.
"Even with their diminutive size, I admit, these things have been handy with a lot of close calls before," Zeela added.
Maneira turned to her sister with an imploring look. Lamalha also regarded the quiet nods from Zeela, herself steeling her jaw as she came to a decision.
"It appears- we got the wrong elf, then."
"Hmm, yes, not the elf we're looking for."
"Yeah, wrong elf for sure!"
Irse beamed and shot them a thumbs up. Only pure unbridled relief kept Xan from outright fainting.
"Of course, you got the wrong elf," Telka screeched, suddenly now standing beside him. "Look at this twig! What makes you think he could've slaughtered all those bandits by himself when he's reedier than a string bean! Why I could crush his arm with just one hand!"
And she proceeded to prove her point by smacking him at the shoulder repeatedly, her palm strikes ineffectual but nonetheless bewildering.
"Help me, I'm a dead man," Xan pleaded to the women who rushed in and tried to soothe and convince the old one to stop.
As expected, their quest was vain.
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Amazonian Scribblings:
"Chultan goddesses" Why yes, I was imagining a squad of deadringers for Grace Jones while writing this.
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