A/N: I don't know what it is about Amazon Lily, but it is a struggle for me to write. I think I'm starting to find a groove again though. Prudish Helena v. the Amazonian idea of decency has been fun to juxtapose. (Though if I were to make Helena truly an Ancient Greek/Spartan, she wouldn't be a prude at all. Eh, well, she is who she is, and she ain't sorry for it).
Ch. 21 – A New Dance
Helena awoke to find herself alone in a prison cell, still weaponless and stripped of her belongings. Well, stripped of more than that. When she got her bearings, she realized that things were a bit breezier than she was used to. She looked down at herself and let out a soft curse:
"What in Hades…?"
She'd been dressed in Amazonian battle clothing, which meant hardly any clothing at all. Why they'd thought to change her out of her rough, homemade chiton was a mystery to her, and an awkward, invasive one at that. How dare they change her clothes, anyway? Even though she was no longer a queen, it still seemed like a breach of common decency. These women really had no shame.
It may have been to search her for other weapons, Helena acknowledged. Not that she'd had anything else. Along with her weapons, they'd taken the flask Mihawk had given her, and her crown and chains of office, which she had brought along to eventually buy passage into the New World.
After a moment of gaining her bearings, Helena forced herself to stand. She almost vomited with the effort. Every muscle in her body ached from the haki-pummeling she'd received earlier. Rubbing her throat, she looked down at her toned but scarred body and sighed as she thought of Hancock, and of Zoro.
The Snake Princess wasn't just more beautiful than Helena by far, she had put her into her place without breaking a sweat. What if Hancock wasn't just crazy? What if Zoro had met her and what if he…?
Helena shook herself. She and Zoro were through with doubting each other. For all her beauty and power, Hancock clearly had a few screws loose. Zoro had better sense than that.
I just wish… she thought, tracing a thumb along her deepest scar where it poked out beneath her Amazonian breastband and ended above her hip. I wish I could be as beautiful as he deserves.
"Wow," a voice said, and Helena's head shot up. One wall of her cell was made completely of criss-crossed, wooden bars. The blonde defense warrior, Marguerite stood outside it with a tray of meager rations, eyeing Helena's scars.
Helena resisted the urge to cover herself, telling herself that modesty wouldn't impress anyone here, telling herself to own the scars that she had earned. She stood with her chin held high as Marguerite stared.
"You're really beautiful," she said, and Helena's eyes widened in shock.
"What?" she spluttered despite herself as Marguerite knelt to push the meager meal under a slot in the door.
Marguerite cocked her head. "You do not think so?"
"I…" Helena looked down at herself, momentarily wondering if she stood too far into the shadows of the prison for Marguerite to see them, but no – the sunlight filtering through the bars from a nearby street clearly illuminated the small room. Anyway, scars aside, Helena had other defects; her height and lack of curves for one; something the ridiculous triangles of fabric she now wore did nothing to hide.
"In all honesty, no," Helena admitted at last. "Naturally as a Princess and a Queen, others have always flattered me that I am, but I have perfectly functional eyes I'm afraid."
Marguerite chuckled. "Here in Amazon Lily, strength is beauty," she explained. "You are clearly strong and have fought incredible battles, not the least of which being that one."
She pointed, not at the scar Mihawk had given her, but at the faded stretch marks across her abdomen.
"You have carried life. That is a great honor."
"Twins," Helena informed her, feeling a sudden glow of pride.
"Women who die in combat and women who die in childbirth are given a warrior's burial here," Marguerite explained. "We believe both acts to be equally sacred."
Helena knelt to retrieve the food, not just surprised by Marguerite's kind assessment of her looks, but by Marguerite's kindness in general. Helena found her easy to talk to despite the situation.
"I'm surprised you know of childbirth here," Helena went on, "How do women have children without men around?"
"Kuja who leave the island sometimes return with child," Marguerite said with a shrug. "I have never questioned the means."
"And what of male children?" Helena asked. After all, if they killed menfolk, male children probably didn't stand a chance here.
Marguerite shrugged. "They are all born female."
Well, that was a relief. Helena wasn't sure she believed her.
"Now you really should eat before the fight," Marguerite insisted, gesturing at the food.
Helena looked down at the plate in her hand. It wasn't anything fancy, but it wasn't prison fare either: a simple rice dish with some kind of fish, a fresh root vegetable chopped on the side, and a cup of cold water. It looked good, but the smell nauseated her.
"Fight?" she asked, trying to decide if she should risk eating the food when she still felt like vomiting. "What fight?"
"You are to be executed," Marguerite sighed. "For attacking the Empress."
Helena smirked, rubbing her sore throat. "Fair enough. I take it it's a gladiator match of some kind."
"You are to fight without a weapon until you perish or until the empress becomes bored and has you shot through with arrows." Marguerite seemed surprised at Helena's chipper tone. "You do not seem as alarmed as I thought you'd be"
"Well, I didn't exactly expect to make it this far," Helena admitted. "A death in combat seems more honorable than some of the other options I've faced recently. – is that why I'm dressed like this?"
Marguerite shook her head. "No. I thought…well, your husband is a friend of mine too. I figured he wouldn't want someone so important to him dressed in an old rag like a castaway, so I made you some new clothes. Sweet Pea dressed you, but I'm glad they fit. Do you like them?"
"Oh," Helena decided it was better to be kind than honest in this case. "Yes! They are lovely. I appreciate the, ah, attention to detail."
The attention to detail of which she spoke was Marguerite's choice in fabric. Helena's scanty attire sported a smattering of tiny, sparkly suns. She didn't exactly love the reminder of her old title and the loss associated with it, but then, that didn't negate the kindness of the gesture.
"There is something I don't understand," the deposed queen went on, "Why are you being so kind to me if I am about to be executed?"
Marguerite shrugged. "I owe your husband my life. – He saved me, and Aphelandra, and Sweet Pea. We had been turned to stone for defying Hancock, but he fought her sisters and convinced her to turn us back."
So Hancock's powers could be undone. Helena had hoped and suspected as much, but relief still washed through her.
"Did it hurt?" she asked, staring with sudden intensity into Marguerite's eyes. "Did the Love Love Beam hurt? Did it hurt transforming back?"
"Not at all," Marguerite said. "It was like I blinked. I don't remember being stone at all."
Helena sighed with relief, and Marguerite shot her a sympathetic smile.
"I'm sure Her Majesty will transform Kina…I mean Kuina back regardless of the outcome of your duels," she reassured her. "Now eat. You don't have much time, and you need your strength."
Resting a pale cheek on an elegant hand, Hancock watched from her snake throne as her hated rival entered the stadium, arms cuffed behind her by a pair of long black snakes. This shouldn't last long. Hancock knew the Sun Queen to be a swordswoman, and without her weapons she couldn't possibly hold her own against the Kuja, not without mastery of haki.
But then she caught sight of Helena's new warrior's attire, and straightened up, every movement languid and elegant despite her anger. Who on earth had dressed the Sun Queen like that? Though Hancock begrudgingly admitted Helena had the bearing of a queen regardless of her clothing, Hancock far preferred to see her dressed in the worn bedsheet she had arrived in. This leant her far too much dignity.
"Ready the archers," she clipped aloud, raising a hand in signal.
Her sisters on either side of her gave a start. "I thought you said we've gathered everyone for a show, and you're going to end it this quickly?" Marigold asked.
"She's trying to show me up, dressing like that," Hancock hissed. "I won't have it."
Sonia and Marigold both turned to stare at their irrefutably beautiful sister, completely shocked at her obviously jealous tone.
"Sister, she is nothing next to you," Sonia pointed out.
"You think I need reassurance?" Hancock shot her way with deadly calm. "Of course she is nothing next to me! But he chose her! That means in his eyes at least she is beautiful, and I won't have her reminding everyone of it! I want her ended quickly."
"And what will that accomplish exactly?" an elderly tone chided. Hancock's gaze fell on the unexpected presence of Grandma Nyon.
"Who let her up here?" Hancock demanded, meaning the platform on which she, her sisters, and the giant snake, Salome currently resided. "Leave at once."
"I came to advise you."
"Sonia, throw her off the platform."
Sonia obediently picked Grandma Nyon up by the waistline of her panties. The old lady had but a moment to screech in protest:
"Do you really think Luffy would be happy, knowing you'd killed someone he cares about?" she protested as she struggled to free herself. "How is this getting on his good side?"
"He will forgive me," Hancock insisted. "His daughter's safety is at stake. Clearly Kina can not be trusted with such a weak woman. Now Sonia…" Hancock nodded again to have Grandma Nyon thrown from the platform.
"And yet you have Kina up here, still stuck in stone!" Nyon pointed out. "Do you truly care about his daughter, treating her this way?"
Hancock turned to eye Kina, still a tiny statue with a look of pure adoration on her cute face. Despite her frozen status, she rested on her own personal snake throne with the stuffed fox she loved placed beside her.
"Would you rather I allow her to watch her birth mother be executed?" she asked softly. "Now Sonia…"
Sonia went to obey her sister's orders only to stop short yet again when Nyon interrupted:
"I would rather you stop and think about what you are doing!" the former empress cried. "If you're going to destroy someone Luffy respects; if that child really means nothing to you, then you should turn them over to the World Government. If they find out we've been harboring either of them, your status as Warlord…"
"SONIA!" Hancock cried again, and finally her sister complied.
"Curse you, Snake Princess! Nyaaaaaa!"
Clearly out of respect for the self-appointed advisor, Sonia threw her into the stands, not into the spike pit below. Perhaps she survived. Hopefully not. Hancock had grown tired of the nuisance.
"Even if the World Government finds out, they will forgive me," she muttered, "Because I am beautiful!"
She turned back to Helena, who looked up unflinching at the archers readying their snake bows from various vantage points about the stadium. Helena's once fashionably clipped hair had already grown out to the point of looking unkempt; it showed white hair plainly through the gold, the stress of ruling aging her young. Covered in scars, her lithe, toned body told a story of battle after battle, of beauty sacrificed for something more.
Queen Helena du Prometheus was everything Boa Hancock was not. And Hancock hated her the more for it.
She raised her arm again, ready to signal the archers to take the shot:
"Sister," Marigold hissed, "I remind you again, we really aren't sure that Luffy is Helena's husband. Based on the child's looks…"
"You!" Hancock called down to her captive. Sonia and Mari had been heckling her about this since she'd taken in the brat. Time to put an end to it once and for all. "Tell me! Did Monkey D. Luffy actually marry you?"
The Sun Queen's brow furrowed in confusion. "Yes, he did," she called back in a firm, alto voice. "Aboard his former ship, the Going Merry."
Hancock threw her head back in despair. "So it's true!" she wailed as her sisters fanned her. "He married her before he even met me! Why didn't he say anything?"
The crowd swooned with her, crying out to one another about how beautiful she looked in her despair. The Snake Princess quickly got ahold of herself, and looked at her unflinching captive. Queen Helena apparently still couldn't be taken with her beauty in light of her daughter's petrification. Or perhaps, being Luffy's soulmate, she also possessed his uncanny ability to resist Hancock's charms. – the very thought of it made Hancock swoon again, languishing on Salome's coils.
To think Luffy's resistance to her may have been out of loyalty to this scrawny stick of a woman! In her mind's eye, Hancock saw his perplexed expression when she had first hit him with the love love beam. Memory of that handsome, vacuous face brought more thoughts of him flooding in, of his loyalty toward protecting even his newest friends, his loyalty toward his brother, his fearless resolve to infiltrate impel down.
Regardless of his marital status, she couldn't help but love him. And it was love for him that finally made her tell the archers to stand down.
"Sun Queen," she called out at last, standing suddenly to her full height. "The man who married you is much loved here. It is solely out of respect for him that I will allow you an honorable death. You will fight Bacura, and if you can defeat her as did your husband, I will allow you to choose one weapon to use in your coming matches."
Helena's brows flickered upward, barely noticeable, and yet there was a sudden gleam of hope in her gaze, which she tried to hide by inclining her head.
"My thanks, Snake Princess," she said in a voice steady and calm. The black snakes binding her arms behind her uncoiled and slithered away. "You will return Kuina to flesh and blood when I am finished?"
"She is my daughter now, Sun Queen," Hancock called down. "I will do with her as I please."
Helena's lip twitched and her fiery gaze intensified, belaying an anger otherwise carefully schooled out of her features.
Hancock had said it to goad her. Naturally she wouldn't leave Luffy's daughter as a statue. Still, she had to admire the Sun Queen's tenacity. So intent was she on staring down Hancock that she didn't appear to notice Bacura, the enormous black panther currently sneaking up behind her.
"Motherhood is synonymous with selflessness," Helena lectured as Hancock yawned. "You know nothing of the sort."
Bacura had crept near enough that her smile - crooked and broken from Luffy's victory - haloed the Sun Queen's head. Surely she felt the creature's hot breath upon her neck! But she didn't flinch.
"I will not allow you use my daughter to try and further your end with my husband," she went on, unblinking. And then she turned, every muscle on her battle-hardened body a coil, a spring pushing her airborne.
Lifting one leg straight up with impressive speed and flexibility as she jumped, she brought her bare foot down hard on Bacura's head. A crater spiderwebbed through the arena as she smashed the ill-fated feline into the ground.
The crowd went crazy at seeing Luffy's wife beat the beast as easily as he had. With a flip of her messy, fair hair, she turned to Hancock, a sneer smearing across her face as she pointed a finger challengingly up at the empress' platform.
"Give me my dagger, witch!"
Hancock nearly burst out laughing. Her dagger? Did she think it somehow gave her a chance? She nodded her consent to the ex-Queen's request, and Marguerite came slowly out to hand the dagger over.
"Such impudence," Marigold hissed.
"Let us be the ones to end her, sister," Sonia insisted.
"No," Hancock replied sternly. "That dagger is made of sea prism, sisters. One nick and it would make you far too vulnerable."
"Surely you don't intend to fight her," Mari gasped. "All she'd need is one lucky hit…"
Hancock laughed lightly. "Of course not, sister," she replied. "You saw our haki clash! – She is not worth breaking a sweat over. Still, as you said, we brought her out here for a show. Let her fight Dance."
Marigold's sumptuous lips curled up into a malevolent grin. "Ah, good choice sister," she simpered.
"Dance will end her quickly and beautifully," Sonia agreed.
Of course she would! Dance had recently fought her way to the top of a tournament, making her the newest member of the Kuja pirates. As luck would have it, she was also a swordswoman, and a ridiculously powerful one at that; far better than the Sun Queen could even dream. Hancock could think of no better way to execute an enemy who had once prided herself so much on her swordsmanship.
"Quickly and beautifully," Hancock agreed, and the sisters laughed.
"A swordswoman better than you?" Usopp asked incredulously.
Helena smiled at the sweet compliment and took a sip of punch.
"I have a more important question," Zoro said, leaning in to her. "Do you still have that outfit they made you?"
Helena choked and nearly sprayed punch out her nose. Sanji and Brook sprayed another red substance out of theirs.
"THAT'S what you're focused on?" she spluttered.
"Ow! The man's got his priorities!" Franky put in helpfully, laughing.
Zoro shrugged, smirking.
"Well," Helena leaned in to him conspiratorially, but whispered just loudly enough to be heard. "I'm actually wearing it right now. It makes great underwear. Good support."
Sanji and Brook went airborne and into the far wall.
"So anyway, as I was saying…"
Naked sea-stone dagger in hand, Helena hadn't meant to give her would-be executioner much thought. She had fully intended to find a way up to that platform and give Hancock a taste of her blade. But as the newest Kuja pirate swaggered into the stadium, Helena couldn't help but stop and stare.
Her opponent had waist-length dreadlocks, dark skin, full lips, a gleaming white smile. But most of note: her eyes were a bright…
"Calypso Blue?" Helena spluttered.
Smooth, beardless jaw aside, the resemblance was uncanny. It couldn't be him, though. Dressed in the scant warrior's garb of the Amazons, she was unmistakably a woman. But Helena couldn't help her surprise, particularly as the pirate drew a pair of machetes from sheaths hung across her back. Scratch that, particularly as she eyed the ex-queen up and down with an almost salacious quirk to her lips. Helena suppressed a prudish urge to try to cover herself by once again reminding herself that modesty would impress no one here.
"Blue? No my name isn't Blue, mmm." – same accent too! Her voice sounded exactly like Calypso's but higher.
She crossed her blades over her body, strong, cut muscles gleaming in the tropical sun. The crowd screamed, turning into a veritable stampede as they tried to clear the way. The pirate lashed out with her blades, throwing a slash powerful enough to blast through the stonework of the stadium. "Hepburn Hew!"
Helena put her recently honed Observation Haki skills to work, jumping and turning a barrel roll to dodge the horizontal slash. She landed in a crouch unscathed, but with eyes wide as she realized just what she was up against. That move had been practically identical to Calypso's Casanova Cut.—and just as powerful.
"Who are you?" Helena gasped.
"It sounds like you've met my devilishly handsome brother, mmm?" the swordswoman grinned. "My name is Calypso Dance."
.
.
.
A/N: Say whaaat? Calypso has an Amazonian sister?
Real quick, gotta make another shameless plug for the story Dragocilvio wrote for me, A Whole New World. I said she included my characters in cameo, but it's not like a regular M. Night Shyamalan, seen in the reflection of a medicine cabinet, The Village type cameo. This is more of an, inserted into the main plot(s), Lady in the Water type of cameo. So go give it a read, leave her a review if you like (because I've been stalking her reviews to see if any of yall head over there). What? I'm interested to see what my readers think of her version of Helena!...and Cygnus. And Calypso. Even a brief mention of Troy coming up. ...sorry,spoilers much?