As a reminder, you can find MORE of this on my SubStar (dot adult slash KajaWilder), it's posted up past chapter 10 there... And if you guys haven't seen an update in at least a month or so, please let me know! I have a busy life, and I get distracted and forget things. This story will be updated 'when I remember' (which is rarely). If yo ufind you enjoy it, however, I follow the links from my Discord (at the bottom). There's, again, 10+ chapters posted elsewhere, and a new one is released monthly.

If you're just interested in discussing things with other readers, of course, you can go to my DISCORD here: h- t_ t_ p-s -: -/ -/ -discord . g-g / N9yDA8t6Cw (taking out hyphens, underscores, and spaces of course).

Finally, you can also read my ORIGINAL FICTION on Kindle. If you've got Kindle Unlimited, they're all free. Here's my author page, h-t_t_p-s -:- /-/ tinyurl _._ com /- 4ffb7wph with links to everything published. (Remove all Hyphens, Spaces, and Underscores, of course... 'cause Ffnet.)

Chap. 2

Silence had not just fallen over Lin's thoughts, but the ring of soldiers that he was sharing a campfire with. His eyes strayed from the buxom, delicious-looking, half-naked warrior-woman on his lap (somehow), to rove around. Dozens of eyes looked back at him from at least two dozen faces. Most of the men he had joined, like most people in the Earth Kingdom Army, were dark haired and dark eyed with tan skin, like his own. But 'most' only meant a little over half. The Earth Kingdom was a large place, after all, easily the largest nation on the planet, with more than fifty smaller kingdoms within its over-arching umbrella. Some were little more than wealthy city-states, like Omashu, which was still ruled by the eccentric King Bumi, said to be a close friend of the Avatar when he was a young boy. Some were simple tribes, like the Water-Benders that lived hundreds and hundreds of li to the south-west, in the vast swamps. Some kingdoms were hundreds and hundreds of li across, with many large cities in their borders. All fell under the rule of the Earth King.

At least, they would if anyone knew where the Earth King was. As things stood now, Lin had heard that the Earth Kingdom was largely being run by a council of advisors the King had appointed before his disappeareance. Not that he was close to the politics of it all, but that was the rumor. Lin, as the son of farmers, was shocked that he had been awarded the position of Sergeant. He barely qualified as a Bender, able to move only small stones with far more effort than it would take him to simply pick it up and throw it.
Some of that- maybe most of it- was due to a lack of formal training, but that only spoke to the circumstances of his birth and upbringing even more. His family would never have been able to afford tutors and trainers, like many Earth Benders would. The Army had given him only the most rudimentary training, just enough for him to qualify as an Earth Bender at all. It wasn't that he lacked power (though, according to those who had the skill to judge such things), it was that Lin simply didn't have enough training at a young age. He was a child when it came to Bending.

He wasn't even particularly skilled as a fighter, though he could hold his own now. Strength wasn't something he lacked, even if his frame was a bit wiry and lanky compared to most of the men he now commanded, and leverage and speed mattered too.

So why had he been singled out again?

Twenty five, thirty men looked at him in awe, eyes and mouths gaping wide. Black hair, brown, yellow, red. Dark eyes, blue, green, gray, and hazel, though in the firelight it was hard to make out anything other than shadows as they stared back at him. Why?

The woman. It had to be.

Not the beauty who twitched her hips against his lap in an entire un-subtle gesture even though the movement was miniscule. No, the other one.

The one who had defeated Boshi, then handed him the actual kill.

Mai.

Was that her name? Lin still didn't know for sure, because in the midst of combat he could have misheard. Mei, Mie, Mea, My, there were any number of variants. Ty Lee, he had heard clearly: that was this woman's name, or at least what the taller warrior had called her.

But why had she singled him out in the first place? This woman was, no doubt, doing the same because of what her taller compatriate had done.

True, Ty Lee had saved his life during the battle as well, or at least saved him from a serious injury that would likely have left him scarred for life if he survived it. He certainly owed her for that, but she had saved a dozen men or more that battle. For all that the army's soldiers ragged on the Kyoshi Warriors for being women and trying to play at battle, no one that had been there in the center of things was doing so. Their skill, as far as Lin was concerned, was incontrovertible. Ty Lee and Mai stood above all of them that he had seen, an entire tier- or more- over the others in skill.

For the soldiers, it was life or death, a struggle simply to stay alive against the bandits who should have been more lacking in training but were clearly not. For the Kyoshi Warriors, things were easier. They apparently practiced far more often than even the regular army's men did.

For those two women... it had been easy. Spectacularly easy. Boshi, the most fearsome fighter Lin had ever set eyes on until that moment, had been so outclassed by Mai that she had looked truly bored for the entire ten or twenty seconds of their battle. Ty Lee had giggled- actually giggled- as she laid waste to a half-dozen men in just a few moments.

So why was he, Lin, a simple farmer's son- a fifth son, no less- suddenly being called Sergeant Lin, and saluted by men who were his equal just hours earlier?

Why was the Kyoshi Warrior the vast majority of the soldiery ogled the most during their march straddling his lap, squirming most specifically against an erection he could not have hoped to prevent? Why was she giving him a look, one whose meaning he could not decipher with reason but which he knew instinctively, as she did so in clear view of people who should have been drinking and carousing in celebration?

Why, oh in the name of all the ancestors, why, did he feel her soft, linen-wrapped chest against his as she leaned close, the hot, moist breath tickling his ear as she whispered, "Say yes. We need to talk. It's- vital to the mission."

Suddenly, everything made more sense.

She wasn't hitting on him, or offering him sex.
Why she had to talk in private for the mission, he didn't know, but Lin was at least quick on his feet. He nodded, "Yes, alright."

Before he could finish the second word, Ty Lee had hopped upward, her large breasts bouncing in his face- even touching him briefly- and stood smoothly, one hand outstretched to help pull him up. She was so soft to his eyes that it was a bit incongruous- not that Lin knew that word- to know how skilled she was. Touching her hand, though, told him exactly how many hours Ty Lee had put into her training. They were easily as calloused as his own, though her skin was still supple.

Not the wear of a farmer, either, but that of a warrior. Her hands were clearly used to holding weapons, even if it seemed she preferred fighting without them.

Ty Lee hauled him to his feet with only a small shift of her weight backward as well, surprising not just him but several of the more observant men with her sheer strength. Of course, they could see her musculature, as on-display as the acrobat's body was, but seeing her lift a man who probably outweighed her by twenty jin or more.

He almost yelped, which would have been very embarrassing in front of the men he was now supposed to lead, but Lin kept it down as he, red-faced and amid sudden, raucous jeers and cat-calls, he allowed the woman to pull him by the hand away from his fire and command.

Lin expected the woman to let go of his hand the moment they cleared the ring of soldiers. Instead, Ty Lee only sped up as they broke into more open areas of the bivouac, until she was almost jogging with her long, silky brown tail flapping back and forth against his arm as she tugged him onward.

She really does have a nice body, Lin caught himself thinking as Ty Lee's unerring guidance took him around one campfire full of roudy soldiers after another, then past the command tents, the armory tents, the mess tents, and farther still until they had passed even the long lines of the latrines.

They were almost to the pickets when he spotted their destination: A single fire, kept low, with just eight tents around it. They were not the large, six- to ten-man tents that the Army carried. Instead, these were small, two-person affairs. The Army's were yellow, green, orange, which helped signify units, with letters and symbols painted onto each side of them for more specific groups. His own tent, Lin well knew- or his old tent, at least, since as a Sergeant he would now have one to himself carried by other men, which would definitely take some getting used to- held the symbol of the Birdfox for the Company, a Sandseal for its Platoon, then 20-16 for Squad Twenty, Tent Sixteen.
Now he would have the same Company and Sandseal, but 20-Jūnshì, because he was the Sergeant in charge of the squad.

Which was still patently ridiculous, but Lieutenant Jo Gai had been clear: He was the only one suitable.

He had, after all, done the killing blow, and the previous Sergeant was dead.

Ty Lee did not slow until she stepped into the ring of tents and announced, "I've got him, you can relax."

Six shadows melted out of the darkness around them, mostly behind the pair, and Lin shuddered as he realized: they had walked, almost jogged, straight past this secondary line of warriors and he hadn't even noticed. Sure, it was night, but still!

Any one of the Kyoshi Warriors standing watch on him, now, could put a weapon into his back. Could have, at any time probably for the last several seconds, and he would never have noticed until it was too late.

Considering each and every one of the shadows was now revealed to be wearing the same armor, robes, and even face-paint the women had worn into battle earlier that day, it was really saying something.

"Come on, stud, have a seat," Ty Lee told him, still tugging him on. She pushed him toward one of the many stones and logs that lined the small, carefully-kept cooking fire, then waited until he was seated before she took a place next to him.

Once again, Lin felt all eyes on him. Just like it was with the soldiers, he found it extremely uncomfortable. Only now, with twelve or fourteen women- he suspected two were either sleeping or still keeping a watch against soldiers who might get ideas about taking liberties- staring instead of his own men, it was somehow worse.

A lot worse.

He sat there. He squirmed. He had once been forced to watch a military Tribunal when a soldier in another Company, Horse-wing in this case, had been caught stealing food and weapons.

That soldier had squirmed uncomfortably in his seat for the entire proceeding in the same way Lin imagined he was now.

But he hadn't done anything wrong. Had he...?
Had that woman, Mai, not been talking to him when she told the other warriors to finish Boshi off?

Had he somehow offended the Kyoshi Warriors, or the tall, stoic beauty in particular?

He felt...

Weird. Strange. Like a piece of boar-snake meat being eyed up for quality at a local butcher's market. Yet, at the same time, as if he were under the eyes of a harsh Tribunal himself.

The closest thing he could equate it to was... no, there was nothing in his experience like it. The Tribunal was close, but then with a healthy dose of... of... the matchmakers, six in all that lived in his small village's area, who had come with offers for his oldest brother. They had eyed him in the same way, too.

Then, unceremoniously, six scrolls were dropped in Lin's lap.

He did yelp then, the weight hadn't just startled him (though it did that), but one of the heavy wooden scroll-ends had struck him in the testicles. He winced, but the tall woman behind him did not apologize, or even make any sign that she had noticed. Instead, through watering eyes, Lin turned to watch as she, Mai, dressed in long green robes but now without her armor, walked away and stooped to enter a tent as gracefully as she had moved while circling Boshi.

His attention was pulled off of the goddess-made-flesh by a snicker of amusement. With water still in his eyes, Lin looked back toward Ty Lee, who was the one mocking him. He could just make out her own arm gesturing toward his lap, "Documents we found in Boshi's lair. Read them."

He hesitated, using the chance to wipe the tears from his eyes- at least they were scant- as an excuse to buy time.

If he read these, he might be privy to military secrets. It could be treason.

... It could also be seen as him delving into matters above his pay-grade, above his station, which would in many ways be worse according to most of the higher-ups in the Earth Kingdom Army.

"You can read, right? I saw you doing reports earlier."

"Of- Of course," Lin murmured, glad his voice wasn't high-pitched or squeaky despite the aching, burning, cold pain between his legs. "I'm- I was the one who, er, did the books for- for my family."

"Merchant family? Cool," Ty Lee chirped, then leaned back with her hands on the ground behind her own log seat so that she could stare up at the stars through the break in the canopy the Kyoshi Warriors- this group of them, at least- had selected for their camp. "Read them."

This time, despite being casual in appearance and tone- and he could not help but watch the way her smooth abdomen flexed and moved as she moved back without so much as a twitch in her feet to balance her- the command was clear. These warriors looked to Ty Lee and Mai for leadership.

She was at least equal to a Lieutenant in rank, and he suspected both were far more dangerous than Jo Gai could hope to be in a million years of training.

He would, in other words, live a longer, healthier, happier life if he obeyed. So Lin did, picking up one scroll after the other.

The penmanship was exquisite, easily equal to the best he had ever seen.

The figures in many were pristine, he could find no error in the logistics or accounting or dates.

But what the scrolls, six in all, told him was not something Lin ever wanted to know. He most certainly could be tried for treason if he knew this.

No one- no one- who knew about the workings of the Dai Li would escape unscathed. Just knowing this...

Lin imagined his neck stretching as he felt the noose tighten around it.

Then Ty Lee sat up straight again with just as effort as she had leaned back, then brushed her hands cassual of the forest loam and pointed once more. "Those scrolls are six of twelve. The others are copies- exact copies, according to Mai, and her eyes are better at that sort of thing than mine are- of the six you have. She's keeping the rest."

"I see," he replied quietly, not sure how he dared speak. He was doomed.

Treason was not looked at kindly in the Earth Kingdom, not after what the Dai Li had done to its King.

He was lucky to be hanged after no less than five years of 'interrogation'.

"What do you think it means?"

A giggle and a soft moan from one of the tents suggested to Lin suddenly that no, the other two he couldn't see weren't on watch- they weren't sleeping, either. Instead, he now suspected the two warrior-women were engaged in a little battlefield stress relief of a kind camp followers would occasionally give, only kept to each other.

He had never, in his entire life, imagined two women doing that together, and for several seconds he found himself distracted as he imagined two soft sets of lips dancing together, hands touching, caressing, in places he had never done himself...

Ty Lee's finger flicked his forehead, and he blinked to find himself staring into her impressive cleavage as she looked at him with worried blue eyes. "You in there, kid?"
"I'm not a kid," Lin protested, feeling his face heat as several of the women around them tittered at his expense. Some, at least, had the grace to hide their laughter behind their ever-present fans. Most did not.

Ty Lee only shrugged and stood up again, so he was staring at her loincloth-covered groin, instead, before she moved away casually.

She had a spectacular ass, and for a moment he caught just a hint of... something. Not her rear, he was sure, because all the Kyoshi Warriors were fastidious about cleaning. Something... else. Something he'd never smelled before. Whatever it was, it was fascinating.

"Tell me what it means," she repeated as she sat down, giving the scrolls, now more neatly organized on his thighs, a significant look.

This time, Lin at least carried through. After several seconds, he looked up at her. "The Dai Li are the ones behind the bandits."

"That's what we think, too," Ty Lee informed him, a casual thumb aimed toward the tent Mai had gone into. "But we aren't sure if we can trust the other officers on this mission."

"Lieutenant Jo Gai wouldn't-" he started to protest.

Then he stopped. How well did he know the Lieutenant, really?
Not well at all.

For that matter, Lin didn't know any of the other members of the Company that well. He was probably the least social one among them, and rarely spent time with the men outside of missions- and this was his first real mission.

If anyone was going to be a suspect of Dai Li spying, it was him.

The knowledge made his blood run cold. He would definitely be tried for treason now.

Unless the Dai Li got to him first, of course.

That fate would be even worse.

Ty Lee's hands moved, and once again Lin found himself surprised by the silent movements of the Kyoshi Warriors as she accepted a satchel with an intricate lock on it from one of the others, who gave her a wink before she turned away and entered another tent. Her bunk-mate joined her a minute later, and soon both of them were whispering excitedly to each other just quietly enough he couldn't make out what they were saying over the night breeze in the trees and the occasional crackle of the fire.

The sounds of passion in the tent nearby was distracting, but it did nothing to help the tingling numbness in his cheeks, in his limbs.

Somehow, though, the voice of Ty Lee pierced through the haze of confusion and fear that Lin felt bubbling within him. "Jo Gai seems alright, we checked him out a couple of hours ago. I don't think he's one of their agents."

"I don't mean any offense," Lin asked, wondering once more how he dared have the sheer temerity, the grit, to ask this woman anything after what he had seen her do, and after what her and her people had casually dropped into his lap, "but who are you that you'd know anything about the Dai Li?"

"I know they're the Earth Kingdom's bogeymen," Ty Lee shrugged, the motion doing wonderful things to her body that, this time, did not have even a chance to captivate him though Lin promised himself that- if he survived to go to sleep- he would remember it in his dreams. "I know you're all terrified of them, and not without reason. We- Mai and I- have fought them before. This was before we joined the Warriors of Kyoshi Island, of course, but we've had our fair share. It's... a little worrisome that they're on the move again."

"I... I thought the Avatar had wiped them out," one of the other Kyoshi Warriors spoke up, the first time he'd heard them speak clearly except for Mai and Ty Lee.

The leader shrugged, "I thought so, too, until we saw these. Maybe it's someone trying to take their place, fill the void they left. Maybe it really is them. Maybe it's just a splinter cell- or a single cell- w- the Avatar missed."
"It doesn't really matter," Lin said quietly, gesturing at the scrolls himself now, "If this is real, if it's true, then... then we're all in grave danger, no matter what the truth is. Just using the name- claiming to know anything about it and not reporting it- is treason. We'll all be tortured, interrogated, and then hanged. Or worse."

Ty Lee just snorted. "I'd like to see them try. They'd have to catch us, first. Besides, we're Kyoshi Warriors. We aren't Dai Li."

"You might be," Lin protested quietly, "but I'm just... just a farm-boy who was unlucky enough to get promoted too much."

"Unlucky? Mai saw you, you know," Ty Lee told him, frowning for the first time.

Even frowning, he thought she was cute, but it still seemed to darken the world somehow that the normally cheerful girl would- or could- even make that expression. "She saw you save that other guy's life. You did fine."

"Others... others did more," Lin protested weakly, "I... I froze."

He didn't know why he said it.

He did not want to admit that to anyone. Especially not to these fierce, amazing, talented, devoted women.

Not to Ty Lee.

Especially not to Mai, who he was certain could hear every word from her own tent.

The acrobat actually laughed, "We all do, at first. It's part of getting used to combat."

"Not everyone did."

"Eh, maybe," the woman shrugged again, nonchalant, and looked up at the dark sky thoughtfully, "I did, though. I was twelve... I was perfect, I thought I couldn't do anything wrong. Then the battle started, and I hesitated. Almost killed me."

"You- you've been fighting since you were twelve?"

Earth Nation soldiers could not even enlist until they were sixteen.

No wonder she was so talented!

It might have begged the question of where she was from, if Lin had a mind to question anything she said, but Ty Lee's story was not done and soon he found himself enraptured along with most of the rest of the listening Warriors.

"Yeah. Well, really I was six, but that was my first battle. I forget the name of the Village we were at. Small, though, like a hundred houses."

"Sounds like home," he murmured.

Several of the Kyoshi Warriors nodded along with him. He knew their Island had a village too, but didn't know how large or small it might be.

"Anyway, there was a raid. Not bandits, it was actual soldiers. They wore clothes we'd never seen before, and their skin was dark like the night sky or mud. Handsome, a couple of them. They roared as they charged, and my father was killed. But I was already training- I wasn't in the army, or anything, but I was trained to defend myself- and one of our guards was, too."

"You had guards?"

She nodded casually. Only nobles, in his experience, or wealthy merchants had guards. That would explain why she'd made the assumption that was why he could read or write before he'd all-but told her his parents were farmers. "Yep. Anyway, they were fighting right away. My brothers, too. Mom hid, tried to drag my dad with her, but I just... froze. Stopped.
He- my dad- was staring at me as he died. I remember his eyes going... empty."

Lin shuddered as images of just hours before came to his own mind. That had happened to him, too.

"Anyway, then someone hit me. One of the guards, I think, brushed by me as he was fighting. Then I was moving. Next thing I remember, the soldiers were all dead, our guards gone, and the men in blue with the dark skin went past. They left me and my mother, but killed my brothers and father and all the guards. Said something about not hurting innocents, no matter what we had done to them. After that, I joined the circus for a while, until I met Mai and our other friend. She's... not with us anymore."

"What happened to your mother, Ty?" one of the women asked quietly.

Lin nodded.

Ty Lee opened her mouth, closed it, then shrugged, "I don't know. I never saw her again. I heard she went crazy- that's why I joined the circus. She wasn't... the same, I think. But the circus took care of me. Took my training, and made me even better. Then the Kyoshi Warriors perfected it into me!"

The last part was said with the same good cheer and enthusiasm she seemed to approach most of life with, and Lin found himself smiling softly along with the women.

Ty Lee looked at him seriously through the smile though, "The Dai Li may be behind this, but we don't know for sure. For now, keep those copies safe. Until the mission is finished, no one knows about it, not even your General if he comes asking. Do you understand?"

Lin paled, but he nodded seriously. "We don't know who to trust."

"Exactly. It's not likely they've infiltrated Kyoshi Island, we're just too remote. But anyone from the mainland might be suspect. We're taking a risk trusting you, but since you just got promoted, it's not likely they'd be after you yet, either- farm boy."

It might have been meant as a teasing insult, but Lin felt his face heat anyway and he looked down at the satchel he held once more.

"Anyway, girls, we should give the good Sergeant a reward for his promotion, and a cover story. What say we break out the lip-paint and give him a visual record of our celebration?"

When Lin staggered back into his own camp more than two hours later, long after most of his men had gone to sleep, it was to even more jeers and cat-calls than he had left it in. This time, he knew exactly why: his face, his neck, his arms, everywhere one might see, he was covered in lip-shaped marks.

They had been delivered one at a time or in pairs, and twice three at a time, as the different Kyoshi Warriors, Ty Lee included, had taken a chance to press their lips to him... somewhere. Only Ty Lee herself had kissed him on the mouth, and Lin's lips still tingled from the memory of the contact. How sweet her breath had been, full of berries and mint!

How delightful her body against his!

Even if the men thought he was now 'a man' (he wasn't), they were at least congratulating him for being with such good-looking, capable warriors.
He could live with that particular lie, at least.

Thankfully, no one questioned him about the ornate, locked satchel he carried that he most certainly had not left the camp with.