Green Eyes

“Keep your fucking hands off of my girls!” shouted Micaela.

“What are you talking about now?” Jared gritted his teeth as he turned to face the short Amazonian leader.

“I saw you grabbing Maria, asshole,” Micaela accused, pointing to an Anorian who began to look very uncomfortable.

Jared’s face assumed an exasperated expression. “You’ve got to be kidding,” he growled. “I was grabbing her wrist, her wrist Micaela. You’re going to get on my back about grabbing her wrist?”

“It is goddamned inappropriate,” Micaela glared, crossing her arms.

“Inappropriate?” Jared yelled. “I was helping her with her grip. A poor grip can cost someone her life, so I think it is very appropriate for me to touch her.”

“Did you stop to think how uncomfortable that might make her?” demanded Micaela.

“I did,” Jared crossed his arms, mirroring Micaela. “I figured that it would be less uncomfortable than getting killed.”

Across the ring, leaning against a tree Selene and Mara were laughing hysterically at the scene unfolding before them. This had been a common scene over the last three and a half weeks. The diminutive Esthorian was standing up to the powerful Kalashonian warrior who towered a full foot over her and she wasn’t giving an inch. For his part, Jared wasn’t going to be bossed around by an Esthorian in a sling.

Despite urgings of Selene and Mara, Jared and Micaela were not getting along. In fact, it seemed that they were going out of their way to get underneath each other’s skin. Today Micaela was complaining about Jared’s teaching methods; yesterday Jared barked at her for daring to feed Barak. Neither really had legitimate complaints against the other; they just wanted to tick the other off.

And it was working, much to the entertainment of Selene and Mara. The tension between them was crackling, as if all the hostility was covering for something. But after missing so badly on the situation with Jael, neither Mara nor Selene were willing to say that to his face. In fact, they had by mutual accord decided not talk about Micaela to him at all; instead just pretend that she didn’t exist which wasn’t easy.

“Should we intervene?” Mara asked as they watched their argument devolve into an insult contest, a rather colorful one on Micaela’s behalf.

“Let ‘em go for another couple minutes,” Selene held off the older woman. “They’re not to blows…yet.”

As it turned out, neither of them had to intervene in the new debate. At that moment, four pairs of Amazons came running into the camp, the last two carrying a third between them. Most of their faces were smudged with dirt and mud which made good camouflage, along with their mottled black and gray cloaks and pants. These Amazons had been the best teams so far trained by the twins and so had been sent out on scouting patrols. Something clearly had gone wrong.

“SELENE!” Jared called to the Navi.

She dashed over to where the Amazons had gathered. Lying in the middle was an Esthorian woman on the tall side. A bow with a snapped string was gripped tightly in her right hand. But what got Selene’s attention was how badly injured this woman was.

She was unconscious, her platinum hair stained with mud and blood. Her breathing was shallow, her complexion pale indicating that her life was being leeched out of her. The culprit, Selene saw, was a hole through the left side of her gut; the kind that can only come from a spear thrust.

“What happened?” she yelped.

“Don’t worry about that,” Jared sharply told her. “Just focus on healing her. You can, can’t you?”

“I think so, yeah,” Selene nodded.

She had spent much of her time training with Micaela, learning tricks to increasing her power’s strength as well as learning some new powers. This would be probably the hardest healing task that she had ever done and given how much healing drained her energy…

It didn’t matter. This woman was dying and she needed Selene’s help. Clearing her mind and tapping into her compassion, Selene pressed both hands down on the sucking wound, channeling all of her power towards it.

Immediately she felt energy drain from her, like her life was being sucked out. It wasn’t quite painful, but severely uncomfortable and began making her feel weak and dizzy, forcing her to tune everything else out. After what felt like an eternity, Selene felt the injury close up underneath her and she relented. The white glow faded and Selene let the wall of fatigue hit.

“Somebody grab her!” she heard a distant voice say as she felt her eyes roll back and she crumpled to the ground.

A couple Amazons were alert enough to catch the Navi and then gently lower to the graveled training ground. Someone else dashed off to fetch a chair and water while the others marveled at what Selene had just done. The injured woman was sitting up now, frantically looking herself over for the unforgettable wound but to no avail.

“What happened?” she finally asked in bewilderment.

“Her,” Jared gestured to Selene’s still unconscious form. “She saved your life.”

“How?” the woman questioned.

“She’s a Navi with healing powers,” Micaela entered the conversation. “Which is fortunate for you otherwise you would’ve been dead.” Whether Micaela was talking to her Amazon or Jared wasn’t entirely clear. Maybe both. “Now what happened?” the leader demanded sharply.

“We were scouting and ran into two cohorts of Blood Guards,” the Esthorian replied, eliciting a grimace from Jared. “They saw us and attacked and that’s when I got stabbed. I’m not entirely sure what happened.”

“We killed 13 of them,” put in another Amazon, an Ammonite it looked like. “At first we were doing well, picking them off and moving in and out of trees like we were trained to do. I have to admit, it worked quite well, at least until Heidi got speared by a woman.”

“What happened to Emmanuelle?” questioned Micaela, her voice tight with worry about her second in command and Heidi’s partner.

The Amazons shifted uncomfortably on their feet. “We’re not sure,” the Ammonite replied quietly. “Once Heidi went down, the rest of the Kalashonians went after Emmanuelle like wolves after a weakened calf. Last we saw of her was one of the Kalashonians smash her head with a shield. The rest of them came after us and we had to withdraw a bit. By the time we came back, Heidi was slumped against a tree and Emmanuelle was gone.”

“Killed?” Micaela questioned tersely.

“No,” Mara shook her head, having come up to the crowd with Selene. “If Emmanuelle was dead, they would’ve left her body behind. Kalashonians are efficient and pragmatic; we don’t bother to strip the dead of their arms unless we have to. Instead we just leave the bodies on the field.”

“Are you saying that they took her prisoner?” Micaela scrunched her face up. “Why?”

“That’s a good question,” Jared scratched his chin. “Kalashonians typically avoid taking prisoners: the only safe men are dead men being one of our oldest axioms.”

“That’s fucking charming,” Micaela growled, anger growing.

“It’s effective,” Jared shrugged. “Unfortunately that might be worse. Clearly they want something from her, my guess is the location of your camp, and when Kalashonians want something, they get it.”

“Worse, those were Blood Guards,” Mara caught her brother’s eye, reading the same worried thoughts there. “Blood Guards don’t traipse through the woods for the fun of it. In fact they only leave their castles when something really important is going on.”

“Brutus?” Jared suggested.

“That’s what I was thinking,” Mara nodded. “He knows that Selene ran into the Harosheth and he knows how Manasseh treats failure. It makes sense that he’s been poking around the Harosheth since then.”

“Using Blood Guards?” Jared furrowed his eyebrows. “That’s not his style.”

“I agree,” his sister concurred. “But like I said, Brutus knows how Manasseh handles failure, especially of this magnitude, and he could be desperate.”

“The Viceroy is known for being unstable but never desperate,” Jared pointed out.

“You have a better explanation?”

“No,” the mercenary admitted.

“Wait just a goddamned minute!” Micaela cut in sharply, stepping between the twins. “Are you saying that Emmanuelle, my second in command, is going to be tortured by that fucking son of a bitch?”

“That’s what it looks like,” Jared allowed.

“God fucking dammit!” roared Micaela, turning her amethyst eyes on Jared. They were glowing with pure rage. “This is your fucking fault.”

“WHAT?!” both twins exploded in astonishment.

“You fucking heard me,” Micaela’s visage was murderous. “You’ve set my women up to get killed by your own people. All that about helping us learn how to really fight was bullshit. In our first encounter with your people, we get out asses kicked and I lose my second in command.”

“Are you saying that I purposely sabotaged your people?” Jared’s eyes narrowed and voice dropping to arctic temperatures, matching Micaela’s look.

“You’ve never liked me or any of us,” Micaela railed at him. “You would betray us in a heartbeat.”

“You’ve lost your mind!” Jared thundered back.

Everyone in the camp stopped and stared at the two individuals as three and a half weeks of building tension threatened to blow up. Even Mara was nervous. Esthorian or not, Micaela was enraged at the loss of her friend and right hand to be beyond the point of reason and was looking for someone to blame. Naturally she focused in on Jared. Unfortunately she had badgered and needled Jared the last three weeks that he couldn’t see her asinine accusations for what they were: asinine. Instead he was just as furious as she.

Micaela’s good fist was balled and Jared’s hand was on the hilt of his sword. The camp held its breath as the two very powerful and very angry people stood face to face, about to kill each other. Things were about to go very, very bad.

Jared relaxed first, removing his hand from his sword, much to the relief of everyone else.

“I have worked my butt off trying to help your people be able to protect themselves, putting myself, Mara, and Selene at serious risk from a psychopath whose been hunting us for over two months,” Jared said his voice glacial. “All the while, I have patiently put up with your constant sexist taunts, your perpetual interfering, and your endless needling because I believed it was the right thing to do.

“But that crosses the line,” he warned. “Your women came back alive because of my training. There is no way eight women who have had less than one month of formal training should’ve come back alive against two hundred Kalashonians soldiers. And those were Blood Guards; the elite of the elite, soldiers who are the most talented of Kalashonians and have at least a decade of the most intense training. To have killed 13 Kalashonians is a miracle.

“You want your little girl back?” Jared snarled. “Fine. I’ll get her for you but that’s it. After that, we’re gone and you’re on your own. Mara, I’m going to need your help. Probably Selene too, in case Brutus or one of his lackeys is along,” The other War Master nodded, concealing both her relief that neither one had killed the other and anger because Micaela had crossed a line, big time.

“Not without me,” Micaela snapped, not letting this go.

“You’re staying put,” Jared snarled in return.

“The hell I am,” she retorted. “She’s my friend and responsibility.”

“And what good do you think you’d do with a broken arm?” he demanded. “Stay here and out of my way.”

“I’ll have Selene heal it and then I’ll be good as new,” Micaela maneuvered herself in front of Jared. “Besides, if you’re going to rescue her, you’ll need someone who knows the Harosheth and I do, better than any Kalashonian.”

“She’s got a point,” Mara cautiously pointed out, not wanting to infuriate her brother any further. She had seen Jared this angry only twice before and each time she’d been just as mad: those incidents had resulted in the massacre of over 3000 Malchians, each, by their hands alone. Angry War Masters were very, very dangerous things.

Jared’s sapphire eyes were so dark they were almost black as he shot his sister a merciless glare. “Fine,” he growled like an enraged tiger. “Just don’t drain Selene too much. We’ll give her the rest of the day to rest up, Creator knows she’ll need it, and then get her after dark.”

“Shouldn’t—”

“One more word out of you,” Jared warned, leveling his lethal gaze at the diminutive Esthorian, “and I will cut off your head here and now.”

Mara stepped between them, facing her brother. “Go cool off before you do something that you regret,” she ordered sharply.

“And you,” she turned to Micaela, leveling a finger at her, “shut your mouth before I regret stopping him.”

Both combatants glared at each other for a tense moment before turning on their respective heels and storming off in opposite directions. Mara released a sigh of pent up tension; they hadn’t killed each other, yet. Turning to a pair of Amazons, she gestured for them to help Selene.

“Let’s take her to a bed,” she ordered. “She’ll be out for a while so we might as well get her comfortable.”

*******